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Knowledge Management from a Social Perspective: The Contribution of Practice-Based Studies

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Abstract

A social perspective on knowledge does not exist independently of social relations and social practices. This chapter illustrates the travel of ideas around knowledge management within a social perspective through three processual activities: sharing knowledge and keeping knowledge alive within a community’s practices; embedding knowledge in material practices; and innovating as an ongoing process. Thus, we argue that a social perspective on knowing is based on three types of relations established between practices and knowledge: a relation of containment (knowledge is a process that takes place within situated practices); a relation of mutual constitution (knowing and practising produce each other); a relation of equivalence (the equivalence between knowing and practising arises when priority is denied to the knowledge that exists before the moment of its enactment). A social perspective on knowledge management has taken several turns from the concept of the community of practice to the development of practice-based studies.

This chapter is the outcome of joint and indivisible work by the authors, whose names appear in alphabetic order. If, however, for academic reasons individual responsibility is to be assigned, Silvia Gherardi wrote sections “Introduction”, “Communities of Practice and Knowledge Management: A Brief History of the Travel of Ideas”, “Discussion” and “Conclusions”; Francesco Miele wrote sections “Sharing Knowledge Between Experts and Novices”, “Embedding Knowledge in Material Practices” and “Innovating Knowledge as an Ongoing Processes”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Trento, Trento, Italy

    Silvia Gherardi & Francesco Miele

Authors
  1. Silvia Gherardi
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  2. Francesco Miele
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Suleman Dawood School of Business, Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan

    Jawad Syed

  2. School of Management and Enterprise, Faculty of Business, Education, Law and the Arts, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia

    Peter A. Murray

  3. School of Business and Economics, Loughborough University, Loughborough, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

    Donald Hislop

  4. Muscat University, St Helens, Merseyside, United Kingdom

    Yusra Mouzughi

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Gherardi, S., Miele, F. (2018). Knowledge Management from a Social Perspective: The Contribution of Practice-Based Studies. In: Syed, J., Murray, P., Hislop, D., Mouzughi, Y. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Knowledge Management. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71434-9_7

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