Knowledge Management

In contexts where ‘smartness’ is hailed as the natural operational by-product of technology deployment, what is the role of actual people and the social structures they form to tackle problems in building and construction, facilitate progress and preserve resources? Can smart artefacts or systems emerge autonomously out of technology – irrespective of the human element, that is – or does the implementation of any future environmental vision require first and foremost appropriate social organisation strategies?

Following on from an Australian government research-funded project on the dialectics of digital innovation and tradition in the construction industry, FAR is committed to bringing ‘people’ to the fore of the debate on smart urban development and regional restructuring. Recently completed studies suggest that looking at innovation processes empirically – trough the labour configurations enabling novel challenges to be carried out on the ground, provides a picture of collective ingenuity that is otherwise eluding technological innovation debates.