The Cyborg City: Re-thinking Urban Resilience Through Mobile Communications

How do we build urban resilience through key areas of critical infrastructure such as mobile communications? Mobile digital communication networks, encompassing commercial mobile and public wi-fi platforms, are ubiquitous in Australian cities, and digital inclusion has emerged as a major theme in metropolitan-level strategic planning (McShane, Wilson & Meredyth, 2014). However, while we have seen a dramatic uptake of internet-enabled mobile devices, to date little is understood about the politics, implementation and role of mobile communications in building resilient cities. This paper builds on the seminal work of Haraway (1985), Swygendouw (1996) and Gandy (2005) to extend the cyborg city lens to the context of Australian urban resilience. Using mobile communications as an example, the paper focuses on critically exploring the implications of our reliance on complex technological networks with reference to urban Australia.