I have spent much of my recent working life in and around Knowledge Management. But I have never thought of it as being solely about how organizations manage their knowledge. A much bigger question is this: how do we, as a society, create knowledge we can reasonably trust?
That question has been on my mind again since I discovered Jonathan Rauch and his book The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth.
Rauch uses the phrase “constitution of knowledge” for the norms, practices, people, and institutions through which societies establish what counts as reliable knowledge. No individual gets the final word. Claims are questioned, evidence examined, assumptions challenged, and errors corrected. Knowledge emerges from this continuing social process.
That immediately caught my attention. How do we collectively make sense of the world? How do we decide which claims deserve our trust? How do we disagree productively and correct ourselves when we get things wrong? These are Knowledge Management questions at the level of society and civilization.
They are also deeply conversational questions. We do not make sense of a complex world alone. We think together, question one another, disagree, reconsider and sometimes change our minds. Conversation is not merely a way of communicating knowledge. It is one of the ways through which knowledge comes into being.
I have created a book page for The Constitution of Knowledge where I have collected material that explores Rauch’s thinking. It includes a short video review, a short video critique, and a longer interview with Rauch.
Knowledge Letter: Issue: 316 (Subscribe)
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