Editorial

Information management as a dual-purpose process in the smart city: Collecting, managing and utilizing information

In the otherwise rich debate on smart cities, the intersection of land use and spatial planning, on the one hand, their social and societal implications, on the other hand, and finally, the potential inherent in ICT-enhanced tools underlying the functioning, operation, management, and administration of smart city, remain overlooked. Considering that, due to multiple environmental and societal pressures, land use, has become more political than ever, whereby pleas for open and transparent methods of coordination, deliberation, and participation proliferate, it is imperative that citizens are involved in the land use policymaking at the level of the city and the neighborhoods. Even if substantial literature addressing each of these issues exists, approaches that would fit these multiple pieces of the puzzle together in one equation are still missing. By elaborating on the findings of an online survey (N = 5752) involving the citizens of a smart city (Lublin, Poland), this paper responds to this imperative. The findings suggest that utilizing insights from e-participation tools and surveys, in combination with more traditional instruments, such as meetings, debates, and workshops, may significantly improve land use policies in (smart) cities.

Increasingly, our understanding of what smart cities and human-computer behavior represent and embody, is shaped by our first-hand experience of both. Whereas there is a certain commonsensical promise in it, in that -- since we live it -- we ‘ought’ to be able to understand more and explain more about the related phenomena, the challenge that arises is that we do not necessarily see more. Accordingly, whichever story about the world, in this case about smart cities and/or human-computer behavior or combinations of them, we may wish to tell, each of them will bear the mark of our prior knowledge, experiences, and worldviews. Not always will it expand and deepen the exploratory and explanatory potential of the ensuing research .The papers included in this special issue seek to navigate this challenge.

Smart city services, smart applications and smart devices form an ecosystem of tools and artifacts that challenge, and times even disrupt, conventions, norms, and rites of behavior, thus prompting diverse behavioral changes at the level of the individual, the group, and the society at large. In this view, smart city may be viewed as a – one of its kind – laboratory to query the complex human-computer relationship from a multi-dimensional perspective. By adopting this perspective, this paper queries the existing smart city surveillance systems to identify their key limitations and sources of frequently justified controversies. It is argued that to bypass these – first – the value of mesh-technology should be explored. It is also argued that – second – it is necessary not only to bring citizens back in the discussion on smart city, but also to highlight the mechanisms by means of which they might be involved in the co-design of smart city solutions and in urban decision-making. To bridge these two imperatives, smart city is conceptualized as a smart service system and, consequently, a wireless integrated mesh-technology enhanced (WIMTE) smart city surveillance system is elaborated.

Today’s cities, regardless of whether they have the capacity and resources to apply smart city solutions or not, face a variety of mutually reinforcing challenges. The United Nations’ (UN) focus on cities and the inclusion of SDG 11 in the SDG Agenda prove that the centrality of cities and urban systems has been recognized by the decision-makers internationally. The case of SDG 11, discussed throughout the chapters included in this volume, serves also as an excellent example that proves the value of multilateralism and of global governance. Multilateralism is at its best in this case because the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda is the outcome of deliberation and consensus reached in the UN. Global governance comes in this picture too; however, because the mechanisms by means of which the SDGs are implemented are more nuanced than international collaboration, they require tools and mechanisms specific to global governance.