1 Trevino(2010)KSIO Ponencia

The Notion of Knowledge Society According to three International Organizations.

Consequences for the Conception of Higher Education

Ernesto Trevio Ronzn

E-mail: [email protected]

Centro de Investigacin y Estudios Avanzados (Center for Research and Advanced Studies)

European Conference on Educational Research, ECER 2010

Main Conference: 25 - 27 August (Wednesday - Friday) Helsinki, Finland

Network: 22. Research in Higher Education Format: Paper

Context and purpose

In this presentation I speak about how the notion of Knowledge Society (KS) is being

conceptualized and used by three major International Organizations (IO) when talking

about the present and future of Higher Education (HE): the organizations are the World

Bank (WB), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and

the United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO).

I am particularly interested in how, when describing the problems, limits, challenges

and possibilities of HE, some of the main arguments deployed by the OI are tied to the

advent of KS and the KE, a kind of elusive reality present and future which requires,

demands and even imposes new types of institutions, procedures, subjects and ways of

thinking.

European Conference on Educational Research ECER 2010

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In this frame of ideas, I try to identify and to a certain point, to explore how the OI

understand the KS, what are the main epistemological, cultural, educational and political

assumptions informing their understanding; and what the implications are for the present

and future of HE.

I have organized the presentation in the following way. Firstly, I will summarise the

research supporting this presentation. Secondly, I will provide some details about the

findings, focusing particularly on the idea of KS as a regulatory and empty signifier and its

implications as a narrative about HE and society.

Research Outline

KS has been a central notion for the last two decades in international conversations about

the transformation of HE. In part, this centrality is due to the way in which some IO have

been using it when discussing the problems and possibilities of HE institutions and systems,

in an era signed by accelerated scientific and technological changes. This persistent use was

an object of analysis in the context of my doctoral research.

Research Questions, Dimensions and Axis

Some leading questions during my research were:

1. How is KS understood by the international organizations and what is HE role in

this frame?

2. What are the epistemological, educational, political and cultural assumptions

supporting this notion?


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3. What policy recommendations are drawn from here and what are their

consequences for the understanding, design and function of HE and the very

ideas of knowledge, education and society?

The research was organized into two dimensions of analysis which correspond to a

basic differentiation between the international dimension and the local or national one. This

distinction enabled me to put under scrutiny some international discussions and

recommendations and the way in which these travelled and were re-signified and

appropriated in the Mexican context.

Crossing these dimensions were two axis of inquiry, in the first one I analysed the

conceptualization of KS used by the three IO in order to identify:

1. Some epistemological, educational, political and cultural assumptions sustaining

their conceptions.

2. How in their discourses is constructed the relationship between KS, the knowledge

based economies, and others processes like the so called emerging knowledge

culture.

Through this axis I studied specific policy recommendations to understand how

conceptualizations would be materialized in specific reform policies. In this paper I only

address the questions in the global dimension.

Theoretical Resources

The research analytical perspective was constructed by borrowing theoretical elements

from the Essex School of political discourse theory (Laclau and Mouffe, 1987), and the

deconstructivist approach as developed by Jacques Derrida (1975) and other post-

structuralist thinkers. This theoretical framework gives special attention to the role of the

political. Here, the political is neither restricted to a specific realm of reality, nor reduced


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to a matter of social management or action. Instead, it appears at the core of the process of

construction of any notion of the social, of HE, of knowledge and culture (Marchart, 2007).

I make reference to the political to point out how, in the identification of problems

and possibilities, hopes and fears regarding HE in the KS, we are dealing with moments

and processes of ontological differentiation, of struggles and articulations, construction and

dissolution of social spaces and structures and not only with management or design in the

technical sense of the expression.

Regarding the Methodology and Sources Used

The research was based on an extended documental study conducted at local and

international libraries, and online databases. As a result, 120 documents produced between

1988 and 2007 by the three IO were read in a preliminary selection. From this, 68

documents were selected for the final stage of the analysis. It was on this last selection that

political analysis strategies were used considering also the use of a combination of

argumentative and conceptual analysis. As a final stage, a comparative analysis was carried

out between the forms of usage of the KS notion and the political initiatives supported by

the three IO in order to find similarities and differences.

Some Findings: KS as an Empty Signifier, Regulating Images and Propositions

I address the first questions in the global dimension: How is KS understood by OECD, WB

and UNESCO, and what is HE role in this frame? The signifier KS has been available in

the academic language since the decade of the 1950s in the work of Hayek (1945), Machlup


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(1962) and later in Bell (1968), Drucker (1969) and others, however, it has been used by

the three OI since the decade of the 1990s. OECD (1996) and UNESCO (1996) started to

use it first, followed by WB by the end of the decade.

In those years the notion was informed by concepts and worries linked to the

development of science and technology, the change in the production and distribution of

knowledge and its implication for the economic and educational arrangements. In this

period KS emerged as a sort of alternative to the idea Information Society, more oriented to

the technological and informational side of the technological development in the three OI.

