The Smart City and Civic Engagement

Abstract

The smart city is one of the most popular concepts used by academics and practitioners to describe the urban future. More and more people around the world are interested in it, from tech giants Google and IBM, which are launching projects to turn entire neighborhoods into smart spaces, to political parties. Most see the smart city as an urban environment where advanced technology is used to solve social and environmental problems. However, there are certain problems in the research and practice of smart cities. One of them is that smart cities disregard the importance of a wide range of institutionalized procedures for public participation in urban development and the management of different aspects of city life. Abroad, there is considerable experience with civic engagement. Moreover, most European political parties have included public participation in urban processes in their policy statements. Western scientists and politicians have paid attention to the issue of public control over the huge amount of personal data accumulated. Unfortunately, this aspect of the smart city, which undoubtedly affects the interests of most residents, is not often mentioned in the Russian literature, although practices of public involvement in the state and municipal governance are developing in Russia: the creation of a comfortable urban environment, participatory budgeting, and online platforms of urban participation. This article provides a brief overview of materials on public participation from leading foreign publications. First, it describes and compares the main concepts and practices of the smart city. Secondly, attention is paid to how city authorities, research organizations and political parties are theorizing and implementing smart city projects. The purpose of this article is to introduce the main conceptual approaches in smart city theory, as well as the practices of political parties and public participation in shaping smart cities, an understudied area of urban development.