Keynote | The Smart Eco-City: Promised land or contradiction in terms?
14.15 - 15.00 @ VONK
Contemporary cities are characterized by a destruction of environmental resources to sustain urban lifestyles of consumption and waste production. They are responsible for 70% of global carbon emissions and are getting more and more problematic for human health and environmental sustainability.
That is why future cities need to balance being places of consumption and knowledge economy with being places of social and biological reproduction. Eco-Cities promise just that. Coined in the mid-seventies of the last century, the concept has grown into a movement with an Ecocity World summit and increasingly integrates supporting digital technologies. But can the smart eco-city hold its promises? And how must design and digital technology change to bring this about? The talk will discuss city futures and the eco-city and deliver concrete examples of failures and first steps to get there.
Who is Anja Overdiek?
Anja Overdiek is professor Cybersocial Design at Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences. Her field is techno-social contexts for sustainability transitions, its design method and competencies. She uses theoretical, design-led and action research methodology based on a ‘more-than-human-centred’ approach. Anja is also an associate professor at the Mission Zero research centre of The Hague University of Applied Sciences, where she specializes in living labs as an environment for sustainability transitions. She has published several books on the topic.
Earlier in her career she was manager Europe of an international ICT/telecom branding and communication agency where she facilitated transition processes with her own company. She obtained her PhD in 1998 from the Freie Universität Berlin (Germany) with a research on social movements and their knowledge production. Together with design researchers, she has been working on techno-social innovation topics for the past 10 years.
Related links:
Creating010| Anja Overdiek
Mission Zero | Anja Overdiek
Linkedin: Anja Overdiek