Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Begoña G. Otero and Stefaan G. Verhulst: “The concept of digital twins has quickly become the new darling of the smart city world. By 2030, more than 500 cities plan to launch some kind of digital twin platform, often wrapped in dazzling promises: immersive 3D models of entire neighborhoods, holographic maps of traffic flows, real-time dashboards of carbon emissions. These visuals capture headlines and the political imagination. But beneath the glossy graphics lies a harder question: what actually makes a digital twin useful, trustworthy, and sustainable?

Having recently worked directly on a U.S. metropolitan digital twin pilot, we know the answer is not just shiny and sophisticated imagery. A genuine twin is a living ecosystem of different stakeholders and diverse datasets — integrating maps, open government data, IoT sensors, predictive AI models, synthetic data, and mobility data into a single responsive platform. Done right, a digital twin becomes a decision-making sandbox: where planners can simulate how pedestrianizing a street shifts congestion, for example, or how a Category 3 hurricane might inundate vulnerable neighborhoods.

If the initial rush of digital twin projects has taught anything, it’s that technology alone is not enough. Building a functional digital twin is as much an institutional and governance challenge as a technical one. The platform must integrate data from multiple sources, including government departments, private firms, utilities, researchers, and other relevant entities. Global leaders in the field, from Singapore’s Virtual Singapore to Orlando’s much-publicized holographic twin, have all discovered the same truth: the long-term value of a twin depends not on its graphics but on its data governance. Singapore’s twin works because its government mandated cross-agency data sharing. Orlando’s flashy prototype only turned serious when planners acknowledged that its future hinges on becoming an open ecosystem where utilities, agencies, and even residents can contribute data.

In practice, however, the necessary data is often scattered and siloed. European pilots have shown this clearly: the obstacle was not imagining use cases but finding and accessing the data to make them possible. In the OASC pilot regions, such as Athens and Pilsen, project teams reported that the biggest hurdle was that much of the relevant data sat in silos — owned by private firms, higher levels of government, or agencies unused to thinking of themselves as data stewards. Even when data existed, municipalities often lacked clear mandates, agreements, or technical workflows to integrate it responsibly.

The same applied in Helsinki, which today runs one of the most advanced city twins in Europe. Before reaching that point, the city had to spend years building a reliable data repository, common standards, and trust agreements with residents to ensure equitable use of information. Similarly, in the UK, the Gemini Principles and the subsequent National Digital Twin programme were born out of recognition that without shared governance, data would remain fragmented across sectors such as energy, transport, and the environment. Both cases show that even resource-rich contexts face governance hurdles first; technology comes later.

The lesson is clear: digital twins will only move beyond hype if we treat them as governance infrastructures, not visual spectacles. That means aligning the concept with frameworks of data governance, collaboration, and digital self-determination — in the process, ensuring that digital twins serve public purposes, respect local contexts, and empower communities to shape how their data is used…(More)”

Paper by Yu Zheng et al: “City plans are the product of integrating human creativity with emerging technologies, which continuously evolve and reshape urban morphology and environments. Here we argue that large language models hold large untapped potential in addressing the growing complexities of urban planning and enabling a more holistic, innovative and responsive approach to city design. By harnessing their advanced generation and simulation capabilities, large language models can contribute as an intelligent assistant for human planners in synthesizing conceptual ideas, generating urban designs and evaluating the outcomes of planning efforts…(More)”.

Paper by Anna Colom and Marta Poblet: “In our digital world, reusing data to inform: decisions, advance science, and improve people’s lives should be easier than ever. However, the reuse of data remains limited, complex, and challenging. Some of this complexity requires rethinking consent and public participation processes about it. First, to ensure the legitimacy of uses, including normative aspects like agency and data sovereignty. Second, to enhance data quality and mitigate risks, especially since data are proxies that can misrepresent realities or be oblivious to the original context or use purpose. Third, because data, both as a good and infrastructure, are the building blocks of both technologies and knowledge of public interest that can help societies work towards the well-being of their people and the environment. Using the case study of the European Health Data Space, we propose a multidimensional, polytopic framework with multiple intersections to democratising decision-making and improving the way in which meaningful participation and consent processes are conducted at various levels and from the point of view of institutions, regulations, and practices…(More)”.

