Expectation of smart mentality and citizen participation in technology-driven cities

Abstract

The purpose of the paper is to investigate the expectations of smart mentality and citizen participation in technology-driven cities. 150 mainstream trend reports, white papers, and research summaries are analyzed in one corpus as business, governmental, and university research cooperations. The changing trends of the related academic literature frame the study. Keyword statistics, word pairs, content networks, and correlation matrix reveal the expected citizen participation. The most referenced top ten cities and their strategies support the understanding of the smart mentality behind the participation. According to the findings, open data, communities, collective participation, socio-technical engagement, and empowerment are the most expected human factors. Anonymity, neighborhood-based implementations, and temporary human roles are underrepresented in the corpus, as well as the privacy concerns and ethical issues. However, the emerging AI technology and the interpretative metaphors with rainforest, team player, and public agora urge a focus also on these indicators with a contribution of citizen engagement. The paper provides governmental policymaking and the academic research of technology-driven cities with a citizen-centric and complex summary.