Business-to-government data sharing in European cities

This PhD research explores the tensions that arise when local governments seek access to business data, as well as the regulatory and non-regulatory approaches to institutionalizing this practice and its outcomes. 

More than half of the world’s population resides and the vast majority of economic activity takes place in cities. As new technologies to generate data are deployed across cities, governments are presented with an opportunity to enhance their data-driven decision-making capabilities to better tackle societal challenges. However, businesses, due to their unique societal role, produce and hold most of this data. 

Accordingly, the first research aim of this project is to explain the frictions between local governments and business when the former seeks access to the data of the latter. This will be achieved by conducting an in-depth qualitative study that applies discourse analysis to interviews with city officials and businesses in three reference case studies of Amsterdam, Barcelona and Helsinki. 

The second research goal of the project is to explore the regulatory and non-regulatory means employed by cities to institutionalize access to business data. This will be done by conducting a survey of all EU cities exceeding 250,000 inhabitants. 

The final objective is to determine whether the outcomes of B2G data sharing at the city level effectively confront societal challenges and contribute to the public good. To analyze this, the methodology of process tracing will provide a framework to systematically track the outcomes of data access and use by local governments. 

This PhD research is conducted by Jaime Bernal.