OECD Report: “AI offers tremendous potential in its use by governments. It helps governments automate and tailor public services, improve decision-making, detect fraud, and enrich civil servants’ work and learning. However, benefits also hinge on managing risks: skewed data in AI systems can cause harmful decisions; lack of transparency erodes accountability; and overreliance can widen digital divides and propagate errors, reducing citizen trust. These trade-offs need to account for governments’ specific challenges where adoption trails some firms in the private sector, slowed by skill gaps, legacy IT systems, limited data, tight budgets, and stricter needs for privacy, transparency, and representation…(More)”.

Report by Sitra and TIAL: “…As demographic pressures intensify, achieving societal goals, such as quality care for all, meaningful employment, and inclusive economic growth, will become increasingly difficult. Thus, Finland needs to rethink its institutional arrangements; not doing so would force Finland into a vicious cycle of reactive, short-term measures and block coordinated efforts for a more anticipatory, integrated approach.

Additionally, demographic change should not be seen solely as a burden to manage. If addressed proactively, it can become a powerful lever for societal transformation. Countries like Sweden, Singapore, and New Zealand show valuable lessons in how demographic transition can be leveraged as a strategic opportunity to build equitable, responsive, and future-proof public institutions.

Possible entry points

This report outlines approaches for rethinking institutions along five strategic priorities. These areas represent critical leverage points where new institutional designs can support demographic resilience, improve equity, and unlock societal potential.

• Governance of transversal issues: Establish institutions that can synthesise demographic trends across sectors, facilitate coordinated action, and harness collective intelligence.
• Organisation of care: Innovate care models by focusing on integrated, person-centred, community-based systems.
• Developing the silver economy: Develop institutional frameworks that coordinate efforts across government, industry, and communities to support innovation and growth in age-related sectors.
• Workforce adaptation: Support inclusive workplace practices through strategic platforms for age-diverse workforce planning and lifelong learning.
• Governance for future generations: Institutionalise long-term responsibility, integrating intergenerational fairness into governance structures…(More)”.

Book by Alex Pentland: “…delves into the history of innovation, emphasizing the importance of understanding how technologies and cultural inventions impact human society. Humanity’s great leaps forward—the rise of civilizations, the Enlightenment, and the Scientific Revolution—were all propelled by cultural inventions that accelerated our rate of innovation and built collective wisdom. Solving current global challenges such as climate change, pandemics, and failing social institutions will require similarly fundamental inventions.

Shared Wisdom provides a unique perspective on human society and offers insights into how we can use technologies like digital media and AI to aid, rather than replace, our human capacity for deliberation. Drawing on his expertise in both social science and technology, the author bridges the gap between these two disciplines and offers a holistic view of the challenges and opportunities we face in the age of AI. By looking deep into our history, Pentland argues that the better we understand the key factors that accelerate cultural evolution, the greater our chances of surmounting our current problems…(More)”.

Article by Written by the Disaster Map Foundation: “On September 10, 2025 Bali experienced one of its worst flooding events in history, triggering the provincial government and the National Emergency Management Agency to declare a state of emergency. Severe flooding across Denpasar, Kuta, and surrounding districts, inundated homes and major roads, and forced evacuations.

Within 24 hours, over 130,000 people used PetaBencana.id to view and share real-time flood updates, as the platform turned into a vital lifeline for residents, volunteers and authorities to coordinate safe navigation and to prioritize evacuation.

Residents in Perumahan Kalista and Kampung Jawa posted urgent updates on rising water levels along the Ayung and Tukad Badung rivers. These reports enabled first responders to direct evacuation teams to the riverside settlements before floodwaters became impassable.

Motorists shared images of flooded stretches of Jl. Sunset Road and Jl. Kayu Aya. PetaBencana’s live map allowed residents to avoid gridlocked intersections and reroute around submerged sections of the road.

In Kesiman Kertalangu, residents reported that 18 homes in Perumahan Pesona Kartika Tohpati were fully inundated. These crowd-sourced reports were used by volunteers to organize sandbagging and to assist families in relocating to higher ground.

