Building an Ontology for Enhancing Value Exchanges through Tokenomics in Local Communities

Blockchain technology is increasingly used in local economies, notably through community currency systems supporting humanitarian projects. However, platform-independent models for these systems are scarce. To fill this gap, we developed the Collaborative Sharing Economy Tokenization Ontology (CSETO), designed for tokenomics in local Collaborative Sharing Economy (CSE) systems. Building on prior work in decentralized governance, CSETO facilitates designing non-profit exchanges of goods and services. We analyzed existing literature to define a reference model covering execution, governance, and tokenomics layers, formalized in CSETO and rigorously evaluated for practical use. Unlike earlier models, CSETO helps developers create token economies while capturing key community dynamics essential for sharing economy success.