Europe is leading a third industrial revolution, says Jeremy Rifkin, and it's all about sharing, the internet, renewable energy and new modes of transport.

Beyond capitalism, towards a sharing economy

After 'The End of Work', 'Hydrogen  Economy', 'The European Dream',

among many of his books, Jeremy Rifkin  is now promoting a new revolution.

With the digital economy we'll reduce costs  and make economies grow faster.

We met him between his meetings  in the European Parliament.

Jeremy Rifkin, you are back in Europe  with a new prophecy,

your vision of the world has already started  and you want to push it further.

Zero Marginal Cost Society is at the heart  of your world vision. What does it mean?

It's the title of my new book.  People shouldn't be frightened of it.

It's pretty easy to understand.  A zero marginal cost society.

We now have three billion people connected  on the communication internet

and at any given time every one of them  have been a Prosumer,

not a seller or a buyer, not an owner  or a worker, a Prosumer.

And that is, people have been producing  and sharing their own music

at near zero marginal cost on the world wide  web, bypassing the music industry.

They've been producing and sharing  their own news blogs, social media,

at near zero marginal cost on the web,  bypassing newspapers.

They are producing their own  YouTube videos, bypassing television.

So the dynamic is still there. Recently you  have been meeting many European leaders.

Here in the EP, you met President Schulz,  in the new Commission...

So what are you asking these European  leaders to do to accelerate this process?

What I'm saying now is that austerity, fiscal  market and labour reforms, fine, I'm for that

but if that's all we're doing, it isn't sufficient.

Because the second industrial revolution  of the 20th century is now sunsetting.

Every economic revolution brings together  new communication technologies,

new energies, and new forms of transport.

We're living off a second industrial  revolution, centralised communication grid,

old energies, fossil fuel and nuclear power  getting more expensive,

and old transportation based on internal  combustion engines, dumb roads.

We can't get any more productivity  out of that. We can't move the economy.

We can't put  the younger generation to work

with this old  second industrial revolution platform.

So you're saying  the internet has a crucial place?

In Germany, and as you know I've advised  the German Chancellor since she came in,

Germany's 27% solar and wind,  green electricity right now.

They're beginning  to set up an energy internet.

They're transforming the electricity grid  to a smart, digitalized energy internet

so millions can produce their own green  electricity in their electricity cooperatives,

and then send it back  to the digitalized energy internet

and share the electricity across Germany  and across Europe.

It means everyone connected to the internet  - the whole human race in about 10 years -

can use all of that big data  coming through to these three internets,

and produce and share  our own goods and services

either at low marginal cost on the market

or near-zero marginal cost  in this emerging sharing economy.

Share our cars, share our apartments  and homes, share our clothes and tools.

That's already happening  for the younger generation.

But we have to address  some pretty important issues here.

We've got to make sure  that this emerging internet of things

which we're all going to use  is network-neutral

and isn't taken over by a few companies  and a few industries.

We have to ensure data security,  personal privacy,

our creative content has to be guaranteed,  and we've got to prevent cyber terrorism.

You write this would mean the end  of capitalism. -I don't say that, no.

In 'The Zero Marginal Cost Society' book  I say capitalism is going to be transformed,

because the capitalist system  is actually giving birth to a baby.

The baby is called the sharing economy  on the collaborative commons.

So now capitalist companies are going to  have to learn to live with this progeny,

nurture it, let it breathe, let it grow,  and over the next 25 years

we're going to have two economic systems  flourishing side by side.

The parent, capitalism,  the progeny, that's now matured.

We're already seeing this.  We have young people,

part of their lives they're in the property  market, in the exchange economy,

but we also have young people  who're producing and sharing

not only their own videos and news blogs,  now their own renewable energy,

their own 3D printed products, they're  sharing their own cars with carsharing,

they're sharing their homes  and apartments on Airbnb.

So there's a dual economy already  emerging with the digital generation.

Ten years ago you wrote a book,  'The European Dream',

that Europe was set to overtake the US  in terms of growth of the economic model.

Ten years later, we are here  with this economic crisis

and we are desperately  looking for a way out of this crisis.

We got caught in these end stages  of the second industrial revolution

where the prices of fossil fuels  continue to go up,

and at the same time  the technologies we use,

like internal combustion engines  and centralised electricity,

So what we're seeing is an entire  industrial revolution infrastructure

where the technologies and the energies,

communication, energy and transport,  have had their day.

And so we're all finding ourselves  uncomfortable

in this interim  between two industrial revolutions.

Though Europe is leading  a third industrial revolution.

Communication internet, now joining with  the renewable energy internet,

and an automated transport logistic internet.

The EU is moving  toward an internet of things platform,

and this is where the European dream  moves to the next stage of its journey.

The EU wants to talk about  new investment and infrastructure

about how to integrate the single market,

and thirdly about  how we can digitalize Europe.

Now we can bring them all together.  This can be done tomorrow morning.

With the new Commission,  it's a new era, this can be done.

Jeremy Rifkin, thank you very much.  -You're welcome. Thank you.