By the turn of century, the notion was somehow silenced and substituted by the

notion knowledge economy in the discourse of the WB and OECD. KE was available long

before, in documents of OECD, cohabitating with KS, but sometimes they were used as

synonymous, sometimes KE as a part of KS, and other times as different kinds of realities.

As a consequence of this proximity and superposition, eventually, it became very difficult

to distinguish between one and the other; so, an effect of ambiguity and symbolic

occupation occurred.

If at any time the KS suggested the possibility of entering a terrain to think about

social arrangements different from the ones provided through notions like progress,

modernity or even globalization, KE definitely reduced this possibility, providing a specific

grid to think about knowledge, HE and social actors and processes. This grid has been

informed by a combination of free market rhetoric, liberal democratic rationalities, different

kinds of knowledge about knowledge and the faith in technology and science and their

effects and possibilities to produce economic competitiveness.

As a result, we have the following categories organizing the idea of HE in the KS

and the KE according to these IO: knowledge markets, learning economy, skill markets,


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knowledge workers, higher education market, competence based curriculum and

evaluation, long life learning, among others, based upon principles such as innovation,

competitiveness, effectiveness, standardization coming from fields of thinking and action

like management, business administration, the theory of organizational development and

others. None of these references are new, but now they are activated and organized in a

specific logic: they provide a conceptual and political frame to determine what is plausible,

urgent, relevant or logical to think, to say and to do regarding HE and its functions in

contemporary and future societies.

From the WB (2000, 2003) and the OECD (1998, 2000) point of view, a functioning

KE would take place when governments invest less in education and research systems so

the private sectors have the opportunity to invest more. Theoretically, this would be

consistent with a perspective of education in a liberal democracy because it would provide

a competitive environment that would encourage the improvement of teaching and

research. Within this rationality, students and academics emerge as clients who move freely

choosing the best option to study and work based on information standardized indicators,

benchmark reports and the sort according to their best interest, while industry, enterprise

or government emerge as costumers whether of skills or knowledge (BM, 2003: 140;

OCDE, 1998: 15).

In this perspective, knowledge would have to be private for the most part because, if

there is no possibility of obtaining benefits, there is no incentive for investment (OECD,

2000: 14). In the end, this regular chain of ideas would respond to the best social interest

and would give back to the citizens the liberty for choosing what, when, how and where to

study, which, according to the OECD is a right somehow deprived by the governments

(OECD, 1998:102).


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Considering some implications of this vision of HE, education and knowledge, in

2005 UNESCO released a document (Towards the knowledge societies) pinpointing the

importance of re-organizing the debate and the very idea of KS in order to think about the

future of contemporary societies and the role of HE in them. As for the notion KS, the

document suggested that we should think in plural, knowledge societies, in order to

recognize the different ways of social arrangements. Besides, the notion should be favoured

over others like KE in order to provide a more open perspective of knowledge and

education that would include space for culture, aesthetics, art and environment. This comes

after establishing that, while knowledge is more and more conceived as a commodity and

these qualities are extended to HE, we witness the expansion of knowledge and education

markets, and this produce even more differentiation and distance between institutions,

countries and individuals.

Although there are some differences in the conceptions of the IO in the three

arguments, KS functions as an empty signifier (Laclau, 2005), that is to say, as a political

element which, in its ambiguity and openness organises for a certain period of time,

explanations, hopes, fears and initiatives coming from different sources regarding the

transformation of HE, society and subjects.

For instance, the KS is at the same time:

- a present and a coming state of reality

- the name of a set of threats and risks menacing individual, institutions and societies

future

- the source of opportunities for those (individuals, institutions or countries) willing

to take them


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In this frame, HE appears as a tool for individuals/institutions/countries to enter the

KS and in this way, overcome inequities and jumping development stages. But it is also a

marketplace, a commodity and a struggle arena. However, to be relevant it needs to be

transformed, otherwise, HEI would be at the risk of being left outside the KS and the KE.

Implications and Inquiries: HE and the Advent of Societies in the Dispute of

Knowledge

I will draw some additional implications based on the second question: what are the

epistemological, educational, political and cultural assumptions embedded in this notion of

KS superimposed with KE?

As for the epistemological assumptions and implications: in two of the three IO the

nature, purpose and possibilities of knowledge are restricted to a problem of correct

production, distribution, negotiation or use. Its disciplinary filiations, validity, diversity,

debate or consequences are not visible as a relevant problem and apparently have no place

because entering into such a territory would postpone the actual production and delivery of

relevant knowledge.

As for the educational assumptions: the basic one is that, instead of complex social

beings, Higher Education Institutions and students can be treated as economic actors in a

competitive environment driven by rational interest and well informed decisions. Another

assumption here is that decisions, market life and information are rational, clear, well

informed and reliable, and that such elements can help us to predict or plan the future.

Another assumption is that education serves better to the public interest if is formed as a

set of marketable skills, a process of competence building and certification because this is

suppose to be the plausible way to face the future.


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Among the several implications of this would be the naturalization of a narrowed

and trivial vision of knowledge, society and HE, and the inability to auto-observe its own

language and the social consequences of it. For instance, knowledge should not be judged

only by its relevance in market circuits but by its place in the dynamics of the social and

human fields.

