| Abstract [eng] |
Globalization and population growth worldwide determined the city’s importance as a subject of the sub-national level in the nation context. The complexity of societal problems stimulated the search of clever ways to tackle city problems more effectively. The growing role of technologies, especially information technologies, formed favorable conditions for an advanced urban area management form of smart cities to appear. However, no scientific or any other kind of literature contains an acceptable to all definition of smart. The concept’s complexity and diversity complicate both its clarification and practical application towards city’s governance and other processes. And although theoretical concepts and evaluation methodologies exist, there is a lack of empirical studies to be found in this field. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to discover at what level is the public governance consistent with the principals of smart city in the city of Kaunas. To better describe the topic, the paper discusses academic literature that analyses the smart concept in various contexts, several of these being city region governance, services, communities, technologies and other. In addition, the characteristics of smart cities as well as the purpose and importance of a smart city in different authors’ point of views are also addressed. In order to fully disclose the essence of a smart city, the second part of the study analyses smart city models, the elements it consists of and dimensions in the context of governance. Furthermore, scientific literature containing city smartness evaluation methodologies and criteria are also reviewed, one of which, that was discussed by R. Jucevičius (2014) is later implemented in the empirical part of the paper. In order to reach a higher practical implementation, the empirical part of the paper is aimed at identifying smart features within city governance. The analysis target of choice is the city of Kaunas. The research part of the paper contains analysis of Kaunas’s strategic action plans, their goals, objectives and priorities. Based on the methodology by R. Jucevičius (2014), it is attempted to observe, which fundamental characteristics of a smart social system can be found in the aforementioned documents. In addition, aiming to distinguish practically noticeable aspects of city smartness an expert interview is included. The discussion on the features of a smart social system identifies the opinions and viewpoints of experts in different fields towards the smartness of Kaunas city’s governance. In order to perceive relevant trends as well as the similarities and differences of characteristics of smartness that were found in city’s strategical documentation and practically observed, the interview analysis results are then compared to smart city features identified in the city’s strategical plans. Finally, recommendations for the city municipality’s council, mayor and administration are formed based on the empirical study’s findings of positive and negative aspects of Kaunas city smartness. These recommendations should serve as a roadmap for the city’s representatives for further amplification of smartness in the city. |
