KNOWLEDGE

SOUTHERN NEW HAMPHIRE UNIVERSITY
AND
OPEN UNIVERSITY OF TANZANIA


COMMUNITY ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
ASSIGNMENT : KNOWLEDGE
PROGRAMME : MSC. CED
COURSE TITLE : PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

CODE : ICD 533
CENTRE : ARUSHA

STUDENT NAME : KASSIAN SIA
LECTURERS NAME: DR. JUMA KADUANGA
SUBMISSION DATE: 22 OCTOBER 2007






1:0 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Definition of Knowledge
There are various attempts and suggestions that tries to define knowledge, ranging to what is known to distillation of information. However, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, knowledge is defined variously as (i) expertise, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education, the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject, (ii) what is known in a particular field or in total, facts and information or (iii) awareness or situation.

Despite a lack of any single agreed definition of knowledge at present, nor any prospect of one, there remain completing theories (wikipedia,2007) John Locke (1689) argued that knowledge is perception of the agreement or disagreement of two ideas.
However, the definition by Locke as been refined (Davenport and Prusake (1998 p.5) as “a fluid mix of framed experience, contextual information, values, and expert insight that provides a framework for evaluating and incorporating new experiences and information”
Wittgenstein saw knowledge as a case of a family resemblance.

From the foregoing discussion, it is difficult to relate knowledge to one aspect only, and also that knowledge is complex and applied differently to suit certain circumstances. For that matter therefore, it suffices to say that, within the context of Community Economic Development, knowledge is the accumulated experience, skills and information availed to the community used to address common problems. This argument is in line with the proposition (Peter F. Duke) that knowledge is information that changes something or somebody either by becoming grounds for actions, or by making an individual (or an institution) capable of different or more effective action.
1.2 Types of Knowledge
There are two main types of knowledge, namely explicit and tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge can be articulated into formal language, (words and numbers), and is normally readily transmitted and even processed by a computer to be transmitted electronically, or stored in data base.

On the other hand, Tacit knowledge is personal knowledge embedded in individual experience and involves intangible factors, such as personal belief, perspective, and the value system. Tacit knowledge is hard to articulate with formal language, and before it can be communicated, it must be converted into words, models, or numbers that can be understood (Krough G. Ishijo K. Nonaka I. (2000)

1.3 Forms of Knowledge
There are two forms of knowledge called situated and partial knowledge.
Situated knowledge (wikipedia) is the knowledge specific to a particular situation. This is normally created out of learning from experience or through undertaking trial and error methods.
Situational knowledge is often embedded in language, culture, or traditions is commonly termed as “posteriori”, meaning afterwards.
Partial knowledge implying that knowledge is always not complete, that is, partial. Through the partial understanding of the problem context and problem dates, it is possible to solve a certain problem.
In that case therefore, man has always endeavourer to address certain setbacks to development, based on the partial understanding of the root cause of the problems, and the opportunities available to solve the same problem. In general practice, Community Economic Development entails an understanding of the obstacle and opportunities for development, and takes advantage of the experience and expertise of the local community, enhance the standard of livelihood of a given community.

The partial knowledge over a given problem or situation, is a manifestation of the widespread knowledge gap between the local community, the government and development practitioners. This being the case in point, concerted efforts need to be done to harmonize mutual understanding so as to collectively address community felt needs and perceptions. Knowledge gap though difficult to bridge, could be minimized through provision of education programmes tailored to empower local community with skills and techniques for sourcing for data and information about issues surrounding them. Government and development practitioners, on the other hand, are charged with the duties of creating conducive environment for the absorption of new knowledge through the use of user – friendly forms of communication knowledge.

2.0 THE ANALYSIS OF KNOWLEDGE

Following the lack of one acceptable standard definition of knowledge, and based on the different applications of knowledge between and among communities, individuals and institutions, it becomes a necessity to attempt to analysis knowledge.

The most important objective of the analysis of knowledge is to state the conditions that are individually necessary and jointly sufficient for proportion knowledge (Stanford Encyclopidia of Philosophy). There are a variety of conditions that are used in the analysis of knowledge, but for the sake of this paper, we look at knowledge as Justified True Belief. The choice of this aspect is based on the understanding that, knowledge has always been conceived as “what is known (wikipedi) …..truth, belief and wisdom. The truth condition is overwhelmingly clear that what is false cannot be known. For example, it is false that Community Economic Development is symonymons to Rural Economic Development, it is not the kind of thing anybody can know. The truth – condition is universally acceptable. The belief condition, though hotly contested, it enjoys support from some philosophers that knowledge without belief is indeed possible, that is, there is knowledge without belief. This argument is based on the fact that, at certain incidences one fails to comply what he sees with his own eyes to come to term with what he sees.

The justification condition requires that for a belief to be true there must be justification, that would qualify as knowledge. Beliefs that are lacking justification are false, although on occasions, such beliefs happen to be true. It follows therefore that, “a belief is justified if, and only if, it fits the subject’s evidence.”

This last condition presupposes that within the context of Community Economic Development, the issue of evidence based information is of paramount importance for effectively and efficiently planning and monitoring development programmes or projects. Shared knowledge must at all times seek to identify the truth, ascertain beliefs and embed justification, In essence, the role of justification condition is to ensure that the analysans does not mistakenly identify as knowledge a belief that is true because of epistemic luck. As Fred Deretske (1989, p.95) puts it correctly that, “those who think knowledge requires something other than or at least more, reliably produced true belief, something (usually) in the way of justification for the belief that one’s produced beliefs are being reliably produced ….why should we insist that no one can have knowledge without it.”

3.0 CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY

Knowledge is broad-based, contentious and multiplicity. This is explained by the manner knowledge has been defined to suit a variety of requirements and applications. However, it suffice to admit that knowledge is an accumulation of experience and skills acquired throughout one’s life cycle.

Explicit knowledge can be readily transmitted and processed, therefore, shared by the community, whereas, tacit knowledge is limited to an individual, and seemingly, contributes to how the individual projects himself or herself the community around he or her. Both explicity and facit knowledge are important to the individuals well-being and community’s unity. The analysis of knowledge seem to be contentions, each representing different views of different philosophers and scholars. However, it goes without saying that knowledge constitutes truth, belief and justification, and that without them, it would be cumbersome to accept knowledge as the part of the hierarchy made up of data, information and knowledge.

Knowledge is fundamental and the single pre-requisite necessary for folstering economic development to our community, and thus, knowledge must be mainstreamed into international, national, and community economic development strategies and programmes.



REFERENCES

1. Achterbergh, Jan & Vriens, Dirk (May – June 2002). “Managing Viable Knowledge.” http://www.nwlink.com/ ~Donclark/knowledge/knowledge.html

2. Davenport T., Prusak L. (1998) “Working Knowledge” in.http.//www.nlink.com/~Donalark/knowledge/knowledge.hotml.

3. KroughG, Ichijok, NonakaI.(2000)”. Enabling knowledge Creation. In http://www.nlink.com/~Don clark/knowledge/knowledge/html.

4. Situated knowledge (hotp.//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/knowledge