Does city smartness improve urban environment and reduce income disparity? Evidence from an empirical analysis of major cities worldwide

Urban policymakers are often proud to advertise their cities as smart, emphasizing the wide–scale adoption of internet technologies, innovation activities, and the number of universities the city hosts as proof of successful transition towards greater smartness. Question, however, remains whether the accumulation of these attributes results in tangible benefits for local residents. To answer this question, we compare different metrices of city smartness with several indicators of intra–urban income disparity and environmental performance, using data available for 100+ major cities worldwide. As the analysis indicates, the proliferation of internet technologies and the number of universities the city hosts, i.e., popular ways of advancing “smartness”, are not related to either intra–urban income disparity or environmental performance of cities per se. We thus suggest that the transition of cities towards greater smartness should be focused on people's needs and ICT-using skills, not on ICT proliferation per se. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first that links the level of city smartness with intra–urban income inequality and environmental performance of cities and substantiates these links empirically. By accumulating this knowledge, the study helps to understand better the smart city phenomenon and its impact on urban development.