How to Manage Knowledge Supporting Stakeholders of Smart Cities?

Abstract

The chapter discusses a proposal to use a process approach to describe the transformation of urban space into smart space. Such an approach was used as a basis for discussing the need for knowledge resources and the availability of such resources in Smart City knowledge management. Using the classical management model, a methodology for carrying out the tasks of planning, organizing, and utilizing the knowledge resources of various stakeholders in Smart City creation processes is shown. The final section presents practical examples of complex problems in the area under discussion. The sub-statement shows a subjective overview of the problems that need to be addressed in further research work.

1. Introduction

Since relatively recently, there has been a very intense, even exponential increase in the number of publications appearing in various search engines after typing in the keywords “Smart City” or “Smart Cities” (S.C.). For example, in the Mendeley® search engine, the use of the aforementioned keywords resulted in finding 2579 items in 2015, but in 2022 there are already 8827 items. Research devoted to the idea of a Smart City has previously appeared in various research centers [1, 2, 3], while the authorship of the aforementioned concept itself is quite commonly attributed to scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology [4, 5]. The idea of a functional comparison of information flow networks in the city with similar flows in the human body has sometimes been criticized for the excessive anthropomorphization of such an approach, but at the same time, it has been correlated with the approach, appearing in studies, dealing with the “urban organism” [6, 7]. The work published in 2001 [8], representing the current research on the problems of managing an intelligent society in an urban e-environment is also worth mentioning.

Today, the term Smart City has moved beyond its original IT-related framework. Perhaps the best way to convey the meaning of the term is to say that smart urban space is the result of transforming an existing urbanized space (or the result of building such a space from scratch), in which users live better. The term “quality of life improvement” is also used. However, the above statements contain a fair amount of ambiguity, especially in defining the beneficiaries of such a better life.

The approach of the authors of many publications to this issue is, in a sense, the fault of B. Cohen, who proposed [9] the following classification of Smart City creation processes (referred to in this chapter as “S.C. processes”) using the “fashionable” notation: Smart City 1.0, Smart City 2.0, and Smart City 3.0.

Cohen takes as the basis of his, perhaps oversimplified, proposal the assumption that the participants in the processes of creating a better living space in cities are: (1) providers of information systems that potentially give a city an intelligence value, (2) the authorities of the cities where such systems will be implemented, and (3) the residents of those cities. It further assumes that in successive classes of S.C. processes (with increasing value of the index), individual groups of beneficiaries cease to be objective and become subjective participants in activities aimed at creating Smart City space and become leaders of S.C. processes. Such leaders in the Smart City 1.0 class are system providers (group 1) and in the Smart City 2.0 class, the functions of project leaders are taken over by city authorities (group 2). In the Smart City 3.0 class, there is the involvement and active participation of group participants (3). Linking Cohen’s proposal to one of the emerging approaches in the literature of the Smart City as a “city of happy people” [10, 11] one can somewhat sarcastically conclude that in the S.C. 1.0 process group, happy are the system providers (because they do good business); in the S.C. 2.0 group, happy are city officials (because they get a good theme for self-promotion); while in the S.C. 3.0 group, theoretically happy should be all participants in the process, including, most importantly, city residents. However, it is not known what it will be like in reality, as the level of S.C. 3.0 remains so far - in the opinion of the author of this chapter - a futuristic entity.

B. Cohen, moreover, with his proposal, caused a certain limitation in the attention of many researchers, especially on such issues as the categorization of knowledge needed to manage a city (not only an intelligent one!) or the available and usable sources of such knowledge (along with an assessment of the possibility of obtaining it). Using Cohen’s concept, one should probably automatically assume that the leader of the S.C. process from a particular group automatically has the knowledge necessary to effectively manage the implementation of that process. This means that it is assumed that, for example, the IT system provider who won the tender for the IT equipment for the S.C. process in city X, just by virtue of that decision, has the knowledge necessary to carry out the implementation. Similarly, the newly elected mayor of a city has such knowledge as a result of the majority (voters) decision. Problems such as the source or sources of this knowledge remain unknown. Moreover, Cohen’s proposed uniformity does not facilitate consideration of the particularly high level of diversity of potential sources of knowledge relating to any unique urban organism and its unique environment when considering urban knowledge.

It is, of course, possible to identify repetitive areas in the functioning of urban organisms (e.g., the organization of traffic, the organization of public transportation, or systems for providing useful information). However, the effectiveness of such an approach depletes with the increasing complexity, and at the same time with individualization of the knowledge necessary for managing a specific sphere of public services in a specific city, as well as in managing the city as a whole.

It is worth adding at this point that those ideas of “higher categories” (i.e., 4.0, 5.0, etc.) of S.C. processes have already appeared in the described studies, usually linking such processes to Industry 4.0 and Society 5.0 concepts (e.g., [12] or Green Economy [13]). However, in this study, the author, in accordance with Ockham’s prohibition of multiplying entities, decided to limit his considerations to “existing entities,” i.e., Smart City 1.0, Smart City 2.0, and (if successful) Smart City 3.0 processes.

