Europe is entering into the new economy, but little is understood about it beyond its disruptive potential - only that the transition phase from a post-industrial to a globally networked knowledge society is likely to take 20 or 30 years. The STAR project - Socio-Economic Trends Assessment of the digital Revolution - is focused on the analysis of the development of the Digital Economy in Europe, in order to contribute to a better understanding of the conditions leading to sustainable social and economic growth patterns - how to survive the transition phase.

STAR is an initiative of the Information Society Programme Key Action II "New Ways of working and Electronic Commerce". Its partners, a team of highly specialised researchers , will analyse evidence on the multiple changes brought about by the new economy in the socio-economic system and their policy implications. The consortium will interact with a Forum of experts within and outside the IST Programme to receive feed-back and insights on STAR results.

STAR results will be published as a series of Issue Reports, Executive Briefings, and workshop presentations addressed to policy makers, industry managers and research experts. A Summary Report (annually from 2001 to 2003) will offer a synthesis of the overall conclusions, and present scenarios for the evolution and socio-economic impact of the digital economy in Europe. Each year, the STAR consortium will review its research programme to ensure that its research priorities are consistent with providing leading research insights on the evolution of the European and global IST markets.

STAR is expected to make fundamental and original contributions to a deeper understanding of the new ways of working and e-commerce objectives of the Information Society Technology Programme's Key Action 2. It is expected that STAR outputs will provide relevant and useful knowledge that is capable of informing policy makers and others concerned with European Information Society developments. STAR workplan is designed to provide original research, and to the extent possible, research based upon primary data.

The project is organised around an annual cycle of work, from September 2000 to August 2003. The partners have identified the main research areas defining the scope of the project research. Each year the project partners will select the specific socio-economic issues to be investigated within the research areas, which will be analysed through ad-hoc studies. The results will be published as specific Issue Reports or Executive Briefings and synthesised in an annual Summary Report.

STAR is a consortium of leading research organisations which are working in co-operation to achieve the research and reporting objectives outlined above. The following description of the research programme is organised around outputs. STAR partners may have responsibilities in more than one Research Area. At the level of individual projects, however, there is a direct assignment and responsibility by partners as indicated in the List of Issue Reports. The discussion of Scenario development will be co-ordinated and led by Databank Consulting, but will involve collective activity by all of the consortium members.

Figure 3 illustrates the structure of the STAR research programme. The first tier entitled Synthesising the Findings, summarises STAR activities addressing the larger questions of Information Society developments related to e-commerce and new ways of working. The central task of developing scenarios will be supported by both synthetic and research work on the macro-economic consequences of Information Society developments and by STAR research on key features of policies related to the e-Europe initiative.

Figure 3 Structure of STAR Research Programme

The second tier of STAR research involves deeper investigation of three central themes - e-commerce developments, trends in new ways of working, and skills evolution. The essential supporting research will focus on market developments supporting or contravening main development trends, emerging techno-economic developments that may confound current trends, and fundamental knowledge about the processes of social adjustment and adaptation essential for achieving balanced growth and sustainable development.