New technologies and regional policy : towards the next cohesion policy framework

This study reports from a workshop on 'New Technologies and Regional Policy: Towards the Next cohesion policy Framework'. The European Parliament's Science and Technology Options Assessment (STOA) Panel organised the workshop in Brussels on 16 October 2017. The objective was to provide input to the debate on the next EU cohesion policy, after 2020. The workshop focused on the impact of new technologies at the European and regional levels, affecting EU cohesion policy and regional innovation-led growth. Members of the European Parliament, specialists from the European Commission, representatives of several regions, Member States and organisations made workshop contributions. See the Appendix for the workshop programme. After the workshop, the author prepared this document as a discussion paper according to the major themes of the workshop, while taking into account the overall scope and the principal content of the workshop. Further inputs on the same and related topics were collected through interviews with EU representatives and other specialists. Policy reports and observations in the scientific literature provided facts and background. See the list of persons consulted and the source material used, detailed at the end of this report. The text that follows relates mainly to EU cohesion policy and includes analyses of the territorial dimension of innovation-led economic growth and relevant policy issues. Particular focus is put on information and communications technologies (ICT) and digital platform economics, as well as on science and technology parks and urban innovation areas. This study also provides policy options for the legislator.