Explaining the model of smart governance with the approach of popular participation in urban decision making (Case study: Tehran)

Many studies emphasize the various components of smart cities, the speed and nature of their governance processes, and the diverse claims to the legitimacy of smart city governance. These indicate that the definitions and conceptualization of smart cities in developing countries are probably darker and can benefit from a regular combination of knowledge. In addition, the digital world's approach to non-digital issues such as social justice, politics, ideology, legality, and regulation suggests that smart city development governance is intertwined with many layers of complexity. It can be more complicated for some developing countries that are still meeting the basic needs of all citizens. The complexity of governance issues that developing countries have with different countries shows that a regular review of the literature is critical to discover what is available in the existing literature on growing smart cities in developing countries. In this regard, the present study examines and analyzes participation in urban decision-making, emphasizing smart urban governance in Tehran.

The present study is descriptive-analytical. In terms of purpose, it is in the category of applied research. The information required for this research has been collected in two ways: library and field. In the field method, the collection of primary data according to the research questions has been done by designing a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire. The statistical population of this study includes municipal employees in 22 districts of Tehran with a population of 500 people. The method of selecting specialists was the snowball technique, in which the available expert was asked to introduce experts who were aware of the research topic. However, few of them were fully aware of the research topic. Therefore, the researcher used the snowball sampling method to identify subject-aware samples, and he continued to do so until all familiar examples of smart urban governance were identified. The sample consisted of 15 employees of Tehran Municipality. The data collection tool was a questionnaire; its validity was confirmed as face validity as well as divergent validity (divergent validity results are presented in the findings section). In order to evaluate the reliability of the questionnaire, Cronbach's alpha and combined reliability were exerted, and, considering the results presented in the research findings, the reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed.

The value of t-statistic obtained for the effect of participation in decision-making on smart urban governance is equal to 20.843,  which is higher than 1.96. Therefore, the effect of participation in decision-making on smart urban governance is confirmed. On the other hand, the value of the obtained path coefficient is equal to 0.622, which is a positive path coefficient, which shows the direct impact of participation on decision-making on smart urban governance. It can also be said that participation in decision-making can explain 38.6% of the variance of the dependent variable, i.e., smart urban governance. The t-statistic value obtained for the effect of political control on smart urban governance is equal to 2.615; also, it equals to 13.870 for the effect of social participation on smart urban governance, which ​​are greater than 1.96; hence, the effect of components of participation in decision-making on smart urban governance is endorsed. On the other hand, the values of the obtained path coefficients for the effect of political supervision and social participation on smart urban governance are 0.132 and 0.584, respectively,  which are positive path coefficients, indicating a direct effect. Components of decision-making are based on smart urban governance.

Citizens' participation in decisions can have many positive effects. Accordingly, this issue was examined with emphasis on smart urban governance in Tehran. The results of the research show that participation can be effective in two ways in the direction of urban decisions for smart urban governance, one in the form of participation with political supervision and the other in the form of social participation. Both variables indicate the significant importance of participation. In fact, it can be said that participation is both politically and socially influential. The realization of this type of citizen participation in urban development is possible in different ways, such as the political activity of residents, importance of residents for politics, share of female representatives in city administration, number of representatives per resident, number of political parties per resident, strategic insight, responsibility for problems related to urban governance, consensualism according to urban culture and identity, social participation based on the principles of smart governance, interaction with citizens, cooperation, appropriate opinion polls on citizenship rights, and social inclusion. Therefore, it is necessary to provide contexts and capacities to help change their lives in cities, and this can be achieved through the above.