Shaping an Effective Ecosystem of the Regional Digital Economy in the Context of Uneven Digital Development

Abstract

The paper presents a study to identify trends in the digital development of regions and the formation of an effective digital regional ecosystem on their basis to elaborate the progressive development of the digital economy. It was found that the main reason why Russia shows an insufficient development in the use of digital technologies, systems, tools and platforms by their actors in the international rankings is the spatial polarization of the digital development of numerous regions that constitute the whole of Russia. Based on the values of Digital Life Index there have been considered the most successful regions in the digital development of life as well as the most lagging regions in this direction; the detailing of this index concerning the digital environment elements of the regions made it possible to determine that, in some cases, with a relatively low total digital life index value in a particular region, it may have optimal values in certain areas compared to other regions and vice versa. The identified trends in the digital development of the regions have confirmed the existence of a digital divide among them, which is reflected in the uneven development of the process of regions’ digitalization; this is due to the existence of certain gaps in the formation and development of an effective region’s digital ecosystem. All the components of the digital ecosystem architecture that allow it to develop in a balanced and effective way were specified: participants, the environment of their interaction and the interaction base. The participants of the region’s digital ecosystem include: the population, business and the state; the environment of interaction are the directions of social and economic life of the regions which influence on the formation of their digital life index; the interaction base is the implementation of the Russian federal projects included in the national project “Digital economy” and the implementation of local regulations in the field of regional digitalization. To build an effective digital regional ecosystem, the paper has formulated a set of measures that will ensure the optimal scenario for the development of the digital economy both within the regions and in the country as a whole.