Referring to the search results of the studies cited above, it can be pointed out here that for the set of keywords “Smart cities knowledge manager” in 2015, 86 items were found in the Mendeley® search engine, and in 2022–183 items, so a very small percentage of publications on smart cities. Only very recently have cross-cutting studies appeared in the subject area, such as [14] or [15]. However, there are no known works presenting a unified methodological approach to the management of knowledge about (and for) a Smart City. Therefore, the author of this study decided to offer the methodological proposals presented below, which assume that any action or activities undertaken (including those related to urban knowledge) should correspond to a previously identified need or needs.

Let us try, as a kind of guide for identifying the needs and determining the means and ways of managing knowledge of an intelligent urbanized space, as well as managing knowledge in such a space, to use the well-known and long-used (since ancient times?) 5 W + H model [16], in which the starting point for solving the problem are the questions: What?, Why?, Where?, When?, Who? and finally How?

According to this model, let us next attempt to clarify the content (elaboration) of the above questions, relating them to the problems of knowledge management in a Smart City. In particular, let us ask:

1. What (what - resulting from the identified needs - goal do we intend to achieve)?

2. Why (why do we feel we need to achieve the identified goal)?

3. Where (where are we going to implement the planned project)?

4. When (when do we plan to start and complete this project)?

5. Who (who will implement and/or participate in this project)?

6. How (with what means and ways will the venture be implemented?

Since the order in which the individual questions are asked is not, from the point of view of the applicability of the methodology described above, important as an element that determines the plan for the implementation of the task, when planning the research intention described in this chapter, it was assumed that the question Q1 i.e., the question about the purpose of the activity, requires an answer. The simplest answer to this question is that the goal is to identify the body of knowledge necessary for the transformation of a selected urbanized space (city) into a smart space.

Let us then try to answer question Q3 i.e., the question about the place whose purpose is formulated above. The simplest answer to the question, stating that such a place is a city, is trivial. In contrast, an answer that includes the name of a specific city also leads nowhere. Each city is, for obvious reasons, unique and unrepeatable, so creating a methodology for such a unique object also seems pointless. However, by analyzing any city as a complex organism performing various functions, we can find repetitive elements in the ways these functions are performed. This can provide a basis for developing certain patterns that can be used for various specific situations. Thus, the author made an attempt, described in this chapter, to propose a certain model approach to the consideration of urban knowledge, usable not only in one specific case of an urban organism.

Before moving on to the next section, let us further assume that the answer to question Q4 is now and in the near future. The term “near future” here refers to the practice of the processes of investment planning and implementation carried out by city governments. In other words, the author assumes that the considerations in this study do not refer to futuristic processes.

Concluding the introduction to this chapter, it is still necessary to point out that the term “management” will be understood as the process of planning and organizing the resources and activities of an entity in order to achieve certain goals in the most effective and efficient manner possible. In this approach, efficiency in management refers to the proper performance of tasks at minimum cost. In practical terms, we will try to show a sequence of activities, including (A) planning, (B) organizing, (C) motivating, and (D) monitoring the process of creating a Smart City. This chapter highlights the first and second management task areas.

2. Identification of stakeholder groups as the basis of the city knowledge acquisition plan

The next question that should be answered at this point is question Q5, or “Who?”. It was decided to use the concept of “stakeholders” as the basis for formulating this answer. The most popular definition of a stakeholder, by R. E. Freeman [17, 18] says that a stakeholder is any person or group that can influence or is influenced by the achievement of an organization’s goals.

It seems natural to assume that the undertakings discussed in this chapter must involve as many stakeholders as possible in the processes of creating and using smart urban space (Smart City). Thus, the author decided, as a first step, to identify the groups of stakeholders participating realistically or potentially in the processes of transforming urbanized space into smart space.

This study intentionally (see the above reference to question Q4) omits the theme of creating smart urban space from scratch. Such a theme results in visualizations available on the web, where we can see beautiful space and urban solutions, beautiful buildings, and lots of greenery, while there are usually no “down-to-earth” (or even “underground”) elements, not to mention the presence in this space, the so-called normal (not idealized) residents. We do not see there, for example, internal and external logistic routes, the problem of waste generated by the urbanized area, the presence of sources of environmental pollution in the urban space (dust, sewage, and noise), and many other, less pleasant effects of any space inhabited by humans. We also usually do not see the presence of inhabitants in such a space, treated not as an averaged population of a given size, but as a very complex social group, whose - perhaps - only common distinguishing feature is residence in one area. Above all, we do not see actual human behavior, both individual and group behavior, with the group generally representing only a part of the city’s population.

In addition, it is worth noting that not only residents can be perceived as users of the urban space which is intended to be transformed into a smart one. Such a space is, after all, an area of various activities of newcomers from outside the city, so they cannot be perceived as a homogeneous group. These include, in particular, people associated with the education system at various levels (from kindergartens to universities), i.e., teachers and students living outside the city, people conducting business in the city but living outside it, people employed in production and service companies, including, for example, stores or restaurants, also living outside the city, people visiting relatives and friends living in the city, and, finally, management entities of a regional and national nature with delegations (representative offices, offices, etc.) in the city, together with some of the staff coming from outside the city to their place of work. In some of the cities included in the S.C. processes, a significant group of public space users may also be tourists or pilgrims visiting places of worship. This should also include individuals or groups of individuals managing, respectively, facilities visited by tourists and places of worship with their infrastructure (e.g., temples). It is justified to ask whether these groups should also be treated as equal stakeholders in the above-mentioned processes.

