Regular readers will be familiar with our coverage of how authoritarian technologies lurk around the infrastructure of smart cities. Our journalists have looked at how Western companies are aiding the surveillance architecture of smart cities in China; we have also detailed how technology is assaulting the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans.

A new book, “The Smart City in a Digital World” (Emerald Publishing), provides a good overview of some of the challenges faced by local and national policymakers who are under pressure to innovate and save public finances. As the author Vincent Mosco demonstrates, smart city solutions often involve the outsourcing of data gathering and other services to companies like Amazon or Google. At the same time, in its most insidious form, the technology can be used to surveil minorities like Uyghurs in China. 

Mosco’s research shows that there are around 1,000 smart city projects in various stages of planning or development worldwide, and around half of these are located in China. India plans to build 100 new smart cities and rejuvenate another 500. 

I recently interviewed Mosco and began by asking him if smart cities were like utopian cities of the past. What follows are highlights of our conversation which have been edited for length and clarity.