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In the quest for Smart City (SC) development, numerous examples of ‘good practices’ have circulated in national and international policy arenas. Learning from good practices elsewhere is a common approach for cities to initiate and develop SC policies of their own. Nevertheless, because of political, legal and cultural differences across countries and cities, policies will always be context dependent, and prosper under specific conditions. There is a vast literature on policy transfer and policy mobility, but much of it utilizes different concepts (i.e., policy translation, policy learning, and policy diffusion). Nonetheless, a critical omission they all share is limited concern for context-dependence and lack of prescriptive clues. Addressing both omissions would lead to a framework in which learning from good SC policy practices, formulating lessons, transferring them, and then adjusting them to fit the recipient's needs is taken up systematically in a stepwise manner. To develop a theoretical framework for Smart City adoption, this study brings together variegated existing literature under the heading ‘policy transplantation’ and synthesizes existing insights into a prescriptive procedure policymakers can follow. A systematic literature review is conducted to identify all key elements and sub-elements associated with SC policy transplantation, leading to a theoretical framework. This (prescriptive) theoretical framework is subsequently validated using an expert group and illustrated through a real-life case. The framework can be used as an analytical lens by researchers, but also constitutes a practical tool to guide policymakers aiming to use insights from good practices and implement them in line with their own contextual setting. Conducting contextual assessment before transplanting a SC policy is essential.

In this article we examine the Dutch emergency legislation for local democracy. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Netherlands, the Temporary Act for digital meetings for local/regional government tiers was enacted. The legislature introduced a system of digital debate and decision-making for municipal and provincial councils, the democratically elected assemblies at the local and regional levels. At the same time the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations set up an evaluation committee to monitor and evaluate the working of the local and provincial governments with this temporary legislation. This article discusses the content and application of the temporary provisions for deliberation and decision-making on a digital platform. The purpose of the legislation is to create possibilities for the elected representatives to continue their work during the lockdown. We examine the design and structure of the legislation and disclose the evaluation results so far. The arrangements aim for secure, transparent and reliable democratic practices. Early evidence pertaining to the effects of the Act show that it works effectively only up to a certain level. We critically discuss the sunset clause in the Act and plead against function creep. Moreover, the expectations now and in the future from continuous digitalization of this part of the democratic process should be modest. On the basis of our analysis of the characteristics of the legislation and the effects on the political work of the representatives, we conclude that the current form of digitalization does not provide for the interaction between representatives and their constituencies and the communities at large.