The City That Listens
Faced with a car pass that doesn't work, an incomprehensible public platform or a digital service built around procedures rather than people, contemporary citizens experience an increasingly familiar frustration: they are living in smart cities, by are still governed by rigid systems.
For years, the digital transformation of public administration has been described primarily as a technological issue: new platforms, interoperability, artificial intelligence, data collection. But the real problem may lie elsewhere. Not the lack of technology, but rather the way public services are designed. Because many systems work perfectly "in theory," only to falter when they encounter the complexity of real life.
This contradiction is the starting point for “Citizen-Centered Public Service Design in Agile Digital Transformation: Insights from Public Mobility Services,” a paper by Hemin Choi of Incheon National University and Maria Cucciniello of Bocconi University, published in the journal Public Administration.
The study describes a possible new model of public administration: less structured around procedures, and more capable of adapting to citizens' concrete needs through continuous feedback, co-design and experimentation. A public administration that doesn't simply digitize existing services, but rethinks them based on people's experiences.
"Digital transformation is only successful when residents and stakeholders are actively involved in service design," explains Cucciniello, Associate Professor of Public Management and Policy at Bocconi.
From Intelligent to Adaptive
The case of Milan's urban mobility analyzed in the research study shows how citizens' expectations have evolved much more rapidly than the administration’s. The pandemic accelerated new habits — smart working, intermittent use of transportation, increased reliance on private vehicles — exposing the limitations of public services designed according to rigid, standardized models.
Many systems work well as long as the citizen matches the profile envisioned by the administration. It's when the complexity of real life comes into play that friction emerges.
In the case of passes for limited-traffic zones, for example, the system is efficient for residents who own cars. But now there are widespread situations — leasing, company cars, families distributed across cities — that complicate the relationship with the administration and increase the perception of bureaucratic rigidity.
One of the citizens involved in the focus groups described this feeling well: "The individual modes of transportation work, but interconnection between them is still very limited."
For Cucciniello, this is precisely the point: "We need to move from a smart city approach, centered primarily on technology, to an adaptive city approach, capable of continuously modifying its services based on citizens' behaviors and needs."
Public Administration as a Learning System
In the paper, the agile logic of software development is applied to public services: continuous iteration, testing, feedback and progressive updates.
This implies a profound cultural transformation. Traditional public administrations are built to ensure stability, control and uniformity. The model described by the research, however, requires administrations capable of experimenting, rapidly adjusting services and processes, and engaging more directly with users.
"Iterative and participatory practices help reduce the gap between service demand and citizen satisfaction," the authors write. The main obstacle, however, remains the very structure of public organizations. Administrative siloing, bureaucratic language, poor data interoperability and cultural resistance make it difficult to build truly integrated services. The challenge, therefore, is not simply introducing new technologies, but rethinking the functioning of public governance.
Policy Implications
The findings from the study are very concrete. The first is that administrations should invest less in digitalization, understood as mere infrastructure, and much more in the ability to understand citizens' actual forms of behavior. Creating an online platform is not enough: one needs to design the entire user experience.
The second concerns the role of participation. Citizen involvement is presented not as a symbolic exercise in consultation, but as an essential component of public planning. According to the authors, citizens should be involved from the earliest stages to define problems and arrive at solutions.
Finally, the paper raises a question that will become central in the coming years: to what extent can a city become adaptive without compromising transparency, inclusion and accountability?
A public administration capable of continuously collecting data on urban behavior promises more efficient and personalized services, but also raises profound questions about algorithmic governance, privacy and control. The real challenge for the cities of the future, Choi and Cucciniello suggest, will not be building more technologically advanced administrations. It will be building administrations capable of learning and adapting to people’s needs.
