Measurement of digital development with partial orders, Tiered DEA, and cluster analysis for the European Union

Abstract The digital economy is increasingly seen as an essential cornerstone in developing national strategies and industrial policies to enhance competitiveness. On the other hand, a realistic assessment of readiness for appropriate policies. In our paper, we group countries European Union (EU) using three different methods applied dataset consisting four main dimensions EU's Digital Economy Society Index (DESI) order identify Europe's geographical “fault lines” terms readiness. DESI composite index aggregating several digitalization-related indicators benchmark progress transformation each member state. However, aim not rank but groups that are close other. used paper partially ordered sets (poset), Tiered Data Envelopment Analysis (TDEA), cluster analysis, known from multivariate statistics. types clustering show high degree similarity, indicating robustness results. Another research question relates extent which development EU Member States corresponds economic core–periphery relationships. While can observe similarity between more less developed clusters be identified institutional quality, also notice some peculiar exceptions (which could provide examples best practices).