Vers une méthodologie d'évaluation de la performance "Smart City" des villes wallonnes : étude préparatoire

Abstract

Due to the increasing urbanisation, the “Smart City” concept has gained more and more attention from both researchers and practitioners in recent years. The former mainly focuses on its definitions, characteristics and implementation. However, its performance measurement is much less common, especially in practice. In the private sector, many organisations evaluate their performance using well known models but what about the public sector ? Do cities evaluate their performance ? Why ? How ? After having approached these interesting questions from a theoretical angle, they were explored for the first time in the case of some Walloon cities, chosen on the basis of specific criteria. Various sources have been exploited to gather the necessary information: mainly face-to-face interviews. The analysis is clear: they do not measure their “Smart City” performance because they face many obstacles. Yet, aware of the potential benefits of such an evaluation, most of them would like to put it in place. In this context, developing a “Smart City” performance evaluation methodology for Walloon cities is a real necessity. Based on all the data collected, informed recommendations were made in this regard to pave the way for the Smart City Institute, identified as the ideal actor to design it.