Learning to Engage Citizens to Make Smarter Cities

ABSTRACT

The effectiveness of government policies seems to be a function of increasing citizen participation through the active shaping of public policy and public service delivery (Singh & Kaushik, Platform for citizen engagement for good governance in India (pp. 48–66), 2020). Recognizing the importance of civic engagement, as part of participatory urbanism (Rahmat, Open cities ;Open data Collaborative cities in the information era (pp. 107–128). Palgrave, 2019) and collaborative governance (Bartoletti & Faccioli, Partecipazione e Conflitto, 13(2), 1132–1151, 2020), this article attempts to highlight and quantify its role in trying to develop the intelligence of a city. This article is based on two pillars. Initially, it decrypts and analyzes the concept of civic engagement and its potential by mapping the dominant bibliographic trends. It then considers the utilization of civic engagement and its integration in the process of developing the intelligence of a city, via a pilot study, the case of the Thessaloniki metropolitan area. Through its two pillars, this article highlights and quantifies the role of civic engagement in the effort to achieve the intelligence of a city and concludes by proposing actions to strengthen and redefine this role. Finally, it is important to emphasize that this article underlines civic engagement in the decision-making process of the respective municipal council or the phase of consultations and proposals and not at the phase of evaluating implemented smart projects. In other words, this article recognizes the importance of preliminary actions and chooses to focus on their benefits. At the same time, it is based on the fact that nowadays, due to the challenges of COVID-19, residents have recognized more keenly than ever the importance of urban space and the benefits of its proper design, so that they may desire to participate more in its urban processes. In addition, residents have become more familiar with the use of technology and are able to use smart applications to evaluate, propose, or vote on municipal project proposals for their cities. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.