Smart City EU - Lighthouse Projects – Investigation of Economic Benefits

The major European Smart City Lighthouse Projects have gained a lot of attention and importance from the designers of Smart City Initiatives (SCI) since 2014. The EU Commission's funding under the Horizon 2020 program is significant. The supported cities include the European metropolises but also several smaller cities. All these cities are repeatedly named Smart City pioneers. However, the research still has a gap when it comes to value generation. This article deals with the economic benefits of these Lighthouse projects. The own developed categories are applied and proved with Lighthouse projects. The range of economic benefits is shown and evaluated using the qualitative content analysis of the data from the EU - CORDIS database. The sustainability in the Smart City Initiatives is showcased as economic benefit is prioritized higher than cost saving or efficiency.

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Smart Governance of City’s Culture: Theoretical and Empirical Aspects

Socialiniai tyrimai ◽

10.21277/st.v43i1.300 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 43 (1) ◽

pp. 5-19

Author(s):

Rytis Milkintas

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Theoretical Model ◽

Smart City ◽

Smart Cities ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

General Level ◽

City Management ◽

Cultural Management ◽

Cultural Field ◽

City Culture

The goal of the research is to prepare a theoretical model of smart cultural governance and to evaluate the smart cultural management of Šiauliai city according to it. The background of creating a smart culture governance model is to define the theoretical constructs of smart city and smart culture management by looking for correlations between these concepts in order to closely link cultural management with the implementation of cultural policy in city management processes and to highlight the specifics of smart cultural management. A systematic model of a smart city is formed and presented, of which cultural management is an integral part. The model highlights the links between cultural management and other dimensions of the smart city. The theoretical model of smart culture management, which was adapted to investigate the expression of smart culture management in Šiauliai city, is presented. This kind of research has not been done so far in analyzing smart culture management in Šiauliai city. The need for the research was inspired by culture specialists of Šiauliai City Municipality Administration and heads of cultural institutions. The qualitative content analysis of theoretical sources of foreign countries and Lithuania was conducted as well as in-depth interviews to collect information that was processed through qualitative content analysis and systematized using matrices. The assessment of model expression based on the informants’ attitudes enabled the researcher to draw substantive conclusions.The research is relevant to Šiauliai city culture field institutions (private, subordinate municipality, subordinate to the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania), Šiauliai city culture field policymakers. In a broader sense, the improvement in the quality of the intelligent social system highlighted in the study will significantly contribute to the general level of culture in Šiauliai. These positive changes will be experienced by the recipients of cultural services.Further research in the field of smart city cultural management is planned to analyze not only the situation of Šiauliai city but also the cultural field of Lithuania as a whole, in connection with the practices of the international cultural field. It is planned to study the smoothness of the transformation of cultural field institutions, adaptation to smart cultural management, and the emerging challenges. Further research is planned to analyze the scientific studies prepared by smart cities, to look for specific actions highlighted in them, challenges for the cultural sector in adapting to the gradual transformation of cities into smart cities.

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“To protect national sovereignty from the EU?” The 2019 EP elections and populist parties in V4 countries

10.31439/unisci-98 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 18 (54) ◽

pp. 71-106

Author(s):

Vladimír Naxera ◽

◽

Viktor Glied ◽

Ondřej Filipec ◽

Małgorzata Kaczorowska ◽

...

Keyword(s):

European Union ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

The Other ◽

Election Campaign ◽

The European Union ◽

Central European ◽

Contemporary State ◽

Election Manifestos ◽

The Eu

This article analyses the 2019 European Parliament (EP) election manifestos of populist parties in V4 countries as a contribution to the contemporary discussion on political populism. The aim of the study is to analyze the election campaign programs which populist parties operating in individual V4 countries presented for EP elections in 2019, using a qualitative content analysis of the official election programs of relevant populist parties and other sources of their communication. It tries to identify topics that have been framed as a problem or risk by Central European populists and how these topics have been interpreted in their programs. The so-called “immigration crisis” and the contemporary state of the European Union are seen as the most problematic topics by a majority of the populists. On the other hand, the majority of these parties do not want some Central European version of Brexit. Their rhetorical goal is rather the reform the Union.

