How Being Watched Changes How You Think

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Simon Makin: “In 1785 English philosopher Jeremy Bentham designed the perfect prison: Cells circle a tower from which an unseen guard can observe any inmate at will. As far as a prisoner knows, at any given time, the guard may be watching—or may not be. Inmates have to assume they’re constantly observed and behave accordingly. Welcome to the Panopticon.

Many of us will recognize this feeling of relentless surveillance. Information about who we are, what we do and buy and where we go is increasingly available to completely anonymous third parties. We’re expected to present much of our lives to online audiences and, in some social circles, to share our location with friends. Millions of effectively invisible closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras and smart doorbells watch us in public, and we know facial recognition with artificial intelligence can put names to faces.

So how does being watched affect us? “It’s one of the first topics to have been studied in psychology,” says Clément Belletier, a psychologist at University of Clermont Auvergne in France. In 1898 psychologist Norman Triplett showed that cyclists raced harder in the presence of others. From the 1970s onward, studies showed how we change our overt behavior when we are watched to manage our reputation and social consequences.

But being watched doesn’t just change our behavior; decades of research show it also infiltrates our mind to impact how we think. And now a new study reveals how being watched affects unconscious processing in our brain. In this era of surveillance, researchers say, the findings raise concerns about our collective mental health…(More)”.

AI in Urban Life

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book by Patricia McKenna: “In exploring artificial intelligence (AI) in urban life, this book brings together and extends thinking on how human-AI interactions are continuously evolving. Through such interactions, people are aided on the one hand, while becoming more aware of their own capabilities and potentials on the other hand, pertaining, for example, to creativity, human sensing, and collaboration.

It is the particular focus of research questions developed in relation to awareness, smart cities, autonomy, privacy, transparency, theory, methods, practices, and collective intelligence, along with the wide range of perspectives and opportunities offered, that set this work apart from others. Conceptual frameworks are formulated for each of these areas to guide explorations and understandings in this work and going forward. A synthesis is provided in the final chapter for perspectives, challenges and opportunities, and conceptual frameworks for urban life in an era of AI, opening the way for evolving research and practice directions…(More)”.

Smart Cities to Smart Societies: Moving Beyond Technology

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book edited by Esmat Zaidan, Imad Antoine Ibrahim, and Elie Azar: “…explores the governance of smart cities from a holistic approach, arguing that the creation of smart cities must consider the specific circumstances of each country to improve the preservation, revitalisation, liveability, and sustainability of urban areas. The recent push for smart cities is part of an effort to reshape urban development through megaprojects, centralised master planning, and approaches that convey modernism and global affluence. However, moving towards a citywide smart transition is a major undertaking, and complexities are expected to grow exponentially. This book argues that a comprehensive approach is necessary to consider all relevant aspects. The chapters seek to identify the potential and pitfalls of the smart transformation of urban communities and its role in sustainability goals; share state-of-the-art practices concerning technology, policy, and social science dimensions in smart cities and communities; and develop opportunities for cooperation and partnership in wider and larger research and development programmes. Divided into three parts, the first part of the book highlights the significance of various societal elements and factors in facilitating a successful smart transition, with a particular emphasis on the role of human capital. The second part delves into the challenges associated with technology and its integration into smart city initiatives. The final part of the book examines the current state of regulations and policies governing smart cities. The book will be an important asset for students and researchers studying law, engineering, political science, international relations, geopolitics, economics, and engineering…(More)”.

How the UK could monetise ‘citizen data’ and turn it into a national asset

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Ashley Braganza and S. Asieh H. Tabaghdehi: “Across all sectors, UK citizens produce vast amounts of data. This data is increasingly needed to train AI systems. But it is also of enormous value to private companies, which use it to target adverts to consumers based on their behaviour or to personalise content to keep people on their site.

Yet the economic and social value of this citizen-generated data is rarely returned to the public, highlighting the need for more equitable and transparent models of data stewardship.

AI companies have demonstrated that datasets hold immense economic, social and strategic value. And the UK’s AI Opportunities Action Plan notes that access to new and high-quality datasets can confer a competitive edge in developing AI models. This in turn unlocks the potential for innovative products and services.

