Highlights

Many people find it difficult to identify the value of smart cities. Smart city icons can bridge that understanding and social divides by empowering people.

Singapore’s route to urban transformation is often narrated as a success story that gave rise to a sleek cityscape of modern skyscrapers, preserved shophouses and iconic public housing estates. What used to be a society housed primarily in low-density village-like ‘kampungs’ in the pre-independence era was quickly transformed into dense residential high rises where roughly 80% of the population now lives. In doing so, the Housing Development Board (HDB) tried to balance the need for density and land optimization with maintaining the close-knit bonds and communities common in the kampungs.

Towards a research agenda on what innovation in government consists of, how the current focus on innovation may be changing the public sector service delivery function, and the extent to which it is a distinct phenomenon as opposed to previous cycles of governmental reform efforts.

If cities are at the center of so much innovation, as is commonly argued, do we adequately understand innovative processes and innovative outcomes at the city level? Moreover, are cities tracking the innovative activities occurring in their midst? Could the goals of supporting innovation be better realized if innovative activity was better understood at an urban scale?

In our new, rapidly changing societies – perhaps the way forward is not to try to tightly control new innovations, but to have the right government structure to safely try new things, respond quickly, evaluate, adjust and adapt.

In recent years, we have seen a growth in popular discourse about the importance of the “city as the future.” Within the context of the increasing importance of the city as a unit, there has also been a corresponding emphasis on the need for city government to “innovate” their policies, services and practices. This post explores a typology of government innovation help to bring clarity to these emerging practices.

How should we refer to people who are aged 65 years or over? This is a question others (Firor, 2016: Graham, 2012; Jaffe, 2016) are pondering and perhaps

In Living Digital 2040: Future of Work, Education and Healthcare, we pointed out the possibilities of using digital technologies to broaden appreciation of the arts. In honour of Singapore’s National Day, we decided to see how existing online analytics tools could help to understand the evolving nature of the National Day songs.

How can smart cities technologies be used to inform community engagement activities?

In May, Professor Chan was invited to join the Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles, a gathering of thought leaders to discuss ideas and solutions to some of the world’s most complex problems, and discuss the topic of “Transforming the Urban Landscape.”