Link to Session Platform

Chairs(s):

Jin-Kyu Jung, University of Washington Bothell

; Mahbubur Meenar, Rowan University

Description:

Title: Public Engagement Practices, Methods and Tools for Smart Cities and Communities
Organizers: Jin-Kyu Jung (University of Washington-Bothell, USA) and Mahbubur Meenar (Rowan University, USA)

The smart city discourses focus on a techno-centered digital solution to urban problems/issues, to make cities more responsive, efficient, sustainable, and intelligent. It considers the use of technical or technological infrastructures and interventions as a means to ensure optimum efficiency with regards to urban planning and sustainable development (Goodman et al., 2020; Hollands, 2008; Roche, 2014). Smart cities need to engage the public in embracing the diverse perspectives, experiences, and opportunities of living in smart communities. Creative engagement tools and methods are essential for unbinding possibilities of creating inclusive smart communities that enhance public participation, provide meaningful educated information, advocate for greater equity in public policies, and ultimately empower the communities (Coe et al., 2001; Harvey, 2000; Visvizi & Lytras, 2019; Zukin, 1995).

Smart cities can be also built based more on collaborative democratic approaches in which cities provide access to data and allow citizens to be part of urban innovation processes, thus building city governance through open and participatory people-centric approaches (Cardullo & Kitchin, 2019; Helgason, 2002; Lee & Lee, 2014; O’Grady & O’Hare, 2012). Public engagement and community participation are not exclusive to smart cities and smart city planning (Arnstein, 1967; Innes & Booher, 2004; Staeheli, 2005); however, smart cities have shed a new light on these concepts and practices by providing new means to enable inclusive public participation in urban and community planning process. There is a potential for smart engagement to represent the kind of direct democracy and participatory planning that define a vibrant civil society, with citizens engaged as active participants in the inclusive planning process with the ability to connect humans through physical, digital, online, and hybrid engagement.

This session invites scholars who are interested in a variety of new visions, facets and methods, practices, and tools for enabling smart engagements, in which smart technologies, infrastructure and governance, and inclusive planning processes all together foster social inclusion, democratization, communications, and engagements with the public. These bind the prospect of smart communities in which people are actively involved in the design of smart cities as users/consumers, as well as participants and co-producers. Case studies from inter- and trans-national perspectives to better examine the extent of public participation and engagement in smart cities are encouraged.

References:
Arnstein, S. R. (1967). A ladder of citizen participation. Journal of American Planning Association, 35(4), 216-224.
Cardullo, P., & Kitchin, R. (2019). Being a ‘citizen’ in the smart city: Up and down the scaffold of smart citizen participation in Dublin, Ireland. GeoJournal. 84(1), 1-13.
Coe, A., Paquet, G., & Roy, J. (2001). E-governance and smart communities: A social learning challenge. Social Science Computer Review, 19(1), 80-93.
Goodman, N., Zwick, A., Spicer, Z., & Carlsen, N. (2020). Public engagement in smart city development: Lessons from communities in Canada's smart city challenge. The Canadian Geographer, 64(3), 416-432.
Harvey, D. (2000). Spaces of hope. Edinburgh University Press.
Helgason, W. (2002, November 15). Inclusion through a digital lens [Paper presentation]. Thinking Smart Cities, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.
Hollands, R. G. (2008). Will the real smart city please stand up? City: Analysis of Urban Trends, Culture, Theory, Policy, Action, 12(3), 303-320.
Innes, J. E., & Booher, D. E. (2004). Reframing public participation: Strategies for the 21st century. Planning Theory & Practice, 5(4), 419-436.
Lee, J., & Lee, H. (2014). Developing and validating a citizen-centric typology for smart city service. Government Information Quarterly, 31(1), S93-S105.
O'Grady, M., & O'Hare, G. (2012). How smart is your city? Science, 335, 1581-1582.
Roche, S. (2014). Geographic Information Science I: Why does a smart city need to be spatially enabled? Progress in Human Geography, 38(5), 703-711.
Staeheli, L. A. (2005). Can American cities be sites of citizenship? What can we do about it? Urban Geography, 26(3), 197-199.
Visvizi, A., & Lytras, M. D. (2019). Smart cities: Issues and challenges. Elsevier.
Zukin, S. (1995). The culture of cities. Blackwell.

Non-Presenting Participants Agenda