For the purposes of this study, it was decided to consider the following as stakeholders in the process of transforming the city into a Smart City:

1. City authorities, empowered to make strategic planning decisions and budgetary decisions, including usually:

   1. Decision-making body: City Council.

   2. Executive body: the Mayor of the City and his deputy or deputies, together with the clerical structures that support him (City Hall).

   3. Other entities whose participation in decision-making regarding the operation of the city is conditioned by existing solutions of a legislative nature.

2. Managers of entities responsible for carrying out tasks in the area of broadly defined municipal management and the so-called own tasks of the city (e.g., in Poland such a task is the organization of education at the level of kindergartens and elementary schools) and managers of other public facilities (e.g., health care facilities or facilities of a cultural and sports or recreational nature).

3. City residents, both participating in the processes in question individually and through appropriate structures of a representative nature (residents’ associations, NGOs, neighborhood councils, etc.).

4. Providers of technical solutions that can be used in S.C. processes (primarily, but not exclusively, solutions from the ICT area).

5. Experts, supporting the activities of primarily the city government, but also stakeholders from other groups. The term “experts” is used here to describe all providers of knowledge complementing the stock of such knowledge possessed by the internal stakeholders indicated above to the extent necessary for effective city management.

The author decided not to include persons and entities “structurally external” to the analyzed urban organism in the list of stakeholders of S.C. processes presented above. Such a nature can be attributed, for example, to legislative bodies, creating the legal framework for the implementation of S.C. processes, or to control bodies, authorized by law to check the correctness of the implementation of these processes, both formally (e.g., compliance with the obligation to spend public funds in a tender formula) and financially. However, it was deemed necessary to take into account the participation of stakeholders from “external” groups (4) and (5) each time in the S.C. process, whose knowledge should, by definition, fill in the gaps in the body of knowledge held by internal stakeholders.

Each of the above-mentioned stakeholder groups has (potentially and realistically) a certain amount of knowledge, concerning the functioning of “its” urban organism. At the same time, it is reasonable to assume that such knowledge may not be sufficient to initiate and carry out the tasks of this particular group in transforming this organism into a smart urban space.

In the considerations presented here, it is important to perceive such transformation not as a project, but as a process. The project approach seems unjustified here insofar as activities aimed at transforming urban space into smart space cannot be closed in a specific time frame. After all, we are observing the constant development of all kinds of solutions, already used or possible to be used in space, defined by the term “Smart City.” The assumption that the possibilities of such development will be exhausted at some point seems unfounded.

Let us further assume that, in practical terms, the process of building a smart urbanized space can be perceived in a discrete manner, that is, as a sequence of discrete states of the process that follow one another, with a specific time step [19]. In this approach, we can conceive of the process as a film, and the instantaneous state of this process as a single frame of the film. Consequently, this chapter uses the term “S.C. process” in reference to the transformation of urban space into a smart space (Smart City) in the sense presented above. The tasks carried out as part of the process are sections of the film, in which the first frame shows the initial state and the last frame – the assumed target state.

The initial classification of tasks, also in the process of transforming urban space into smart space, should include:

1. To identify and describe a sequence of past states (the history of the process under study),

2. Identify and describe the current state of the process,

3. Determine, to the extent possible, the future of the process, e.g., using appropriate forecasting methods [20, 21, 22].

Transferring the above set of tasks to the field of research on knowledge in and about the Smart City, it is necessary to repeat the statement that the development of science and technology offers more and more opportunities to apply innovative solutions in making urban space more user-friendly (smarter?). The above statement determines the necessity for stakeholders, especially decision makers of S.C. processes, to keep up with such developments, also in terms of managing the knowledge necessary for their tasks. Therefore, the task plan, aimed at managing such a body of knowledge, should take into account, in addition to the need to initially identify the body of available knowledge and determine the means and ways of acquiring, collecting, and sharing it, the need to plan and organize adequate means and ways of supplementing such knowledge.

3. Knowledge of the city in the process of transforming this city into a smart space

Now let us ask how the concept of a “Smart City” relates to any existing and inhabited, larger or smaller city that has the ambition to be smart but is in a particular “existing (current) state.”

As indicated above, three groups of stakeholders from those indicated above naturally exist and function in any urban body: groups (1), (2), and (3). These are the groups that make up the “social infrastructure” of a given city and have, through the functioning of “structural” mechanisms, so to speak, for acquiring and collecting data, processing this data to obtain useful information and, as a result, creating a certain body of knowledge about that city.