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User Perception of a Smartphone App to Promote Physical Activity Through Active Transportation: Inductive Qualitative Content Analysis Within the Smart City Active Mobile Phone Intervention (SCAMPI) Study (Preprint)

10.2196/preprints.19380 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Anna-Karin Lindqvist ◽

Stina Rutberg ◽

Emmie Söderström ◽

Anna Ek ◽

Christina Alexandrou ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Physical Activity ◽

Randomized Controlled Trial ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Mobile Phone ◽

Smart City ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Controlled Trial ◽

Active Transportation ◽

Smartphone App ◽

Randomized Controlled

BACKGROUND Physical inactivity is globally recognized as a major risk factor for morbidity, particularly the incidence of noncommunicable diseases. Increasing physical activity (PA) is therefore a public health priority. Engaging in active transportation (AT) is a viable approach for promoting daily PA levels. Mobile health interventions enable the promotion of AT to a larger population. The Smart City Active Mobile Phone Intervention (SCAMPI) study was a randomized controlled trial designed to evaluate the ability of a behavior change program delivered via a smartphone app to motivate participants to increase their PA by engaging in AT. OBJECTIVE This qualitative study aims to examine the acceptance and user experience of the app promoting AT that was used in the SCAMPI trial (the TRavelVU Plus app). METHODS A total of 17 residents of Stockholm County (13 women; age range 25-61 years) who completed the 3-month app-based behavioral change program (delivered through the TRavelVU Plus app) in the SCAMPI randomized controlled trial during 2018 agreed to participate in a semistructured telephone-based interview. These participants were well representative of the whole intervention group (n=127) in terms of baseline characteristics such as age, sex, and area of residence. The interviews were audiorecorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using an inductive qualitative content analysis. RESULTS The content analysis revealed 2 themes and 4 subcategories. The first theme, “main motivators: monitoring and messages,” highlighted that monitoring AT and being able to set weekly goals using the app were the primary motivators reported by study participants. The second theme, “acceptable but modifiable,” reflects that the app was well accepted and effectively encouraged many participants to use more AT. Nevertheless, there were functions in the app that require modification. For example, while the semiautomated travel tracking feature was appreciated, participants found it time-consuming and unreliable at times. CONCLUSIONS This study contributes novel insight into adults’ experiences of using a mobile app to promote the use of AT. The results showed that the app was well accepted and that self-monitoring and goal setting were the main motivators to engage in more AT. The semiautomated tracking of AT was appreciated; however, it was also reported to be energy- and time-consuming when it failed to work. Thus, this feature should be improved going forward. CLINICALTRIAL ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03086837; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03086837 INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT RR2-10.1186/s12889-018-5658-4

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Public Participation in Smart-City Governance: A Qualitative Content Analysis of Public Comments in Urban China

10.20944/preprints202009.0195.v1 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Zhe Gao ◽

Siqin Wang ◽

Jiang Gu

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Public Participation ◽

Smart City ◽

Urban Governance ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Analytical Framework ◽

Urban China ◽

Private Governance ◽

Negative Comments ◽

Urban Problems

Public participation is crucial in the process of urban governance in smart-city initiatives to enable urban planners and policy makers to take account of the real public needs. Our study aims to develop an analytical framework using citizen-centred qualitative data to analyse urban problems and identify the areas most needed for urban governance. Taking a Chinese megacity as the study area, we first utilise a web-crawling tool to retrieve public comments from an online comment board and employ the Baidu Application Programming Interfaces and a qualitative content analysis for data reclassification. We then analyse the urban problems reflected by negative comments in terms of their statistical and spatial distribution, and the associative factors to explain their formation. Our findings show that urban problems are dominantly related to construction and housing, and most frequently appear in industry-oriented areas and newly-developed economic development zones on the urban fringe, where the reconciling of government-centered governance and private governance by real estate developers and property management companies are most needed. Areas with higher land price and a higher proportion of aged population tend to have less urban problems, while various types of civil facilities affect the prevalence of urban problems differently.

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Donbas crisis key actors: narratives and perceptions in the interviews of Ukrainian elites

Cognition communication discourse ◽

10.26565/2218-2926-2018-17-07 ◽

2018 ◽

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Narrative Theory ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Decision Makers ◽

Valuable Insight ◽

Eu Member States ◽

Constructive Dialogue ◽

The Usa ◽

Nuanced Understanding ◽

The Eu

This article examines real events, their perceptions and narratives concerned with the key actors in the Donbas crisis – Ukraine, the EU/EU member states, Russia and the USA. Perceptions and narratives are traced in the texts of interviews with Ukrainian policy- and decision-makers from political, business, cultural, and civic cohorts (40 respondents). The elites were interviewed in the winter of 2016 within the framework of the Jean Monnet Network “Crisis, conflict and critical diplomacy: EU perceptions in Ukraine and Israel/Palestine” (C3EU), supported by Earsmus+ program of the European Commission. Informed by the strategic narrative theory [Miskimmon et al. 2013], the article undertakes a qualitative content analysis of the interview texts, explicating elite perceptions of the crisis in Donbas. The results spell the need for a more nuanced understanding of Ukraine’s perceptions of key actors in the ongoing conflict as well as the origin of these perceptions. Arguably, such understanding may benefit the EU’s critical diplomacy towards Ukraine and add a valuable insight to the constructive dialogue between Ukraine and the EU.

