Does the Development of the Digital Economy Lead to Technological Gaps or Technological Catch-up?Empirical Evidence from the Belt and Road Countries
At the opening ceremony of the third Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation in 2023,President Xi Jinping announced that promoting technological innovation would be one of the eight major steps China will take to support the joint pursuit of high-quality Belt and Road(B&R)cooperation.The latest wave of digital technological revo-lution and industrial transformation offers a historic opportunity for many emerging markets to achieve leapfrog develop-ment.However,it also risks widening the technological gap between some B&R countries and leading countries.Enhanc-ing cooperation in the digital economy,fostering digital economic development,bridging the technological gap,and shar-ing growth benefits are essential for the joint pursuit of high-quality B&R cooperation.Therefore,seizing the digital economy opportunities to achieve technological catch-up has become a critical issue of contemporary significance and strategic urgency.This paper first incorporates the digital economy into the technological catch-up theory framework,based on the North-South country model,to reveal the mechanism of digital economic development affecting the technological gap.The empirical evidence supporting the mechanism mentioned above is provided from data on B&R countries spanning 2010 to 2021.Second,the paper investigates the impact of absorptive capacity on how digital economic development af-fects the technological gap between B&R countries and leading countries,by adopting the inverted S-curve of technology and the theory of technological diffusion.The paper examines the heterogeneity of technological catch-up among B&R countries,attributed to variations in country-level scale,with the application of Metcalfe's law.Third,from the perspec-tive of symbiosis fostered by digital economic collaboration,the paper explores the lift-up effect of digital economic col-laboration between China and B&R countries on the technological catch-up in smaller countries along the B&R.The main findings are summarized below.First,in the context of the digital economy,the technological differentials between B&R countries and leading countries have generally transitioned from technological gaps to technological catch-up.Second,the technological absorptive capacity of B&R countries plays a moderating role between the digital economy and the technological differentials,shifting the inflection point of the U-shaped curve to the left.Third,the impact of the digital economy on technological catch-up among B&R countries reveals a"small country dilemma".Fourth,digital eco-nomic collaboration helps overcome scale-related constraints,leading smaller countries along the B&R to achieve techno-logical catch-up.The contributions of the paper are presented as follows.First,we identify a two-sided effect of digital economic de-velopment on technological catch-up in B&R countries,providing empirical evidence of the potential for achieving tech-nological catch-up.Second,we highlight the critical role of absorptive capacity in enabling B&R countries to bridge the technological gap,offering a theoretical foundation for how they can rapidly bridge the technological gap.Third,we prove the presence of a positive lift-up effect of digital economic collaboration between China and B&R countries,offer-ing an important pathway for smaller countries to overcome the"small country dilemma".This reflects the idea of a hu-man community with a shared future embodied in the construction of the Digital Silk Road and provides an important path for B&R countries to bridge the technological gap.The research findings of this paper carry important policy implications for how B&R countries can achieve techno-logical catch-up through digital economic collaboration:first,continuously strengthen digital economic collaboration among B&R countries;second,enhance the technological absorptive capacity of these B&R countries;third,break down the barriers among B&R countries and overcome the scale-related constraints;fourth,strengthen the collaboration be-tween China and B&R countries and accelerate the technological catch-up in smaller B&R countries.
Digital EconomyTechnological Catch-upTechnological GapBelt and Road
NETL
NSTL
万方数据
