Table 1 Observations and questions regarding deliberative spaces for knowledge politics in urban transformations

Who?

· There are discrepancies between who is affected and whose voice is considered legitimate in smart urbanism

· Existing power relationships play an important role in who gets to say what about the issue and its framing

· The timing, location, use of language and jargon, group composition, skills required to understand and contribute to deliberations as well as institutional boundaries and responsibilities produce in- and exclusions of actors and what they can(not) say

· How is ‘inclusion’ understood by different actors and whose voices are considered legitimate, in what form and on what basis?

· How do the quality and quantity of participating actors as well as power relationships between them shape the diversity of data, information, and knowledge being produced?

· How is the transformative knowledge framed by different actor framings?

· What actions are being taken to learn to listen to marginalised actor knowledges?

What?

· Different actors’ definitions and operationalizations of key terms may clash

· The potential effects of experiments with smart urbanism cut across institutional boundaries and communities of practice

· Potentially fruitful non-smart knowledges and solutions are often absent from deliberations

· Realizing smart ambitions requires a strategy to go with the production of data

· A persistent belief in the objectivity and neutrality of facts obstructs discussion on the values and priorities embedded in smart knowledge production

· How are the terms and boundaries of deliberation being set?

· How much attention is paid to processes shaping knowledge production – including providing room for cross-sectoral implications, non-smart knowledges, non-smart solutions and strategies required to realize the ambitions aimed for – compared to knowledge about the focal object?

· How is the validity of different knowledge claims deliberated, and what theory of information and knowledge is used to do so?

Where?

· Localities leave traces in data generated through smart city projects, although their visibility is erased when data gets aggregated

· Data transfer and scaling often meets with obduracy and resistance

· Broader architectures of knowledge generation and decision-making are historically shaped and embedded in long-term networks

· How influential is the setting in which knowledge is produced for which kind of knowledge output?

· What happens when data or knowledge moves to other locations and situations?

· How locked-in are our knowledge production methods, and are they still appropriate to new transformational challenges?

When?

· Knowledge politics stretch across all phases of project development

· The timing and timeframe of deliberations has consequences for what such deliberations can(not) contribute towards

· Smart urban initiatives often take the form of experiments and time-demarcated projects

· How often should we deliberate over the generation and use of knowledge?

· If knowledge politics is perennial, at what points in a transformative cycle should we open up to deliberation?

· How to ensure continuity of successful projects beyond the timeframe of experiments and pilots?

How?

· Instances of explicit knowledge politics deliberations are rare and rarely institutionalized

· knowledge politics can be deliberated in various formal and informal ways, with implications for what voices are (not) heard and which issues are (not) addressed

· Existing arrangements such as funding programmes’ formal requirements, (in part) shape the space available to deliberate knowledge politics

· Existing technology assessment approaches by and large fail to recognize the value of non-expert (citizen-based) data, and to address concerns about future forms of urban governance, ownership of knowledge and urban lifeworlds that may emerge from widespread application of smart technologies

· How is deliberating knowledge politics different from other deliberations?

· How to institutionalize deliberative norms and processes for knowledge politics?

· How to change the modalities of urban transformation programmes, so that knowledge deliberation is possible before and after key commitment activities (such as research and development agendas)?

· How to recondition institutional capabilities for constructive technology assessment?