"Wise Cities" Chronicle

Blending historical research, ethnographic inquiry, case studies, and interviews, the Wise City Chronicle documents, categorizes, analyzes, shares, and promotes work by urban planners, neighborhood activists, and municipal leaders working at the grass-roots level to build strong communities and deliberative, engaged, participatory democracies.

As the name implies, attention to the practices and practitioners of “wise cities” offers an alternative and/or counterpart to the hype surrounding “smart cities,” an emphasis intended to compliment – and at times, complexify and challenge – the data-driven, algorithmically-designed, and technologically-oriented approaches being promoted in academia and celebrated in popular media.

Whereas “smart” cites prioritize technology and big-data (often impersonal and anonymous), speed (often “responsive,” possibly automatic, and generally change-oriented), and expertise (often top-down), wise city leaders turn these characteristics on their heads to encourage solutions that may be customized, close, and particular.  Wise City successes are rooted in personal relationships and cultivated through collaboration, requiring the creation and long-term stewardship of trust.  Wise cities emphasize learning and reflection over speed and reaction – with parallels to the department's legacy of promoting reflective practice among planners.  “Wise City” proponents value history, memory, and stability – not through a blind static conservatism of the status quo, but rather the “at first, do not harm” spirit of the Hippocratic Oath mingled with the humility of the “two-ears, one-mouth” attention to context and relationships.

In short, attention to the importance of wise cities could promote a “Slow Food Movement” for Urban Planners.