Such knowledge primarily includes the history (in discrete process terms: a sequence of previous states over a pre-approved time horizon) and the current state of the city, identifiable in particular by:

1. Specific territorial conditions, such as the location of the city (region, country, continent, and climate zone) and specific neighborhoods affect, for example, the way municipal tasks are carried out. Nowadays, the formula of metropolises as peculiar communities of local government units, established by a group of neighboring units to jointly carry out specific tasks, is widespread. In the author’s place of residence (the region of Upper Silesia in Poland) there is a metropolitan structure (the Metropolis GZM), which unites 41 cities and municipalities with a total area of 2.5 thousand square kilometers, in which 2.3 million residents live. Within the GZM, most of its entities are in contact with each other’s borders, with the result that many cities border only cities (and not rural areas). Such a structure of neighborhoods has led to the decision of the Metropolitan Cities and Municipalities to delegate to the Metropolitan Management Board to carry out its own tasks of organizing public transportation in the entire area of the GZM.

2. Specific geographic, climatic, and geological conditions, that determine the manner of land development. We are talking, for example, about the need for specific solutions in the construction of buildings in earthquake zones, zones threatened by frequent river flooding, or, finally, zones in which existing and planned urban infrastructure may be threatened by the effects of such human activities as underground mining (surface damage caused by ground movements forced by mine operations) or open-pit mining (significantly affecting the state of groundwater).

3. Urban conditions, i.e., existing residential and non-residential buildings, historical monuments, green, recreational, and sports areas with their own infrastructure, places of religious worship, industrial areas with production facilities, etc.

4. Municipal infrastructure, i.e., road network, bridges, and viaducts, above- and underground rail networks (streetcar, subway, and railroad), electrical networks, gas pipelines, water pipelines, and sewage networks together with their own instrumentation (transformer stations, switching stations, pumping stations, and treatment plants)

5. The social profile of the city’s residents (number of residents, age profile, education, and property status).

6. Other historical and cultural conditions, such as the presence among the city’s residents of adherents of different religions, national minorities, or clusters of immigrants.

Such an existing reality conditions, on the one hand, an identified or identifiable, to a greater or lesser extent, specificity of knowledge needed in managing such an “urban reality” and, on the other hand, a specific set of end users, using such knowledge to a different extent and in different ways. In particular, such knowledge should be the basis for the initial decision to undertake the implementation of the process of transforming a city space into a smart space.

It should be borne in mind, of course, that first of all, the body of knowledge of a particular stakeholder group in a particular area is not, by definition, the same as that of another group. This is primarily due to the dissimilarity of knowledge acquisition channels. Secondly, on the other hand, the extent of knowledge collected and stored by stakeholders is strongly related to the ways in which such knowledge is used. Slightly generalizing, we can assume that stakeholders from the first group most often and most willingly use knowledge based on statistical data, the individual city resident is not interested in being an “average resident.” Instead, it is important for him to have detailed knowledge about his immediate environment: family, neighbors, and local community.

According to the author of this chapter, the factors differentiating the process of creating a Smart City “from scratch” and the process of transforming an existing and functioning urban organism into a Smart City are worth discussing at this point. Here we can notice key differences, conditioning the possibilities of knowledge acquisition and utilization.

In the first option, internal stakeholders - at least at the time of planning, organizing, and starting the process of building the target structure in practice do not exist. The city, which is just beginning to emerge or is still in the planning and design phase, has no residents, authorities, or municipal services, or has authorities in a seed state. Without fear of making a big mistake, it can be assumed that the people employed by the entity creating such a new structure will, for the vast majority, not be associated with it ultimately. This brings on a moral hazard to treat the target stakeholders in a maximally simplified and idealized way. This is evident in a great many studies dealing with S.C. The authors of the process usually devote only limited attention to the issue of the presence of residents in such a newly emerging urban organism. For example, it is assumed that all residents will be equally well educated and heavily involved in the S.C. process and that this involvement will be based on altruistic attitudes [23, 24]. It can be somewhat maliciously stated that the creators of such concepts most often wish that all residents of the newly created smart urbanized space will be young, beautiful, healthy, and at least tolerate (and perhaps love?) each other.

However, in option two, when attempting to transform existing urban space into smart space, we must face a much more difficult and complex problem. In particular, we cannot arbitrarily make simplifying (and usually facilitating) assumptions, but must take into account the “existing state,” both the state of the city’s inanimate matter and the state of its population, along with all the factors that impede - potentially and usually realistically - the S.C. process.

It is worth formulating a few more detailed questions at this point, such as:

• Can the characteristics of smart space be obtained by existing urban space and under what conditions?

• What means and ways can enable a city to achieve “smart” characteristics if such a process starts from “found” conditions?

Sometimes it is also worth asking (which can be extremely important in practice, especially for financial reasons):

• Can the process of a city acquiring the characteristics of “intelligence” be subject to staging?

• Whether the implementation and possible staging of Smart solutions can and should apply only to selected “sectoral” tasks (e.g., only the organization of public transportation or the system of supplying residents with water linked to the disposal of municipal wastewater)?

• What sectors of the city’s operations should and can be included in the transformation first?

• What order of implementation (rank of importance/relevance) should be adopted for each stage of the S.C. process?

An inquiry may also be warranted:

• What is the end goal of a given task in the S.C. process (what instantaneous state do we intend to achieve)?

• What resources are needed to achieve this goal?

• What preparatory activities are required to start the implementation of the task (e.g., change of the spatial development plan for part of the city, public consultations, obtaining external funding)?

• What is the deadline for achieving the end goal for this task?