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Assessing the Effects of Directive 2014/95/EU on Nonfinancial Information Reporting: Evidence from Italian and Spanish Listed Companies

Administrative Sciences ◽

10.3390/admsci11030089 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (3) ◽

pp. 89

Author(s):

Stefanía Carolina Posadas ◽

Lara Tarquinio

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Comparative Analysis ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Progressive Reduction ◽

Nonfinancial Information ◽

Country Level ◽

Information Reporting ◽

Before And After ◽

Cross Country ◽

The Eu

This paper explored the effects of new regulation on the disclosure of NFI in two European countries, Italy and Spain. The method used to develop the analysis is mainly qualitative. Content analysis was performed to verify the sustainability indicators disclosed by Italian and Spanish companies, listed on the FTSE MIB and IBEX 35 Indexes, before and after the Directive’s publication and implementation in national legislation. The level of NFI disclosure was scored using a disclosure index. The comparative analysis found a progressive reduction in disclosure levels for Italian companies compared with Spanish companies, for which an expansion of the disclosure was detected. Moreover, a reduced gap between the quantity of NFI reported in the two countries was found. This is one of the few studies to use a 3-year longitudinal analysis to investigate the EU Directive’s impact at the cross-country level.

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EU Smart City Lighthouse Projects between Top-Down Strategies and Local Legitimation: The Case of Hamburg

Urban Planning ◽

10.17645/up.v5i1.2531 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 5 (1) ◽

pp. 107-115 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Katharina Lange ◽

Jörg Knieling

Keyword(s):

Smart City ◽

Local Governance ◽

Early Stage ◽

Smart Cities ◽

Single Case ◽

Pilot Project ◽

The European Union ◽

Horizon 2020 ◽

State Of Research ◽

The Eu

The concept of the smart city has become increasingly popular in recent years and a large number of cities globally follow smart city strategies. By awarding subsidies in the Horizon 2020 programme, the European Union (EU) has taken on an influential role in how smart city projects are conceived and implemented in European municipalities. Using the example of the smart city pilot project mySMARTLife in Hamburg, the purpose of this article is to examine the area of tension between strategically pursuing own objectives and adjustment to external provisions of the EU funding framework. In a qualitative single case study, the article analyses what implications the project mySMARTLife has on urban development practice and local governance arrangements in Hamburg. Examining current literature on smart cities from the perspective of multi-level governance and presenting the current state of research dealing with EU smart city projects, a theoretical framework is developed. The analysis reveals that, due to the EU funding framework, precise project contents are contractually defined at an early stage when local stakeholders have limited involvement in this process. Furthermore, the analysis shows that the EU smart city funding in the project mySMARTLife is more limited to the implementation of individual interventions than to a comprehensive smart city strategy. As a result, this article considers EU-funded smart city initiatives as experimental fields that enable cities to gain experiences that can be incorporated into local strategic development objectives.

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An international study of technology enhanced learning-related strategies from the perspective of disruptive innovation

Interactive Technology and Smart Education ◽

10.1108/itse-11-2019-0077 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 17 (4) ◽

pp. 475-488

Author(s):

Michael Flavin ◽

Valentina Quintero

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

International Study ◽

Disruptive Innovation ◽

Technology Enhanced Learning ◽

Or Efficiency ◽

Content Type ◽

World University Rankings ◽

Institutional Strategies ◽

Enhanced Learning

Purpose The purpose of this study was to analyse institutional strategy documents relating to technology-enhanced learning. Design/methodology/approach In total, 84 documents were sampled from 71 leading higher education institutions (HEIs), identified through the Quacquarelli Symonds World University Rankings 2018. Qualitative content analysis with a directed approach was used to analyse the strategy documents. The specific theory used was disruptive innovation. The use of “innovation”, or variants thereof, was counted in each document. Ten case studies from the sample were used for content analysis. Findings Technology-enhanced learning-related strategy documents are conservative, advocating the more efficient use of existing technologies, or the incremental enhancement of existing technologies, but not transformation through technology. Originality/value By evaluating the extent to which selected institutional strategies engage with innovation in technology-enhanced learning, this study argues HEIs advocate sustaining innovation or efficiency innovation to a greater extent than disruptive innovation.

