FACULTY OF SOCIAL STUDIES

Comparison of political parties’ approach to the Smart City initiatives based on their position on the left-right spectrum

Master’s Thesis DARYNA SAKHAROVA

Supervisor: PhDr. Petr Kaniok, Ph.D.

Department of International Relations and European Studies European Studies Brno 2020

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COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Bibliographic Record

Author: Daryna Sakharova Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University Department of International Relations and Euro- pean Studies Title of Thesis: Comparison of political parties’ approach to the Smart City initiatives based on their position on the left-right spectrum Degree Programme: European Studies Supervisor: PhDr. Petr Kaniok, Ph.D. Academic Year: 2020 Number of Pages: 72 Keywords: Smart city, political party, political spectrum, left- wing, right-wing, content analysis

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COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Abstract

This work analyses how the political parties present the Smart City concepts in their programs. The author uses the method of content ana- lysis of political parties' manifestos in order to determine whether there is an actual difference between the political parties in their reflection of the Smart initiatives depending on their position within the political spectrum. This work also aims to define whether certain similarities are present between left- and right-wing parties concerning the Smart agenda. Following the research, the author concludes that the topics re- lated to the Smart agenda are frequently used by the political parties in order to maintain the fundamental principles that correspond to their position in the political spectrum.

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Statutory Declaration

I hereby declare that I have written the submitted Master's Thesis concerning the topic of Comparison of political parties’ approach to the Smart City initiatives based on their position on the left-right spectrum independently. All the sources used for the purpose of fi- nishing this thesis have been adequately referenced and are listed in the Bibliography.

In Brno 6 September 2020

...... Daryna Sakharova

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COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Acknowledgements

Hereby I would like to sincerely thank PhDr. Petr Kaniok, Ph.D. for his guidance, patience, and advice while supervising my Thesis. His con- structive remarks have played a significant role all long. Furthermore, I would like to express special gratitude to my parents and friends which were always supporting me during my Master studies.

4 TABLE OF CONTENTS 5

Table of Contents

List of Abbreviations ...... 7 List of Figures...... 9 1 Introduction ...... 10 2 Defining key features of Left- and Right-wing political parties 12 2.1 Left-wing political parties ...... 12 2.2 Right-wind political parties ...... 13 3 Smart City definition and delimitation of the concept ...... 16 3.1 Smart governance ...... 17 3.2 Smart economy ...... 19 3.3 Smart environment ...... 21 3.4 Smart people ...... 22 4 The aim of the thesis and current state of knowledge ...... 23 4.1 Parties selection ...... 24 4.2 State of knowledge ...... 27 5 Methodology and research strategy ...... 29 5.1 Comparative approach ...... 29 5.2 Content analysis ...... 29 6 Analysis of the attitudes of the political parties towards the Smart City concept ...... 36 6.1 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Governance . 42 6.2 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Economy ...... 46 6.3 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Environment 49 6.4 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart People ...... 55 7 Discussion of the state of knowledge ...... 58

5 TABLE OF CONTENTS 6

8 Conclusion ...... 61 Bibliography ...... 63

6 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 7

List of Abbreviations

CEE – Central and Eastern Europe CHES – Chapel Hill Expert Survey DI – Digital Inequality EER – Estonian Greens EIP-SCC – European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities EU – European Union G2B – Government to Business G2C – Government to Citizens G2E – Government to Emploees G2G – Government to Government GVC – Global Value Chains ICT – European innovation partnership on smart cities and communities KSČM – Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia LW PP – Left-wing Political Party NGO – Non-Profit Organization ODS – Civic Democratic Party of Czech Republic OECD – Organisation for Economic Co-operation and De- velopment RW PP – Right-wing Political Party SC – Smart City SDE – Social Democratic Party of Estonia SE – Smart Economy SEnv – Smart Environment SG – Smart Governance

7 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 8

SM – Smart Mobility SP – Smart People

8 LIST OF FIGURES 9

List of Figures

Figure 1 – Smart City Dimensions Figure 2 – Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their support either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Governance parameter Figure 3 - Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their support either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Economy param- eter Figure 4 – Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their support either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Environ- ment parameter Figure 5 – Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their support either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Governance parameter Figure 6 – Similarities and differences of the Smart City strategies’ re- flection of LW and RW PPs Figure 7 - Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart Governance of LW and RW PPs Figure 8 – Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart Economy of LW and RW PPs Figure 9 – Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart Environment of LW and RW PPs Figure 10 – Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart People of LW and RW PPs

9 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

1 Introduction

The fact that cities are constantly increasing in size by both urban land expansion and the growth of its population has already become uni- versally accepted. The European urban agglomerations have trans- formed into the centres of education and knowledge-based and prosper- ing economies. These areas are often considered to maintain better la- bour productivity and a higher quality of life (BBVA research, 2016). These great advantages that are frequently associated with the ‘Big City Life’ are causing a considerable increase in the urban population. For in- stance, due to increasing urbanisation by the end of the 21st century the urban population will rise up to 9 billion people. This implies that 85% of the world’s total population will become the cities’ inhabitants (OECD, 2015). The EU is not an exception regarding the urbanisation phenome- non. The current figure of the European dwellers with an urban area res- idency is approximately 75% of the EU population (Urban Environment, n.d.). This figure is as well gradually significantly increasing. Apparently, due to the rapid growth in the population and a massive flow of migrants harboured by the great number of the European cities, cities are facing a great number of political and economic challenges. In this context, main issues that should currently be addressed include ris- ing environmental pressure, massive migration that might cause further social, urban and cultural problems, the increasing need for smart re- sources allocation strategies, etc. Apart from that, as it has been esti- mated by the European Commission (n.d.), cities have begun to operate as autonomous entities by maintaining their personal economic, social, and environmental standards. Evidently, due to the fact that these issues are closely related to different political topics, it has become a mandatory task for the city governments and the political actors to introduce nu- merous innovative development strategies that will resolve upcoming urban issues. The innovative urban solutions’ projects that are frequently pre- sented nowadays include the popular concept of Smart Cities that has al- ready conquered the technical market as a solution that will maintain sustainable urbanisation. The SC is presented as the smart computing appliances and technologies implemented to achieve advanced connec- tion of crucial infrastructure components and services, such as the city

10 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM administration, education, healthcare, public safety, real estate, trans- portation, and utilities (Washburn et al., 2010). Eventually, this concept’s realisation is expected to result in the enhancement of the quality of cit- izens’ life. For this reason, the SC has integrated its concepts into a great number of European cities’ development projects and initiatives. The EU is currently realising a process to determine and fund the SC’s strategies in order to overcome the present urban challenges and by that to reach its 2020 targets (Russo, et.al, 2014). For instance, the Euro- pean Commission has introduced the European innovation partnership on smart cities and communities (EIP-SCC) that aims to present sustain- able integrated solutions to numerous urban issues (European Commis- sion, n.d.). Apart from that, European funds (e.g. European structural and investment funds and Horizon 2020 (Russo, et.al., 2014)) are launched in order to provide the maintenance to the smart development. Evi- dently, that fact proves that the SC initiatives have already gained the im- portance on the EU level. Due to the fact that the political parties are rather dynamic and are frequently adapting their strategies in accordance to different external and internal factors (Huhtanen, 2015), the SC might be another topic that gradually starts to be discussed among politicians and is becoming ex- tensively used in the political parties’ strategies throughout the world. The reason for this is that the SC strategies frequently propose innova- tive solutions to numerous political issues that are present at global, na- tional, and local levels. These problems generally include numerous eco- logical concerns, problems that are related to the allocation of energy re- sources, the migration crisis, aging population, housing and jobs’ crises, etc. Apart from that, the SC initiatives also demonstrate a demand for the partnerships’ formation between the public and private sectors (Ber- rone, Ricart, 2012). However, the question of whether the SC concept is addressed in an equal way by political parties of the same ideological bloc or whether there are any limits of the concept’s usage that are present due to the party’s ideology appears. The further section explains how can the polit- ical parties be differentiated among each other and which key factors are used in order to present the parties’ distinction. The distinction between the left- and right-wing will foster the formulation of expectations of pos- sible differences between the political parties within the SC initiatives.

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2 Defining key features of Left- and Right- wing political parties

The concept of determining the political party ideology within its position on the left and right political spectrum is widely applicable in Europe. The considerable advantage of the left-right concept is that it has frequently demonstrated its ability to relatively accurately predict polit- ical behavior and mass attitude (Geser, 2008). Gabel and Huber (2000) have affirmed that these left/right-wing attitudes are used in the great number of empirical studies dedicated to different issues such as “macro- economic policy-making, legislation institutional choice, electoral compe- tition, voting behavior, political representation, and cabinet stability”. In addition, two purposes for the political parties’ determination within the left-right political spectrum can be identified: the collective one and individual one. By considering the collective level, it can be stated that the concept of a political spectrum serves as a frame of refer- ence which permits political parties to distinguish themselves, and thus to associate their policy attitudes to this position. The individual level re- fers to the electorate ability to choose between the parties and form their political evaluation based on the left-right concept (Weber, 2012). In order to determine the detailed description of LW and RW ideo- logies, the core principles of their distinctions should be introduced. As will be described below, the LW and RW ideologies represent the oppo- site poles of the opinions about equality, either political, economic, or so- cial, and the government’s role in different state’s matters.

2.1 Left-wing political parties

The left-wing political parties (LW PPs) include social democrats and socialists, the far-left political parties (e.g. communists) (Hloušek, Kopeček, 2010), and centre-left political parties (e.g. social liberalism). The LW politics supports the concept of egalitarianism or social equality and also adheres to the idea of the state’s control of the majority of polit- ical and economic areas (Bobbio, 1993). The contemporary LW politics

12 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM prefers policies where the government is in charge of organising the na- tion’s economy and where the state industries are publicly owned (McDonald, Mendes, Kim, 2007, p. 64). Numerous researches also sug- gest that the LW PPs frequently act in a more pro-environmental manner in comparison with their RW counterparts (Neumayer, 2004). Social Democrats and Socialists are associated with the most char- acteristic party family on the left side of the political spectrum. These parties have initially rejected the market economy and promoted the idea of state planning and nationalization. In addition, they aim to elimi- nate differences between the society members, and by that achieve full equality within the society (Hloušek, Kopeček, 2010, p.15). The parties’ manifestos of social democrats and socialists are mainly focused on fos- tering solidarity, social justice, protection of citizens who may be socially underprivileged, and policies aiming to diminish social differences via redistributive taxation. They aspire to reach as low unemployment as possible and maintain economic prosperity. Simultaneously, their effort to reduce societal differences was precepted rather as an emphasis on equal opportunities (Hloušek, Kopeček, 2010, p.17). In addition, Glyn (2001) has affirmed that the main endeavors of the LW PPs are dealing with maintaining the full employment, developing of the welfare state, and the governmental redistribution of resources. The significant number of political parties have adopted the rela- tively liberal approaches and by that have obtained the center-left posi- tion in the Left/Right dimension. The center-left parties, according to Smith (1997), can be characterized as limiting the most destructive con- sequences of laissere-faire economics. Therefore, similarly to the LW PPs, they emphasize the relevance of government intervention in man- aging the economy of the state and also “the welfare enhancement” of citizens. However, in contrast to the ‘pure’ LW politics, the center-left does not inevitably cause the introduction of redistributive policies be- tween classes, however, a great number of such policies are still being recommended.

