Participatory Smart Cities Citizenship

This book critically examines ‘smart city’ discourse in terms of governance initiatives, citizen participation and policies which place emphasis on the ‘citizen’ as an active recipient and co-producer of technological solutions to urban problems. The current hype around smart cities and digital technologies has sparked debates in the fields of citizenship, urban studies and planning surrounding the rights and ethics of participation. It also sparked debates around the forms of governance these technologies actively foster. This book presents new socio-technological systems of governance that monitor citizen power, trust-building strategies, and social capital. It calls for new data economics and digital rights for a city founded on normative ideals rather than neoliberal ones. It adopts a normative approach arguing that a ‘reloaded’ smart city should foster citizenship as a new set of civil and social rights and the ‘citizen’ as a subject vested with active and meaningful forms of participation and political power. Ultimately, the book questions the utility of the ‘smart city’ project for radical municipalism, proposing a technological enough but more democratic city, an ‘intelligent city’ in fact. Offering useful contribution to smart city initiatives for the protection of emerging digital citizenship rights and socially accrued benefits, this book will draw the interest of researchers, policymakers, and professionals in the fields of urban studies, urban planning, urban geography, computing and technology studies, urban politics and urban economics.

Smart City Citizenship provides rigorous analysis for academics and policymakers on the experimental, data-driven, and participatory processes of smart cities to help integrate ICT-related social innovation into urban life. Unlike other smart city books that are often edited collections, this book focuses on the business domain, grassroots social innovation, and AI-driven algorithmic and techno-political disruptions, also examining the role of citizens and the democratic governance issues raised from an interdisciplinary perspective. As smart city research is a fast-growing topic of scientific inquiry and evolving rapidly, this book is an ideal reference for a much-needed discussion. The book drives the reader to a better conceptual and applied comprehension of smart city citizenship for democratised hyper-connected-virialised post-COVID-19 societies. In addition, it provides a whole practical roadmap to build smart city citizenship inclusive and multistakeholder interventions through intertwined chapters of the book. Users will find a book that fills the knowledge gap between the purely critical studies on smart cities and those further constructive and highly promising socially innovative interventions using case study fieldwork action research empirical evidence drawn from several cities that are advancing and innovating smart city practices from the citizenship perspective. Utilises ongoing, action research fieldwork, comparative case studies for examining current governance issues, and the role of citizens in smart cities Provides definitions of new key citizenship concepts, along with a techno-political framework and toolkit drawn from a community-oriented perspective Shows how to design smart city governance initiatives, projects and policies based on applied research from the social innovation perspective Highlights citizen’s perspective and social empowerment in the AI-driven and algorithmic disruptive post-COVID-19 context in both transitional and experimental frameworks

This book analyzes e-participation in smart cities. In recent decades, information and communication technologies (ICT) have played a key role in the democratic political and governance process by allowing easier interaction between governments and citizens, and the increased ability of citizens to participate in the production chain of public services. E-participation plays and important role in the development of smart cities and smart communities , but it has not yet been extensively studied. This book fills that gap by combining empirical and theoretical research to analyze actual practices of citizen involvement in smart cities and build a solid framework for successful e-participation in smart cities. The book is divided into three parts. Part I discusses smart technologies and their role in improving e-participation in smart cities. Part II deals with models of e-participation in smart cities and the organization issues affecting the implementation of e-participation; these chapters analyze the efficiency of governance models in relation to the establishment of smart cities. Part III proposes incentives to motivate increased participation by governments and cititzenry within the smart cities context. Written by an international panel of experts and practitioners, this book will be a convenient source of information on e-participation in smart cities and will be valuable to academics, researchers, policy-makers, public managers, citizens, international organizations and anyone who has a stake in enhancing citizen engagement in smart cities.

Globally, Smart Cities initiatives are pursued which reproduce the interests of capital and neoliberal government, rather than wider public good. This book explores smart urbanism and 'the right to the city', examining citizenship, social justice, commoning, civic participation, and co-creation to imagine a different kind of Smart City.

Smart Cities: Issues and Challenges: Mapping Political, Social and Economic Risks and Threats serves as a primer on smart cities, providing readers with no prior knowledge on smart cities with an understanding of the current smart cities debates. Gathering cutting-edge research and insights from academics, practitioners and policymakers around the globe, it identifies and discusses the nascent threats and challenges contemporary urban areas face, highlighting the drivers and ways of navigating these issues in an effective manner. Uniquely providing a blend of conceptual academic analysis with empirical insights, the book produces policy recommendations that boost urban sustainability and resilience. Combines conceptual academic approaches with empirically-driven insights and best practices Offers new approaches and arguments from inter and multi-disciplinary perspectives Provides foundational knowledge and comparative insight from global case-studies that enable critical reflection and operationalization Generates policy recommendations that pave the way to debate and case-based planning

This book presents a comprehensive overview of the various aspects for the development of smart cities from a European perspective. It presents both theoretical concepts as well as empirical studies and cases of smart city programs and their capacity to create value for citizens. The contributions in this book are a result of an increasing interest for this topic, supported by both national governments and international institutions. The book offers a large panorama of the most important aspects of smart cities evolution and implementation. It compares European best practices and analyzes how smart projects and programs in cities could help to improve the quality of life in the urban space and to promote cultural and economic development.

​This book will provide one of the first comprehensive approaches to the study of smart city governments with theories and concepts for understanding and researching 21st century city governments innovative methodologies for the analysis and evaluation of smart city initiatives. The term “smart city” is now generally used to represent efforts that in different ways describe a comprehensive vision of a city for the present and future. A smarter city infuses information into its physical infrastructure to improve conveniences, facilitate mobility, add efficiencies, conserve energy, improve the quality of air and water, identify problems and fix them quickly, recover rapidly from disasters, collect data to make better decisions, deploy resources effectively and share data to enable collaboration across entities and domains. These and other similar efforts are expected to make cities more intelligent in terms of efficiency, effectiveness, productivity, transparency, and sustainability, among other important aspects. Given this changing social, institutional and technology environment, it seems feasible and likeable to attain smarter cities and by extension, smarter governments: virtually integrated, networked, interconnected, responsive, and efficient. This book will help build the bridge between sound research and practice expertise in the area of smarter cities and will be of interest to researchers and students in the e-government, public administration, political science, communication, information science, administrative sciences and management, sociology, computer science, and information technology. As well as government officials and public managers who will find practical recommendations based on rigorous studies that will contain insights and guidance for the development, management, and evaluation of complex smart cities and smart government initiatives.​

As the field of public administration has been changing due to globalization, government reforms, and increasing governance practices within intergovernmental networks, research and teaching in public administration also adapted itself to these changes. Public policy research and instruction has become transformed and has diffused into other countries with the help of international organizations and other agents of change and transfer. Research in this field is seen as an opportunity for a definitive shift from traditional models of public administration in the sense that policies may be better designed, articulated, and governed through a collaborative approach, while service provision could be enhanced in terms of proximity, representativeness, and innovativeness. The Handbook of Research on Global Challenges for Improving Public Services and Government Operations provides comprehensive approaches to the study of public administration and public policy from a comparative perspective and includes sound theories and concepts for understanding opportunities and challenges governments face when seeking to improve public services and government operations. The book is a compilation of selective high-quality chapters covering cases, experiences, and practical recommendations on topics related to public administration, public policy, social policy, public management, and public affairs. This book is ideal for policymakers, students, and researchers in the field of public administration, public policy, governance, public management, public affairs, citizen engagement, and administrative sciences and management along with practitioners, stakeholders, and academicians interested in the best practices of various countries in public administration and policy.