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Public Participation in Smart-City Governance: A Qualitative Content Analysis of Public Comments in Urban China

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su12208605 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (20) ◽

pp. 8605

Author(s):

Zhe Gao ◽

Siqin Wang ◽

Jiang Gu

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Public Participation ◽

Smart City ◽

Urban Governance ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Analytical Framework ◽

Urban China ◽

Private Governance ◽

Negative Comments ◽

Urban Problems

Public participation is crucial in the process of urban governance in smart-city initiatives to enable urban planners and policy makers to take account of the real public needs. Our study aims to develop an analytical framework using citizen-centred qualitative data to analyse urban problems and identify the areas most needed for urban governance. Taking a Chinese megacity as the study area, we first utilise a web-crawling tool to retrieve public comments from an online comment board and employ the Baidu Application Programming Interfaces and a qualitative content analysis for data reclassification. We then analyse the urban problems reflected by negative comments in terms of their statistical and spatial distribution, and the associative factors to explain their formation. Our findings show that urban problems are predominantly related to construction and housing, and most frequently appear in industry-oriented areas and newly developed economic development zones on the urban fringe, where the reconciling of government-centred governance and private governance by real estate developers and property management companies is most needed. Areas with higher land prices and a higher proportion of aged population tend to have fewer urban problems, while various types of civil facilities affect the prevalence of urban problems differently.

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User Perception of a Smartphone App to Promote Physical Activity Through Active Transportation: Inductive Qualitative Content Analysis Within the Smart City Active Mobile Phone Intervention (SCAMPI) Study

JMIR mhealth and uhealth ◽

10.2196/19380 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 8 (8) ◽

pp. e19380

Author(s):

Anna-Karin Lindqvist ◽

Stina Rutberg ◽

Emmie Söderström ◽

Anna Ek ◽

Christina Alexandrou ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Physical Activity ◽

Randomized Controlled Trial ◽

Content Analysis ◽

Mobile Phone ◽

Smart City ◽

Qualitative Content Analysis ◽

Controlled Trial ◽

Active Transportation ◽

Smartphone App ◽

Randomized Controlled

Background Physical inactivity is globally recognized as a major risk factor for morbidity, particularly the incidence of noncommunicable diseases. Increasing physical activity (PA) is therefore a public health priority. Engaging in active transportation (AT) is a viable approach for promoting daily PA levels. Mobile health interventions enable the promotion of AT to a larger population. The Smart City Active Mobile Phone Intervention (SCAMPI) study was a randomized controlled trial designed to evaluate the ability of a behavior change program delivered via a smartphone app to motivate participants to increase their PA by engaging in AT. Objective This qualitative study aims to examine the acceptance and user experience of the app promoting AT that was used in the SCAMPI trial (the TRavelVU Plus app). Methods A total of 17 residents of Stockholm County (13 women; age range 25-61 years) who completed the 3-month app-based behavioral change program (delivered through the TRavelVU Plus app) in the SCAMPI randomized controlled trial during 2018 agreed to participate in a semistructured telephone-based interview. These participants were well representative of the whole intervention group (n=127) in terms of baseline characteristics such as age, sex, and area of residence. The interviews were audiorecorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using an inductive qualitative content analysis. Results The content analysis revealed 2 themes and 4 subcategories. The first theme, “main motivators: monitoring and messages,” highlighted that monitoring AT and being able to set weekly goals using the app were the primary motivators reported by study participants. The second theme, “acceptable but modifiable,” reflects that the app was well accepted and effectively encouraged many participants to use more AT. Nevertheless, there were functions in the app that require modification. For example, while the semiautomated travel tracking feature was appreciated, participants found it time-consuming and unreliable at times. Conclusions This study contributes novel insight into adults’ experiences of using a mobile app to promote the use of AT. The results showed that the app was well accepted and that self-monitoring and goal setting were the main motivators to engage in more AT. The semiautomated tracking of AT was appreciated; however, it was also reported to be energy- and time-consuming when it failed to work. Thus, this feature should be improved going forward. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03086837; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03086837 International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) RR2-10.1186/s12889-018-5658-4

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