2.2 Right-wind political parties

By examining the RW politics, it has been inferred that it supports economic liberalism, privatisation, removal of borders, and personal

13 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM freedom of the individual. The RW PPs include the conservative parties, far-right (e.g. fascist parties), and centre-right (e.g. classical liberalism). Geser (2008) presents the analysis conducted by Laver and Budge (1993), where the right ideology was identified with emphasising “tradi- tional morality, law and order, free enterprise and national autonomy”. McDonald, Mendes, Kim (2007, p. 64) have described the RW politics as standing for the private enterprises organising the national economy of the state. It can be affirmed that the RW PPs simultaneously support the idea of the free market and political arguments about individualism and the reduced presence of the public sector. Conservatists, for instance, demonstrate fear towards an extension of citizenship rights and elimina- tion of societal inequality, due to the fact that it strengthens the role of the government in society. They also endorse social and moral conserva- tive principles (King, 1987). Referring to the New Right or the center-right parties, it should be mentioned that the emergence of New Right was caused by the combina- tion of two distinct ideologies which are neoliberalism and neoconserv- atism. For this reason, the New Right ideology is based on the signifi- cance of the state not intervening in the economy and the emphasis on traditional values. Inequalities, in contrast to the center-left politics, are perceived as the factor that can foster greater economic competitiveness and individual self-sufficiency (Smith, 1997). PPs might show a slight dif- ference in relation to their support of the state’s nonintervention into economic matters. For an instance, as Girdon and Ziblatt (2019) stated the conservative parties have demonstrated the greater commitment to the free-market economics, whereas Christian democrats' centrist posi- tions about that matters depicted their cross-class base of support. Nevertheless, despite the above-mentioned core principles of LW and RW differences, the distinction between left and right politics has always changed in its meaning and importance depending on time and various national contexts (March, Mudde, 2005, p.25). Bobbio (2003, p. 40) has stated that the "right" and the "left" cannot be taken as two mere ideologies. He claims that limiting them to the mere expression of ideo- logical ideas would be an inappropriate simplification. He introduces topics that, although may appear so in a rapid and captivated assessment, cannot be explicitly considered as either RW or LW because they belong to both sides despite a fundamental contradiction. This contradiction be- tween LW and RW, however, does not disappear even if they take the

14 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM same side. Such concepts as individualism and technical progress belong to these topics. These topics can be used as a rhetorical weapon in a pos- sible political clash. Therefore, it is important to realize that political par- ties consider individualism and anti-individualism, and technical pro- gress and stagnation as purpose-related values, that can, for instance, be used to support (RW) or as an argument against (LW) tradition, or to en- force (RW) or restrict (LW) certain privileges (Bobbio, 2003, p.76). These topics may also include the Smart City concept, in which the crite- ria of equality and freedom are fundamental. The SC concept, as it will be further described, is a complex term that is broadly related to the vast number of various practices and topics. For this reason, likewise the technical progress case, it can be expected that the SC concept may be introduced by both LW and RW PPs in spite of fundamental contradiction. Political parties may tend to use certain con- cepts related to the smart agenda in their manifestos in order to support the fundamental principles that closely correspond to their position in the political spectrum. For this reason, it poses a question which con- cepts of the SC might be actively supported by RW PPs and which con- cepts will gain more attention by the LW parties.

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3 Smart City definition and delimitation of the concept

In this chapter, the concept of a Smart city will be presented and an- alysed in order to understand what particular practices can be differen- tiated and most importantly which of them are closely related to the po- litical matters. In order to comprehend the complex term of SC, it is necessary to split the concept into further sub-concepts. These sub-concepts form di- mensions, which in case of joint realisation form and maintain the work of the SC. Therefore, the Vienna University of Technology has identified the so-called the European Smart City System that comprises of the fol- lowing dimensions: smart people, smart economy, smart mobility, smart environment, smart living, and smart governance. In this context, Caragliu, Bo, and Nijkamp (2011) have stated that: “these dimensions are based on theories of regional competitiveness, transport and ICT econom- ics, natural resources, human and social capital, quality of life, and the par- ticipation of society members in cities”.

Figure 1: Smart City Dimensions

Source: Ilasco, 2018

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3.1 Smart governance

Smart Governance (SG) can be determined as the technology-based cooperation between state governments and citizens in order to main- tain urban development (Tomor et al., 2019). This term is frequently equated with digital governance due to the special role of communica- tion via the internet and modern technology. According to OECD (2014), the digital government can be defined as “the use of digital technologies, as an integrated part of governments’ modernisation strategies, to create public value.” The digital government ecosystem is operated by govern- ment actors, NGOs, businesses, citizens’ associations, and individuals and is maintaining a great amount of data, provides services by interacting with government. Apart from that, the corresponding term of e-govern- ment is also associated with the usage of ICTs that might foster effective governance (OECD, 2014). The involvement of government in the ICT supportive initiatives frequently imply the city administration, service delivery, and decision- and policy-making (Institute of D-Government at Waseda University, 2018). For this reason, this topic is as well highly rel- evant in the context of political parties. Mechant and Walravens (2018) explain the interconnection be- tween the SC and the e-governance by presenting the overarching themes that are related to such concepts as data, governance, and partic- ipation. The data theme can hardly be overestimated since it contributes to the development of smarter forms of governance that will be per- formed with the help of comprehensive data collection techniques. The important task for governments is to maintain these operations by sim- ultaneously applying the open-data techniques. It can be assumed that in the context of political parties, data collec- tion techniques will be mostly formulated by the LW PPs due to the fact that they aim to reach the state’s control of the majority of political and economic areas (Bobbio, 1993). The data collection techniques will serve as a method by which the governmental control over the state’s matters can increase. The RW PPs supposedly should not contradict the develop- ment of the data collection and storage techniques, however, simultane- ously, the RW parties will not closely relate themselves to this agenda since, according to their ideology, they will pass this agenda to the pri- vate sector.

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It is important to present the most frequent ICT application initia- tives that are associated with the recent digital programs covering cen- tral, regional, and local governments and are, therefore, are most likely to appear in the context of political parties. These initiatives are designed to collaborate in the following forms: Government to Government (G2G), Government to Employees (G2E), Government to Business (G2B), Gov- ernment to Citizens (G2C) (Alharbi et al., 2014). Thus, G2B and G2C re- quire a more detailed description as these concepts may play a particu- larly important role in the context of political parties.

• Government to Business

Government to Business (G2B) provides the exchange between gov- ernment and business organisations and simplifies the selling of prod- ucts of both private and public sectors (Alharbi et al., 2014). The repre- sentative example that illustrates the G2B interaction is, for instance, the interaction via electronic data interchange (EDI). This type of reciprocity presents a standardised method of documents and data exchange be- tween the government and private enterprises. Both the private compa- nies and the public sector employ the EDI technology for transactions (e.g. online procurement of products), due to the fact that it frequently reduces transactions costs and enhances operational efficiency. Apart from that, the G2B interaction is evaluated as the method that simplifies the mechanisms of conducting and controlling the taxation mechanisms (Rhoda, n.d.). The above-mentioned concept is strongly connected to the relations between the public and private sectors that are the essential criteria that differentiate the LW and RW PPs. Supposedly, the LW PPs might demon- strate the far-reaching implication of the G2B initiatives that will foster the government to establish proper control over the private sector and thereby regulate the state's economy. In this case, G2B will be addressed in order to introduce different controlling mechanisms over the private sector. Such tools as online accounting systems, strict taxation controlling tools, and online company registering systems might be represented by the left-wing political parties. In addition, the transparency sustaining mechanisms might be mentioned in the LW programs.

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On the contrary, the main assumption in relation to the RW PPs is that these parties will concentrate on the G2B initiatives that can facili- tate private sector management. For this reason, technologies that are simplifying various customs clearance processes, payment of taxes, and fis- cal checks (e.g. introduce new forms of remote checks via the Internet) are expected to be mentioned by the RW PPs. Apart from that, these will include initiatives that are simplifying the process of obtaining licenses to undertake business activities.

• Government to Citizens

The Governance to Citizens (G2C) enables services provided by the state to be available in the electronic form to the citizens (Alharbi et al., 2014). It can generally include the majority of public services, such as e- voting, e-tax board, e-business, e-citizenship, e-residency, e-school, and university, etc (E-Estonia). The public services that are available online are frequently de- scribed as fostering the concept of the welfare state by simplifying the provision and citizens’ excess to public services and by that bringing equal opportunities to the state citizens. Such a conceptual interconnec- tion between digital governance and the welfare state has been often bounded for practices that are widely applied, for instance, in Denmark (Schou, Hjelhot, 2017). Due to the fact that the LW PPs indicate a clear preference towards the policies that are expanding the welfare state (Schmidt, 2009), it should be assumed that these parties will demon- strate the deeper implication for G2C services. On the contrary, programs of the RW PPs should contain a neutral position towards the G2C services with the relatively modest number of references to them, in comparison to the LW parties. The RW PPs may mostly concentrate on the E-Business initiatives that is closely related to simplification of governance interac- tion with the actors of the private sector.

3.2 Smart economy

Smart Economy (SE) is the concept that aims to foster the elabora- tion, sustainability, and attractiveness for new investment, typically in-

19 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM cludes such concepts as e-business, e-commerce, productivity magnifica- tion, and fosters the employment and innovation and development of new products and services (Universidad de Alicante, n.d.). According to the EIB (Koller, 2018), the implementation of SE initiatives is influencing the competitiveness at the local and national level, since it is dealing with innovation performance, private sector operation, applications for a trademark, and employment of technologies and ICT by the companies. Due to the fact that the SE is as well implying the usage of the Inter- net in order to provide numerous digital services, the SE is frequently interconnected to the emerging concept of the Digital Economy. Evi- dently, the development of the Digital Economy entails the modification of goods and services production, and, importantly, methods by which goods and services are introduced to the market (Brynjolfsson, Kahin, 2002). In addition, it promotes market liberalisation and removes the trade barriers by reducing trade costs, contributing to the coordination of global value chains (GVCs), connecting manufacturers and consumers globally (OECD, 2019). Due to the fact that the RW PPs are determined by the aspiration for implementing policies established to promote market liberalisation and competitiveness, it can be assumed that these parties will express the continuing support for the SE initiatives. The RW PPs may, for instance, promote the development of numerous start-ups in the digital economy and may also promote the private sector engagement with different tools (e.g. IoT tools, Big Data, advanced analytics, etc.) that may foster the de- velopment of the sector within the digital sphere. Regarding the LW PPs, the special emphasis within the SE concept should be put on the initiatives related to the employment issues. Ac- cording to OECD (2019), the approximate number of 14% of jobs will be substituted by automation, and 32% are likely to be considerably modi- fied in the process of their execution. This fact raises different concerns about the possibility of facing a rapid rate of unemployment. Since the LW PPs aspire to eliminate unemployment in cities, the programs of these parties are expected to comprise initiatives that will introduce so- lutions for the unemployment issues.

