Public Purpose

An Independent Advisory Company

Cities and urban innovation

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The London Recipe

This is Charlie Leadbeater’s piece on the combination of system and empathy at the heart of successful city making.

London’s ability to pull off this fearsomely complex trick is its real competitive advantage. It has not come about by design but nor is has it emerged from thin-air. The city’s capacity to be self-governing at scale rests on infrastructures that provide the platform on which people can be creative. The combination of two ingredients lies at the heart of London’s success. Understanding those ingredients and how they combine will be vital to its future success.



Attachments: CFL_THE-LONDON-RECIPE

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Town and Gown: A Digital Update

This is a paper I wrote for a roundtable, hosted by Deakin University and sponsored by the Business/Higher Education Roundtable, Cisco and IBM. It explores the links between “connected campus” strategies by universities and the “
connected community” strategies of the cities in which they work.

“What is at stake is substantial. As universities rethink their teaching and learning models around a new digitally-infused experience for students and staff, the cities and communities around them are doing pretty much the same in pursuit of new ambitions for growth, inclusion and sustainability. In turns out that there is much in common in the twin, and increasingly interdependent ambitions of “town” and “gown” as they seek new sources of advantage and resilience. Increasingly, smart cities and connected universities are trying to do the same things. It makes sense to explore the extent to which, through their shared investments in new digital infrastructure, capabilities and platforms, they might be more successful together than apart”.



Attachments: Town-and-gown-a-digital-update-v1-0April2015[1]

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More Together (Charlie Leadbeater)

This is a monograph from Charlier Leadbeater about the impact of a new breed of civic innovators using new ways to connect people and place for initially small changes that build to larger shifts in the way a city thinks and works.

“Cities need capable mayors and good public administration. Yet much of the time the most important contract is between the citizens themselves—what matters is how we regulate our behaviour, peer to peer, through shared norms and practices”.



Attachments: More-Together-Charlie-Leadbeater[1]

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#wethecity2 From Possibilities to Practice

This is the second #wethecity Issues Paper. It provides an update on, and some more examples about, new practices of connection and collaboration, especially using new digital tools and platforms, for city outcomes in growth, jobs, mobility, governance and social inclusion.

“One of the new challenges is to recognise how the management of liveability and productivity will change – is being changed – in this digital and collaborative era. At the heart of that challenge are the same digital and disruptive driving forces for connection, communication and collaboration that are upending settled institutions everywhere and their practices of investment, performance, governance and leadership. The economy and society are now irretrievably digital. Nowhere is that revolution being played out more fiercely and with more consequence than in our cities.”



Attachments: wethecity-1[1]

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#wethecity1 Collaborating to compete in the digital era

Co-authored with Committee for Sydney CEO Tim Williams, this Issues Paper sets out the case for connectedness and collaboration at the heart of new platforms for innovation, services and inclusion.

“In the current age, it is the cities whose governance, infrastructure and communications best enable such collaborations to flourish – and who harness most effectively the energy, talent and creativity of the people who live there now or who might be attracted there – that will be the most innovative, will secure the most investment and will attract the most talented. Cities are collaborating to compete and the ones that collaborate most compete best”.



Attachments: wethecity-1[1]