It seems obvious that, just as the structures of any existing and functioning urban organism are created and developed in stages, the city’s intelligence is also worth building in a similar way. Since the S.C. process is multi-faceted, i.e., it involves many different aspects of the city’s functioning (e.g., communications, security, and waste management), the process stages oriented to these aspects can be implemented in parallel or partially overlap in time. However, it must be remembered that each aspect goal is part of an overarching goal: building a smart urban space. It is therefore necessary to ensure that the sub-tasks are properly coordinated. It is unacceptable, for example, if the implementation of a task from the area of implementing new transportation solutions significantly impedes the implementation of a task from the area of restructuring the system of water and sewage networks. In addition, if we have grounds for predicting that the results of the implementation of a particular stage of the S.C. process may change the rationale for the implementation of another “sectoral” stage, we should rather use a serial arrangement of such stages. For example, if we make changes to the road system, it is worth waiting until the completion of the implementation of this work to take measures aimed at reorganizing the public transportation system.

Let us also remember that the introduction of Smart solutions in the second of the considered variants of the S.C. process is carried out on the “living urban tissue,” which raises the necessity to take into account certain attitudes and behaviors of residents (sometimes resistance of some residents). It is worth for decision-makers to give all stakeholders time to get acquainted with and “get used to” the implemented solutions. Again, it is worth remembering that altruistic attitudes in the real world are the exception rather than the rule. City residents tend to consider proposals for change according to the criterion of their own benefit from the solution proposed under the S.C. project. Actions aimed at S.C. should therefore include, for example, specific actions to convince unconvinced residents of the transformed urban space of the benefits resulting from the introduction of new solutions, and then educate these residents in the use of the introduced solutions.

Reports of S.C. deployments in various parts of the world abound in the literature bases, such as [25, 26, 27], but the social dimension of such implementations is perhaps not sufficiently appreciated (and studied and then described) by their authors. A kind of fascination with technologies, especially ICT technologies, dominates the available studies, while - in the opinion of the author of this study - too little attention is paid to such factors as customs and culture at the place of implementation (taking into account the size of the “cultural leap” needed to achieve the assumed level of Smart), as well as the level of willingness of local residents to accept Smart solutions. Anyway, the latter factor is related to elements of behavior and attitudes that are “beyond geography” and “beyond culture,” such as fears stemming from technophobia, observed especially in older people [28].

Education needs appear to be crucial to the success of implementations of the type in question. It is still worth noting that while the available studies talk about educating the population [29, 30], educating decision-makers at various levels is extremely rarely mentioned. Similarly, an issue that is not very popular among researchers is the identification of the sources of knowledge about a particular city that may be available to the experts involved in the S.C. process (especially: external experts).

Another important issue, and unfortunately overlooked by many authors, is economic issues, for example, the amount of expenses required for the introduced solutions or the sources of funding for such expenses [31, 32]. In particular, a theme such as the ability of a city’s budget to bear the expenses needed for a given implementation is practically not addressed.

It is now necessary to consider how to manage the city, and ultimately how to manage the knowledge of the city:

1. Plan and organize activities aimed at inventorying the existing body of knowledge about the city, which is assumed to be the subject of the S.C. process, with identification of the gestors of such knowledge.

2. Plan and organize channels for acquiring missing knowledge before and during the tasks that make up the S.C. process,

3. Create an entity (or entities) authorized to use the knowledge it has in implementing the S.C. process,

4. Provide means and ways to replenish one’s knowledge base.

In particular, the above summary was conceived as a starting point for creating a list of knowledge resource needs necessary for effective Smart City management and associating such a list of needs with knowledge resources that are or should be held by participants in S.C. processes.

The matrix shown in Table 1 should:

1. Identify a specific knowledge resource or resources under the responsibility of only one of the stakeholders considered at a given stage of the analysis.

2. Recognize a detailed knowledge resource or resources under the responsibility of more than one stakeholder.

3. Identify such a body of knowledge among those deemed necessary at a given stage of analysis, which is not currently available to the process stakeholders being considered.

	Resource 1	Resource 2	Resource 3	Resource 4	Resource 5
Stakeholder 1	x	x	x
Stakeholder 2		x			x
Stakeholder 3			x
Stakeholder 4					x
External Participants (EP)
EP 1				x
EP 2		x		x
EP 3			x

Table 1.

Diagram of the matrix linking knowledge gestors to their area knowledge resources (own elaboration).

The last of the situations indicated above requires looking for managers of the required knowledge resources outside the organization implementing the process in question. Adding such managers in terms as in Table 1 will mean adding more rows to the table, labeled “external participant (EP).” We will finish the procedure of expanding the matrix when all the required detailed knowledge resources that we have decided to include have a manager indicated in the first column. It should also be assumed that external participants can contribute knowledge in areas already “developed” by stakeholders.

In particular, the analysis of the matrix shown in Table 1 can provide a basis for deciding whether it is possible and reasonable to modify the plan for the creation of a knowledge resource (e.g., for the S.C. process) in such a way that the missing elements of the resource, initially recognized as needed, may not be used at a given (e.g., initial) stage of the activity with the assumption that they will be obtained and used in subsequent stages of the process, if necessary. A negative answer to the above question means, of course, that experts or other external participants with the needed knowledge should be sought immediately.