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3.3 Smart environment

According to Aletà, Alonso, and Ruiz (2017), the ongoing city trans- formation which is obtained by the creation of extensive infrastructures causes a considerable impact on the environment. These impacts include the consumption of natural resources and energy, emissions that fall to the atmosphere, water, etc, and waste overflow. In order to regulate the extent of this impact, the Smart Environment (SEnv) component of the SC’s realisation was introduced. In this context, it is more important to consider the SEnv concept from its environmental perspective. For this reason, the main aim of the SEnv concept will lie in maintaining the en- vironmental sustainability of the city and its green growth. Aletà, Alonso, and Ruiz (2017) have claimed that urban sustainabil- ity can be examined by studying two approaches. The first one is dealing with the energy resources and the so-called ‘consumption-prevention’ which includes: “renewable energy, technological grids, pollution control and management, ecologically green buildings, green urban manage- ment, reutilization, etc.”. The second one is connected to the manage- ment of resources that includes waste, street lighting, improving water and air quality, etc. The Smart Mobility (SM) that is the further concept of SC is as well closely connected to urban sustainability. For this reason, it is convenient to merge these terms in this work. The SM concepts include strategies designed to enhance the city environment (e.g. decreasing the number of private vehicles and employing the transport modes that cause the emis- sions’ cut). As it was mentioned in previous chapter, the LW PPs are more likely to comprise pro-environmental positions in their programs in compari- son to the RW PPs. Neumayer (2004) has inferred that this can be ex- plained by the fact that the pro-environmental orientation elaborates on the distribution of goods and the LW skepticism concerning the unregu- lated markets. Therefore, the SEnv strategies are anticipated to incorpo- rate more SEnv strategies.

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3.4 Smart people

The concept of Smart People (SP) lies in placing the special empha- sis on human resources, however, simultaneously, it does not exclude the role of technology and IT-strategies. Nevertheless, the human resources’ strategies move the attention towards to the citizens that are viewed as the key factor of the SC realisation (Meijer, Bolívar, 2013). In this context, the SC in the first place means a city where the human capital and the citizens’ level of education are the key factors for the facilitation of urban development (Meijer, Bolívar, 2013). In addition, as Nam and Pardo (2011) stated, the SP concept is formulated by maintaining the social in- clusion of city residents in different public services and soft infrastruc- ture that includes knowledge resources, voluntary organisations, and crime-free environments. Evidently, for this reason, a great number of educational techniques should be implemented in order to facilitate the high level of digital inclusion or digital equality (Bee Smart City, n.d.). Fi- nally, if the above-mentioned strategies are realised, the active partici- pation of citizens will be promoted and eventually increased. Hereby, it can be assumed that the LW PPs should immerse them- selves into the promotion of Smart People strategies, and may endeavour to enhance the overall level of knowledge of the state's population to use digital technologies. These expectations are based on the fact that namely LW PPs support the theory of egalitarianism or social equality (Bobbio, 1993). For this reason, they may put the special emphasis on the necessity to eliminate the problem of computer illiteracy and digital inequality.

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4 The aim of the thesis and current state of knowledge

Due to the previously mentioned assumptions, it is particularly im- portant to study how is the SC concept depicted and integrated into the context of political parties of the EU country members and what differ- ences in the parties’ engagements to the smart agenda might appear de- pending on the position of the party within the political spectrum (left- or right-wing). Therefore, the main aim of this thesis is therefore to answer the fol- lowing research questions: 1. How do the left-wing political parties conceptualise the smart technologies and services in their political programmes? 2. How do the right-wing political parties conceptualise the smart technologies and services in their political programmes? 3. What differences and similarities are present between left- and right-wing political parties in their formulation of the SC con- cepts? In order to study the above-mentioned questions, it is important to choose the samples that will widely cover the range of the political par- ties’ units of both LW and RW PPs in the EU member states. Therefore, it is essential to study political parties (LW and RW) that might cover the different economic and social context of the EU. The LW and RW PPs of the following countries have been selected for the analysis: Estonia, Denmark, and the Czech Republic. The selected countries differ in such factors as the size and population, the economic prosperity of the state, its geographical location (e.g. western vs. CEE states), etc. Apart from that, the parties namely of these states were se- lected due to their leading positions in the performance of state’s digital- isation (European Commission, the Digital Economy, and Society Index, 2019) and implementation of Smart technologies. For instance, accord- ing to the International Digital Government Rankings Report (2018),

23 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Denmark gained first place in implementing activities of the digital gov- ernment. In addition, Denmark is also considered to be suitable for the analysis, since Denmark is the representative example of the wealthy western EU state and, for this reason, the implementation of smart initi- atives can be executed at a significant level. Simultaneously, Estonia that ranked the fours place (International Digital Government Rankings Report, 2018) also belongs to the foremost countries in the digital agenda. Apart from that, Estonia has been named as “The most advanced digital society in the world” due to its wide range of public services available online (E-Estonia). Regarding the selection of political parties of the Czech Republic, un- like the above-mentioned states, the Czech Republic ranked merely the 39th place in the Digital Government Implementation (2018). However, the state is hitherto considered to be the leader of the smart projects’ development in comparison to other CEE states. In addition, the Czech Republic aims to achieve the same living standards as the western Euro- pean countries possess and its government is mostly interested in initia- tives that can contribute to the state’s economic wellbeing. The develop- ment of the SC initiatives can, therefore, be a tool that might foster reach- ing this target. Due to the above-mentioned reasons, it is expected that the digital agenda will be strongly emphasized in the context of the political parties of these states. In addition, it will be essential to study how do the LW and RW PPs depict the smart and digital agenda in different economic and social contexts of the states. Although, divergences might appear be- tween the results of analysis of different political parties within different European states due to the different meaning of the left-right categories among the states. The result might be also influenced by the fact that se- lected states, as it was already described above, differ in their emphasis on smart initiatives.

4.1 Parties selection

In order to achieve the main aim of the thesis, four parties (two left- wing and two right-wing) from each of the selected states have been cho- sen for analyses. For this reason, the following political parties have been selected for analysis:

24 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Estonian right-wing parties:

• Isamaa (centre-right to right-wing) • Estonian Reform Party (Estonian: Eesti Reformierakond) (centre- right) Estonian left-wing parties: • Social Democratic Party (Estonian: Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, SDE) (centre-left) • Estonian Greens (Estonian: Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, EER) (centre-left) Danish right-wing parties: • Venstre (center-right) • Liberal Alliance (centre right to right wing) Danish left-wing parties: • Social Democrats (Danish: Socialdemokratiet) (centre-left) • Socialist People’s Party (Danish: Socialistisk Folkeparti, SF) (cen- tre-left to left wing) Czech right-wing parties: • ODS (centre-right to right-wing) • TOP09 (centre-right) Czech left-wing parties: • KSČM (left-wing to far-left) • Czech Social Democratic party (centre-left) Numerous scholars (e.g. Gabel, Huber, 2000) have highlighted the fact that in order to evaluate the extensive range of theoretical argu- ments on numerous topics that are related to macro-economic policy- making and electoral competition, the reliable data concerning the left- right position of a political party should be present. The party manifestos

25 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM data that was coded by the numerous research groups is frequently con- sidered to be the exclusive data that enables the researcher to measure the left-right stances over the extensive-time period and over the broad range of countries. Gabel and Huber (2000) have inferred that usage of these data can result in relatively accurate predictions of the parties’ placement within the Left/Right dimension. The estimation of the selected parties’ left- and right-wing positions is based on the 2014 Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES). The CHES surveys are dedicated to the evaluation of national parties’ stances on different topics such as European integration, political ideology on a general left– right dimension, and numerous policy issues. The measurement of the position within the left/right political dimension is made by placing the party on the eleven-point scale from left to right (the lower the party’s value is the further the party moves towards the left side of the dimen- sion). By studying the data provided by CHES 2014, the selected parties were separated to the right-wing (parties which value varied from 6 to 11 in lrgen column) and left-wing (parties which value varied from 0 to 6 in lrgen column). Nevertheless, it is essential to emphasise the fact that the selected parties that stance the same political ideology can vary in the degree of belonging to this ideology. For an instance, the two samples of the RW PPs of the Czech Republic consist of TOP09 that is the conservative-lib- eral party and by that appears to maintain the centre-right ideology (Černoch et al., 2011) and ODS that is frequently determined as, as well, the liberal-conservative party, however, whose ideology ranges from the centre-right to the right-wing (Enyedi, Linek, 2008). The reason for this is that the party system of the majority of the EU countries does not allow to limit the selection of the parties to strictly the pure right- and left-wing parties. Apart from that, at present, determining the exact affiliation of a party to a purely left-wing and right-wing ideology is often considered to be problematic, since parties are frequently not rigid in their positions and adapt their stances depending on various external factors. For this reason, the main aim in the parties’ selection was to choose parties that contain the same ‘side’ ideology, whereas the level of its obstinance can differ among samples. It is also significant to state that certain parties were chosen due to the assumption that they might engage in the smart agenda and related ICT initiatives more than the others. This assumption is based on the data

26 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM extracted from the Manifesto Project Dataset (2020), which is developed in order to study and analyse the parties’ election manifestos in order to foster surveys of parties’ policy preferences. In order to assume whether the political party will be dedicated to the relevant agenda, the indicator Technology and infrastructure was chosen and compared between dif- ferent political parties of the selected states. Therefore, political parties that had the highest number of references to the above-mentioned indi- cator were selected for analysis (The Manifesto Project, 2019). Regarding the possible uncertainties of the survey, it is significant to mention that restricting research specifically to merely four political parties of each country may reduce the overall representativeness of the results. Therefore, the research will not reflect the stances of every polit- ical party in Denmark, the Czech Republic, and Estonia. However, due to the selection of namely the most successful and 'popular' political parties (parliamentary parties), this fact should not dramatically reduce the gen- eralizability of results in the selected EU countries. In addition, this work will be limited to the analysis of the latest manifestos of political parties related to the SC initiatives. During recent years, different types of the EU funding opportunities for EU regions and cities development and Smart cities implementation were launched. This includes such initiatives as URBACT (2014-2020), Horizon 2020 (2014- 2020), Urban Innovative Actions (2015-2020), etc. (European Commis- sion ‘Finding for Cities’, n.d.). For this reason, it can be assumed that the latest manifestos will comprise the greater attraction and involvement of political actors of the EU member states into the Smart agenda in com- parison to the previous years due to the larger financial opportunities offered by the EU.

