Show me the value: overcoming citizen adoption challenges

Smart expectations:
planning smart cities in Asia

Introduction time, but is often viewed as the wave of the future “It is amazing
in terms of good governance. to see cities rely
Promises of smart city benefits presents a
on traditional
challenge for cities as they must plan for new
A lack of participatory transportation
technology-led initiatives that are often beyond
their existing capacities. “It is amazing to see planning models, such as
cities rely on traditional transportation models, Globally, governments are increasingly involving
an analysis of
such as an analysis of transportation destination residents in city planning, including in smart transportation
that is conducted every four years,” says Victor initiatives. Asia anecdotally lags behind in destination that is
Mulas, Senior Operations Officer, who leads the this regard and where it takes place is often an conducted every
agenda on Innovation and Entrepreneurship afterthought, something Mr Mulas attributes four years”
in Cities at the World Bank Group’s Trade & to a top-down approach that is pervasive in Victor Mulas, lead
of Innovation and
Competitiveness Global Practice. “When you the region. In India, for example, the national Entrepreneurship in Cities,
show them the benefits of real-time data, they Smart Cities Challenge included a component of World Bank Group’s Trade
& Competitiveness Global
sometimes doubt it works.” citizen participation but primarily as a feedback Practice
mechanism on existing proposals and not as a
He attributes public sector scepticism to inertia mechanism for policy.1 The lack of participatory
to change. “First you need authority to change
1
http://www.
policy-making generally is especially evident in smartcitieschallenge.in/
the planning process. Then you need a champion ASEAN. Indicative of this—besides Singapore recentnews/first-winners-
inside the system who has the knowledge to (8)—Vietnam (43) and Malaysia (47) are the of-the-smart-cities-
do that and who is very persistent,” Mr Mulas only two ASEAN countries in the top 50 in challenge-announced
suggests. Involving businesses and citizens in e-participation globally, according to the United
smart city planning typically only happens after
2
https://
Nations 2016 e-participation index.2
publicadministration.
those key ingredients are in place, which can take
un.org/egovkb/en-us/
Data-Center

1 © The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2016


But citizen expectations across the region are
likely to put pressure on governments to improve:
32% of survey respondents conducted for this
research programme say that better governance
is one of the main benefits of making a city smart.
“As a city planner, we have to address [different]
layers in smart city initiatives and we are
[especially] targeting young ones who are going to
be within the city for a long time,” says Mohd Najib
bin Mohd, executive director of planning for Kuala
Lumpur. The city therefore has a plan to make it a
“connected city” by 2020, which includes a range
of local and federal government data initiatives,
such as enhancements in e-government.
In Asia, respondents who say their city has better
governance are far more likely to be familiar
with what constitutes a “smart” city (cited by
33%) compared to those with weaker governance
(16%). They are also far more likely to say that
their city is much better in enhancing quality of
life—a fundamental objective of smart cities—
compared to those who have weak governance
structure (34% vs 1%). (Figure 1)
Signs of progress
City governments almost exclusively determine
and prioritize smart city initiatives internally
but the extent to which they ask for feedback
from businesses and citizens—the smart city end
Figure 1: Value of good governance
A better run city can lead to a more innovative & liveable city
(% of respondents)
1%
Much more innovative city
1%
Much better quality of life in city
16%
Very familiar with smart cities
2 © The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2016
Show me the value: overcoming citizen adoption challenges
users—varies greatly across Asia with most cities
Read more
not doing it at all. There are exceptions, however.
about smart and
In Singapore, REACH (reaching everyone for sustainable cities
active citizenry @ home) is a government agency in ASEAN at http://
tasked with engaging citizens on policy issues.3 startupmycity
Founded in 1985 to simply receive “feedback”, the economist.com
agency has grown in importance over the years
and has since been designated to serve as an
e-engagement platform, moving beyond feedback
to also engage citizens via electronic means on
key policy initiatives. Although residents are
only asked to comment on various plans (as
opposed to making suggestions before they are
created), what separates the process from many
other cities is the fact the city-state government
provides a summary of responses to those who “We [as a
provide suggestions, hence acknowledging their government] are
contributions and managing expectations. the planner but
we may not be the
In Kuala Lumpur, the local government has also
perfect planner”
recognised the importance of citizen feedback.
Mohd Najib bin Mohd,
“We [as a government] are the planner but we executive director of planning
for Kuala Lumpur
may not be the perfect planner,” says Mr Mohd.
He mentions public WiFi as an area in which
they actively engage with the private sector
and also solicits feedback from the public.
“We have people engaged in those initiatives,
and it has become a standard feature to have
consultations,” he adds.
Weaker governance Stronger governance
39%
34%
33%
3
https://www.reach.gov.sg
 Show me the value: overcoming citizen adoption challenges

Figure 2: Getting smarter Into the future

Well-managed cities will be much smarter five Sceptical observers of smart city planning in Asia
years from now
view current processes as window-dressing as
(% of respondents)
My city has strong governance
cities try to give the impression they are adapting
50 My city has weak governance
to a global trend. But this may change. “In three to
40
five years, citizen participation will be embedded
44%
into any large-scale smart city initiative in Asia,”
30 predicts Mr Mulas. “But it will probably follow
the Singaporean approach in terms of receiving
20 feedback on existing initiatives rather than
creating full-blown participatory decision-making,
10 as Asian countries generally prefer a top-down
15% approach.”
0
Very smart At the same time, survey respondents who say
their city has better governance, are far more
In Seoul, South Korea, the Metropolitan likely to believe their city will be “very smart” five
Government has taken participatory planning years from now (cited by 44%) compared with
one step further: it claims the 2030 Seoul Plan is those with weaker governance (15%), adding
the city’s first “citizen participation-type basic additional pressure on the region’s cities to 4
http://english.seoul.
urban planning” strategy that involves residents follow the participatory good governance model
go.kr/policy-information/
in every step of the way and that the future vision increasingly common in the west. (Figure 2) “If urban-planning/urban-
of the 2030 Seoul Plan will be determined by we propose a project, we have to explain it and planning/1-2030-seoul-
citizens themselves.4 get feedback,” concludes Mr Mohd. basic-urban-plan/

3 © The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2016