Lost direction

I had been trying to write this post for several days without success before I finally got started . It seems that without a clearly-organized reading schedule or prompts I become timid about finding new topics to explore. For the last post, I had a jumping-off point (Polanyi) and I used it to pick two other articles I could tell based on their titles dealt with similar ideas. For this one, I dillied over the reading list, but when making an informed decision began to seem impossible, I bit the bullet and selected three of the articles more or less at random for this post. So this is an explorative adventure for all of us, and not just for you (readers). We'll see how it goes.

The first piece I chose to read, "The Once and Future Information Society," provided an interesting framework for my consideration of future readings and concepts, so it worked out a bit serendipitously that I chose to tackle it so close to the beginning of this project. Its authors (Rule and Besen) posit that a concept exists amongst intellectuals that information and its methods of being shared have (are? will?) changed (changing? change?) social history. While there is no doubt that the ways in which society handles and accesses information (and the kinds of information to which society has access), Rule and Besen question the assumption that this is drastically overhauling society-- in terms of economy, politics, and all.

The "information society" described in the article is a flattering but somewhat nebulous concept. The changes attributed to it by information theorists are bold and somewhat spurious (particularly the Drucker assumption, originally published in 1968 and allegedly reiterated by subsequent authors on the subject, that our society is "post-capitalist"-- maybe my view is skewed by the SuperBowl advertisements, but I think I would have to squint pretty hard to lose sight of capitalism's supposedly invisible hand in our culture). My take on this concept links nicely to the central argument described by Daneshgar and Parirokh and explained in this blog post by my professor Dr. Burns-- knowledge is a commodity. While capitalism may look different now than it did before the advent of technology changed the ways in which we engage with information, by now even information has been incorporated into the capitalist framework. We trade in it as easily as we trade in more traditional forms of currency, and many see an exchange rate between the two. (Saint Simon and other information theorists, as detailed by Rule and Besen, consider it a focal point of information society that information has increased economic value, calling into question exactly what Drucker may have meant by his curious phrasing.)

Because of the vagueness of the definitions of the terms involved, it's difficult to estimate the exact effects this has had on the economy and society as a whole. Rule and Besen point to outlandish optimism and egoism on the part of intellectuals who have asserted that the "information society" has had a large and lasting effect. One interesting part of the debate is whether we ought to classify "theoretical knowledge" separately from "practical knowledge," but this gets messy when the distinction between the two breaks down, as it does each time a new stride forward is taken and more and more theoretical knowledge becomes practically applicable.

The takeways from this piece are that 1) education is important for the possibility of success in this age, but 2) it is still no guarantee thereof, particularly in cases where a system is already in place. Individuals have a greater chance of socioeconomic advancement with access to information, but information does not necessarily assist the masses in their struggle toward social justice. Information has been weaponized with the advent of expert witnesses, and there are in some ways more traps to fall into than ever. The idyllic "information society" playfully referenced in the title is not all it's cracked up to be-- and the article cautions against investing in its fantasy.

The next reading I chose was Duguid and Brown's "Organizational learning and communities-of-practice: Toward a unified view of working, learning, and innovation." This article examines the ways information moves through organizations. Duguid and Brown look, instead of vaguely-defined "society," at organizations, which are thought of as more mechanical and precise. I see a connection to the Rule and Besen piece discussed above-- serendipity, again-- because one of the main points this article makes is that excellent and potentially very useful information can come to light through work, but if it originates in the wrong part of the system, it may never be shared equitably and help the betterment of the entire organization. This sounds a lot like Rule and Besen's cautioning against overoptimism on the part of intellectuals who favor the term "information society." 

Unlike Rule and Besen, who simply wished to point out the pitfalls of a way of thinking, Duguid and Brown provide a solution to this problem. They say that in order for organizations to best utilize the information provided by their members, they need to first acknowledge those members as individuals capable of innovative thought. This will allow organizations to reevaluate their standard practices and help allow for creative problem-solving rather than rote sticking to a formula provided by the organization.

The final piece I am looking at this week is Frank Blackler's "Knowledge, Knowledge Work, and Organizations: An Overview and Interpretation." The theorists Blackler reviews seem to call back to the material I engaged with last week, about knowledge and what it is. Again the answer is indefinable and, the article suggests, attempts to define it restrict it too much to make it useful. Knowledge lives in the dynamic space between people and their communities, and we have not yet invented a way to talk about it concretely. It changes constantly and cannot be pinned down.

Then, however, Blackler diverts to a course that runs closely to the Rule and Besen piece. This is to discuss "knowledge work," which is a way of talking about the commodification of knowledge and the ways knowledge fits into the capitalist infrastructure. Blackler contends that the central issue in knowledge work is how to respond to the changes in information systems (in both structure and action). The ways in which organizations interact with information are changing, and the ways they weather those changes are going to dictate how successful they are in this informational-capitalist economy.

~*~

Readings discussed:

Rule, J. B., & Besen, Yasemin. (2008). The once and future information society. Theory and Society, 37(4), 317-342. doi:10.1007/s11186-007-9049-6

Brown, J. S., & Duguid, P. (1991). Organizational learning and communities-of-practice: Toward a unified view of working, learning, and innovation. Organization Science, 2(1), 40-57. doi:10.1287/orsc.2.1.40

Blackler, F. (1995). Knowledge, knowledge work and organizations: An overview and interpretation. Organization Studies, 16(6), 1021-1046. doi:10.1177/017084069501600605