Towards Sustainable Digital Ecosystems

Within more open and democratic societies responsible performances and behaviors are requested in order to build sustainable social and business systems. The aim of this study is to elucidate a pattern in order to identify the drivers leading digital ecosystems towards a sustainable path driving ethical and responsible practices and behaviors. Within post-industrial economies brain intensive and knowledge oriented where digital and information and communication technologies (ICTs) contribute to designing and maintaining a global digital ecosystem the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) tend to play a relevant role as engines and drivers of economic growth and development but also as agents of social innovation and responsible action driving people and consumers to appreciate and follow the ideas and values that contribute to increasing the health and wealth of communities by learning through social and responsible behaviors and initiatives. Within knowledge-based societies and economies, technology-driven government, business and people cooperate to develop innovation, sustain growth and co-create social and public value. «Business ecosystems tend to refer to intentional communities of economic actors whose individual business activities share in some large measure the fate of the whole community» (Moore, 2006, p. 33). Organizations and consumers collaborate in order to create value and compete to extract economic value. A value co-creation approach requires to build new infrastructure capabilities driving a high quality of the relationships between the customers and the companies by enabling personalized co-creation experiences. «Co-creation converts the market into a forum where dialogue among the consumer, the firm, consumer, communities and networks of firms can take place» (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004, pp. 11-12).