If the process of acquiring detailed knowledge resources is complex and multi-threaded, it may be reasonable to use a solution that combines both paths indicated above. In particular, we can rank the needs [33] in terms of searching for managers of knowledge that we do not have at a given stage of the process and abandon a given resource at the current stage, at the same time launching a search for external participants according to the adopted hierarchy of needs.

Let us apply the above approach to the process of transforming urban space into smart space, i.e., to the S.C. process. Having made, described in this chapter, a preliminary analysis of the needs, concerning the use of detailed knowledge resources in the implementation of the process, and using the initially indicated set of participants (stakeholders) of the process, an attempt can and should be made to present how to create an adequate knowledge resource and use such knowledge in the management of the S.C. process.

In presenting a proposal for such a way below, the author of this chapter has primarily used his own experience related to:

• Many years of scientific and research work at the Silesian University of Technology, associated with the implementation of numerous research projects, including projects related to S.C. issues, as well as the development of publications, original expert reports, and evaluation of project funding applications, including those related to the broad topic of Smart Cities,

• Serving as a councilman and chairman of the City Council, and also as the deputy mayor of his City,

• Serving as a member of the executive body in the regional representation of local governments,

• Serving two four-year terms as a member of the Sejm of the Republic of Poland,

• Performing duties as a member of the Polish Parliament’s delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe during the aforementioned period.

4. Knowledge management in the process of transforming city space into smart space

Let us take the following assumption as the basis for the considerations presented below: knowledge about a particular city is the sum of the knowledge resources of stakeholders operating in that city and its environment (closer and further). This assumption is often repeated in scientific studies, the authors of which propose different approaches to how to integrate such knowledge. In the available literature, there are often works dealing with this issue and embedded in the medical field. There have also been studies of a review nature, such as [34]. Quite popular, for example, is the ontological approach [35, 36]. However, in the opinion of the author of this chapter, such proposals, although methodologically correct, have - in the perspective of participants in S.C. processes - the nature of a contrived intellectual experiment. It can be assumed that the vast majority of participants in such processes, in order to understand, for example, the meaning of the term “ontology,” must reach for a dictionary. Therefore, in this study, an attempt was made to take maximum account of practical aspects in the preparation and implementation of a specific S.C. process, with particular attention to the difficulties and problems in knowledge management, usually showing the gap between theory and practice.

Very often in the practice of S.C. processes, the starting point for the planning, preparation, and “launch” of the process is the implementation of a project aimed at developing a “Smart Strategy” for a given city. In order to organize further considerations, let us assume here that we will consider only S.C. projects falling within the group of Smart City 2.0 according to the proposal by B. Cohen, i.e., projects that are conducted (coordinated) by the authorities of a given city, and their implementation involves - to a greater or lesser extent - internal stakeholders of S.C. processes. However, experts or institutions employing experts (e.g., scientific and research entities) are often involved in the implementation of projects of the type in question, i.e., participants usually coming from outside a given urban body.

Smart Strategies are usually prepared for a specific time horizon and related to higher-level strategic documents, such as a city development strategy or spatial development plan. The Smart Strategy or related documents generally indicate the objective(s) to be achieved, which are then broken down into tasks to which contractors are assigned.

Let us further assume that the Smart Strategy was developed and - most often - adopted by resolution by the decision-making body (the City Council). Such a Strategy should include guidelines for practical considerations for the implementation of tasks, as indicated in the previous section.

In task (A), it is crucial to identify the city’s knowledge managers, which can be facilitated if such managers participate in the preparation of the Smart Strategy for the city. The next step is to assess the willingness of these managers to share their knowledge. This issue is raised in available studies, such as [37, 38] Although - in the opinion of the author of this study - the assumption that altruistic attitudes are the basis for the readiness for such sharing is not fully justified. It can be assumed that attempts to share knowledge, for example, by managers of municipal entities carrying out tasks in the area of municipal management, may be enforced by an official order issued by the governing body of the city. However, since employees with specific knowledge may find it difficult to articulate it, especially in the required form of, for example, rules, it may be reasonable, especially in the initial phase of the S.C. process, to try to implement a “meta-knowledge” formula (e.g. [39, 40, 41]). In such an approach, we take an inventory of knowledge managers while recording what knowledge assets these managers possess. Such an inventory should also be aimed at identifying such task areas for which the involvement of external experts is needed or will be necessary. An example of the use of the matrix notation, proposed previously (Table 1), to achieve such a goal is shown in Table 2.

	“Daily functioning” of the urban organism	Development strategies, investment projects	Public transport	Waste management	…
Internal; Stakeholders (IS)
City authorities and City Hall structures	x	x	x	x
Managers of entities, implementing tasks in the area of municipal management and the so-called own tasks of the city		x	x	x
City residents	x	x (?)	x (?)	x
External; Stakeholders (ES)
Municipal (metropolitan) association		x	x
Regional authorities		x

Table 2.

Diagram of the matrix linking participants in the S.C. process to their area knowledge resources about the city (own elaboration).

