Leveraging the digital ecosystem concept for development research and practice–potentials, limitations, and ways forward

Shaping how information and communication technology (ICT) adoption supports sustainable development has become a major challenge for countries worldwide. The concept of a digital ecosystem has recently become prevalent among development organizations to aid diagnoses and guide actions addressing that challenge. However, not only are there various ways in which a digital ecosystem is conceptualized, but its meaning is also blurred with earlier uses in business studies. Against this backdrop, the present paper takes stock of how the digital ecosystem concept has come to be used as a tool to describe the state of ICT adoption in countries and understand ICT impacts on development outcomes. Systematizing existing uses of the concept, the paper distinguishes between a descriptive, enabler-centered, and actor-centered digital ecosystem perspective. It furthermore discusses existing uses of a digital ecosystem and the extent to which they realize the potential added value of this concept for development practice and research.