Abstract
The future generation of smart cities is a very timely and attractive topic for the research community worldwide. The evolution of this generation is oriented toward providing innovative services and policymaking to guarantee the well-being of citizens. Research on smart cities is maturing and the question of securing the well-being of cities' inhabitants is increasingly attracting the attention of researchers, practitioners, and policymakers. Considering the challenges and opportunities cities/urban spaces generate, today the imperative is to examine how targeted research and cutting-edge innovation can be effectively communicated to all stakeholders. Thus, synergies emerging at the researchinnovation- policymaking nexus can be exploited and city dwellers' well-being can be enhanced. Pervasive computing, big data analytics, crowdsourcing, and other timely technologies, including user behavior, brand popularity, recommender systems, and social media analytics, bear the promise and potential that viable solutions to key problems and challenges specific to the future generation of smart cities will be found. The objective of this Special Section in IEEE ACCESS is to examine this promise and potential from a variety of complementary interdisciplinary perspectives, including computing/ ICT, political economy, public policy, innovation, and entrepreneurship.