The assignment of stakeholders to knowledge areas as in Table 2 undoubtedly has a number of weaknesses. Undoubtedly, a major disadvantage of such an assignment is its static nature, so that, for example, it is not possible to take into account the impact of changes over time, affecting individual stakeholders, on the knowledge base held. The most obvious reason for such changes may be the tenure of the city government, and thus the impact of the emergence of new people in key decision-making positions (city councilors, mayor) as a result of elections. Another factor potentially affecting the knowledge resource of the stakeholder(s) of the S.C. processes in Group 2 is the mobility of employees, in this case, employees of the units implementing the city’s own tasks. The departure of an employee with a certain amount of useful, including for the S.C. process, knowledge may result in the loss of this resource. Therefore, a decision to create a formalized knowledge base, combining a description in the formula of “meta-knowledge” (knowledge about knowledge) combinedwith a record of a set of formulable rules, drawn up using knowledge engineering methods to assist the manager of the knowledge resource in its articulation and recording in a form, adopted as the basis for the knowledge base being created, may be justified.

Another problem, worth noting and considering, is the potential reluctance or inability of individuals (from different stakeholder groups) to share knowledge, especially to articulate the knowledge they have (e.g., in the form of rules). The author of this chapter, while appreciating the competence of knowledge engineers, does not believe in their omnipotence. Also, the supporting role of the knowledge engineer has limitations, if only due to the classic principle of “Garbage in, garbage out.” This problem, in the author’s opinion, also requires the implementation and execution of appropriate educational measures.

Finally, it is important to consider the nature of individual internal stakeholders’ knowledge about the city and the individual purposes for which this knowledge is acquired and collected. A city resident accumulates individual knowledge, such as facilitating his or her movement around the city area and the offer of different types of transportation, knowledge of places for good shopping or successful recreation but also knowledge of effective ways to break through various administrative barriers to deal with day-to-day matters, especially administrative ones.

A body of knowledge is being created, which should also be available to city managers and allow them to improve “office-citizen” contacts. These are often no-cost or low-cost measures, and their successful implementation can significantly improve residents’ assessment of the quality of life in their city.

In summary, in planning the S.C. process, one should:

1. Plan and organize activities aimed at inventorying the existing body of knowledge about the city, which is assumed to be the subject of the S.C. process, with identification of the gestors of such knowledge.

2. Plan and organize channels for acquiring missing knowledge before and during the tasks that make up the S.C. process,

3. Create an entity (or entities) authorized to collect and share, as well as protect the knowledge held in the implementation of the S.C. process,

4. Provide means and ways to replenish one’s knowledge base.

Composed of the above-mentioned elements, the action plan should lead to a state in which the implementers of the S.C. process have a body of knowledge, recorded and accessible according to knowledge management theory. However, at this point, it is worth referring to practice, which often contradicts theoretical assumptions.

5. Subjective review of problems in the practice of urban knowledge management

In the previous sections of this chapter, the main attention was devoted to the analysis of conditions which, in matrix terms presented in Table 1 and Table 2, can be described by the term “horizontal” (described by the rows of this matrix). Let us now try to consider the problems, described in the columns of this matrix. In particular, these are the problems shown in those columns where the body of “sectoral” knowledge is held by more than one manager of such knowledge.

Consider, for example, the column of the matrix shown in Table 2, described as “Daily functioning of the urban organism.” This column identifies the city government as knowledge managers, supported by clerical structures (the City Hall) and residents. Let us try to describe the peculiarities of the knowledge base of the two mentioned managers.

The body of knowledge about the functioning of the urban organism, which is the responsibility of the city authorities, includes knowledge about the history and current image of this organism, generated both by numerous channels of information of a statistical nature and by the recording of individual residents’ matters processed by the City Hall structures. It is worth noting that information, generating the knowledge resource of city decision-makers, should, as a rule, be open and accessible to city residents (with exceptions defined by relevant legal regulations). The body of knowledge of the city authorities is used in the procedure of individual matters of residents, but first of all, it is the basis for activities related to the adoption of decisions of a strategic nature by these authorities, such as budget decisions or decisions of a planning nature (e.g., regarding the city’s spatial development plan), as well as the basis for the preparation of strategic documents.

Knowledge, which remains the responsibility of each resident, is of a completely different nature. The body of this knowledge consists primarily of personal experience acquired during the period of residence in a given space, combined with knowledge derived from the social relations existing in the space. It is also worth noting that such “individual knowledge” usually contains a significant base of tacit knowledge and - especially in some cultural and political systems - a component of the base which the author proposes to call “covered knowledge.” This term describes, in particular, knowledge of relationships and dependencies, including family and social relationships, allowing for faster and more efficient handling of official matters.

Comparing the descriptions of the knowledge resources of the two “city stakeholders” presented above, one can come to the conclusion that these resources are completely incompatible and cannot form the basis for joint action. However, in the author’s opinion, attempting to find solutions (perhaps of an organizational and formal nature) that would, for example, limit the needs of city residents to own and use the above-mentioned “covered knowledge resource” would contribute significantly to the overall goal of the Smart City, that is, broadly understood, to improve the quality of life in the city. It needs to be noted that this is an example of improving the level of intelligence of the city without the need to purchase and implement advanced ICT solutions. Since the recommendation to make an attempt should be correlated with an indication of who should make the attempt, the author is of the opinion that in the search for an agreement between city authorities and residents, the initiating party should be the first mentioned stakeholder of the S.C. process.

