PhD Defense Ceremony: Negar Noori

During her PhD, Negar mapped the Smart City design variables, policies and its development process in a conceptual model through studying the Smart City good practices of Amsterdam, Barcelona, Dubai, and Masdar. To develop practical solutions from the results, she formulated the lessons learned from the good practices into innovation policies to transfer to Smart City initiatives. Negar continues her work at the Dynamics of Inclusive Prosperity Initiative as a postdoctoral researcher, during which she investigates ‘How to turn a Smart City into an Inclusive Smart City’.

“The evolution path of Smart City indicates that it will be located in a place that in addition to strong technological stimuli, the human factor is the core in its development. In this sense, many leading smart cities have already mentioned the ‘inclusive’ policy in their Smart City programs. Nonetheless, this transition appears to be an experimental pathway for them due to the ambiguity of the concept of Inclusive in the Smart City discourse. The primary objective of this research is to enhance an understanding of the concept of inclusion and its criteria in Smart City discourse. To apply the result, we aim to work with Dutch cities like The Hague, Rotterdam, and Amsterdam.”