Connected with this, in terms of the cultural assumptions and implications, the

research shows that HE in the KS is to encourage a culture of knowledge, competitiveness

and effectiveness. Culture here is understood basically as a malleable disposition to be

activated through different sets of governing practices. The implication here is that, judging

by the way in which this image is presented, I find more a set of conducts than an

appreciated value or condition.

In terms of political assumptions, here I see a very interesting operation. KS

provides a plural set of experiences for thinking HE. Through an articulation of a free

market approach in a liberty reference, the IO using this signifier gives life to a form of

rationality that provides with a plausible and attractive way of thinking about HE. This

rationality tells a story about the present and future of HE, about individuals, organizations,

nations. Deploying a language of hopes and fears (Popkewitz, 2008), produces a space of

representation about what is a problem or a risk for HE now and in the future; and what is

possible and urgent to change now with respect to that future. This creates a political

configuration for the emergence of political options that seem plausible and reasonable.

Another political outcome has to do with the principles of universalization.

Although the three IO recognize that every country is different, there is a clear gesture of

producing a global approach towards the reform of HE. Specific sets of minds, specific

ideas and hopes produce similar languages, vocabularies and behaviours around the world,


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producing and reinforcing the effects of governing at distance and self-policing through

listing, benchmarking, vocabularies or standards.

Closing Consideration

As I read the considerations of the three IO, I wonder why two of them speak more of KE

and not of KS, and why the other one remains in its domain; I think one of the reasons is

that in a KE configuration, individuals, institutions and countries are simpler to configure

and to address. They emerge as effective knowledge machines, with less density and more

mobility; however, to me, this is a narrow understanding of the way in which individuals

and HE function.

During the first part of my presentation I said that the political is a concept that

helps to think in terms of the process that produce and dissolve social process and

structures. In the case of KS, KE and other notions driving our understanding of HE we can

see the political effects in the act of building narratives making reiterative references to the

risks of not having a competitive and efficient HE system, well integrated and well

governed and this regulates a good part of the political and academic discussion regarding

the present and future of HE, a good part of what can and needs to be said, thought an done

about it.

So we have narratives hopes and fears, of salvation telling a story of necessary

changes in a era of deficits, budget cuts and economic competitiveness. This language gives

HE the status of knowledge factory and all of us, of knowledge machines. But

acknowledging that in the worries of the OI there are legitimate interesting ideas I basically

disagree with most of the assumptions on which they are based because at the same time


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that magnify the problems and economic role of HE, they over simplify the function of

knowledge and HE to its economic role.

When these concepts circulate in the policy design, making and acting circuits they

give back a social institution whose major probable achievement would be to provide with

some good knowledge assets for the KS/E, and I find this trilling and worrying for the most

part.

References

Derrida, J. (1975). La diseminacin. Espaa: Fundamentos

Hayek, F. (1945). The Use of Knowledge in Society, American Economic Review,

XXXV (4): 519-30.

Laclau, E. y Ch. Mouffe (1987). Hegemona y estrategia socialista. Mxico: Siglo XXI.

-------- (2005). La razn populista. Buenos Aires: FCE.

Marchart, O. (2007). Post-Foundational Political Thought: Political Difference in Nancy,

Lefort, Badiou and Laclau (Taking on the Political). Edingurgh: Edingurgh

University Press.

Peters, M. (2003) Education policy in the Age of Knowledge Capitalism. Policy Futures in

Education, Vol. 1, N. 2, pp. 361-380.

Popkewitz, T. S. (2008). Cosmopolitanism and the Age of School Reform. NY: Routledge

Stehr, N. (1984). The Knowledge Society. The growing impact of Scientific Knowledge on

Social Relations. Dorderecht, Holland: Reidel Publishing.

OECD. (1998). Redefining tertiary education. Paris: Organization for Economic

Cooperation and Development.


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-------- (1999) University research in transition. Paris: Organization for Economic

Cooperation and Development.

OECD. (2000). Knowledge management in the learning society. Paris: Organization for

Economic Cooperation and Development.

OECD. (2007). Giving knowledge for free. Paris: Organization for Economic Cooperation

and Development.

OECD. (2007). Higher education and regions globally competitive locally engaged. Paris:

Author.

UNESCO. (1996). Higher education in the XXI Century View of Latin America and the

Caribbean. Paris: Author.

UNESCO. (1997). Towards a new higher education. Paris: Author.

UNESCO. (1998). World declaration on Higher Education for the twenty-first century:

vision and action. Paris: Author.

UNESCO. (2003.) World conference on higher education +5. Final report of the Higher

education partner. Paris: Author.

UNESCO. (2005) Towards Knowledge Societies. Paris: Author.

WB. (1994). Higher education lessons. Washington, DC: World Bank

WB. (2000). Peril and promise in tertiary education. Washington, DC: World Bank

WB. (2003). Constructing knowledge societies. Washington, DC: World Bank

WB. (2006). Latin American Universities and the Third Mission. Washington, DC: World

Bank

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1 Trevino(2010)KSIO Ponencia