The public policies of Smart Cities and Territories: Key Role of Governance in the Process of Public Value Creation[Politiques publiques de Villes et de Territoires Intelligents : le rôle clé de la gouvernance dans le processus de création de valeur publique]

The smart city concept is regularly associated with the ambition to create multi-dimensional value. Several authors have proposed to study it from the angle of the public value theory. However, few works have directly addressed the influence of governance practices on the public-value-creating process. We propose to bridge this gap by focusing on the French public policies of Smart Cities and Territories (SCT). After a literature review on the relationships between smart city, governance and public value we developed an analysis framework designed to apprehend the prevailing mode of governance for each SCT policy action and activity, whether proactive or open, as well as the various type(s) of public value created. The six "value-generating mechanisms" described by Harrison et al. (2012), efficiency, effectiveness, intrinsic enhancements, transparency, participation, and collaboration were set as mediatory variables. We then carried out an exploratory longitudinal qualitative study of two French local collectivities. Our outcomes allowed us to specify the role of governance in the public value-creating process in implementing SCT policies. We highlighted the contribution of proactive governance to creating the first five types of public value identified by Harrison et al. (2012): economic, political, social, strategic and quality-of-life. Open governance also drives these types of public value, especially the last two: ideological and stewardship. Yet, its implementation remains limited mainly due to technical and organizational factors, as well as to pressures exerted on resources which make it difficult to jointly handle the twofold dynamic of proactiveness and openness. We therefore identified a risk of not fulfilling the promise linked with the smart city concept to renew the relationship between public collectivities and their legitimacy and support environment, and thus a risk of relying only on partial public- value-creating dynamics.