The Political Economy of Digital Ecosystems

This book connects political economy perspectives with scenario planning for
mapping out future trajectories of digital ecosystems. The focus is purposefully
on digital ecosystems as it encompasses economic, political and social contexts
on a global, national and local level. The diversity of political economy
approaches allows the author to explore alternative meanings of digital ecosystem
development, which is particularly useful for envisioning alternative futures.
Often visions about the future of digital ecosystems suffer from a lack ofimagination and confirmation bias, which is favorable to the extrapolation of
current trends. A wide range of political economy perspectives applied through
positivist theorizing in this book shows different interpretations of developments
in digital ecosystems. Scenario planning teams around the world have applied a
collective imagination to show how future trajectories can be radically different
from the current trends. The book outlines meta-scenarios for alternative futures
of the political economy of digital ecosystems by reviewing and synthesizing the
work of foresight teams. These meta-scenarios served as insights for developing
four scenarios for European digital ecosystems through the workshops with
high-level executives and experts. The scenarios identified the nature of EU
cooperation and the development of digital infrastructure as key drivers.