4.2 State of knowledge

There is a substantial number of studies dealing with the PPs’ dis- tinction within different policies and political initiatives. For instance, Hooghe, Marks, and Wilson (2002) presented a study indicating a great interdependence between the party’s stance on European Integration and its position on the traditional left/right dimension. In addition, Eric Neumayer (2004) undertook a research where the relationship between

27 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM the party’s position within the political spectrum and its support for en- vironmental policies and issues was analysed. Further studies were also dedicated to the influence of rising globalisation on the level of partisan polarisation over trade policies that were, for an instance, conducted by Milner, Judkins, and Notes (2004). However, even though the concept of SC has been extensively used in the policy area (Caragliu, et al. 2011), due to the fact that policies re- lated to the digital and smart agenda are considered to be relatively new and merely start to be introduced into the parties’ manifestos, the cur- rent number of studies in the academic literature that is dedicated to the SC initiatives addressing the issues related to political parties’ concept framing is rather limited. The majority of this modest number of works is mainly dealing with the estimation of the role of political party as an actor of the concept im- plementation. For instance, Ion Ilasco (2018) has used the typology of the “triple helix” presented by Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff (2000) is in order to study the relationship between the strength of leftist parties within municipal councils and the level of smart city development. The “triple helix” typology is used to analyse urban regimes and the extent of involvement of different actors in urban development. It introduces the concept of “triple helix” model that can be used to analyse different types of collaboration in urban governance. It has presented three distinct models: (1) ‘laissez-faire’ model where the main emphasis is put on in- dustry and business actors; (2) ‘statist’ model presenting the importance of governmental actors and the (3) emphasis on the academia (Ilasco, 2018). Another example is the work of Bossuyt and Savini (2017), where authors analysed the role of PPs in formulating the urban agendas of sus- tainable development by examining eco-district projects development of Amsterdam and Stockholm. The authors concluded that PPs are relevant in this problematic and should be contemporary within urban develop- ment research. Nevertheless, there is a substantial gap in academic literature where the SC will be studied as the factor under which the left- and right-wing political parties can be distinguished. Due to the fact that the role of po- litical parties in urban development can be hardly overestimated, this study will aim to seal this existing gap.

28 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

5 Methodology and research strategy

In the following sub-section of the work, the research method se- lected for the study will be presented. In the beginning, the comparative approach and subjects of comparison, based on which the parties' atti- tude to the SC concept will be compared, are defined. Thereafter, the method of data analysis that was selected for the thesis is described.

5.1 Comparative approach

The comparative approach was selected in order to perform the analysis of study cases (in terms of countries and political parties). Kan- tor and Savitch (2005) state that the comparative approach merely facil- itates a credible explanation of the studied phenomena. The reason for this is that namely comparison presents how variables differently oper- ate in diverse social circumstances. Since the examined concept of Smart City comprises a variety of concepts that might differ depending on dif- ferent contexts, the comparative approach has been selected and is con- sidered to be highly appropriate for the analysis. According to Abadie et al. (2014), studies that were conducted by adopting the comparative approach are developed by including “meticu- lous description and analysis of the characteristics of a small number of cases, as well as of their differences and similarities”. The fact that the comparative approach enables the researcher to gather the detailed in- formation is particularly important since the explicit exploratory de- scription of how the topic of the SC differs among the LW and the RW PPs depending on different contexts will facilitate the generalization from the research of the selected cases to the whole EU, which is the main aim of this work.

5.2 Content analysis

This work uses the method of content analysis in order to present the approach towards the SC concepts of selected parties of Estonia, Czech Republic, and Denmark in a selected time period. The analysis will

29 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM be based on the primary sources which are the programs of the parties developed for the parliamentary and for the local/municipal elections. According to Cole (1988), content analysis is a method that is used to analyse written, verbal, or visual communication messages (in Elo, Kyngäs, 2007). Content analysis can be classified as qualitative (Bernard a Ryan 1998) and quantitative (Berelson, 1952). While the main aim of the quantitative content analysis to code text data into explicit categories and then describe this data by using statistical methods, the qualitative research analysis interprets the content of text data through the system- atic classification process of coding and identifying themes or patterns (Hsieh, Shannon, 2005). In other words, it can be inferred that the quan- titative approach aims to depict certain phenomena in numbers and sta- tistical data, while the qualitative content analysis is used in order to de- scribe different symbols and characteristics of the phenomena. Due to the fact that the main aim of the thesis does not require to compare the frequency of the concept mentions and that it is important to understand how do the political parties describe the SC concept, the qualitative con- tent analysis was chosen for the research. Content analysis requires the definition of the coding unit and cod- ing categories, which will enable the researcher to describe the content of the examined data (Beneš , Drulá k, n.d.). The coding unit can be defined as a part of a text with a meaningful value about the phenomenon which is being examined (e.g. word, sentence, paragraph, etc.). The coding unit of this work is a quasi-sentence. According to the Manifesto Project (2020), a quasi-sentence is a single statement. In addition, grammatical sentence can contain more than one quasi sentence, however, a quasi- sentence can never include more than one grammatical sentence. Each coding unit will be assigned to a specific SC concept (category). Basic concepts of the SC have been deduced (Smart Governance, Smart Economy, Smart Environment, and Smart People) from the definition of the smart city proposed by Caragliu, Bo, and Nijkamp (2011) that was presented in the previous chapter. The specific strategies of the particu- lar concept may be supported more by the particular ideology, while the contrary ideology will put its emphasis on the different SC concepts. The division of the concepts is absolutely crucial, since, eventually, it will en- able the researcher to understand what are the differences and similari- ties of the parties’ attitudes towards the SC concept as the whole. Figures 2, 3, 4, 5 present the specific practices of each concept, reveal the certain

30 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM expectations of their support either by the LW or the RW PPs, and explain why are these concepts anticipated to be supported namely be the con- crete ideology. Expectations that are presented in Figures 2, 3, 4, 5 are based on the definitions of the RW and the LW ideologies that were de- termined in the previous chapters.

31 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 2: Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their sup- port either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Governance param- eter

Practices expected to be Practices expected to be Concept Sub concept supported by the RW PPs supported by the LW PPs

The SG concepts are not expected It is anticipated that the SG to play a fundamental role in the concepts will be more programs of the RW PPs, since addressed by the LW PPs, these parties do not intend to since this concept is highly attain the state control over each related to the realization of sector of public life. the welfare state. DC techniques contain Data collection is a tool that accountability character, fosters the governmental control Data which fosters the state’s over different areas and is not Collection control of the majority of expected to be strongly political and economic addressed in the RW PPs. areas. Optimisation of the work of Digital control of private private sector: digital sector: digital processing of processing of data and data and operations Smart operations provided by the provided by the private Governance private sector with the main aim sector with the main aim of (SG) of optimisation. control. - Digital initiatives to - Online accounting facilitate PS management; systems; Governance - Simplifying various - Strict taxation to Business customs clearance controlling tools processes; available online; - Simplifying taxes payment - Companies web and fiscal checks receival registering systems; via internet; - Online transparency - The processes of obtaining sustaining the licences to undertake mechanisms in PS online business activities. work.

- availability of the Digital state services (e-voting, e- Governance - emphasis on Business services tax board, e-business, e- to Citizens available online. citizenship, e-residency, e- school and university, etc). Source: Author

32 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 3. Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their sup- port either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Economy parameter

Sub Practices expected to be Practices expected to be Concept concept supported by the RW PPs supported by the LW PPs

SE practices are generally more expected to be The SE concept might be supported by the RW PPs, mentioned by the LW PPS, but as that they are determined the special emphasis is expected by the aspiration for to be put on the initiatives that implementing policies promote the social equality established to promote among individuals, to which the market liberalisation. LW PPs are specifically oriented. Hereby, digitalisation might be the case. - Entrepreneurship and digital start- ups; The LW PPs may not contradict Digitalized - Digital economy as a to these strategies, however, they Economic tool of are not anticipated to emphasise model competitiveness; - Digital Market their necessity. Smart promotion. Economy (SE) It is expected that this agenda will be particularly addressed by the LW PPs, since the LW parties tend to address issues of social The RW PPs are not inequality. The following expected to emphasise concepts may be to supported: strategies aiming to reduce Changes in issues in labor market, - Creation of new jobs in labour since the RW generally do computerisation and market not aim to attain the digital technologies; caused by elimination of social - Innovative digital digitizatin inequality. solutions for alternative job creation; - Professional training: support for professional training for working with smart technologies.

Source: Author

33 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 4: Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their sup- port either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Environment param- eter

Practices expected to Practices expected to be supported by the Concept be supported by the LW PPs RW PPs Due to distributive concerns, it is anticipated that the SEnv should evoke enthusiasm The RW PPs are among the LW PPs. The following concepts generally less likely to may be to supported: Smart address environmental - Renewable energies to maintain urban Environment issues, for this reason environment; (SEnv) the SEnv is as well less - Air and water quality; likely to appear in the - Green zones creation; RW PPs’ programs. - Ecologically clean transport and transport systems; - Reuse and recycling. Source: Author

Figure 5: Anticipations of differences between the ideologies and their sup- port either by the LW or the RW PPs within the Smart Governance param- eter

Sub Practices expected to be Practices expected to be Concept concept supported by the RW PPs supported by the LW PPs The RW PPs are assumed to LW parties are expected to mainly support initiatives of immerse themselves in this agenda city development that are more, since it is highly related to

proposed by citizens, the citizens’ equal inclusion into universities, research canters, the usage of technology and digital or private enterprises. services. Smart - Citizens’ initiatives in the - May as well highlight this People Citizens’ development of SC agenda, since it also tangible (SP) initiatives strategies may be in relation to ideology. particularly addressed. - The DI is not assumed to Digital - Computer Literacy; be emphasised, since it is inequality - Provision of the internet. related to the social (DI) egalitarianism. Source: Author

The results of the content analysis will be presented in the subse- quent sections that will depict the comparison of the SC concepts’ intro- duction between the LW and RW parties’ blocks within the selected states. The attitude of the political parties towards the SC issues will be

34 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM analysed and compared in the dimensions of Smart Governance, Smart Economy, Smart Environment, and Smart People. The main aim of the further sections is to present a fully detailed description of the differ- ences and similarities that occurred within each of the above-mentioned concepts. It will be also important to estimate which of the expectations that were presented in Figures 2, 3, 4, 5 were confirmed during the study.

Ultimately, based on the analysis of the results, it will be possible to affirm what is the main attitude of the political parties towards the SC concept as the whole depending on their ideology. It will be possible to assert whether the SC concept can serve as the factor under which polit- ical parties can be classified as either left or right. This will be crucial in order to estimate which differences are based on the ideological stances of the parties and which differences are mostly caused by the states’ is- sues.

35 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

6 Analysis of the attitudes of the political parties towards the Smart City concept

In the beginning, it is important to state that the results of the re- search demonstrate that specific differences were present in the LW and RW PPs’ approaches to the SC concept. As it will further be demonstrated in the concrete examples, these differences are based on the general ide- ological positions of the parties. Apart from that, there were concepts in which examined representatives of both sides of the ideological spec- trum attained similar positions, while initially it was expected that these concepts will entail further ideological differences. This may be ex- plained by the fact that the specific strategies have already become ac- cepted and promoted within the particular country to such extent that both ideologies began to incorporate these strategies in their programs. Thereby these strategies lost their significance for the ideological differ- entiation of the political parties. The results of the study are presented in Figure 6 that includes both similarities and main differences that the LW and the RW political parties depict in relation to the SC concepts. The important finding is that the general differences between the ideologies of the LW and the RW PPs are applicable within the SC con- cept. As anticipated, the SC concept as the whole cannot be defined as a concept that is solely supported by the LW or the RW ideology. It is a rather complex term related to numerous practices and topics that were introduced by both LW and RW PPs despite their fundamental contra- diction. Data that is depicted in Figure 6 reveals that there are specific concepts and practices within the SC that were supported either by LW PPs, while others were supported by RW PPs. Similar to the particular topics that were introduced by Bobbio (2003, p.76), political parties re- fer to certain concepts of smart innovations in their manifestos in order to maintain the fundamental principles that correspond to their position in the political spectrum. The careful description of each of the concepts is required in order to comprehend the attitude of both ideologies to the examined concept.

