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The Urban Stack
Longer-form essays on AI, cities, public systems, and what actually works on the ground.
Subscribe on SubstackAI • Public Services • Cities • State Capacity
The future of government will be shaped by how cities use AI, finance, land, and institutional reform together.
Abhas Jha writes at the intersection of artificial intelligence, digital government, public systems, and urban transformation. His work connects strategy with implementation: from procurement and digital public infrastructure to resilience, land, housing, and the future of cities.
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India Decoded
A recurring deep dive into India’s economics, policy, technology, and institutional change.
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Current thesis
The next frontier in government is not AI for its own sake. It is applied intelligence embedded into public systems: procurement, permitting, urban management, service delivery, land systems, census operations, health and disaster response, and the digital institutions that make states more capable.
What this site is for
A home for essays, books, and practical thinking on how cities and governments can become smarter, faster, and more equitable, without losing sight of political economy, implementation realities, or institutional design.
Current Agenda
Three arguments shaping the work right now
This site is organized around a practical intellectual agenda: what governments need to rethink if they want AI to improve public outcomes rather than simply add new technology to old systems.
Argument 1
AI only matters when it changes how the state works
The real prize is not a pilot or a chatbot. It is better execution inside procurement, permitting, urban management, service delivery, and the internal operating systems of government.
Argument 2
Cities are where abstract technology becomes real governance
Cities sit at the junction of land, infrastructure, politics, delivery, and citizen experience. That makes them the most consequential proving ground for public-sector AI.
Argument 3
State capacity is the missing variable in most AI debates
Data, institutions, incentives, financing, and administrative capability determine whether digital tools strengthen the state or simply expose its weaknesses more quickly.
Focus Areas
Four domains where ideas meet implementation
AI for public service delivery
Using AI to improve operational decision-making, frontline delivery, early warning systems, and citizen-facing services.
Digital public infrastructure
Building the rails for identity, payments, data-sharing, consent, and government platforms that scale across sectors.
Cities, land, and resilience
Linking urban growth, housing, infrastructure, and risk management to the long-run performance of cities and regions.
State capacity and reform
Rewiring the machinery of government so strategy, institutions, incentives, and technology reinforce one another.
Featured Essays
Selected essays on AI, government, and India
India’s AI Heresy
A case for frugal AI, applied deployment, and a government strategy grounded in real public value rather than frontier hype.
India’s First Digital Census Offers a Once-in-a-Lifetime Opportunity
How digital tools and AI can turn census operations into a more usable public asset.
From Paper to Platform
Why public procurement is becoming one of the most important arenas of state modernization.
COBOL and Cobwebs
A look at the legacy technology trap that still shapes government performance around the world.
The Machinery of Progress
State capacity, governance, and what it will actually take to build a smarter Indian state.
Hardwiring AI into the Economy
What industrial policy, public demand, and institutional design mean for real-world AI adoption.
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The homepage now refreshes automatically from The Urban Stack and India Decoded, so the most recent writing appears here without manual updates.
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Platform Map
Different venues for different kinds of work
Publications
Publications and formal papers available online
Books, working papers, and research publications across urban development, resilience, housing, infrastructure, and public systems.
2026
Harnessing Digital Technology for Climate Resilience: Lessons From Asia and Africa
Chapter 7 in AI-Enabled Learning for Climate Action, edited by Sheila Jagannathan (Routledge)
2020
Three Strategies to Overcome Data-Sharing Challenges to Improve the Social Determinants of Health
Patterns (co-author)
2013
Building Urban Resilience: Principles, Tools, and Practice
World Bank book with Todd W. Miner and Zuzana Stanton-Geddes
2013
Strong, Safe, and Resilient: A Strategic Policy Guide for Disaster Risk Management in East Asia and the Pacific
World Bank book with Zuzana Stanton-Geddes
2012
Cities and Flooding: A Guide to Integrated Urban Flood Risk Management for the 21st Century
World Bank handbook with Robin Bloch and Jessica Lamond
2011
Five Feet High and Rising: Cities and Flooding in the 21st Century
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 5648
2010
Safer Homes, Stronger Communities: A Handbook for Reconstructing after Natural Disasters
World Bank handbook with Jennifer Duyne Barenstein and co-authors
2007
Low-income Housing in Latin America and the Caribbean
World Bank en breve
2005
Institutions, Performance, and the Financing of Infrastructure Services in the Caribbean
Edited volume, World Bank Working Paper No. 58
2005
A Time to Choose: Caribbean Development in the 21st Century
World Bank en breve (co-author)
Selected Coverage
Reporting, interviews, and public conversations
Independent reporting and public discussions on urban flooding, climate risk, resilient infrastructure, digital mapping, and the transition to net zero.
2025 · Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team
Building Tech Partnerships for Humanitarian Impact
A keynote on AI, satellite imagery, digital twins, and community mapping for safer cities.
2023 · BBC Future
What It Really Takes for Asia to Get to Net Zero
On stranded infrastructure, transition finance, and credible emissions data.
2023 · Modern Diplomacy
Cooling the Heat: Can India Lead the World in Green Cooling Innovation?
Why extreme heat, affordable housing, and equitable access to cooling belong in one policy agenda.
2020 · Financial Times
Flooded Asia: Climate Change Hits Region the Hardest
Coverage of the growing human and economic consequences of extreme flooding across Asia.
2020 · Economist Intelligence Unit
Towards a Resilient Society
An assessment of disaster readiness and urban resilience in five Southeast Asian cities.
2013 · The New York Times
More on Divergent Paths to Human Progress
Andrew Revkin's Dot Earth discussion of development, resilience, and human progress.
2012 · Science
World Bank Frets Over Urban Flooding in Asia
Coverage of the launch of Cities and Flooding and the case for integrating risk into urban growth.
About
Public policy, technology, housing, and urban infrastructure
Abhas Jha is an Indian public policy expert and author working at the intersection of digital technology, urban infrastructure, affordable housing, and public services. He is the World Bank's manager for urban development and disaster risk management in Eastern and Southern Africa.
Before joining the World Bank in 2001, he served for twelve years in the Indian Administrative Service. His work has since spanned more than 40 countries across Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean, combining policy reform, development finance, institutional design, and implementation.
His urban work includes affordable-housing and urban-poverty programmes in Mexico; infrastructure, land, and resilience programmes across several regions; and research on integrated urban flood-risk management. He is a lead author of Cities and Flooding and Safer Homes, Stronger Communities, and a co-author of Building Urban Resilience.
His current writing and public work examine how artificial intelligence, satellite imagery, open mapping, digital twins, and digital public infrastructure can improve government decisions and deliver better services, especially for low-income and climate-vulnerable communities.