The growth of urbanization has been dramatic in the last decade. Indeed, it is expected that 70 percent of the world's population will live in cities by 2050. This rate has increased the pressure for adjusting the actual infrastructures, and investing in new ones, in order to minimize the social and environmental impacts. To manage this issue, an increasing number of cities around the world is adopting the concept of "smart cities", with economic and society implications. In parallel, the concept of social responsibility implies an equilibrium between economic and society interests within a network of different stakeholders including the own smart cities. In order to sustain such equilibrium and respond to increasing stakeholder pressures about their social impacts, firms are developing innovative approaches. In this context, social and environmental innovations are creating new opportunities and challenges that are still under-explored. The intersection of these trends is generating new streams of research that imply both opportunities and challenges for researchers and practitioners.

The SMS Conference Extension at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid will bring together a panel of distinct scholars of various perspectives and experiences as well as prominent researchers interested in smart cities, the green movement and social responsibility. This extension pursues two main objectives: First, to discuss and develop topical and future research avenues at the intersection of smart cities and social responsibility. Second, to enable networking and spur the exchange of ideas and experiences about and beyond the extension theme.

Smart cities and social responsibility have unique characteristics, opportunities and threats. These distinctive elements are all strategic issues that we seek to address during this workshop. Interesting questions that may be discussed are for instance:

• What are the implications of smart cities to firms, in terms of opportunities, threats and changes in the competitive scenario?
• To what extent do social entrepreneurship and clean technologies bring firms closer to cities and improve citizens’ quality of life? How can this be implemented in practice?
• If we consider smart cities as networks of different stakeholders, what is the role of the social responsible firm?
• To what extent can smart cities be considered as stakeholders that control the social responsible firm?
• What are the potential impacts of the increased process visibility offered by networked sensors on several industries, especially those based on information asymmetry?
• Drawing on the distinction between "top-down" or "bottom-up" smart cities implementation approaches, what are the implications of firms proactive and reactive strategies?
• To what extent do smart cities shift the power structure within supply networks?
• How can we measure the “online reputation” of firms that are involved in smart cities initiatives?
• How to include the citizens in the process of decisions in a smart city?
• How to frame the accountability of the conflicts that may occur within smart cities?
• What are the mechanisms involved in the dynamics of alliances among smart cities?
• To what extent do data security issues hinder smart cities efforts?
• Can large corporation apply the insights of smart cities? Conversely, can smart cities rely on the models from large corporations?
• Which frameworks can be developed to analyze the financing of smart cities?
• Can social responsible banking participate in the development of smart cities?
• How can the theory of networks be used to advance smart cities?

These questions will be explored through thematic breakout sessions and panel discussions involving experts and scholars that are new to the field to leverage potential synergies.

We are able to accept up to 50 participants for this workshop and acceptance will be based on a first come, first serve basis.

About the Host Institution:

Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) is renowned for its teaching and research as well as its university services. It has 4 campuses in the Madrid region, located in the municipalities of Madrid, Getafe, Leganés and Colmenarejo, all with modern, high quality facilities. The UC3M has 17.898 students, being similar in size to some of the major European universities. It offers 31 bachelor’s courses, 39 official master's courses plus 33 private master courses, and 18 doctorate courses in the diverse fields of research. The Department of Business Administration, consistently ranked first in Business Administration Studies in Spain, is committed to high quality teaching and research. Teaching includes programmes at the undergraduate and graduate levels, including an MBA programme accredited by AMBA and a PhD programme on Business Economics and Quantitative Methods. The Business Department at UC3M ranks among the 200 best Business Departments worldwide according to the Eduniversal Ranking.

Registration:

A registration fee of US$ 105 per participant will be charged to cover expenses. Please note, SMS members will receive a $20 reduction.

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