Another example to consider is described in the column of the matrix shown in Table 2 “Development strategies, investment projects.” Since decisions of a strategic nature obviously affect all stakeholders in S.C. processes, they should participate as actively as possible in the preparation of the relevant documents. In addition, since every urban organism functions in a certain environment, the need to take into account knowledge of similar decisions in neighboring entities and at the superordinate level (the city’s development strategy cannot be completely disconnected from the development strategy of the region in which the city is located) seems obvious when preparing the strategies and development plans. Hence, the demand for the participation of external stakeholders (in Table 2 “municipal (metropolitan) association” and “regional authorities,” respectively). Let us skip the description of the detailed knowledge requirements, which are the responsibility of all the entities included in this column, and focus on the postulate for the participation of residents in the preparation of development strategies (in particular: Smart strategies). Such a postulate seems obvious, but - as the author’s practical experience shows - it is extremely difficult to implement. Hence, the question mark in the corresponding box of the matrix shown in Table 2. In the literature we can find numerous studies devoted to the implementation of the model of public participation in the activities of public administration (e.g., [42] or [43]). However, practice usually looks different from theory. In such practice, the participation of residents in all forms of public consultations, the carrying out of which is often, for example, in the development of strategies or changes to spatial development plans, a legal requirement, attracts a small group of residents (in a city with a population of about 200,000 such consultations usually involve at most a few dozen people), usually belonging to one of two categories:

1. Persons directly concerned, such as owners of land covered by the development plan amendment under preparation,

2. Skeptics, that is, people who contest every solution according to the principle: “No because no, we are attached to what is, we do not want novelty.”

When preparing and implementing S.C. processes, we should also take into account not only the lack of interest of the general public but also various forms of resistance to change by some residents or groups of residents. It therefore becomes a necessity to implement all possible ways of educating Smart Cities stakeholders, both to involve them in the process of shaping their place of life and its surroundings and to make proper use of its “smart” capabilities obtained in the S.C. process. Once again, the city government should be the natural initiator of such activities.

Yet another type of problem is described in the matrix, shown in Table 2, by the “Public Transportation”. At the intersection of this column and the “City residents” row, a question mark also appears next to an indication of knowledge possessed by city residents, useful in solving problems from the indicated area (an “x”). By analyzing the sample competencies and knowledge resources of individual stakeholders:

• City authorities: issuing location decisions for public transportation infrastructure elements and, most often, financing this infrastructure.

• Managers the aforementioned infrastructure: purchase and maintenance of rolling stock.

• Metropolitan union: coordination of route network, timetables, passenger information

We come across the problem of locating the routes of transportation lines and the location of bus stops. Agreeing in principle with the need to implement public participation in all activities affecting a city resident, the author believes that it will usually be justified to adopt the use of solutions adopted arbitrarily in this case. Because, most often, when discussing the location of the transportation line and stops, it turns out that everyone involved wants the line to run not directly next to their property (because of noise, vibration, and increased traffic) but very close (because then you do not have to walk far). The same applies to the location of stops. Since it is impossible to meet all such expectations, it may be worth limiting residents’ influence on decisions until residents develop the right pro-community attitudes.

6. Conclusions

Research on the possibilities and needs for transforming urban space in such a way as to make the space as friendly as possible to its users (city residents, but not exclusively) covers more and more new problem areas.

In addition to problems such as the impact of large built-up areas on the local climate (so-called urban heat islands [44]), research is being undertaken on socially motivated phenomena, such as the occurrence of “exclusion” phenomena in cities [45]. Quite a few studies are described, showing a view of the intentions to create a Smart City from the side of communities, variously excluded or isolated (as well as self-excluded and self-isolated) in the functioning urban organism. One can sadly state that city authority, and, unfortunately, some researchers behind them, are eager to show, for example, smart traffic light management, downtown parking space management, or a Smart City information system. Hidden away, or perhaps only in the realm of understatement, are the possible expectations and needs of residents of parts of the city inhabited by ethnic minorities, or parts of the city where there is a phenomenon that can be enigmatically described as an “area with a reduced standard of living space” remain hidden, or perhaps only understated. On the other hand, in many cities, we are dealing with the phenomenon of creating enclaves of substandard living, referred to by the term “gentrification” [46].

Therefore, the author of this chapter wants to clearly emphasize that the thoughts presented herein are an attempt to describe the current state. Undoubtedly, however, the problems of knowledge of the urban organism, the construction and management of the resources of such knowledge, and the making of decisions based on this knowledge are and will remain both the subject of research by scientists and the subject of the practice of the stakeholders of the processes taking place in the urban organism, such as S.C. processes.

Abbreviations

S.C.: Smart City
S.C. process: process focused on creating intelligent urban space
IT: informatic techniques/informatic tools
ICT: information and communication technologies
5 W + H model: model based on answering the questions: What?, Why?, Where?, When?, Who? and How? (to do something, to solve some problem)
NGO: Non-Governmental Organization