On March 16th, 2026, the new Honours Programme “City Science for Transformative Urban Futures.” kicks off at Craft DAStU.

The programme explores the emerging field of City Science, focusing on how scientific knowledge, data and interdisciplinary research can inform decision-making processes and policy design in cities. The initiative aims to strengthen the dialogue between universities, public administrations, research centres and local stakeholders, experimenting with new forms of knowledge co-production to address contemporary urban challenges.

The Honours Programme also features a series of open lectures, open to the wider academic community. The lectures bring together international scholars to discuss the role of knowledge, data and interdisciplinary research in addressing complex urban challenges, with a particular focus on the relationship between science, governance and public decision-making.

The programme will officially begin with an inaugural lecture on 16 March at 15:30 by Vanesa Castán Broto (University of Sheffield), titled “Cities, complexity, politics, and knowledge.”

Upcoming lectures:

23 March 2026 – 09:30
Government, governance, and the production of knowledge
Tommaso Vitale, Sciences Po Paris

30 March 2026 – 09:30
The Social Life of Science: STS and Sociology of Science
Riccardo Chesta, Politecnico di Milano

27 April 2026 – 09:30
Data, government and AI: challenges and risks
Giovanni Allegretti, University of Coimbra

11 May 2026 – 14:30
Participation, action research, knowledge and data co-production
Laura Saija, University of Catania

The Honours Programme is developed by CRAFT (DAStU, Politecnico di Milano) in collaboration with AUIC – School of Architecture Urban Planning Construction Engineering, the City Science Initiative, Eurocities, and ANCI Lombardia.