Smart City Index Research Articles

Scrutinizing the Smart City Index: a multivariate statistical approach

The smart city represents a frequently elaborated concept which however comes short in delivering a consistent definition. Nevertheless, almost every description has always been oriented to its technological component, sustainable development policies, and enabling high capacities for learning and innovation. Moreover, the smart city aims at connecting people, information and other city elements using state-of-the-art technologies. As a result, it creates a sustainable, greener city, pushes forward competitive and innovative commerce, and increases overall life quality. The integrated view of a smart city underlines it does not operate in isolation, which is why every subsystem of a city needs to develop its smart component. A wide range of rankings is used to determine the smartness of cities by mapping out the pros and cons of each analysed city. As the way to integrate various indicators into one value which will represent the rank, a composite index approach is most frequently used. Still, composite indexes are usually formed using the equal weight approach, which is heavily criticised in current literature. In this paper, we try to provide added value to the Smart City Index by implementing the statistical post hoc I-distance approach. The procedure enables us to shed some additional light on the issue of sensitivity of cities’ rank. The application of post hoc I-distance defines indicators which are most significant for the ranking process. It consequently empowers city decision-makers to improve their performance, with a focus on those particular indicators.

Smart cities as a source for entrepreneurial opportunities: Evidence for Spain

In the context of economic crisis, it is necessary to drive changes in the productive model towards a smart society. Particularly in urban areas, the Smart City movement has become an agent for change to help fight the loss of competitiveness and unemployment. Literature review shows that there is little regarding the generation of knowledge and entrepreneurial activity in the context of a smart city and in Spain in particular. This study contributes to filling this gap. We start by identifying the potential sources of entrepreneurial opportunities that a medium-sized smart city may offer based on the Knowledge Spillover Theory of Entrepreneurship. We then provide empirical evidence that the Smart City label has positively influenced the effective creation of new businesses. To this end, we examine 44 Spanish Smart City initiatives included and classified in the Smart City Index according to their smartness level. Our results confirm the relation between the Smart City label and the entrepreneurship rate. Moreover, they allow us to present some relevant considerations and implications concerning the maturing process of Smart City initiatives. These considerations are of particular interest for those agents involved in the smart city entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Сюжет об «умном городе» в Индонезии: сравнение программных документов в 4 городах

This paper aims to investigate the narrative of smart city policy in four Indonesian cities. Yogyakarta City, Surabaya City, Magelang City, and Madiun City were chosen as the locus of this study since these cities were winners of the Indonesian Smart City Index 2015.The author compares their medium-term development planning documents using analysis of policy narrative approach which reconstructs the stories that actors tellabout policy issues written in the official policy document. This study endeavours to analyse how these cities engage with smart city policy and initiative from a comparativebased study.Based on the content analysis as a research method, it can be concluded that these cities conceptualise the smart city program in different ways since there is no specific regulation guiding smart city policy in Indonesia. The result of this study also maps the main themes of smart city as stated in their medium-term development planning document. Theoretically, it contributes the discourse of smart city policy studies in a developing country context. Practically, this study suggests a policy implication that cities need to consider as a specific grand design on how local government implement smart city initiative.

Smart Environment Program, Smart Way to Smart City

Bandung City Government is ranked the 3rd in smart city index in Indonesia only within 8 months of smart city application. Considering this achievement, it is necessary to study this fast-tracking success of smart city to enable a lesson learnt for other local governments. Hence, this research aims at evaluating the best practices of smart environment program as one of smart city projects and analyzing the positive transformation being brought. The analysis will be based on three core activities in smart environment: (1) the creation of thematic parks as open public spaces; (2) the restoration and the revitalization of rivers and its river banks; (3) urban gardening or urban farming. Combined with the result of extensive of literature review, this research will apply eight (8) aspects of smart environment. These aspects are (1) The Provision of Public Open Space; (2) Good Waste Management; (3) Slum Areas Management; (4) The Revitalization of River; (5) Eliminate “Chopsticks Syndrome” in Building Construction; (6) Alternative energy; (7) Reducing the Production of CO2; (8) Urban Farming.
 A qualitative research method were used in this research. The analysis of this research is a comparative analysis, with the use of smart city best practices in other cities in other countries as the benchmark. Seven local government work units/departments/agencies of Bandung Citywhich play important role as the leading sectors of the smart environment program were the key resources of this research. The data were collected from 30 interviews. This research gave its reader a new perspective in understanding the concept and the practices of smart city in the public administration perspective.