Paper presented at CIRN Conference, Prato

Malefa Topo traveled to Italy last month to present a paper and a research poster titled "Explaining the Use and Non-Use of Smart Cities Services in Johannesburg: Residents’ Perspectives" at the 12th Prato Community Informatics Research Network (CIRN) conference. The paper was based on preliminary results from her master's research that examined what makes residents use or not use Smart Cities services, to try and identify ways that will ensure that all residents have the privilege of using the provided Smart City services. Preliminary results showed that existing models that explain use and non-use need to be expanded to take account of issues of awareness, access, and trust that arise in a developing country context.

Malefa Topo with her research poster

The conference, hosted by Monash University at their centre in Prato, ran from the 9th to the 11th November 2015. Topics relating to information and knowledge sharing and how the production of information and knowledge can reflect unequal distributions of power and privileges were discussed at the conference. The conference also included a workshop on ethics, diversity, and inclusion that aimed to move towards approaches that ensure that ICT facilitates social inclusion and equal privileges.

 

Malefa Topo networking with other researchers

A copy of the paper can be downloaded here:
Topo and Backhouse (2015). Explaining the use and non-use of Smart City services in Johannesburg: Residents' perspectives. Paper presented at the 12th Prato CIRN Conference 9-11 November 2015, Prato, Italy.