The topic that our group chose to research is how smart cities develop and operate differently based on the conditions of their implementation. Through deeper research, we concluded that these differences stem from forms of bias or lack of support for a certain group that may be underrepresented in the population. The cities we had focused on throughout our research include Nairobi, Kenya, and Cape Town. A similar issue that resides in both cities is terrorist attacks and civil unrest, which brings about a question of safety in these cities and if their citizens may be at risk for the crimes being committed. We believe that the best framework that applies to these cities is Foucault's theories specifically on Power and Control. Throughout his work, Foucault emphasizes the point of how power comes within each individual and is decentralized. Foucault believes that surveillance has an extremely powerful role in society and through surveillance, such as in mental hospitals, and prisons, individuals learn how to behave correctly by using social discipline rather than force.
This heavily applies to the issues of terrorism and crime being experienced in smart cities like Nairobi and Cape Town because their governments are utilizing surveillance to regulate and prevent crime in certain areas, which has clearly been working. This also relates to our topic of Artificial Intelligence because it is truly the next step in the development of technology. Having systems that are able to make their own decisions based on criteria and have a form of automation will allow crimes to be regulated at a much faster rate and inform the public of an event occurring way faster than was thought to be possible. The current implementation of these technologies includes surveillance cameras throughout the city in crime-stricken areas, in addition to much stronger communication systems, which will end up saving hundreds to thousands of lives in the case of an emergency. Another part of Foucault's theory that applies to these cities is his Social Construct theory that emphasizes that technology is a product of human action. Specifically, these apply to the crimes being committed in these cities because these crimes had resulted in stronger technologies being put into place to face them and are focused on circumstances of the issue. Finally, governments in these cities are utilizing surveillance to catch criminals before they commit crimes by analyzing their background and viewing their relationships with other individuals and their history. While officials in Cape Town are using these surveillance technologies to predict fires before they happen. Clearly, the application of these technologies is endless, and in the future technology will end up saving thousands of innocent lives in these cities.