IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v140y2021ics0305750x20304228.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mobilising urban knowledge in an infodemic: Urban observatories, sustainable development and the COVID-19 crisis

Author

Listed:
  • Acuto, Michele
  • Dickey, Ariana
  • Butcher, Stephanie
  • Washbourne, Carla-Leanne

Abstract

Along with disastrous health and economic implications, COVID-19 has also been an epidemic of misinformation and rumours - an ‘infodemic’. The desire for robust, evidence-based policymaking in this time of disruption has been at the heart of the multilateral response to the crisis, not least in terms of supporting a continuing agenda for global sustainable development. The role of boundary-spanning knowledge institutions in this context could be pivotal, not least in cities, where much of the pandemic has struck. ‘Urban observatories’ have emerged as an example of such institutions; harbouring great potential to produce and share knowledge supporting sustainable and equitable processes of recovery. Building on four ‘live’ case studies during the crisis of institutions based in Johannesburg, Karachi, Freetown and Bangalore, our research note aims to capture the role of these institutions, and what it means to span knowledge boundaries in the current crisis. We do so with an eye towards a better understanding of their knowledge mobilisation practices in contributing towards sustainable urban development. We highlight that the crisis offers a key window for urban observatories to play a progressive and effective role for sustainable and inclusive development. However, we also underline continuing challenges in these boundary knowledge dynamics: including issues of institutional trust, inequality of voices, collective memory, and the balance between normative and advisory roles for observatories.

