Abstract Summary
Today’s cities are datafied smart cities. Data - and the more visible manifestations of data in the form of apps, platforms, and urban interfaces - shape how people interact in a range of social domains and with various institutions. The nature of datafied systems, the power relations and the values embedded in various urban systems have a major impact on the inclusiveness of citired. The amplification of infrastructural inequities happens for instance through biased algorithms that unjustly target and harm specific groups and individuals, by smart tech being designed for able-bodied and media literate people while ignoring intersectionality, or via automated tech that supports a depoliticized and frictionless urban management instead of civic participation and just urban governance rooted in frictions, struggles and ongoing dialogue. A key challenge of inclusive smart cities therefore is to make sure that the datafication of urban life does not promote the interests of the few but that it benefits (at least not impedes or harms) peoples’ collective interests to fully participate in (urban) society. In the burgeoning transdisciplinary field of smart city research, increasing attention is being paid to this relationship between data, local governance and inclusion. However, the ways in which inclusion is conceptualized varies across different disciplines, with labels such as equity, social justice, fairness, responsibility, and others in use. In this contribution, we expand on what “inclusion in the datafied city” means from our own disciplinary perspectives in Media Studies, Public Governance and Law, and Urban Studies. This contribution aims 1) to conceptualize inclusion in the datafied smart city by bringing different disciplinary perspectives together; 2) to illustrate hands-on approaches for addressing inclusive datafied smart cities by means of two case studies; 3) to reflect on ways in which transdisciplinary insights contribute to understanding and shaping inclusive smart urbanism. We do so by looking at three framings of inclusion: an institutional perspective that emphasizes technological access; a culturally-sensitive conceptualization of inclusion in intersectional terms; and, more recently, and a multidimensional understanding of inclusion that highlights negotiation and co-creation.
