Smart cities

Local and regional governments call for ensuring a digital transformation that leaves no-one behind at the Smart Cities Live 2020

“Digital rights have become our present. New technologies are essential for the future of humanity, and you, local leaders have been tasked to think ahead to ensure that our future is shaped with our communities.”

“We need to address a new concept of citizenship centered around participation. A smart government needs to empower citizens through an open government approach that favors citizen participation.”

“The question is how do we use smart technology to take care of our people? We have used it to register people to ensure we can trace contacts, but also to help people to start businesses from home and ensuring skill training for people who have had to stay at home.”

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Background

In the past three years, technologies played an essential role in connecting people to their surroundings, especially during lockdowns derived from the pandemic. However, the crisis we are experiencing has accelerated the uptake of digital solutions, tools, and services and projected us quicker towards a digital economy, and according to the UNCTAD, it has also revealed a need to bridge the digital divide.

This situation further isolated populations already left behind in the pre-covid world. Without available equipment to connect with the rest of the world or deliver socially distanced services, some small businesses had to shut their door. In the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), solely an estimated 20% of the population use internet. This implies that youth and children did not have access to education when the government shut the schools, but also that their parents could not telework. On the other hand, developed countries’ economies and states moved towards full digital solutions. As a result, social interactions mostly happened through technology, political spaces became virtual, and the web became a market opened to the world. All societies realized that digital readiness is now essential, but also that human interactions are at the heart of our daily lives.

The session constitutes a step in the development of the Pact since it redefines smart cities and addresses the relationship between technology and the COVID-19 recovery, the role that local and regional governments need to play when using data and technology, and the role that key policymaking spaces such as the Cities Coalition for Digital Rights play in the protection of human rights at the digital level.

129

billion USD on global revenues from smart city projects

80%

of the population in the least developed countries is not connected to the internet

Challenges

First, democracies should ensure equity and digital inclusion. It entrenches providing care for people who are distant from digital technologies, such as older people and people in LDCs.
Secondly, digital rights need to be established to regulate this new public space. Technology needs to be put at the service of communities, and to this end it needs to be shaped by local decision-makers on the ground instead of decision-making shaped by standard technology and algorithms.
Societies need to acknowledge that politics tend to happen in virtual spaces, as well as to stimulate people’s political participation and their creativity. Therefore, organisations and grassroots bodies need to foster volunteer participation in cross communities activities.
The United Nations needs to recognize the intrinsic relationship between digital rights and the achievement of global agendas.
Finally, to ensure full digital inclusion, all spheres of government and international bodies should cooperate with local institutions. Indeed, this must be a trans-sectorial transition that requires specific adaptations to the populations and the territories.

Learn more about the challenges being faced by cities and regions

Responses

Most of the responses to the global pandemic have been digital:

In Subang Jaya (Malaysia) and Deagu (South Korea), technology helped tracing contacts and make sure that every citizen had access to basic needs. The two mayors pinpointed voluntary participation and governmental cooperation as responsible for the efficiency of these challenging strategies.
The 2019 Smart Cities Study focused on smart governance and it aims to provide information on strategies and projects that cities around the world have been implementing.
The concept of “Smart Governance” has been introduced as a key aspect in integrating all citizens in their own political ecosystem. It aimed at exploring to what extent a renewed use of technologies can lay the ground towards a better urban quality of life.
UCLG Community of Practice on Digital Cities seeks to develop an efficient cooperation network focused on making the most of new information and communication technologies to share, assimilate and adapt them to local needs. Since 2016, it is composed of political councils, commissions, workgroups and a practical community.

Learn more about other responses and initiatives in terms of Migration:

Towards the Pact

“Inclusivity”, “trust” and “collaboration” have been identified as essential principles to guide local action. This means ensuring that all political bodies play their part for a fair digital transformation.
As a malleable and fast means of communication, technology represents one of the key tools to the construction of the Citopia^[1]. Its use should be adapted to the need of each territory.
Online meetings allow people to connect around the world and to learn from very different cultures but are not accessible to everyone, so international bodies should ensure that no one is left behind.

^[1] Citopia refers to a way of recovering from the pandemic that leads us towards a world driven by peaceful cities

Resources

Smart Cities: Local and regional governments call for ensuring a digital transformation that leaves no-one behind

For further information on the topic of Public Service Delivery and its impact on cities and regions, please refer to the related resources included below.