However, there’s a catch. Most citizens have signed over their data to companies by accepting standard terms and conditions. Once citizen data is “owned” by companies, this leaves others unable to access it or forced to pay to do so.

Commercial approaches to data tend to prioritise short-term profit, often at the expense of the public interest. The debate over the use of artistic and creative materials to train AI models without recompense to the creator exemplifies the broader trade-off between commercial use of data and the public interest.

Countries around the world are recognising the strategic value of public data. The UK government could lead in making public data into a strategic asset. What this might mean in practice is the government owning citizen data and monetising this through sale or licensing agreements with commercial companies.

In our evidence, we proposed a UK sovereign data fund to manage the monetisation of public datasets curated within the NDL. This fund could invest directly in UK companies, fund scale-ups and create joint ventures with local and international partners.

The fund would have powers to license anonymised, ethically governed data to companies for commercial use. It would also be in a position to fast-track projects that benefit the UK or have been deemed to be national priorities. (These priorities are drones and other autonomous technologies as well as engineering biology, space and AI in healthcare.)…(More)”.

The Next Wave of Innovation Districts

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Bruce Katz and Julie Wagner: “A next wave of innovation districts is gaining momentum given the structural changes underway in the global economy. The examples cited above telegraph where existing innovation districts are headed and explain why new districts are forming. The districts highlighted and many others are responding to fast-changing and highly volatile macro forces and the need to de-risk, decarbonize, and diversify talent.

The next wave of innovation districts is distinctive for multiple reasons.

  • The sectors leveraging this innovation geography expand way beyond the traditional focus on life sciences to include advanced manufacturing for military and civilian purposes.
  • The deeper emphasis on decarbonization is driving the use of basic and applied R&D to invent new clean technology products and solutions as well as organizing energy generation and distribution within the districts themselves to meet crucial carbon targets.
  • The stronger emphasis on the diversification of talent includes the upskilling of workers for new production activities and a broader set of systems to drive inclusive innovation to address long-standing inequities.
  • The districts are attracting a broader group of stakeholders, including manufacturing companies, utilities, university industrial design and engineering departments and hard tech startups.
  • The districts ultimately are looking to engage a wider base of investors given the disparate resources and traditions of capitalization that support defense tech, clean tech, med tech and other favored forms of innovation.

Some regions or states are also seeking ways to connect a constellation of districts and other economic hubs to harness the imperative to innovate accentuated by these and other macro forces. The state of South Australia is one such example. It has prioritized several innovation hubs across this region to foster South Australia’s knowledge and innovation ecosystem, as well as identify emerging economic clusters in industry sectors of global competitiveness to advance the broader economy…(More)”.

Where Cloud Meets Cement

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Hanna Barakat, Chris Cameron, Alix Dunn and Prathm Juneja, and Emma Prest: “This report examines the global expansion of data centers driven by AI and cloud computing, highlighting both their economic promises and the often-overlooked social and environmental costs. Through case studies across five countries, it investigates how governments and tech companies influence development, how communities resist harmful effects, and what support is needed for effective advocacy…(More)”.

Designing Shared Data Futures: Engaging young people on how to re-use data responsibly for health and well-being

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Hannah Chafetz, Sampriti Saxena, Tracy Jo Ingram, Andrew J. Zahuranec, Jennifer Requejo and Stefaan Verhulst: “When young people are engaged in data decisions for or about them, they not only become more informed about this data, but can also contribute to new policies and programs that improve their health and well-being. However, oftentimes young people are left out of these discussions and are unaware of the data that organizations collect.

In October 2023, The Second Lancet Commission on Adolescent Health and well-being, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and The GovLab at New York University hosted six Youth Solutions Labs (or co-design workshops) with over 120 young people from 36 countries around the world. In addition to co-designing solutions to five key issues impacting their health and well-being, we sought to understand current sentiments around the re-use of data on those issues. The Labs provided several insights about young people’s preferences regarding: 1) the purposes for which data should be re-used to improve health and well-being, 2) the types and sources of data that should and should not be re-used, 3) who should have access to previously collected data, and 4) under what circumstances data re-use should take place. Additionally, participants provided suggestions of what ethical and responsible data re-use looks like to them and how young people can participate in decision making processes. In this paper, we elaborate on these findings and provide a series of recommendations to accelerate responsible data re-use for the health and well-being of young people…(More)”.

