The Smart City – Does the Individual Matter?

ABSTRACT

Early smart city projects tended to be technology-driven, conceiving of the citizen as a data provider. New citizen-centered projects have emerged that challenge the role of the individual in these second-generation smart cities. While some works describe the political role that individuals play in these cities, they only indirectly address the place of technology in determining the participation of the individual in these projects. In this article, we draw on the work done on another technical system—cyberspace—to address the relationship between individuals and technology in the smart city and its consequences. Adapting a typology initially developed for cyberspace and using examples of the City of Montréal, we identify three potential categories of the individual’s role within the smart city: (1) Active role (involved individual), (2) Passive role (synchronized individual), and (3) Victim (disadvantaged individual). We show that the individual is a misinformed figure, despite attempts to focus smart development on citizens. Moreover, we posit that the individual cannot have a real political role as long as the political vision of the city does not precede the technical dimension.

KEYWORDS:

• smart city
• individual’s role
• cyberspace

Notes

1 Our goal is not to criticize the Montreal experience or its genealogy but rather to use this experience as an illustration and springboard for our reflection. Furthermore, our analysis of Montreal stops after the Smart City Challenge is awarded in 2019. Starting in 2019, a new step—funded by the award of the Smart City Challenge—has begun: Montréal en commun, a program structured around three components (mobilities, food, and data) involving a large community of actors, most of which are NPOs or university laboratories.

2 When we refer to a document in French, we write Montréal in its French form. When we refer to Montreal in the English text, we write Montreal in English.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sandra Breux

Sandra Breux is a professor at the Institut National de Recherche Scientifique, Centre Urbanisation Culture et Société, Montréal, Québec, H2X 1E3, Canada.

Jérémy Diaz

Jérémy Diaz was previously a PhD student at the Université du Québec à Montréal, Département d’Études Urbaines et Touristiques, Montréal, Québec, H3C 3P8, Canada.

Hugo Loiseau

Hugo Loiseau is Professeur titulaire, École de politique appliquée, Faculté des lettres et sciences humaines, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Québec, J1K 2R1, Canada.