Smart cities and transparency. Does smartness influence transparency?

Smart cities invest in human, social capital and infrastructures, implementing modern technology in order to achieve their goals. They promise to help achieve better results by providing a link with stakeholders and co-producing results by connecting all actors operating at city level and thus promoting participation. This can also lead a city’s governing body to improve the degree of information disclosed about the city’s priorities and actions, promoting public participation and trust in government. The purpose of this article is to investigate if the smartness of a city is associated with a higher level of transparency. In particular, we assess whether greater levels of digital smartness are associated with higher levels of transparency. The analysis focuses on Italian municipalities. Our findings show that greater levels of digital smartness are associated with a higher level of transparency. This points to some interesting implications, especially in terms of improving confidence in government and reducing corruptio