From identity and inequality to aggregation and transfer: discourses of social differentiation in a smart city

Gillian Rose (School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford)

This paper will explore how a wide range of stakeholders in a 'smart city' discursively construct specific forms of social difference as they discuss their smart activities. While critics of the smart city suggest that the recent interest in the 'smart citizen' cannot address questions of social inequality and digital exclusion, the paper will suggest that, nonetheless, smart city stakeholders do assume a certain form of the social in their talk. The paper will characterise that form as one based on data transfer and aggregation, and will explore its implications for smart city governance.

Human Geography Seminar Series

The Department of Geography at King’s College London is pleased to host its Human Geography Seminar Series for this academic year. The Series brings together the interests and expertise of the Contested Development, Risk and Society, and Urban Futures Research Domains and the King’s Climate and King’s Water Activity Hubs to explore new frontiers in research and policy on human-environment interactions.

Find out about other seminars in the series here.