A Systems Approach to Smart City Development

In recent years, smart city development has emerged as a critical field of inquiry and practice, driven by rapid urbanisation, technological advances, and urgent sustainability imperatives worldwide. Yet, despite significant academic attention and policy investments, many cities struggle to realise their visions of being truly “smart,” as well as “sustainable” and “green.” This gap between aspiration and reality is often due to fragmented approaches that address only parts of complex urban systems without sufficient integration across sectors, stakeholders, technologies, and environmental concerns.

This book, A Systems Approach to Smart City Development, is an ambitious and comprehensive response to this pressing need. It builds on more than twelve years of the author’s original empirical research, theoretical explorations, and practical engagements in urban computing, sustainability studies, and systems integration. The book builds on these extensive research works and crafts them into a unified, accessible framework designed to guide scholars, policymakers, city planners, technology providers, and community leaders towards developing truly liveable, resilient, and equitable cities of the future.