ABSTRACT
Smart city concepts have predominantly been concerned with how new digital solutions can contribute to increased sustainability in urban societies. The challenge of developing a sustainable future is both complex and ambiguous, usually being cross-disciplinary in its aspects. Yet, although smart city research and innovation work has become more cross-disciplinary, it predominantly follows a linear and substantive ontology, making it challenging to address social and dynamic aspects of developing the smart city. The purpose of this chapter is to present a relational and processual approach to the smart city as concept, practice, and methods. The chapter has three parts. First, it describes an example of how we typically work with development projects in urban development in a linear and substantive way, pointing out the inconsistencies and possible shortcomings of this way of working. A more relational and radically processual understanding of reality, based in American Pragmatism, is then presented, before elaborating on how it more specifically can contribute to understanding central dimensions of the smart city concept and practice.
