Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/318758 
Year of Publication: 
2021
Citation: 
[Journal:] Business Systems Research (BSR) [ISSN:] 1847-9375 [Volume:] 12 [Issue:] 1 [Year:] 2021 [Pages:] 197-215
Publisher: 
Sciendo, Warsaw
Abstract: 
Background: Information and communication technologies (ICTs) gained prevalent organizational and structural value in the modern economy. E-commerce is one of the sectors directly influenced by technological change. However, not all countries have the same opportunities to develop e-commerce growth; there are significant discrepancies in ICT utilization worldwide, known as the digital divide. Objectives: The purpose of this paper is to explore the level of difference among European countries regarding the e-commerce functionalities in their enterprises using a cluster analysis. Methods/Approach: To accomplish the paper goal, the k-means cluster analysis was conducted on the Eurostat data from 2019. Enterprises from 28 European countries were taken into consideration. The Kruskal-Wallis test is used to explore if the differences among clusters regarding the digital development, measured by the Digital Economy and Society Index are significant. Results: The investigation confirmed that there are significant differences among European countries regarding the development of e-commerce. However, a similar level of e-commerce is not related to economic and digital development. Conclusions: Since the relationship between economic development and e-commerce development in European countries is not linear, country-level policies are likely to be significant factors driving e-commerce development, which leads to the need for further investigation of this issue.
Subjects: 
e-commerce
website functionalities
digital divide
European Union
JEL: 
O33
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article

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