Present-day smart cities not only utilize data on the natural environment and device operations, but also data on individual (resident) attributes and behavior. As such, urban services are expected to be developed by comprehensively considering human activity. However, it may also lead to social resistance toward the collection of personal information, and raise ethical issues about how to collect and use such information, which have often resulted in litigation overseas.
Thus, a crucial theme in the social implementation of smart cities is that the community understands and accepts the technology (social acceptance). However, this social acceptance is considered to be strongly associated with the characteristics, historical background, and historical features of the community, and hence there is no universal silver bullet. Accordingly, we work to accumulate knowledge that contributes to the improvement of social acceptance, by thoroughly verifying past cases, testing its validity in the field, and exploring the processes and factors of social acceptance (or non-acceptance) of smart cities.