The taming of chaos: Optimal cities and the state of the art in urban systems research. (November 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Taylor, Linnet
• Other Names: Bannister Jon guest-editor.; O'Sullivan Anthony guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Urban studies. Volume 58:Number 15(2021)
• Page Start: 3196
• Page End: 3202
• Publication Date: 2021-11
• Subjects: big data -- urban systems research -- mobile phones -- transport -- optimisation; 大数据 -- 城市系统研究 -- 手机 -- 交通 -- 优化; Cities and towns -- Periodicals; City planning -- Periodicals; 307.1216
• DOI: 10.1177/00420980211012838
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0042-0980

Abstract

What can urban big data research tell us about cities? While studying cities as complex systems offers a new perspective on urban dynamics, we should dig deeper into the epistemological claims made by these studies and ask what it means to distance the urban researcher from the city. Big data research has the tendency to flatten our perspective: it shows us technology users and their interactions with digital systems but does so often at the expense of the informal and irregular aspects of city life. It also presents us with the city as optimisable system, offering up the chance to engineer it for particular forms of efficiency or productivity. Both optimisation itself, and the process of ordering of the city for optimisation, confer political and economic power and produce a hierarchy of interests. This commentary advocates that researchers connect systems research to questions of structure and power. To do this requires a critical approach to what is missing, what is implied by the choices about which data to collect and how to make them available, and an understanding of the ontologies that shape both the data sets and the urban spaces they describe.