Nineteenth International Conference on Knowledge, Culture, and Change in Organizations

Abstract

In 2015, the union government of India introduced a new urban programme titled the smart city programme to improve urban sustainability with technological innovation and automation. Once, the initial euphoria settled down, the union government faced with an uphill challenge to envisage the city’s development vision and deliver it on-ground. While the technological limitation, budgetary shortfall, and land constrains remained a persisting challenge, the outdated organisational structure and institutional inadequacy of the local (urban) governments curbed the union government’s vision to achieve a structured urbanisation in India. As a measure, the union government proposed to establish a special purpose vehicle (SPV) headed by a chief executive officer (CEO) to envisage a futuristic city vision and implement the urban development projects. In India, an institutionalisation of the urban governance process started with the enactment of the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act 1992. But with the growing organisational complexity and technological advancement, the urban governments are becoming a non-performing entity. The paper has two purposes. Firstly, it investigates the existing organisational structure, actors, activities and networking, and rules and regulations of the local governments to identify the reasons for its’ gradual deterioration. Secondly, to model the changing organisational system’s relationship with the existing institutional set-up and its’ usefulness to solve urban problems. The research will use organisational theories and institutional frameworks to develop its’ central argument and establish the model. The paper will select two cities in India for empirical research and discussions.