36 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 6: Similarities and differences of the Smart City strategies’ reflection of LW and RW PPs

Smart Key strategies that were Differences between PPs references to the SC City supported by both Concepts Concept ideologies Left-wing Right-wing - No mentions of - Introduction of services that will - G2B and E- digital state services optimise the work business - Promotion of data SG of private sector strategies were collection - G2B systems frequently techniques and controlling the supported regulations private sector - Creation of new jobs due to ongoing - No mentions of - Economic model computerisation the developement supporting was strongly of new jobs due to digitalization; supported; introduction of - Digital economy as a - Innovative digital digital tool of solutions for technologies SE competitiveness alternative job - Professional - Entrepreneurship creation; training for and digital start-ups; - Support for working with - Digital Market professional smart promotion. training for working technologies was

with smart not mentioned technologies - Renewable sources - Renewable sources of energy (Estonia as of energy: Estonia – - In the Czech an exception); more support from Republic, smart - Smart transport was the LW PPs; transport systems supported by both - In Estonia and were addressed (BUT: differences in Denmark, smart more. SEnv the extent of support transport systems - Eco clean within the states); were addressed transport in the - Eco clean transport; more; Czech Republic - Green zones - Eco clean transport was emphasized protection in Estonia and more. - Air and water Denmark was quality. emphasized more. - Provision of the - No statements internet related to the - Provision of - Strategies enhancing engagement of professional staff to the computer specialy trained SP teach elderly people literacy people to teach elderly to use online- - Citizens’ initiatives the usage of online- services in the SC services development Source: Author

37 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

The analysis has demonstrated that the topic of SC and its main practices is gradually becoming popular and is being frequently incorpo- rated into the programs of political parties. Even though it was initially expected that this agenda will be primarily addressed by the political parties of Denmark and Estonia, due to the fact that these states are ranked among the leading states in implementing activities of the digital state initiatives (International Digital Government Rankings Report, 2018), the analysed parties of the Czech Republic have also considerably dedicated their programs to some problems related to SC initiatives. It should be stated that Estonian political parties have incorporated the drastic number of stances related to Smart Governance in compari- son to other parties of the selected states. This result was partially fore- seen due to the fact that the development of digital government practices is particularly popular in Estonia that is as well universally considered to be “the most advanced digital society in the world” (E-Estonia, 2020). In addition, the parties of Denmark have developed particularly sophisti- cated strategies for the implementation of the Smart Environment. This can be explained by the fact that Denmark is world-famous for maintain- ing the world's greenest economy. The essential part of its economy is dependent on the development of solutions to global issues encompass- ing green energy strategies (Boggild, 2012). Apart from that, topics re- lated to Smart Economy were highly developed by parties within all of the analysed states. As stated above, data presented in Figure 6 demonstrates that par- ticular differences occurred between the LW and RW ideology in their references to the SC terms. However, in the majority of cases, both ideo- logies did not contradict each other. The differences were mostly caused by the fact that the particular concept was used by parties that are on the same side of the political spectrum and was merely ignored by the par- ties on the other side of it. Moreover, the results have shown that in a considerable number of cases (e.g. SE, SG) the party introduces a partic- ular concept of smart technology in order to emphasise its existing ideo- logical positions. In other words, in particular cases, parties support those areas of technological progress that contribute to the promotion of the main points of their ideologies. In relation to occurred ideological differences, for an instance, the results presented in the sections of Smart Economy and Smart People in-

38 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM dicate that the LW PPs address issues related to the concept of egalitari- anism and social equality that appear due to technology development and innovations. The LW PPs have mentioned the necessity to develop strategies that will eliminate differences between the society members that are caused by the introduction of new technologies (e.g. in relation to job distribution; digital literacy; provision of professional staff to teach elderly people to use online services, etc.). The LW PPs mentioned their intentions to introduce alternative workplaces in modern sectors (EER, 2019; Socialdemokratiet, 2017), initiate educative programs that in- crease technical skills of the workers (the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020; Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019; Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019), and reconsider the workers’ rights (ČSSD, 2017). The RW PPs, in this context, did not incorporate similar stances con- cerning job distribution and professional training. However, as it will be further presented, some of the RW PPs managed to comprise strategies of digital inequality, particularly digital illiteracy (e.g. Estonian Reform Party). Nevertheless, the RW PPs did not manage to encompass sophisti- cated strategies toward these problems. This absence of mentioning re- lated to job distribution issues, can be explained by the fact that the RW PPs, in contrast to the LW, view inequalities as the factor that stimulates economic competitiveness (Smith, 1997). Furthermore, as it was anticipated, the RW PPs have addressed and supported digital innovations facilitating the private sector management (G2B services – e.g. reporting-free reporting). According to the RW PPs, the aim of the expansion of digital services is to improve the interaction between the private sector and state and to foster the work of the enter- prises (e.g. “One Stop Shop” system) (Estonian Reform Party, Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019, p.47; TOP 09, 2017). On the contrary, in par- ticular cases, the LW PPs have incorporated tools that foster control over the private sector management (e.g. development of internet accounting systems) (Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019; Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). The interesting results were also discovered after examining the SEnv concept’s usage. Even though, generally, the LW and the RW PPs have acquired a rather similar positive viewpoint towards this agenda, there were still some distinctions between parties. It was discovered that the topic of renewable energy sources was introduced by contradicting strategies between the LW and the RW PPs of Estonia, however, there

39 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM were no contradictions determined between the LW and the RW parties of Denmark and the Czech Republic. This could be explained by the fact that every state allocates electricity generation among energy sources in a different way, and, therefore, each state will present a different view on renewable energy sources’ engagement. Nevertheless, the example of Es- tonian LW and RW parties’ differences indicate that the LW PPs parties are slightly more likely to be engaged with the eco-friendly policies (in that case eco-clean energy production). For this reason, it can be stated that the difference that is present in Estonian parties can serve as a party’s affiliation to a particular ideology. Despite the above-mentioned differences, the research also demon- strated that there is a surprising number of concepts in which both ide- ologies tend to have a rather similar point of view. These similarities are foremost present in parties’ supportive positions related to Digital Gov- ernance services’ allocation and the ongoing process of digitalisation in the economy. Even though it was primarily anticipated that the LW PPs would be more dedicated towards the agenda of Digital Governance ser- vices’ allocation, while RW PPs were expected to be rather neutral or even ignore this agenda, the results have shown that the approaches to these issues do not differ between the RW and the LW PPs. In this con- text, both ideologies support online education and language training, dig- italization of healthcare services and cultural heritage (ČSSD, 2017; Es- tonian Reform Party, 2019; Isamaa, 2019; ODS, 2017; Sotsiaaldemo- kraatlik Erakond, 2019). Another similar finding is related to practices that foster the process of digitalisation in the economy. For instance, the RW PPs emphasise the enhancement of the state’s economy via the de- velopment of digital technologies (Isamaa, 2019; Estonian Reform Party, 2019). Similarly, the LW PPs mentioned economic strategy based on modern technologies, innovations, and skilled people (e.g. ČSSD, 2017). Therefore, these concepts do not serve as the factor under which parties can be assigned to the particular ideological bloc. Another significant result is that, despite the presence of statements concerning technology and innovation in both ideological parties, the LW PPs generally tend to include the greater number of concepts related to the SC in comparison to the RW PPs. LW PPs have developed a great num- ber of SC strategies even in the Smart Economy topic, which was ex- pected to be more introduced in the RW parties. In addition, as it will be further demonstrated, the LW PPs have included much more complex

40 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM strategies that foster the SC concept implementation in comparison to the RW PPs. For instance, in the context of Smart Environment, the LW PPs (e.g. Estonian Greens; the Social Democratic Party of Estonia) devel- oped a sophisticated strategy that will foster the implementation of re- newable energy technologies. On the contrary, the RW PPs have often in- cluded a rather modest number of sentences that reveal their strategies toward the implementation of the SC strategies. Furthermore, there are almost no practices that are mentioned merely by the RW parties and are not spoken about in the programs of its ideological rivals. The single ex- ception is the G2B that is a component of the Smart Governance concept. However, this fact meets expectations that were formed before conduct- ing the study. In addition, there was not detected a great number of divergencies between the examined countries. The rather insignificant country vari- ance was present in the parties’ stances towards the SEnv. Namely, such topics as the employment of renewable energies sources, eco clean transport promotion, and smart transport systems development were introduced differently among the states. For example, the usage of re- newable energy sources was addressed in a different way by the Esto- nian LW and the RW parties, while this topic was similarly presented by the opposite party blocks in Denmark and the Czech Republic. It will be further presented in the chapter dedicated to SEnv that this difference can be explained by a different view on renewable energy sources’ usage by each state. It can be inferred that parties support those practices of the SC con- cept that enhance and complement the key positions of their ideology the most. For this reason, it can be stated that the concept of SC as such can be adjusted to both sides of the ideological blocks in order to promote their key ideas. Therefore, the concept of SC cannot be clearly deter- mined as an ideological concept, while its separate concepts’ usage fre- quently demonstrates a clear difference in the party programs of the LW and RW. The further sub-chapters reveal the more detailed comparison of the parties’ attitudes to each of the above-mentioned SC concepts.

41 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

6.1 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Governance

It can be stated that Smart Governance (SG) is a concept that has been introduced by all of the examined parties regardless of their ideo- logical affiliation. The results of the analysis that depict the attitude to- wards the SG of LW and RW PPs is presented in Figure 7 and is explained in this chapter. The significant finding is that the majority of digital state services and the data collection and storage techniques were incorpo- rated by the LW and the RW PPs to their programs in similar ways. The differences that occurred are related to the E-Business services that are dealing with the exchange of data between government and business or- ganisations. As was expected, strategies that aim to implement govern- ment control over the business sector were introduced by the LW PPs, while the RW PPs have demonstrated the willingness to collaborate with the private sector in the development of digital service and introduce services that will facilitate the work of the private sector. It can be inferred that the SG is one of the most used concepts of the SCs for both the LW and the RW PPs. The topic of Smart or Digital gov- ernance was particularly covered by PPs of Estonia in comparison to other examined states. Manifestos of examined Estonian parties have in- cluded a great number of stances concerning the Digitalisation of public administration and state services. Both sides of the ideological spectrum in Estonia have emphasised the fact that Estonia should keep its leading position of the E-state, and for this reason, investment in technologies and innovations should increase (Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019; Isamaa, 2019, p. 33). In contrast to that, Danish and Czech political par- ties did not engage themselves too deeply into this topic.

