Power, rules of the game and the limits to knowledge management: Lessons from Japan and Anglo-Saxon alarms

Clegg, S; Ray, T

Power, rules of the game and the limits to knowledge management: Lessons from Japan and Anglo-Saxon alarms

Clegg, S

Ray, T

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Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Prometheus (United Kingdom), 2003, 21 (1), pp. 23 - 40
Issue Date:: 2003-01-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Clegg, S https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6083-4283	en_US
dc.contributor.author	Ray, T	en_US
dc.date.issued	2003-01-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Prometheus (United Kingdom), 2003, 21 (1), pp. 23 - 40	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	0810-9028	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/1130
dc.description.abstract	Much of the Knowledge Management (KM) literature assumes that all relevant knowledge can be represented as information and 'managed'. But the meaning of information is always context-specific and open to subsequent reinterpretation. Moving over time or between contexts affords scope for new meanings to emerge. Making sense of information signals (speech, body language, tone-of-voice or whatever)-and the absence of such signals-involves dimensions of individual and collective tacit knowledge that are frequently misrepresented or ignored in mainstream KM. By relating power and knowledge to 'rules of the game', it is possible to consider how the contexts in which information is rendered meaningful are bounded, as well as crucially related in the stretch between macro-level processes and micro-level practices. In the knowledge debate, Japan stands as a counterfactual to Anglo-Saxon expectations about formal rules, liberal individualism and market-rational entrepreneurship. While seminal accounts of knowledge creation in Japanese companies impelled the West towards KM, there has been no corresponding KM-boom in Japan. Our interpretation of the processes by which Japanese and Anglo-Saxon practices are situated suggests that KM is limited by the separation of knowledge from power and information from meaning.	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Prometheus (United Kingdom)	en_US
dc.relation.isbasedon	10.1080/0810902032000050992	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Science Studies	en_US
dc.title	Power, rules of the game and the limits to knowledge management: Lessons from Japan and Anglo-Saxon alarms	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	1	en_US
utslib.citation.volume	21	en_US
utslib.for	160510 Public Policy	en_US
utslib.for	1605 Policy and Administration	en_US
utslib.for	1801 Law	en_US
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Business
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Business/Management Discipline
utslib.copyright.status	closed_access
pubs.issue	1	en_US
pubs.publication-status	Published	en_US
pubs.volume	21	en_US

Abstract:

Much of the Knowledge Management (KM) literature assumes that all relevant knowledge can be represented as information and 'managed'. But the meaning of information is always context-specific and open to subsequent reinterpretation. Moving over time or between contexts affords scope for new meanings to emerge. Making sense of information signals (speech, body language, tone-of-voice or whatever)-and the absence of such signals-involves dimensions of individual and collective tacit knowledge that are frequently misrepresented or ignored in mainstream KM. By relating power and knowledge to 'rules of the game', it is possible to consider how the contexts in which information is rendered meaningful are bounded, as well as crucially related in the stretch between macro-level processes and micro-level practices. In the knowledge debate, Japan stands as a counterfactual to Anglo-Saxon expectations about formal rules, liberal individualism and market-rational entrepreneurship. While seminal accounts of knowledge creation in Japanese companies impelled the West towards KM, there has been no corresponding KM-boom in Japan. Our interpretation of the processes by which Japanese and Anglo-Saxon practices are situated suggests that KM is limited by the separation of knowledge from power and information from meaning.

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http://hdl.handle.net/10453/1130