Geografie 2020, 125, 397-422
Towards smart(er) resilient cities. Evidences from Romanian urban areas
, Mihail Eva1, Ema Corodescu-Roșca1, Bogdan-Constantin Ibănescu3, Ana-Maria Opria1, Gabriela Carmen Pascariu3
1Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iaşi, Faculty of Geography and Geology, Department of Geography, Iasi, Romania
2Romanian Academy, Iași Branch, Romania
3Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, Faculty of Law, Centre for European Studies, Iasi, Romania
Received July 2019
Accepted March 2020
The investment in communication technologies has become increasingly prominent in cities, as they face a considerable pressure to become “smarter”. Connected technologies are able to collect and analyze data in real time, leading to predictive and adaptive decisions. However, being smart(er) does not necessary mean being more resilient; in fact, using sophisticated technologies may have some drawbacks that diminish the general resilience capacity of cities. The present paper aims to explore the relationship between resilience and smart city initiatives. The number of smart city projects is therefore firstly correlated with the resilience capacity (built on three dimensions: economic, socio-demographic, and environmental), then to the outcome resilience (calculated as the recovery following the recent economic crisis). The results show a clear connection between the most socially resilient cities, the share of employment in tertiary activities, and the implementation of smart city projects.
Keywords
smart cities, smart initiatives, resilience capacity, resistance, recoverability, resilience performance.
Funding
This work was supported by a grant of Ministery of Research and Innovation, CNCS – UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P4-ID-PCCF-2016-0166, within PNCDI III” project ReGrowEU – Advancing ground-breaking research in regional growth and development theories, through a resilience approach: towards a convergent, balanced and sustainable European Union.
