Abstract:

Small coastal-or blue-cities face a dual mandate: to decarbonise and diversify while sustaining fragile estuarine ecologies and cultural lifeworlds. Using Brunei Darussalam as a case, this paper conceptualises how frontier digital–intelligent technologies – the Internet of Things (IoT), the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), and Artificial Intelligence (AI) – can catalyse sustainable urban transformation when embedded within blue governmentality. It integrates urban economic theory, relational network perspectives, and governmentality analytics into a unified framework of Intelligent Blue Governmentality, structured around the cyclical logic of Sensing, Analysing, Acting, and Learning (SAAL). Empirically, the framework is operationalised through four digital pathways: (1) Smart Blue Mobility (AI-routed water taxis and sensorised jetties); (2) The Blue Cultural–Creative Economy (AI-assisted heritage curation and NLP-based Jawi digitisation); (3) Knowledge Infrastructures (human–machine translation platforms and policy NLP tools); and (4) Platformised SME Ecosystems (social network intelligence and digital trust economies). These are supported by a delivery architecture that combines a Quadruple Helix governance model, a shared data lake, and a coastal digital twin for participatory and adaptive decision-making. The study concludes that digital–intelligent transformation can only deliver sustainable outcomes when it evolves into a form of reflexive governmentality – one that aligns algorithmic intelligence with ecological ethics, participatory data stewardship, and heritage-anchored coastal urbanism.