Orkun Basaran
Title: HAPPINESS IN CITIES: THE MOMENT-CENTRED CITY
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Erkki Karo, Dr. Veiko Lember
Opponent: Dr. Amirouche Moktefi
Defense: 2-3 June 2022
Abstract: Happiness has clearly been an essential factor in defining city governments’ agendas. The two dominant happiness lenses that city governments use mainly focus on objective well-being and eventually lead to materialistic strategies with sub-optimal outcomes. This thesis explores a third lens, moment-centred lens, which focuses more on subjective well-being by aiming at the moments of citizens and taking ‘feelings’ as the means of influence. To this end, a novel conceptual framework is proposed, and exploratory empirical research is conducted to test the framework, targeting the ad-hoc applications of this lens worldwide. Drawing on the findings, a taxonomy and a preliminary repository of moment-centred lens applications are developed. The implications of the analysis show that moment-centred lens has the potential to help improve happiness in cities, and it seems worthwhile to take the literature forward on this topic, starting with elaborating the taxonomy that is presented in the thesis.
Keywords: Happiness, quality of life, liveability, moment-based happiness, citizen happiness, peak moments