Suggested Citation

  • Acuto, Michele & Dickey, Ariana & Butcher, Stephanie & Washbourne, Carla-Leanne, 2021. "Mobilising urban knowledge in an infodemic: Urban observatories, sustainable development and the COVID-19 crisis," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:140:y:2021:i:c:s0305750x20304228
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105295
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X20304228
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105295?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gustav Engström & Johan Gars & Niko Jaakkola & Therese Lindahl & Daniel Spiro & Arthur A. van Benthem, 2020. "What Policies Address Both the Coronavirus Crisis and the Climate Crisis?," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 76(4), pages 789-810, August.
    2. Ruth Stewart & Harsha Dayal & Laurenz Langer & Carina van Rooyen, 2019. "The evidence ecosystem in South Africa: growing resilience and institutionalisation of evidence use," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 5(1), pages 1-12, December.
    3. Federico Caprotti & Robert Cowley & Ayona Datta & Vanesa Castán Broto & Eleanor Gao & Lucien Georgeson & Clare Herrick & Nancy Odendaal & Simon Joss, 2017. "The New Urban Agenda: key opportunities and challenges for policy and practice," Urban Research & Practice, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(3), pages 367-378, July.
    4. Cociña, Camila & Frediani, Alexandre Apsan & Acuto, Michele & Levy, Caren, 2019. "Knowledge translation in global urban agendas: A history of research-practice encounters in the Habitat conferences," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 130-141.
    5. Beth Perry & Tim May, 2010. "Urban knowledge exchange: devilish dichotomies and active intermediation," International Journal of Knowledge-Based Development, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 1(1/2), pages 6-24.
    6. Parnell, Susan, 2016. "Defining a Global Urban Development Agenda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 529-540.
    7. Vanessa Watson, 2014. "Co-production and collaboration in planning - The difference," Planning Theory & Practice, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 62-76, March.
    8. Yvonne Rydin, 2006. "Joined-up Knowledge for the Sustainable City?," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 38(6), pages 1005-1007, June.
    9. Susan Parnell, 2020. "The enabling conditions of post-pandemic city government," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 47(7), pages 1143-1145, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Andrew Sudmant & Vincent Viguié & Quentin Lepetit & Lucy Oates & Abhijit Datey & Andy Gouldson & David Watling, 2021. "Fair weather forecasting? The shortcomings of big data for sustainable development, a case study from Hubballi‐Dharwad, India," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(6), pages 1237-1248, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Cociña, Camila & Frediani, Alexandre Apsan & Acuto, Michele & Levy, Caren, 2019. "Knowledge translation in global urban agendas: A history of research-practice encounters in the Habitat conferences," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 130-141.
    2. Patricia Basile, 2023. "Vulnerability, neglect, and collectivity in Brazilian favelas: Surviving the threats of the COVID-19 pandemic and the state’s necropolitics," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 60(9), pages 1690-1706, July.
    3. Anna Kovacs-Györi & Pablo Cabrera-Barona & Bernd Resch & Michael Mehaffy & Thomas Blaschke, 2019. "Assessing and Representing Livability through the Analysis of Residential Preference," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(18), pages 1-23, September.
    4. Shuangqing Sheng & Wei Song & Hua Lian & Lei Ning, 2022. "Review of Urban Land Management Based on Bibliometrics," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-25, November.
    5. Cavoli, Clemence, 2021. "Accelerating sustainable mobility and land-use transitions in rapidly growing cities: Identifying common patterns and enabling factors," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    6. David Klenert & Franziska Funke & Linus Mattauch & Brian O’Callaghan, 2020. "Five Lessons from COVID-19 for Advancing Climate Change Mitigation," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 76(4), pages 751-778, August.
    7. Paul Benneworth & Tiago Ratinho, 2014. "Reframing the Role of Knowledge Parks and Science Cities in Knowledge-Based Urban Development," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 32(5), pages 784-808, October.
    8. Sophie King & Peter Kasaija, 2018. "State-movement partnership in Uganda: Co-producing an enabling environment for urban poverty reduction?," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series esid-098-18, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    9. Jonathon Taylor & Andy Haines & James Milner & Mike Davies & Paul Wilkinson, 2018. "A Comparative Analysis of Global Datasets and Initiatives for Urban Health and Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-21, October.
    10. Tubridy, Fiadh & Lennon, Mick & Scott, Mark, 2022. "Managed retreat and coastal climate change adaptation: The environmental justice implications and value of a coproduction approach," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C).
    11. Philipp Horn & Diana Mitlin & Jhono Bennett & Beth Chitekwe-Biti & Jack Makau, 2018. "Towards citywide participatory planning: emerging community-led practices in three African cities," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series 342018, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    12. Roberta Sonnino & Helen Coulson, 2021. "Unpacking the new urban food agenda: The changing dynamics of global governance in the urban age," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(5), pages 1032-1049, April.
    13. Biancamaria Torquati & Giulia Giacchè & Tiziano Tempesta, 2020. "Landscapes and Services in Peri-Urban Areas and Choice of Housing Location: An Application of Discrete Choice Experiments," Land, MDPI, vol. 9(10), pages 1-21, October.
    14. Khan, Muhammad Salar & Jamil, Kamil & Malik, Ammar A., 2022. "Delivering Urban Mass Transit—The Case of Lahore, Pakistan," SocArXiv 2zj8m, Center for Open Science.
    15. Akaateba, Millicent Awialie & Huang, Huang & Adumpo, Emile Akangoa, 2018. "Between co-production and institutional hybridity in land delivery: Insights from local planning practice in peri-urban Tamale, Ghana," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 215-226.
    16. Das, Ashok & Susantono, Bambang (ed.), 2022. "Informal Services in Asian Cities: Lessons for Urban Planning and Management from the COVID-19 Pandemic," ADBI Books, Asian Development Bank Institute, number 30, Décembre.
    17. Kamila Borsekova & Samuel Koróny & Peter Nijkamp, 2022. "In Search of Concerted Strategies for Competitive and Resilient Regions," Networks and Spatial Economics, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 607-634, September.
    18. Michael Keith & Eugenie Birch & Nicolas J. A. Buchoud & Maruxa Cardama & William Cobbett & Michael Cohen & Thomas Elmqvist & Jessica Espey & Maarten Hajer & Gunnar Hartmann & Tadashi Matsumoto & Susan, 2023. "A new urban narrative for sustainable development," Nature Sustainability, Nature, vol. 6(2), pages 115-117, February.
    19. Thoto, Frejus & Mas Aparisi, Alban & Derlagen, Christian, 2023. "An ecosystemic framework for analysing evidence-informed policy systems for agricultural transformation – Case study of Benin," ESA Working Papers 330800, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Agricultural Development Economics Division (ESA).
    20. Rolando Fuentes & Marzio Galeotti & Alessandro Lanza & Baltasar Manzano, 2020. "COVID-19 and Climate Change: A Tale of Two Global Problems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(20), pages 1-14, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:140:y:2021:i:c:s0305750x20304228. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.