42 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 7: Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart Governance of LW and RW PPs

Similarities between LW Digital Government Digital Government practices and RW PPs in relation to practices supported supported by the RW PPs Smart Governance by the LW PPs - Support for adoption - Simplification and of effective data enhancement of the private collection and storage sector work through E- techniques - Control of private Business services: - Support for sector through E- ▪ Online entrepreneurship transparency of Business ▪ Cancellation of electronic collected data techniques sales records - Introduction of digital ▪ Online ▪ Introduction of the Single services: accounting Collection Point ▪ Health-care systems ▪ Reporting-free reporting services ▪ Control over mechanisms ▪ Cultural heritage taxation ▪ Stop Shop system ▪ Language - Collaboration of public and training private sectors in delivery of ▪ Education digital state services Source: Author

Despite the parties’ different levels of involvement in the SG topic, the concept of SG or eGovernment as a whole is positively viewed by all examined political parties. The majority of examined political parties consider digitalisation as a way to improve the work of the public admin- istration and simplify the citizens’ life. For an instance, the Czech RW party ODS (2017) has stated that it supports “the development of digital society and eGovernment that should be built on the principles of openness, accessibility and a small state” in order to simplify the life of the modern citizen. Simultaneously, the Czech LW party ČSSD (2017) claimed to “dig- italise public administration in order to speed it up”. A similar viewpoint was acquired by Estonian and Danish PPs. However, as this chapter will reveal, the main differences regarding the digital state services were con- nected to the question of whether these services are developed to control or simplify the work of the private sector.

43 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Concerning the digital state services, both of the parties’ blocs have included a significant number of suggestions concerning the introduc- tion of electronic services into the citizens’ everyday life. For an instance, both the LW and RW PPs have put a special emphasis on introducing dif- ferent digital platforms that will foster the language training (Estonian Reform Party, 2019; Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019). Both ideolo- gies have also demonstrated similarities in their positive attitude to- wards the digitalisation of cultural heritage (Isamaa, 2019; ČSSD, 2017) and user-friendly healthcare electronization and digitalization (ČSSD, 2017; ODS, 2017). Another finding is that both blocks have mentioned the development of e-education, which means the possibility of attaining the high school or university education via the internet (Sotsiaaldemo- kraatlik Erakond, 2019; Estonian Reform Party, 2019). However, only the RW parties promoted the idea of collaboration be- tween public and private sectors in elaboration on and the delivery of dig- ital state services. In this context, for instance, the Danish Liberal Alliance stated that it supports the coordination between the public and business sectors in developing government digitization strategies (Liberal Alli- ance, n.d.). In addition, regarding the parties’ attitude towards the implemen- tation of online services, it is important to present the parties’ position towards the realisation of these strategies in relation to the governance interaction with the private sector, since there were discovered differ- ences among the parties’ strategies towards this subject. As was ex- pected, the RW PPs generally expressed greater support for the expan- sion of digital services in the way to stimulate governmental interaction with the private sector. Estonian Reform Party (2019) aims to: “modern- ize and expand digital services in the country to ensure fast, convenient and non-bureaucratic interaction between enterprises and the state”. In addi- tion, the RW PPs were emphasising the fact that the use of digital tech- nologies and digital interactions should primarily simplify the work of the private sector. For an instance, Estonian Reform Party has written that “(…) make more use of the real-time economy to simplify bureaucracy, reduce administrative burden and the shadow economy; in particular, we consider it necessary to develop reporting-free reporting” (Estonian Re- form Party, 2019, p.47). Another example is that the Czech RW party TOP 09 have incorporated the idea of the establishment of the “One Stop Shop”

44 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM simplifying the work between government and private enterprises by al- lowing entrepreneurs to register in the system, where “the entrepreneur enters only invoices for purchased or sold goods and services” (TOP 09, 2017). The LW PPs do not include a considerable number of references to- wards the optimisation of the private sector’s work via the development of digital technologies. In addition, considering the left-wing attitude to- wards Government-to-Business solutions, in specific cases, these parties demonstrate the greater involvement in the idea of elaboration of differ- ent controlling mechanisms, in particular, internet accounting systems. In this context, the Danish Socialistic Folkeparti states that due to techno- logical development, it is necessary to be sure that the is no tax evasion (Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019.) In this context, for example, Estonian Greens stated that “(…) will help Estonian businessmen switch to com- puter-readable accounts, at least when communicating with government agencies” (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). Due to that fact, it can be stated that the LW PPs are evolving the explicit idea of implementing the use of the smart technology that might foster the accountability of the private sector to the government. The data collection was treated equally in both the LW and the RW PPs. This topic has acquired a considerable number of mentions in the parties’ programs of all of the examined states. Both ideologies equally emphasise the fact that the data should be open, and different regula- tions should be introduced in order to enable each citizen to have free excess to different state collected data. Therefore, the data collection and storage cannot be considered as a factor under which parties can be clas- sified as either left or right. Therefore, it can be inferred the SG concept was generally positively referred to by all of the examined political parties despite their ideology. Similar positions were present in statements concerning the storage and collection of data and digital services proposed by the state. It may be partially explained by the fact that these services became so widely ac- cepted and promoted within the states that both RW and LW PPs aim to incorporate these strategies into their programs. The differences that were detected were mainly related to the topic of E-Business services. Accordingly, the LW PPs aim to increase the public sector control over the private sector. In contrast to that, the RW PPs promote the develop- ment of services that simplify the enterprise’s work.

45 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

6.2 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Economy

Both RW and LW PPs incorporated a considerable number of pro- motive utterances related to SE into their programs. Even though the re- sults demonstrate that political parties view the digitalisation and intro- duction of smart technologies as an economic opportunity for their state independently on their position on political spectrum, the differences based on the general ideological positions of the parties towards Smart Economy were determined. The principal finding in relation to the SE is that the LW PPs tend to address issues related to the influence of ongoing process of computerisation on the labour market, whereas the RW PPs did not incorporate any stances related to this topic (see fig. 8). The sim- ilarities that occurred between two ideologies were related, for an in- stance, to the maintenance of the ongoing process of technical develop- ment and digitalisation in the economy, an increase of competitiveness via digital technologies, and support to the development of the digital market (see fig. 8).

Figure 8: Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart Economy of LW and RW PPs

Practices Similarities between LW and RW Practices supported by the supported by the PPs in relation to SE LW PPs RW PPs - address the necessity to - RW PPs do not - support to technical create new workplaces include the need development and digitalisation due to the automation to introduce in economy process new jobs due to - introduction of technologies as a - support for innovative digitalisation way to enhance competitiveness digital solutions for - Professional - digital services and e-governance alternative job creation training for are viewed as an important area encouraged; working with of state’s economy - support for new - support for digital market professional training technologies is - support to entrepreneurship and for working with smart not mentioned digital start-ups technologies by the RW PPs Source: Author

As it has been stated above, the LW PPs tend to stress the fact that the technical progress and the increasing number of digital tools that are being introduced and implemented in the economy cause changes in the

46 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM labor economics. Therefore, these parties state that these changes re- quire adaptation in different economic spheres. LW PPs frequently ad- dress issues related to the creation of new alternative workplaces due to the rapidly increasing automation process and usage of technical tools. In this context, both Estonian LW SDE and EER support the creation of jobs in modern sectors of the economy that are based on innovative solutions and the application of emerging technologies. EER, due to the party’s ten- dency to support the environmentally-friendly policies’ development, has specifically emphasised the importance of the creation of “many well- paid jobs in the green industry and other sectors of the economy.” (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). Furthermore, the LW PPs address the problem of a lack of technical and computer skills that appears due to the rapid process of automation. Hence, the LW parties state that it is necessary to introduce different ed- ucative programs for workers in order to keep them demanded in the la- bour market. This issue was particularly addressed by both of the exam- ined LW PPs of Denmark, which adopted the concept of “continuous edu- cation” that is presented as an effective solution to the lack of the skilled workforce and disappearance of particular unskilled jobs that are caused by technological advances (the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020; So- cialistic Folkeparti, 2019). Another representative example is that the Social Democrats of Estonia mentioned the possibility of launching the digital academy programs that will improve digital competences of offi- cials (Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019). The LW PPs also propose to adopt digital solutions that will contrib- ute to the increase in employment within their state. Estonian SDE party addressed the necessity to "(...) place older people in the labour market (...). We will create innovative digital solutions for public life and work of people of advanced age" (Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019). In reference to the examined RW PPs, as expected, these parties do not depict issues related to changes that will occur in a labour market that are caused by digitalisation process in their programs. This absence of any references towards this topic can be explained by the fact that these parties traditionally aim to enhance economic competitiveness and individual self-sufficiency (Smith, 1997). Economic inequalities, includ- ing inequalities in the labour market, are understood as a tool to reach these aims.

47 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Despite this contradiction, it is also important to describe similari- ties that occurred between the RW and the LW PPs. Firstly, both ideolo- gies generally demonstrated a positive viewpoint considering digitalisa- tion in different economic spheres. Regarding this, both ideologies sup- ported technological development and digitalisation as a tool that will increase competitiveness (see fig. 8). The RW Estonian Reform Party and Isamaa in their 2019 programs have particularly connected the optimi- sation and enhancement of the economy with the development of smart and digital technologies. Thereby, Isamaa has stated that “further devel- opment of the Estonian economy should be based on innovation and new investments in education, science, technology (including IT) and produc- tion” (Isamaa, 2019, p. 7). Similarly, the LW PPs support the ongoing pro- cess of technical development and digitalisation. The Social Democratic Party of Estonia affirmed that it “supports the digitalization and automa- tion of industrial enterprises...”. In addition, the SDPE puts a special em- phasis on the improvement of productivity and, for this reason, it sup- ports the governmental participation in high-tech tenders of enterprises (SDPE Program in the 2019 Parliamentary Elections). It should be mentioned as well that examined political parties, espe- cially Estonian and Danish ones, view the digital services and e-govern- ance as one of the important areas of the state’s economy. The LW and the RW parties have affirmed that it is important to support the private sector in the development of e-governance, and have put a special em- phasis on support for the IT enterprises that are export-oriented in order to maintain and extend international contracts. Such statements can be as well considered as the parties’ affirmation to maintain digital market de- velopment. In addition, Denmark frequently positions itself as a country in which green and environmentally friendly growth is the strongest side of its economy (Boggild, 2012). Enhancing Danish green technology ex- ports is presented as a priority for the country's economy. Therefore, the Danish LW PPs, which are also considered to be eco-friendlier oriented, present the development of green technologies and technologies of the circular economy as priority areas for development (Socialistic Folke- parti, 2019; the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020). An important example is the Estonian parties that frequently view the export of digital services as one of the most significant economical duties. For example, Estonian Green party stated that it: “supports sci-

48 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM ence-intensive and technology-based entrepreneurship, primarily by creat- ing a favourable business environment and creating suitable legal condi- tions.” (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). The RW PPs have acquired similar stances in relation to this topic. Estonian RW Isamaa 2019 stated that it encourages the export of Estonian IT solutions that relate to e- governance. It has also claimed that in order to maintain this export it will create the best opportunities for Estonian IT companies to trade these solutions to other countries (Isamaa, 2019). The Czech TOP 09 views the creation of a single energy market and facilitating the process of digitalization positively and rather beneficial for the state economy. The party, thus, supports Digital Single Market and trade agreements that it incorporates (TOP 09, 2017). For this reason, it can be affirmed that both the LW and the RW ideologies demonstrate similar views on the entrepreneurship and digital market in their programs. Another important finding is that, even though it was initially ex- pected that the RW PPs will view the introduction of technologies as a way to enhance competitiveness, the analysis has demonstrated that both the RW and the LW PPs expressed a similar point of view towards this point. In this context, for example, the RW Estonian Isamaa stated that: “to improve the efficiency of agriculture and the food industry, which will also increase competitiveness, it is necessary to support the introduc- tion of new technologies...” (Isamaa, 2019, p. 48). Similarly, the LW Social Democratic Party of Estonia views the city of Tallinn as: “…a smart buyer that regularly invests in new technologies in order to increase the compet- itiveness of the city and implements pilot projects of innovative solutions to face challenges of the capital development.” (Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Era- kond, 2019). Therefore, the strategies of digital technologies’ develop- ment as a way to increase competitiveness are addressed by both sides of the ideological spectrum.

