Edinburgh Napier University

  Drawing upon the smart experiences of "world class" cities in n.America, Canada and Europe, this book provides the evidence to show how entrepreneurship-based and market dependent representations of knowledge production are now being replaced by a community of policy makers, academic leaders, corporate strategists and growth management alliances with the potential to liberate cities from the stagnation they have previously been locked into. In particular, it will show how such market-based representations of knowledge production are now being replaced by a community of policy makers and academic leaders with:
• the corporate strategies and growth management alliances capable of reaching beyond the idea of "creative slack";
• a notion of innovation which allows cities to reach beyond the idea of creative slack and be "smarter" in generating the intellectual capital that is needed to meet the efficiency requirements of wealth creation;
• the "wealth of intellect' also needed for cities to not only be economically innovative and culturally creative, but smarter in drawing upon the enterprise required for industry and government to open-up, reflexively absorb and discursively shape these strategic alliances;
• the "creative" means for such a participatory system of governance to be smarter when not only liberating cities from the stagnation they have previously been locked into, but in freeing them up to promote the type of civic renewal
smarter cities also pave the way for.
Bringing together the critical insights of papers drawn from a collection of leading international experts on the transition to smart cities, this book proposes to do what has recently been asked of those responsible for Creating Smart-er Cities. That is: to assemble the definitional components, critical insights and institutional means by which to get beyond the all too often self-congratulatory tone cities strike when claiming to be smarter.