Future design in the public policy process: giving a voice to future generations

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Paper by Marij Swinkels, Olivier de Vette & Victor Toom: “Long-term public issues face the intergenerational problem: current policy decisions place a disproportionate burden on future generations while primarily benefitting those in the present. The interests of present generations trump those of future generations, as the latter play no explicit part as stakeholders in policy making processes. How can the interests of future generations be voiced in the present? In this paper, we explore an innovative method to incorporate the interests of future generations in the process of policymaking: future design. First, we situate future design in the policy process and relate it to other intergenerational policymaking initiatives that aim to redeem the intergenerational problem. Second, we show how we applied future design and provide insights into three pilots that we organized on two long-term public issues in the Netherlands: housing shortages and water management. We conclude that future design can effectively contribute to representing the interests of future generations, but that adoption of future design in different contexts also requires adaptation of the method. The findings increase our understanding of the value of future design as an innovative policymaking practice to strengthen intergenerational policymaking. As such, it provides policymakers with insights into how to use this method…(More)”.

Why Generative AI Isn’t Transforming Government (Yet) — and What We Can Do About It

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Tiago C. Peixoto: “A few weeks ago, I reached out to a handful of seasoned digital services practitioners, NGOs, and philanthropies with a simple question: Where are the compelling generative AI (GenAI) use cases in public-sector workflows? I wasn’t looking for better search or smarter chatbots. I wanted examples of automation of real public workflows – something genuinely interesting and working. The responses, though numerous, were underwhelming.

That question has gained importance amid a growing number of reports forecasting AI’s transformative impact on government. The Alan Turing Institute, for instance, published a rigorous study estimating the potential of AI to help automate over 140 million government transactions in the UK. The Tony Blair Institute also weighed in, suggesting that a substantive portion of public-sector work could be automated. While the report helped bring welcome attention to the issue, its use of GPT-4 to assess task automatability has sparked a healthy discussion about how best to evaluate feasibility. Like other studies in this area, both reports highlight potential – but stop short of demonstrating real service automation.

Without testing technologies in real service environments – where workflows, incentives, and institutional constraints shape outcomes – and grounding each pilot in clear efficiency or well-being metrics, estimates risk becoming abstractions that underestimate feasibility.

This pattern aligns with what Arvind Narayanan and Sayash Kapoor argue in “AI as Normal Technology:” the impact of AI is realized only when methods translate into applications and diffuse through real-world systems. My own review, admittedly non-representative, confirms their call for more empirical work on the innovation-diffusion lag.

In the public sector, the gap between capability and impact is not only wide but also structural…(More)”

Urban Development Needs Systems Thinking

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Yaera Chung: “More than three decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, cities in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) continue to grapple with economic stagnation, aging infrastructure, and environmental degradation while also facing new pressures from climate change and regional conflicts. In this context, traditional city planning, which tackles problems in isolation, is struggling to keep up. Urban strategies often rely on siloed, one-off interventions that fail to reflect the complexity of social challenges or adapt to shifting conditions. As a result, efforts are frequently fragmented, overlook root causes, and miss opportunities for long-term, cross-sector collaboration.

Instead of addressing one issue at a time, cities need to develop a set of coordinated, interlinked solutions that tackle multiple urban challenges simultaneously and align efforts across sectors. As part of a broader strategy to address environmental, economic, and social goals at once, for example, cities might advance a range of initiatives, such as transforming biowaste into resources, redesigning streets to reduce air pollution, and creating local green jobs. These kinds of “portfolio” approaches are leading to lasting and systems-level change.

Since 2021, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has been collaborating with 15 cities across EECA to solve problems in ways that embrace complexity and interconnectedness. Selected through open calls under two UNDP initiatives, Mayors for Economic Growth and the City Experiment Fund, these cities demonstrated a strong interest in tackling systemic issues. Their proposals highlighted the problems they face, their capacity for innovation, and local initiatives and partnerships.

Their ongoing journeys have surfaced four lessons that can help other cities move beyond conventional planning pitfalls, and adopt a more responsive, inclusive, and sustainable approach to urban development…(More)”.