6.3 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart Environment

It can be affirmed that, generally, the formulation of the concept of Smart Environment (SEnv) in the programs of political parties did not reveal the great number of differences between the RW and the LW PPs.

49 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

The SEnv concept was positively presented by all of the examined polit- ical parties despite their ideological affiliation. There was a great number of similarities of the SEnv concept usage comprised in the programs of the RW and the LW PPs (see fig. 9). The results demonstrated that the allocation of renewable energy sources, eco clean transport promotion, and smart transport systems de- velopment were introduced differently among the states. For an in- stance, the allocation of renewable energy sources was differently pre- sented by the LW and the RW parties of Estonia, while there were no dif- ferences determined between the opposite party blocks in Denmark and the Czech Republic. This chapter will present that this difference can be mainly explained by the fact that each state had a different view on re- newable energy sources’ engagement. Nevertheless, it can be affirmed that, as it has been anticipated, LW PPs parties tend to be more engaged with the agenda of eco-clean energy production. For this reason, it can be stated that the difference that is present in Estonia emerged from the ideology of the parties. Therefore, the implementation of strategies of re- newable energy sources can serve as an indicator of the party’s belong- ing to the concrete ideology. However, referring to the eco clean transport and smart transport systems strategies, the chapter will reveal that these practices cannot be considered as explicit indicators of the party’s affiliation to either right or left ideology, due to the fact that, in Denmark and Estonia they were emphasised by the left parties, while in the Czech republic by the right ones.

50 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 9: Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart En- vironment of LW and RW PPs

SEnv Similarities between LW and SEnv practices practices RW PPs in relation to Smart supported by the LW PPs supported by the Environment RW PPs - Renewable sources of - Even though - Renewable sources of energy energy: Estonia – more smart transport (Estonia as an exception); support from the LW systems were - Smart transport systems were PPs; supported by supported by both (BUT: - Even though smart both, in the differences in the extent of transport systems were Czech Republic, support between the LW and the supported by both, in it was more RW within the states); Estonia and Denmark, emphasized by - Eco clean transport (BUT: it was more the RW PPs. differences in the extent of emphasized by the LW - Eco clean support between the LW and the PPs; transport in the RW within the states); - Eco clean transport in Czech Republic - Green zones protection was Estonia and Denmark was more supported by both; was more emphasized emphasized by - Maintenance of air and water by the LW PPs; the RW PPs; quality was addressed.

Source: Author

The LW PPs tend to include a much more detailed description of the strategies of the SEnv practices’ realisation, while the RW PPs were mostly using rather general statements that did not reveal the concrete strategy. For instance, in case of usage of renewable energy sources, the LW Socialistik Folkeparty of Denmark addressed the necessity of utiliza- tion of energy that was produced via wind turbines, solar panels, etc (the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020; Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019). Simul- taneously, the RW PPs of Denmark support the idea to expand the usage of sustainable forms of energy, however, these parties did not include any concrete examples. This may be caused by the fact that particular parties from the sample are primarily focusing on environmentally re- sponsible policies (e.g. Estonian Greens). For this reason, it is correct to the initial expectation that the left ideology may be connected to the con- cept of the Smart Environment to a higher extent in comparison to the

51 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

RW counterparts. Nevertheless, there was a great number of strategies that were introduced by the RW PPs as well, therefore, the SEnv cannot be considered as an explicit concept under which it is possible to deter- mine the ideology of the party. The significant difference that was detected lies in the Estonian par- ties’ attitude toward the level of implementation of renewable energy sources. The important fact is that this difference was detected merely in the viewpoint of Estonian Parties, while the LW and the RW parties of Denmark and the Czech Republic revealed similar positions towards this topic. According to Estonian Greens (2019), it is necessary to eliminate Estonia's dependence on shale energy, which was criticised for being “not only the largest environmental pollutant but also very harmful to the health of Estonians along the way”. For this reason, Estonian Greens aim to financially support energy conservation and renewable energy tech- nologies. In their 2019 program, the party presented the complex plan that will foster this process (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). Simi- larly, to this, the Social Democratic Party of Estonia supported the idea of using renewable energy (SDPE Program in the 2019 Parliamentary Elec- tions). On the contrary, the RW PPs do not include an explicit strategy of using renewable energies that might substitute the shale energy. Even though, both Estonian Reform and Isamaa parties merely support the de- velopment of both renewable and shale energies, the Isamaa party views shale as the main energy resource of Estonia and it intends to support its usage in the “most efficient and environmentally way” (Estonian Reform Party, 2019; Isamaa, 2019). For this reason, these parties are still relying more on shale energy in their programs in comparison to the LW parties. In the context of Denmark, both the RW and the LW PPs have em- phasized the fact that Denmark should keep its leading positions as the state with the green economy and expand the use of sustainable forms of energy (Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019; the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020; Venstre, n.d.). It has been already stated that Denmark builds its economy on the grounds of developing solutions to global issues, which includes green energy strategies. Namely environmental and energy so- lutions make approximately 10% of Danish exports (Boggild, 2012). For this reason, the absence of different positions between the ideological blocks in Denmark can be explained by the fact that the application of

52 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM renewables became particularly important for the state economy and is frequently promoted within the state and societal actors. Referring to the Czech Republic, all parties independently on ideo- logical affiliation have supported the so-called “appropriate energy mix” which denotes that the usage of both renewable energy sources and nu- clear energy should be endorsed. Similar to the Danish case, no differ- ence in the parties’ attitude toward the renewable energy sources usage was found (KSČM, 2017; ČSSD, 2017; TOP 09, 2017). Due to the above-mentioned arguments, it is possible to affirm that within each state different positions on renewable energy sources’ en- gagement were developed. For this reason, political parties of each state indicated different results in their stances towards this topic. Neverthe- less, even in this case, it is possible to state that LW PPs parties tend to be more engaged to the agenda of eco-clean energy production, as it has been anticipated. Therefore, it can be stated that the difference that is present in Estonia emerged from the ideology of the parties. Another important difference is related to the ecologically clean transport systems and logistics. There were examples when the topic of transport and infrastructure systems development was supported by both the LW and the RW PPs. However, in case of Estonian and Danish political parties, the analysis has demonstrated that this topic was pro- moted rather by the LW PPs, while the Czech RW PPs have developed much more sophisticated stances towards the smart transport and infra- structure systems. Therefore, it is complicated to infer which parties are more inclined to support this issue. It should be stated that the LW PPs tend to integrate strategies that support clean transport that does not harm the environment. This was particularly noticeable in programs designed by the left parties of Esto- nia and Denmark. For an instance, both the Socialistik Folkeparty and the Social Democrats of Denmark have incorporated strategies of reduction of usage of gasoline and diesel vehicles, supported the process of electri- fication of the public transport and promoted the employment of electro cars, etc. (the Social Democrats of Denmark, 2020; Socialistic Folkeparti, 2019). In addition, Estonian Greens have also mentioned the develop- ment of the computerised Smart Grid and have included the intention to digitalise transport systems and logistics. (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019).

53 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

In contrary to this, the RW PPs of Estonia and Denmark do not in- clude a great number of concrete strategies or steps towards the mainte- nance of eco-clean transport systems. These parties mainly aim to “es- tablish high-quality connections between different parts of Estonia, de- velop a public transport system that combines different types of transport…” (e.g. Estonian Reform Party, 2019). This aim might be re- lated to the Smart Grid system as well, but since the parties did not in- clude the precise description of the realisation strategy it is rather com- plicated to determine it. Similarly, the Danish RW parties did not demon- strate their deep immersion into this topic. Nevertheless, as has been mentioned above, analysis of the Czech parties’ programs showed a different result. In this context, the LW PPs did not include a considerable number of stances that address the im- portance of eco-clean transport and logistics development. The KSČM party has once mentioned its intention to maintain environmentally friendly modes of transport and combined types of transport (KSČM, 2017). The ČSSD has referred merely to the need for a major moderniza- tion of the public transport in the Czech Republic, including the develop- ment of the high-speed railways. Nevertheless, the parties did not indi- cate active involvement in this issue (ČSSD, 2017). In contrast to that, the RW PPs have included the greater number of sentences that describe their vision of eco-friendly transport and smart infrastructure. For instance, the ODS party has presented its functional solutions in the concept of smart cities that are primarily based on the use of modern technologies and an innovative approach to city manage- ment in such practices as smart parking and electromobility (ODS, 2017). In addition, the TOP 09 affirmed that the party will ensure that: “the whole system gradually works in the concept of smart grids (SMART GRIDS) and creates synergy effects with other infrastructure systems in [for an instance] transport.... [TOP 09] has ambitions for the Czech Republic to be one of the European leaders in building smart infrastructure”. The party has incorporated strategies that address the necessity to support e-highway development, innovative projects of self-driving cars, dy- namic control systems, driverless subway, smart navigation systems, etc (TOP 09, 2017). Therefore, this practice cannot serve as a clear indicator of the party’s affiliation with a particular ideology, since analysis has shown that the practice is supported by both the right and left, but in particular

54 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM countries, it is a priority for the right parties, while in other states it is a priority of the left ones. The similarities that occurred between the LW and the RW PPs in- clude strategies that foster the maintenance of air and water quality and green zones protection. For an instance, the Czech LW KSČM aims to “…improve water conditions in the landscape” and “…protect drinking wa- ter sources and water sources” (KSČM, 2017). Similar to this, the RW TOP 09 addresses the need to protect the Czech landscape and nature, includ- ing the protection of water, soil, and biological diversity (TOP 09, 2017).

6.4 Attitudes of political parties towards the Smart People

Regarding the Smart People (SP) initiative, despite initial expecta- tions, the study of the parties’ position towards this concept indicated that there were no fundamental differences between the RW and the LW PPs. Merely in the small number of cases, these differences were tangible. As this subchapter will demonstrate this difference was mainly caused by the fact that the LW PPs have managed to introduce a more detailed strategy towards the elimination of the issues related to digital illiteracy. This result was anticipated since the LW PPs generally tend to be more involved in practices that enhance social equality. However, the unex- pected finding was that the RW PPs displayed a significant level of in- volvement in the topic of digital inequality. For this reason, it can be in- ferred that the topic of Smart People did not induce essential contradic- tions between two ideologies. Therefore, the topic of Smart People can- not be considered as the concept under which the RW and the LW ideo- logies differentiate themselves. It can be also affirmed that this topic was not the primary one among the political parties since they did not include the great number of stances towards it. The mentioned concepts of SP were rather general and were given a rather short description, for this reason, it was fre- quently hard to estimate the position of parties to this topic. Neverthe- less, it was possible to determine that de facto in reference to the major- ity of SP notions the RW and LW PPs demonstrated a rather similar point of view (see fig. 10).

