The concept of smart city as a strategy in development of city marketing: the case of Sarajevo

Abstract

Many cities in the world are using the concept of smart city as a new strategy and approach to urban planning to improve the quality of life of their citizens, ensure sustainable development and continuous economic growth. Smart cities use different technology and digital solutions in everyday processes to solve social and urban problems and make life in cities easier through various areas of application. Numerous challenges that even Sarajevo is facing like air pollution, traffic congestion, non-transparent administration, waste management, etc. could be solved with the implementation of the concept of smart city. However, for a city to become smart, it needs a lot of preparation, utilization of resources and many people involved. Achieving this goal requires a good foundation of knowledge about the available opportunities and obstacles that may be encountered along the way. Therefore, the main goal of this master thesis is to explore what are the opportunities and constraints for the development of smart city projects in Sarajevo from the perspective of the key stakeholders, as well as to examine to what extent this concept is known by the key stakeholders, how the decision-making process flows and how city marketing approach can help Sarajevo in becoming a smart city. Research is done to provide insights and guidelines for smart city implementation for the purpose of improving life of Sarajevo’s citizens, attracting new investors, and offering tourists better experience. Hence, exploratory qualitative research was used in the form of semi-structured in-depth interviews. Participants in this research were people of interest related to the subject matter, and they were divided into four groups: international organizations, IT industry, academic community and local government. These four groups represent main stakeholders in the development of smart city projects and all of them have already been involved in some way in these projects in B&H. Despite the most mentioned issues of complicated bureaucratic procedures, unclear division of responsibilities and jurisdiction among municipalities, city and canton, absence of unified strategy and others, it can be concluded that Sarajevo holds a potential to be branded as a smart city, but only after significant work is done. The findings suggest that change should start from the local government by taking a more proactive role, improving inter-institutional collaboration and inter-municipal coordination, addressing pressing urban issues, and ensuring transparent communication with citizens. These changes should be explained in a unified city marketing strategy that would focus on long-term positioning of Sarajevo as a smart city. This research provides recommendations for all relevant stakeholders involved in the process of creating smart city projects and city marketing. In addition, it provides a good foundation for future research in this area since there is a scarce number of academic papers from Bosnia and Herzegovina published on the topics of smart city and city marketing.