Knowledge Evolution and Societal Transformations

Jerald Hage

Description

A new paradigm that synthesizes existing social science theories

Knowledge is more than information but instead the organizing of information into theories and practices that allow us to do things and accomplish goals. The first stage of knowledge creation depended upon creative scientists and entrepreneurs, but the second stage required research laboratories and teams. Now cooperation between organizations is necessary to solve individual, organizational, institutional, and global problems that face us today.

Individuals presently are raised in four kinds of social contexts: traditional, modern, post-modern, and anomic. These contexts explain partisan divides as well as the inability of some to succeed in society. Post-modern contexts produce individuals who are cognitively complex, creative, critical but have empathy towards others. The acceleration in knowledge creation is caused by not only the growth of more post-modern individuals who are creative but organizational innovation and innovative regions. Organizational structures that discourage radical innovations are contrasted with those that facilitate it. Similarly, the histories of three innovative regions--Silicon Valley, Kistra in Sweden, and Hsinchu in Taiwan—are contrasted with the failure of Rt. 128 near Boston.

During the second wave of knowledge creation, social structures were differentiated vertically. Now in the third wave, the differentiation process is horizontal. In the stratification system this means different capitalist classes and work logics rather than social classes with super salaries, thus increasing social inequality. In the study of organizations, this translates into missionary and self-management forms where post-modern individuals obtain meaningful work and ask for customized service. In the study of networks it means the rise of systemic coordinated networks replacing supply chains.

Given the growing inefficiencies of labor markets, product/service markets, and public markets (elections), systemic coordinated networks are proposed as a solution. Furthermore, we need a national corps of individuals with special skills in sectors with shortages who can then be assigned to work in disadvantaged areas. Pre-school, primary school, and secondary school need to be reinvented to facilitate more upward social mobility. Agriculture and industry also require radical new innovations. To build a new civil society, governments have to encourage participation in programs that help others.

List of Illustrations; Foreword: A Magnum Opus for Our Times and the Future by Michael Quinn Patton; Odyssey: Social Capital Acknowledgements in the Intellectual Journey through the Micro, Macro and Meso Worlds of Reality; Chapter One Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Knowledge: Punctuated Equilibrium Theory, Knowledge Creators, Structural Change, Adaptive Problems, and Institutional Solutions; Part One Knowledge Creators or Problem Solvers: Creative Minds, Radical Organizational Innovations, and Regional Environments That Encourage Higher Radical Innovation Rates; Chapter Two Knowledge Creators: Individual Creativity; Chapter Three Knowledge Creators: Radical Organizational Innovation; Chapter Four Knowledge Creators: Institutional Environments That Encourage Radical Innovation; Part Two Structural Change: Structural Diff erentiation and Dediff erentiation in Occupations and Their Classes, Organizations and Their Contexts, Networks and Their Cohesions; Chapter Five Structural Changes in the Stratifi cation System: New Occupations and Kinds of Social Classes; Chapter Six Structural Change in the Organization– Context Nexus: New Organizational Forms and Collaborative Competition; Chapter Seven Structural Change in Network Cohesion Links: New Coordinated Network Systems and Collaborative Social Cohesion; Part Three Adaptive Problems and Institutional Transformations Required to Create Meaningful Work, Employment, and Social Integration; Chapter Eight Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Skill Formation/ Research Capability System: Institutional Transformations That Produce New Skills and Reduce Alienation; Chapter Nine Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Economic System: Institutional Transformations to Create Decision- Making Jobs and Reduce Powerlessness; Chapter Ten Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Political System: Institutional Transformations to Create Safety Nets for the Socially Isolated/Mentally Ill and Constructing a New Democracy; Chapter Eleven Everything We Must Do to Further Social Evolution and Institutional Transformations: Solutions, Strategies, and the Stickiness of Path Dependencies; A Future Voyage: The Fourth Stage of Knowledge Creation; References; Index.

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• Sociology
• Research and development
• Social sciences

Informations

• Publié par: Anthem Press
• Date de parution: 30 avril 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785273773
• Langue: English

