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Network Governance and Urban Innovation: From Collaboration to Delegation of Powers?

Civil Society
Democracy
Governance
Local Government
Public Administration
Public Policy
Technology
Giorgia Nesti
Department of Political Science, Law, and International Studies, University of Padova
Giorgia Nesti
Department of Political Science, Law, and International Studies, University of Padova

Abstract

Economic decline and austerity, climate change and energy consumption, poverty and immigration, decline of citizens trust in traditional party politics and increasing demands for direct participation in local decisions call municipalities to solve complex problems with reduced economic resources and political support. Many cities tackled the challenge by introducing innovative institutional arrangements, governance tools, products, and services often based on the extensive application of ICTs in what is termed the ‘smart city’ approach. These innovations promote networking, interaction and collaboration among stakeholders, and transform the city in an ‘open ecosystem’ where politicians, public officials, NGOs, associations, research centres, universities, private companies and individual citizens interact. The smart city approach extensively relies on PPPPs (public, private, and people partnership) but, remarkably, these forms of networking are often based on fragmentation of policies and on delegation of related responsibilities through mechanism of co-production. Using data collected through an in-depth qualitative research carried out in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Wien, and in three Italian ‘smart’ cities (Turin, Bologna and Padova), the paper is aimed at investigating how local actors interact to produce and to manage innovation and at analysing the impact generated by network governance and co-production at the organisational level (within public administration) and in democratic terms (on the ‘local polity’). Innovation in/through smart cities, in fact, albeit emphasising network governance and coproduction as the forefront of participation, often produces seclusion and hides a decline in policy-makers’ attention to the public interest. Nevertheless the analysis of case studies reveals that new tools can be successfully implemented to enhance real democratic participation and to generate a diffused policy responsiveness.