Citizen empowerment in newly born smart cities in Mauritius

Abstract

Advances in technology are quickly paving the way for smart cities. The Government of Mauritius has set up the Smart City Scheme to provide an enabling framework and a package of attractive fiscal and non-fiscal incentives to investors for the development of smart cities across the island. However, prior to the design and implementation of such technologies, it is important to predict the behavioural intention to use such technology so that smart city technologies effectively empower citizens and improve the quality of life of citizens. In this research work, it is proposed to use the TAM to effectively assess the perception and readiness and the perceived usefulness of certain smart city technologies such as for transportation as well as identifying key smart city applications for Mauritius. The aim of this research project is to evaluate and assess the different factors and condition that can have an impact on the perceived ease of use (PEOU), perceived usefulness (PU), behavioural intention (BI) to use and actual use (AU) of smart city technologies. For smart cities to become a reality in Mauritius, smart city applications and services should be citizen-centred and relevant for ordinary citizens in their everyday life. This research work allows assessing the readiness of Mauritian citizens for Smart city applications, as well as identifying applications which can empower citizen.