55 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

Figure 10: Similarities and differences of the attitude towards the Smart People of LW and RW PPs

Smart People Smart People Similarities between LW and practices supported practices supported RW PPs in relation to Smart People by the LW PPs by the RW PPs

- Presenting solutions to the digital - Absence of - Presenting inequality: provision of the internet solutions to the solutions to the to the citizens digital inequality digital inequality: - Presenting solutions to the digital related to engaging inequality: improving computer appointment of professional staff literacy professional staff to teach usage of - Support for citizens’ initiatives in to teach usage of online-services the development of Smart City online-services

strategies Source: Author In the context of SP, firstly, it was important to consider what was the attitude of political parties towards the issues related to digital ine- quality. Herein, both the RW and LW PPs mostly refer to the state’s pro- vision of the internet as the key solution that is related to the problem of digital inequality. For an instance, the Czech LW ČSSD has stated that they "will foster the construction of mobile and cable high-speed networks, so that the Internet connection is available in high quality and at a low price in the largest possible territory of the Czech Republic" (ČSSD, 2017). The RW ODS has also encompassed the idea to establish a high-speed inter- net connection thought the Czech Republic (ODS, 2017). Concerning solutions increasing the level of computer literacy, which is as well closely related to the digital inequality issue, both ideologies positively reflect the idea of digital training. Both ideologies also empha- sise the importance of including people of every age category into the highly digitalised society. For instance, the Estonian RW Reform Party stated that it is important to provide people who aim to develop digital skills with age-appropriate instructions on technology and services (Es- tonian Reform Party, 2019). The Social Democrats of Denmark have also claimed that it is essentially important to "... ensure that all citizens have access to digital infrastructure, the digital competence of citizens should

56 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM be strengthened. Everyone should be able to use, create and evaluate the content [of digital services and technology]" (Socialdemokratiet, 2017). Even though the intention of engaging professional staff to teach el- derly people to use online-services was mentioned merely by Estonian Greens, it is possible to infer that this strategy to decrease digital inequal- ity is addressed by LW PPs (Erakond Eestimaa Rohelised, 2019). It re- flects the particular strategy of the state’s allocation of service and its guarantee that the service would be available to everyone. The RW par- ties did not mention strategies related to this theme. This example serves as a piece of evidence, that, as it was expected, even though the topic of digital inequality is addressed by both LW and RW PPs, it is still more developed by the LW parties since they present more accurate strategies. Lastly, there were almost no mentions that are explicitly related to the support of the citizens’ initiatives in the development of Smart City strategies neither in programs of LW nor in RW parties. Although, the only observation that should be mentioned is that the LW and the RW parties affirmed that there should be implemented financial supports for IT development. For instance, the Danish Liberal Alliance stated that the great number of operating grants should be transformed to support tech- nology development. It has also stated that the public sector should pro- vide the opportunity to develop IT systems for private entities through tenders (Liberal Alliance, n.d.). Similarly, the Danish Social Democrats claimed that it is significant to pay more attention to technical research. In this context, the party assured to "...increase the share of government spending on technical research and development from 15 to 20%" (So- cialdemokratiet, 2017). The Social Democratic party of Estonia also ex- pressed the party’s willingness to support and finance research projects that will develop ideas for the use of Estonian language in digital plat- forms (Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond, 2019). Therefore, the support for Citizens’ initiatives in the development of SС strategies is another area where there were no differences between the two ideologies.

57 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

7 Discussion of the state of knowledge

This research introduced essential results that contribute to the number of studies dedicated to the PPs’ distinction within different poli- cies and political initiatives. The particular importance of this work lies in the fact that it managed to demonstrate how parties of different Euro- pean states differ in their vision of the Smart City depending on their po- sition within the political spectrum. Due to the fact that this study pre- sented important results of how the SC concepts are the factor under which the LW and RW PPs can be distinguished, this study can be con- sidered as a significant start to seal the existing gap of the academic lit- erature in this topic. The results of the study correspond to the initial expectation that the SC concept can be included among the topics of in- dividualism and technical progress proposed by Bobbio (2003, p.76). The reason for that is that the results indicate that the concept of Smart City is not supported and used exclusively by the LW or the RW ideology. Due to the fact that the SC is comprised of different sub-concepts that make the SC concept itself more sophisticated, both the LW and the RW PPs frequently include different SC strategies to promote their already existing ideological stances. Apart from demonstrating that specific general ideological differ- ences are applicable within the parties determination of the SC concept, another significance of this study lies in the fact that it supplements ex- isting theories and description of parties’ ideology with the new vision that presents how the LW parties try to achieve this societal equality dur- ing the ongoing process of technical development and innovations. For instance, this work demonstrated that the LW PPs, in contrast to the RW PPs, tend to eliminate social inequality issues that start to arise due to technological development. This result supports the already existing the- ories and description of the LW ideology as aiming to eliminate differ- ences between the society members and to achieve full equality within the society (Hloušek, Kopeček, 2010, p.15). In addition, the study also supported results presented by Neumayer (2004) who inferred that the LW PPs tend to be more pro-environmental orientated due to the fact that these parties are slightly more likely to be engaged with the Smart Environment strategies.

58 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

In reference to the RW PPs, the results indicate that, as it was antic- ipated, these parties frequently include innovative smart strategies that would facilitate the private sector management. The study presented how this approach differed from the LW parties that, on the contrary, mention tools that will foster control over the private sector manage- ment by the government. This result supports the basic difference be- tween the left and the right ideology that lies in the parties’ attitude to- wards the relations between the private and public sectors which was described by McDonald, Mendes, and Kim (2007, p. 64). The research also presented concepts to which examined LW and RW parties attained similar attitudes, while initially it was expected that these concepts will entail further ideological differences. This finding is particularly important due to the fact that it challenges conventional left and right party characteristics. These concepts include Digital Govern- ance services’ allocation and the ongoing process of digitalisation in the economy. For instance, it was anticipated that the left parties would ded- icate themselves more towards governmental allocation of digital ser- vices to the citizens, while the right parties were expected to be rather neutral to this topic. This contradicts statements made, for instance, by Schmidt (2009) who inferred that namely the LW PPs support policies that are expanding the welfare state. The result of this work demon- strated that both the LW and the RW PPs address this topic in an equally positive way. Similarly, in the case of digitalisation of the state’s econ- omy, both ideologies included strategies of economic development that are based on modern technologies and innovations. This finding also contradicts to the determination of the RW parties of McDonald, Mendes, Kim (2007, p. 64) that states that merely RW parties promote policies that ensure market liberalisation and competitiveness. As has been men- tioned in previous chapters, this can be explained by the fact that these concepts belong to the strategies which have become so to say univer- sally accepted to such extent that both RW and LW ideologies incorpo- rate these strategies in their manifestos. For this reason, these strategies lost their significance for the ideological differentiation of political par- ties. These results should open up space for further research to deter- mine which characteristics of LW and RW PPs are still relevant and which differences have already become rather obsolete.

59 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

In addition, further studies on this topic should be made due to the fact that in particular cases (e.g. Smart Governance) manifestos of politi- cal parties of merely one out of three of examined countries contained relevant data for analyses. For this reason, parties of other European states should be analysed in order to confirm the results presented in this study. These findings could then serve as a basis for the theory that particular concepts of SC can serve as the factor under which parties can be differentiated.

60 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

8 Conclusion

The concept of Smart Cities became a popular solution that aims to achieve sustainable urbanisation and is frequently addressed by differ- ent political actors due to its relation to various political issues. This the- sis has demonstrated that concepts related to Smart Cities are gradually becoming another popular topic that is discussed among politicians and is being incorporated into the programs of political parties of states that differ by numerous factors. Through the interpretation of the results of the content analysis of election programs of selected political parties of Denmark, the Czech Republic, and Estonian, this work provides an over- view of the current approach of the right- and left-wing political parties to the Smart City concepts (Smart Governance, Smart Environment, Smart Economy and Smart People). It was particularly important to de- termine the main differences and similarities that are present between two ideologies in their introduction of the SC concepts into their election programs in order to assert whether the Smart City concept can serve as the factor under which political parties can be classified as either left or right. This work confirmed the fact that the SC is a complex term that can- not be generally related to either LW or RW ideology, but it rather con- tains the vast number of practices introduced by both the LW and the RW PPs. Nevertheless, it can be inferred that the left parties generally include more concepts related to the smart city in comparison to their ideologi- cal opponents. Apart from that, the analysis has demonstrated that the more complex strategies that promote the Smart City concept realisation were designed by the LW PPs. In addition, the results of the research demonstrated that there were both specific differences and similarities present in the LW and the RW PP’s attitudes towards the smart city concept. The differences that were determined emanate from the ideology of the parties. It can be stated that the political parties incorporate certain concepts of smart in- novations to their programs in order to maintain the fundamental prin- ciples that correspond to their position in the political spectrum. There- fore, it can be stated that the differences between the right and the left ideology are applicable within the parties’ strategies of the SC.

61 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

This difference was particularly obvious in the case of the introduc- tion of the Smart Economy concept. The results of the analysis of Smart Economy and Smart People strategies indicate that the left parties em- phasised issues related to social equality that can appear because of tech- nological development. The LW parties appeal to the significance of the strategies that will eliminate differences between the society members that are caused by the introduction of new technologies. On contrary, RW PPs did not manage to incorporate sophisticated strategies that address these problems. In addition, the results of the analysis related to Smart Governance depict the RW ideology strongly supports the private sector expansion via the implementation of digital technology, while the LW PPs mentioned strategies that increase government control over private sector management. These findings are as well deeply connected with an existing fundamental principle of both ideologies. Another important finding is that in the considerable number of practices both the LW and the RW parties tend to develop a similar ap- proach. These similarities were particularly noticeable in both ideolo- gies’ support for Digital Governance practices (Government to Citizens services’ development (e.g. digitalization of healthcare services)) and digitalisation in the economy. There was also a positive attitude of both ideologies to the Smart Environment concepts. The mere exception in this agenda is related to the topic of renewable energy sources which was introduced by contradicting strategies between the left and the right par- ties of Estonia, while no contradictions were found between the left and the right parties of Denmark and the Czech Republic. This exception can be explained by the fact that every state allocates electricity generation among energy sources in a different way. The findings of this work open up space for further research on the topic of the political parties’ attitude towards the Smart Cities. It would be especially useful to determine whether attitudes of other left and right parties of other EU member states differ in the same way regarding this topic. These findings could then serve as a basis for verifying the theory that the particular strategies and concepts of Smart Cities can be the fac- tor under which political parties can be differentiated as either left- or right-wing.

62 COMPARISON OF POLITICAL PARTIES’ APPROACH TO THE SMART CITY INITIATIVES BASED ON THEIR POSITION ON THE LEFT-RIGHT SPECTRUM

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