Smart governance for smart cities and nations

There is an increasing emphasis on utilizing ICT to drive global governmental transformation to enhance efficiency and cost-effective service delivery. Smart governance represents a novel and data-driven progressive approach, prioritizing intelligence in operations, upholding an exceptional standard of public administration, and contributing to the development of smart cities and nations. A smart city uses advanced technology and innovation to augment urban life and efficiency to ensure sustainability and a smart nation extends these principles across regions. Although smart governance is a priority in building smart cities and nations, its challenges and strategies are still not well-defined from the perspective of developing a smart nation and city. Smart Bangladesh is an inclusive digital transformation initiative and a grand vision of the government, advancing towards becoming a developed, prosperous, and smart nation by focusing on four key pillars: smart citizens, smart government, smart economy, and smart society. This study involved interviews with multi-level stakeholders and served as a preliminary step toward providing insights into and understanding the significant challenges and priorities in transforming a smart country and building smart cities. The research identifies fourteen prime challenges of smart governance that are pivotal for transforming Bangladesh into a smart nation and creating smart cities. Among these, stakeholders particularly emphasize the need for administrative reform, robust smart infrastructure, finance, uninterrupted electricity, strong data privacy and security, and effective big data management as crucial to the success of the country's vision. The analysis proposes a conceptual framework based on stakeholders' priorities that can serve as a practical guideline for practitioners to develop a strategic roadmap for effective preparedness to transition to a smart nation and build smart cities. The study fills a research gap in governance theory concerning the evolution of transformative technology-based governance, particularly emphasizing the significance of smart governance in the development of smart nations and cities.