Smart Citizens vs. the Urban Intelligence Industrial Complex

“A Urban Intelligence Industrial Complex (led by IBM, Cisco, General Electric, Siemens, Philips et al) has emerged and continues to try to insert itself into urban agendas; with little success, in comparison to the marketing spend, it must be said. One can imagine a quiet fading away of all those “Smarter Planet” promotional schemes soon, actually.”

Excerpted from an introduction to an essay on Smart Cities, by Dan Hill:

“At first glance (this may seem) like a destructive critique of technology in the city. It is not. Technology is culture; it is not something separate; it is no longer “I.T.”; we cannot choose to have it or not. It just is, like air. There are different forms of technology in different cities, of course, but given that technology and culture have fused (arguably, always had) the issue is now a cultural one; what kind of culture do we want in our cities? How do we orient ourselves, with regards to today’s particular technological cultures?

We know how our cities were oriented as regards irrigation, language, currency, double-entry book-keeping, clocks, looms, trains, sewage, power plants, elevators, cars, containers—these are all forms of technology, which were in some way aligned to, and sprang from, the core urban dynamics of their age (and perhaps those eternal urban drivers of culture and commerce.)

So, how do we orient our cities as regards The Network? And how might this then address the core issues of our age?

So the goal is entirely constructive, and to shift the debate in a more meaningful direction, oriented towards the raison d’etre of our cities: citizens, and the way that they can create urban culture with technology.

Although it says “manifesto” up there, this is not a manifesto in the sense that Marinetti would write one—probably for the best—but instead a quest for the right questions. As such, you might infer your own manifesto from it (even in opposition to it!)

The essay surveys three types of activities, and scenarios, demonstrating active citizens, noting some issues along the way, and then critiques the opposite—the production of passive citizens—before asking a couple of questions and suggesting some key shifts in attitude required to positively work with the grain of today’s cultures, rather than misinterpret it.”

Read the manifesto here!

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