Updates about the overflow of Sungai Taman Pancing guided responders in deploying boats and assisting families trapped along Jl. Taman Pancing Barat–Timur.

Emergency services confirmed that PetaBencana data was used alongside official coordination channels to deploy rescue teams and manage traffic flow. For many residents, the platform became a critical navigation tool that reflected rapidly changing conditions...(More)”.

Article by Rene Almeling: “…“how” questions can evoke more wandering responses that often include crucial information about social processes, history, networks, decision-making, and uncertainty. How did I come to work as a sociology professor at Yale University? Well, when I was in college, someone mentioned that becoming a professor required a Ph.D., so after graduation I worked at a nonprofit for a few years while deciding whether to apply to graduate school. I emailed my undergrad adviser, who suggested a few Ph.D. programs. I crossed off those in places with harsh winters (unknowingly eliminating most of the top sociology programs). I was accepted to UCLA, which had smart and supportive faculty working on gender, my main area of interest. And in 2007, after six years of study, I landed a job at Yale, right before the Great Recession eviscerated the academic job market. Here I sit years later.

This is a typical response to a “how” question: years of history, references to influential people and key moments, reflections on emotions and thought processes.

Questions that begin with “how” and not “why” are powerful in part because they tend to reveal social processes occurring at multiple analytical levels. For example, my response above includes references to what social scientists call the “micro” level, the level of individuals and their thinking and behavior. There are also mentions of social processes happening at the “meso” level, a middle level between micro and macro that can include anything from small groups and local communities to organizations; I discuss interactions with teachers, friends, and coworkers, as well as specific universities. Finally, there is evidence of “macro” level processes shaping my trajectory. The macro usually refers to broader historical and structural processes and, in this case, includes the institution of higher education more generally, the labor market, and economic upheavals like the Great Recession…(More)”. See also: Inquiry as Infrastructure: Defining Good Questions in the Age of Data and AI.

Article by Emanuel Maiberg: “The Department of Justice has removed a study showing that white supremacist and far-right violence “continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism” in the United States.  The study, which was conducted by the National Institute of Justice and hosted on a DOJ website was available there at least until September 12, 2025, according to an archive of the page saved by the Wayback Machine. Daniel Malmer, a PhD student studying online extremism at UNC-Chapel Hill, first noticed the paper was deleted. “The Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs is currently reviewing its websites and materials in accordance with recent Executive Orders and related guidance,” reads a message on the page where the study was formerly hosted. “During this review, some pages and publications will be unavailable. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.” Shortly after Donald Trump took office he issued an executive order that forced government agencies to scrub their sites of any mention of “diversity,” “gender,” “DEI,” and other “forbidden words” and perceived notions of “wokeness.” The executive order impacted every government agency, including NASA, and was a huge waste of engineers’ time. We don’t know why the study about far-right extremist violence was removed recently, but it comes immediately after the assassination of conservative personality Charlie Kirk, accusations from the administration that the left is responsible for most of the political violence in the country, and a renewed commitment from the administration to crack down on the “radical left..(More)”.

Paper by Aaron Chatterji et al: “Despite the rapid adoption of LLM chatbots, little is known about how they are used. We document the growth of ChatGPT’s consumer product from its launch in November 2022 through July 2025, when it had been adopted by around 10% of the world’s adult population. Early adopters were disproportionately male but the gender gap has narrowed dramatically, and we find higher growth rates in lower-income countries. Using a privacy-preserving automated pipeline, we classify usage patterns within a representative sample of ChatGPT conversations. We find steady growth in work-related messages but even faster growth in non-work-related messages, which have grown from 53% to more than 70% of all usage. Work usage is more common for educated users in highly-paid professional occupations. We classify messages by conversation topic and find that “Practical Guidance,” “Seeking Information,” and “Writing” are the three most common topics and collectively account for nearly 80% of all conversations. Writing dominates work-related tasks, highlighting chatbots’ unique ability to generate digital outputs compared to traditional search engines. Computer programming and self-expression both represent relatively small shares of use. Overall, we find that ChatGPT provides economic value through decision support, which is especially important in knowledge-intensive jobs…(More)”.