Igor Calzada

Benchmarking future city-regions beyond nation-states

This paper argues that new city-regional configurations are emerging and establishing a regional order beyond nation-states, both as a consequence of certain nationalistic political devolution claims and due to the economic renewal and nation-state re-scaling trend advocated by the ‘new regionalism’. Based on the author’s findings, which elucidate the distinction between four nationalistic (Scotland, Catalonia, Basque Country and Iceland) and four non-nationalistic city-region cases (Oresund, Liverpool/Manchester, Dublin and Portland), this paper highlights that there is no single model for city-regions and emphasizes that this trend has become increasingly complex due to its wide range of causes: political devolution and nation-state rescaling processes (Scotland, Catalonia, Basque Country, Liverpool and Manchester), flow of commuters (Oresund), democratic regeneration (Iceland), and economic renewal (Dublin and Portland). This paper benchmarks eight city-regions by systemically investigating their social innovation processes to understand better their dynamics beyond their respective nation-states.

The Techno-Politics of Data and Smart Devolution in City-Regions: Comparing Glasgow, Bristol, Barcelona, and Bilbao

This paper explores the substantial effect that the critical understanding and techno-political consideration of data are having in some smart city strategies. Particularly, the paper presents some results of a comparative study of four cases of smart city transitions: Glasgow, Bristol, Barcelona, and Bilbao. Likewise, considering how relevant the city-regional path-dependency is in each territorial context, the paper will elucidate the notion of smart devolution as a key governance component that is enabling some cities to formulate their own smart city-regional governance policies and implement them by considering the role of the smart citizens as decision makers rather than mere data providers. The paper concludes by identifying an implicit smart city-regional governance strategy for each case based on the techno-politics of data and smart devolution.

The Right to Decide in Democracy between Recentralisation and Independence: Scotland, Catalonia and the Basque Country

2014 is going to be remembered as one of the most ‘experimental’ years in order to put direct democracy into practice by the right to decide (Lopez 2011) by small nations (Keating 2014), in reference to their nation-states (Ohmae 1995). While, the 18th September was the date of the independence referendum for the future of the UK and Scotland, the 9th November, is already uncertain whether or not the right to decide via consultation will take place in Catalonia.

Problematizing and Politicizing Smart City-Regions: Is Devolution Smart?

Questo articolo riflette su significati, governance e dimensione tecno-politica delle smart city attraverso l’osservazione di alcuni cambiamenti in corso, in Europa, presentando un framework concettuale in grado di definire politicamente le smart city-region come combinazioni tecno-territoriali complesse, transcalari, fondate sull’uso dei dati, multiattoriali, sperimentali e, presumibilmente, democratiche. Questa riflessione si inserisce in una profonda fase di riforme di competenze e confini amministrativi, come dimostrano i quattro casi di Bristol e Glasgow (Regno Unito) e di Barcellona e Bilbao (Spagna). Combinando il tema della governance con questioni tecnologiche e territoriali, l’articolo sostiene che la devolution potrebbe concretizzarsi attraverso strategie smart fondate su (i) sovrapposizioni e contraddizioni transcalari; (ii) proprieta, gestione e alfabetizzazione all’uso dei dati; (iii) approccio multiattoriale; (iv) cittadinanza democratica e digitale

From Smart Cities to Experimental Cities

Calzada examines in this chapter the ways in which the hegemonic approach to the “smart city” is evolving into a new intervention category, called the “experimental city.” While this evolution presents some innovations, mainly regarding how smart citizens will be increasingly considered more as decision makers than data providers, likewise, some underlying issues arise, concerning the hidden side and ethical implications of the techno-politics of data and the urban commons. These issues engage with multi-stakeholders, particularly with the specific Penta Helix framework that brings together private sector, public sector, academia, civic society, and entrepreneurs. These innovations in urban life and its governance will inevitably bring us into debate about new potential models of business and society, concerning, for instance, the particular urban co-operative scheme employed.

Benchmarking Cross-Border City-Regions: Basque and Øresund Comparative Territorial Connection

This article compares from the social innovation multidisciplinary scope, two contrarily complementary European cross-border city-region case studies by applying the 5-System City-Region analytical framework presented sequentially, at the RSA 2013 Winter Conference in London (Calzada, 2013) and RSA 2014 European Conference in Izmir (Calzada, 2014). On the one hand, the case of the Basque Country (OECD, 2013) nationalistic city-region (Calzada, 2011) in between Spain and France nation-states reflects surprisingly low cross border territorial development strategic synergies. On the other hand, in contrast, the case of the Oresund non-nationalistic city-region (OECD, 2003) shows a highly cooperative and fluent cross-border dynamic that started in 2000.

‘Algorithmic nations’: seeing like a city-regional and techno-political conceptual assemblage

ABSTRACT There are changing dynamics among political regionalization processes and the rescaling of nation-states in Europe. However, updated and timely research remains scant, ambiguous and unable to meet the challenges of data-driven societies and uneven borders. Nations’ physical boundaries matter as much as political borders in their pervasive and growing algorithmic, stateless, liquid and metropolitan citizenship patterns. This paper explores these new ‘connectographies’ from a regional science perspective, introducing the term ‘algorithmic nations’ as a city-regional and techno-political conceptual assemblage. A case study is presented of the small stateless city-regionalized European nation of the Basque Country through its analytical and transitional lens, locally known as ‘Euskal Hiria’ (Basque city-region in the Basque language). This paper questions whether the Basque Country could evolve by (1) modifying its governmental logics and (2) merging its three separate devolved administrations (3) while enabling their direct interactions with citizens (4) through blockchain technologies as the small state of Estonia is implementing and employing cutting-edge algorithmic governance frameworks. In doing so, this paper suggests how four drivers – metropolitanization, devolution, the right to decide and blockchain – may be respectively invigorating four dynamics – geoeconomics, geopolitics, geodemocratics and geotechnologics – in this transition towards the algorithmic nations. Ultimately, this paper concludes with an algorithmic nations research and policy agenda decalogue of how these geotechnological changes might determine the future position of small stateless city-regionalized nations in the European Union.