Citizens as sensors/information providers in the co-production of smart city services

Citizens play a central role in smart cities, both as the users of the services delivered by the city and as active participants in the initiatives aimed at making cities smarter. By assuming the concept of co-production as the lens through which to look at citizen’s participation, the paper considers the role of citizens as information providers in smart city initiatives and discusses the conditions under which citizens, as playing this specific role, can participate to the development of smart cities. Behind the rhetoric of participation that affects many smart city discourses, the paper argues that citizens as information providers can play a co-producer role in smart city initiatives only if they are given back the control over the data they produce with their behaviors.