New Project retained for funding, "Digital Urban Development — How large digital corporations shape the field of urban governance (DIGI-GOV)"

We are happy to announce that the following project was awarded funding by the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) under its CORE Programme: 

Digital Urban Development - How large digital corporations shape the field of urban governance (DIGI-GOV, C20/SC/14691212)

Principal Investigator: Dr. Constance Carr, Department of Geography & Spatial Planning (DGEO)

Abstract (longer summary to follow soon!)

DIGI-GOV aims to understand the role of large digital corporations (LDCs) in digital urban development, how the presence of LDCs in urban planning practice challenge pre-existing modes urban governance, and how LDC-led urban development constitutes a new relational geography of digital cities. DIGI-GOV is thus a chance to call international scholarly attention to, and raise awareness among local practitioners concerning, this critical shift in the ways that contemporary digital cities are constructed, planned, mediated and governed.

DIGI-GOV is an expansion to DIG_URBGOV (Carr/Hesse 2019) that examined Alphabet Inc.’s (the parent company to Google) digital city project in Toronto that raised important issues for urban planners, development practitioners, and urban studies scholars everywhere (Carr/Hesse 2020a/b). DIGI-GOV expands on this research because the range of platform services provided by LDCs is not only increasing in volume but also in centrality, as more and more public and private institutions rely on these as essential digital infrastructures, modifying socio-political and intuitional patterns that characterize contemporary urbanity and challenging modes urban governance. There is thus an urgent need to study the trajectories of urbanization that are rolled out under the leadership of LDCs and the tensions in urban governance that are unleashed. Adding a comparative dimension, DIGI-GOV looks at several cities, in addition to Toronto, that have been challenged by the presence of LDCs—Seattle, Arlington, Bissen, and Eemshaven—and teases out how these cities are relationally connected through LDC-led urban development on one hand, and what practitioners can learn from these experiences on the other. The methodology is qualitative and focusses on the contextuality and processuality of urbanization in each case. It also reflective through open deep dives that ensure that the research is buttressed against latest developments in the field while awakening debate and fostering transversal knowledge exchange.

The DIGI-GOV project responds to challenges recognized at all levels of policy-making: The European Commission’s (EC) priority of “A Europe fit for the Digital Age” (EC 2020a) and strategy of “Shaping Europe’s Digital Future” (EC 2020b); and, the Luxembourg Government’s mission of “harnessing digitalization as a tool for positive transformation [and related understanding that] infrastructure [as] foundation for the future” (Digital Luxembourg 2020a, 2020b); and the Luxembourg government’s National Research Priorities, articulated in, “Sustainable and Responsible Development” (FNR 2020, 4).

This 3-year project will build a four-person team: a post-doc, a PhD, and two Master students. DIGI-GOV also looks forward to further collaboration with networks established through DIG_URBGOV such as the CITY Institute, York University, the German Academy for Spatial Research and Planning (ARL), the International Network of Urban Research and Action (INURA), and many other colleagues who supported DIG_URBGOV along the way.

Get in contact if you want to get involved!

References

Carr, C/Hesse, M. 2019. Digital Urbanism and the Challenge of Urban Governance (DIG_URBGOV) – Short Research Summary. https://orbilu.uni.lu/handle/10993/39673
Carr, C., Hesse, M. 2020a. When Alphabet Inc. Plans Toronto’s Waterfront: New Post-Political Modes of Urban Governance, Urban Planning, 5:1, 69-83.
Carr, C. Hesse, M, 2020b. Sidewalk Labs closed down - whither Google's smart city? RSA Regions 10.1080/13673882.2020.00001070
Digital Luxembourg 2020a. “Harnessing digitalization as a tool for positive transformation” https://digital-luxembourg.public.lu
Digital Luxembourg 2020b. Infrastructure, foundations for the future. https://digital-luxembourg.public.lu/priorities/infrastructure
EC 2020a. “A Europe fit for the Digital Age” https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age_en
EC 2020b “Shaping Europe’s Digital Future” https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age/shaping-europe-digital-future_en
FNR 2020. CORE 2020 Programme Description. https://storage.fnr.lu/index.php/s/wTjSHEqbzwcFOwN/download