Article Preview
Top1. Introduction
India is seeing rapid growth in its economy propelled by a push to industrial activities and lowering of its dependence on agricultural activities (Tripathi & Rani, 2018). It is a well-known fact that the agricultural economy runs in rural areas whereas industries are mainly situated in the cities or the metropolitan regions (Gumma et al., 2017). Evidence suggests that industrialization has resulted in a mass migration from rural areas to urban areas over the past few decades (Shahbaz et al., 2018). Per the 2011 census, 31% of India’s population now lives in urban regions, and this number is projected to reach 60% by 2050 (Jain & Korzhenevych, 2020). The main challenge with rapid urbanization is the risk of cities expanding in an unplanned manner and city resources coming under constant pressure to meet growing demands of its population. For instance, most of the cities in India are facing serious problems in terms of high levels of pollution, resource inequalities, and inadequate service infrastructure (Smart Cities Mission, 2017).
To overcome these issues, the Government of India has launched the Smart Cities Mission with an ambitious target to convert 100 of its top cities to smart cities. The objective of the Smart Cities Mission is to create future smart cities that meet the aspirations of their citizens (Praharaj et al., 2018). These futuristic smart cities are expected to heavily utilize Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) for efficiently solving urban problems (Anthopoulos & Fitsilis, 2014; Yeh, 2017). Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the emerging ICTs that is expected to play a key role in effectively delivering citizen services within smart cities (Allam & Dhunny, 2019). Leading countries of the world have recognized the potential of AI with an expectation of approximately 10% to 20% of their GDPs will be based on AI technology by 2030. Accordingly, the respective governments are playing an active role in coming up with AI strategies for application in agriculture, healthcare, transport, and smart cities (NITI Aayog, 2018). Recent studies observed that AI-enabled systems can help improve performance of various city government departments (Ahad et al., 2020). Particularly, municipal authorities can leverage the power of AI to offer citizens personalized services, make accurate forecasts, and simulate what-if scenarios before implementation (Dwivedi et al.,2019).
However, the adoption of AI comes with its own set of complexities and challenges which are mainly related to the way an AI solution is designed and implemented (Jobin et al., 2019). Specifically, there are growing concerns regarding an AI solution’s data collection methods, data usage patterns, algorithm selection, and its opaqueness (Ananny, 2016; Tsamados et al., 2021). Stephen Hawking famously said: “Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks” (Cellan-Jones, 2014). The reason for this concern may lie in multiple unknown parameters or non-deterministic and subjective nature of an AI system. For example, AI algorithms learn on their own, therefore it is not always possible to interpret the precise logic of AI systems. Hence, there is an inherent threat that the AI system built for one right purpose may be intentionally or unintentionally exploited for a wrong purpose (Helbing, 2019).
In literature, the study of intention to use a technology based on its perceived benefits and perceived risks falls under broader technology adoption research area. Indeed, technology adoption is a widely studied topic in information systems (IS) domain with numerous theories proposed by past researchers (Lai, 2017). Such studies enable solution providers to design the applications keeping end users’ expectations in mind. In the current research study, we explore key factors that influence citizens intention to use AI-enabled smart city services considering AI’s strong potential to assist in e-governance of cities and challenges it poses for the society.