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City Solutions Network gathers resources from the volumes of available
knowledge, information and data found on the World Wide Web. It could
not exist without the medium of the Internet, nor without the efforts
of thousands of people who share freely their learning from practical
experience, research and analysis.
The world's leading urban experts are either directly published on the
Web, or have their works cited there. They are writing in the first instance
for several different audiences. These range from peers in academia or
the professions, to specific consulting clients and local governments,
to International Financial Institutions and United Nations agencies.
In brief, urban experts may not be primarily producing their works expressly
for leaders of cities seeking knowledge, information and data from the
Internet. Commercial interests, such as suppliers of infrastructure technology
do write specifically for this new medium. However, they naturally focus
on the most positive features of their products, technologies or services.
Based on extensive Internet research and analysis over a two-year period,
City Solutions Network has a five-part challenge to suppliers of solutions,
focusing on key findings, conclusions, advisory recommendations and specifications
they produce:
- To express research and findings in lay language, and in summary
form.
- To situate them within the context of the larger issues faced by
urban leaders as much as possible, or else to challenge the prevailing
view of what those larger issues should be. Go to Twelve
Main Issues.
- To put as much knowledge and information as possible -- including
product literature -- into "user-friendly" formats that can be adapted
readily and used by urban leaders, e.g., into the form of slide presentations,
briefing notes, or draft policy statements for council consideration.
- To position findings and conclusions according to a "systems view"
of urban dynamics as much as possible, e.g., by calculating the approximate
percentages of populations affected. In the case of commercial suppliers,
this means providing information about the linked systems and the other
factors on which your products, technologies, and services depend.
- To assess the risks of acting upon or not acting upon knowledge and
information in terms of populations affected and other variables, and
as realistically as possible. In the case of commercial interests, this
means providing information which allows the performance of your product,
technology or service to be assessed.
This challenge assumes that urban experts and companies would like to
see more of their efforts or offerings reflected in actual day-to-day
practices of municipal governments, business ventures, communities, etc.
Most would also appreciate credit and recognition from people in positions
of authority. Many would like to learn more about the world and about
their own discipline or field. They would appreciate comments from users
apply or attempt to apply their findings or products, technologies, and
services.
Here are some reasons for presenting each of the challenges listed above:
- Expressing research findings or product specifications in lay language
recognizes that the majority of urban leaders are not technical experts.
Or they may be experts in engineering but not in urban sociology, in
business administration but not in telecommunications technology, etc.
In addition, English may not be their first language, even though it
is the dominant language of the Internet. Summaries take advantage of
the great versatility of the Internet. References can always be made
to larger documents for further consultation. These may be readily accessible
in a way that paper publications are not.
- Elsewhere in this Website, you will find extensive discussions of
the main issues facing urban leaders and why they are issues. These
tend to be "top of mind" for urban leaders in assigning relevance to
the vast amounts of information that flow into their offices daily.
If there are "hooks" in what urban experts and commercial suppliers
produce, they will find their results or offerings picked up more readily.
- Putting results and specifications into user-friendly formats recognizes
the fact that most urban leaders and their advisors have limited time.
They may also lack financial resources or technical capabilities to
formulate polished presentations. Moreover by setting results out in
presentation formats, urban experts are likely to clarify their own
thinking. They may also increase the chances of successful adoption
of their findings and conclusions or their commercial offerings. They
may reduce opportunities for misunderstanding and for others overstating
or ignoring what they have to say.
- Cities are both physical and social systems. Each type of expertise
tends to focus on different elements of these systems, and to stress
the importance of that element in the larger scheme of things. Knowledge
could not advance without this kind of focus. Yet urban leaders must
always attempt to integrate a variety of results from different sources,
and a range of perspectives on urban problems. Once again, they are
most likely to give credence to those sources which dimension both their
results and the consequences of those results.
- Urban experts are obviously convinced of the importance of what they
are doing. Otherwise they would not work long hours on difficult problems
to which there are no easy answers. Yet all risks facing urban leaders
are not equal, either in absolute or in relative terms. Some are immediate
and pressing. Others are large, but fairly remote. The more realistic
you are about the types of risks you are addressing, and the consequences
of those risks for cities of different types, the better. For example,
you will surely want to avoid causing panic in a range of cities not
readily affected by a looming type of disaster, by implying that all
are equally at risk. You will also want to be balanced in your analysis
of probabilities that different events may occur, recognizing the resiliency
of human beings and of whole societies. You will want to provide performance
assurances relating to commercial products, technologies, and services.
The editors of City Solutions Network have a vested interest in active
and creative responses to the above challenges by urban experts and by
commercial suppliers. The more you do along these lines, the less time
Network editors will need to spend in reducing, reformatting, adapting,
and otherwise manipulating materials as they are currently found on the
Internet. The editors can then concentrate on adding value by linking
different solutions better, by carrying out in-depth assessments of solutions
in field practice, etc.
This first generation of City Solutions Network tries to offer some of
the best available and most practical tools on the Web. The more others
in the community of urban experts and suppliers of solutions contribute
to its further evolution, the more impact it is likely to have.
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