Extrait

Knowledge Evolution and Societal Transformations
Knowledge Evolution and Societal Transformations
Action Theory to Solve Adaptive Problems
Jerald Hage
Anthem Press
An imprint of Wimbledon Publishing Company
www.anthempress.com
This edition first published in UK and USA 2020
by ANTHEM PRESS
75–76 Blackfriars Road, London SE1 8HA, UK
or PO Box 9779, London SW19 7ZG, UK
and
244 Madison Ave #116, New York, NY 10016, USA
Copyright © Jerald Hage 2020
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN-13: 978-1-78527-375-9 (Hbk)
ISBN-10: 1-78527-375-2 (Hbk)
This title is also available as an e-book.
Dedication: My Family Tree
My family tree was formed in the mid-1960s when I married Madeleine Cottenet. The family’s evolution has sustained me throughout all these decades. Therefore, I dedicate this book to all the members of this family tree with the hope that it can help my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren.
CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
Foreword: A Magnum Opus for Our Times and the Future by Michael Quinn Patton
Odyssey: Social Capital Acknowledgements in the Intellectual Journey through the Micro, Macro and Meso Worlds of Reality
Chapter One Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Knowledge: Punctuated Equilibrium Theory, Knowledge Creators, Structural Change, Adaptive Problems, and Institutional Solutions
Part One Knowledge Creators or Problem Solvers: Creative Minds, Radical Organizational Innovations, and Regional Environments That Encourage Higher Radical Innovation Rates
Chapter Two Knowledge Creators: Individual Creativity
Chapter Three Knowledge Creators: Radical Organizational Innovation
Chapter Four Knowledge Creators: Institutional Environments That Encourage Radical Innovation
Part Two Structural Change: Structural Differentiation and Dedifferentiation in Occupations and Their Classes, Organizations and Their Contexts, Networks and Their Cohesions
Chapter Five Structural Changes in the Stratification System: New Occupations and Kinds of Social Classes
Chapter Six Structural Change in the Organization–Context Nexus: New Organizational Forms and Collaborative Competition
Chapter Seven Structural Change in Network Cohesion Links: New Coordinated Network Systems and Collaborative Social Cohesion
Part Three Adaptive Problems and Institutional Transformations Required to Create Meaningful Work, Employment, and Social Integration
Chapter Eight Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Skill Formation/Research Capability System: Institutional Transformations That Produce New Skills and Reduce Alienation
Chapter Nine Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Economic System: Institutional Transformations to Create Decision-Making Jobs and Reduce Powerlessness
Chapter Ten Knowledge Evolution and Adaptive Problems of the Political System: Institutional Transformations to Create Safety Nets for the Socially Isolated/Mentally Ill and Constructing a New Democracy
Chapter Eleven Everything We Must Do to Further Social Evolution and Institutional Transformations: Solutions, Strategies, and the Stickiness of Path Dependencies
A Future Voyage: The Fourth Stage of Knowledge Creation
References
Index
ILLUSTRATIONS
Figures
1.1 The Evolution of Science and Technological Research
1.2 Theories Synthesized in the Causes of Innovation and Their Interrelationships
2.1 Macro to Micro to Macro: Opportunities to Learn Two Social Grammars, Postmodern Individuals and Their Styles of Interaction and Societal Change in Behaviors
2.2 The Impact of Rising Levels of Knowledge (Education and Technology) on the Socialization of Children
3.1 Determinants of Radical Innovation
4.1 Diverse Innovative Districts and Multiplier Effect on Organizational Innovation
5.1 Knowledge and Social Classes
6.1 The Evolution of Organizational Inputs: Supply
6.2 The Evolution of Organizational Contexts: Demand
7.1 Diagram of Functional Adaptiveness
7.2 Knowledge and the Rise of Heterogeneous Social Capital
Tables
1.1 Level of Knowledge: Embeddedness
1.2 Four Stages of Knowledge Creation
1.3 The Anatomy of Society: Three Kinds of Social Structures
1.4 Adaptive Problems of Society: Three Institutional Realms
3.1 Measuring Radical Organizational Innovation or Technical Progress
4.1 Dimensions for Describing the Diversity of Innovation Districts: Measures
4.2 Dimensions for Describing the Diversity of National Innovation Systems
6.1 Burns and Stalker’s Two Organizational Forms
6.2 Comparison of Various Schemes for Describing Organizational Forms
6.3 Characteristic of Postmodern Organizations: Variations on the Organic Model
7.1 Resources Needed to Sustain a Society
7.2 Parsons’s AGIL Scheme of Functional Performances: Empirical Measures
7.3 Types of Interorganizational Networks
8.1 State Control over Skill Formation
8.2 Political Economy of Public Education Expenditures, 1875–1965
9.1 Results from the GLSDV Models: Dependent Variable Log Real GNP, 1875–1985
10.1 State Control over Welfare and Health
10.2 The Political Economy of Public Social Welfare Expenditures, 1875–1965
10.3 Total Social Benefits as a Percentage of GDP by Institutional Arrangements (2016)
11.1 Path Dependencies: Obstacles to Institutional Transformations
Action Theory
1.1 One Success Story in Overcoming the Valley of Death
2.1 How Two Social Grammars Aid Individuals of Jewish Origin
2.2 Postmodern Experiences versus Anomic Experiences: Explaining Adaptiveness (Resiliency) to Catastrophes
3.1 Postmodern Entrepreneurship: Social Innovation to Solve Societal Problems
3.2 Restoring Automotive Innovation at GM
6.1 Evolution and Disequilibrium: Conflict
7.1 Evolution and Disequilibrium: Conflict and Lack of Goal Achievement
7.2 Close Encounters and the Internet
8.1 Making One of the Poorest Schools One of the Best—in the World: The Case of Rinkeby in Stockholm, Sweden
9.1 Incubating High-Tech Companies: France
9.2 Saving Retail Chains: Lessons Learned from Best Buy
10.1 Britain’s Program to Reduce Child Poverty
10.2 Kinds of Volunteer Civic Action in Unis-Cité
10.3 Reducing Costs in a Prisoner Rehabilitation Program in Arizona
FOREWORD: A MAGNUM OPUS FOR OUR TIMES AND THE FUTURE
Michael Quinn Patton
This book is a magnum opus that makes sense of the past, explains the present, and lets us peer into the future. Here is an overview of what this magnum opus addresses by unpacking complexities, identifying essences, contrasting conflicting positions, mapping interconnections, and ultimately creating a new whole in the form of an integrated understanding of our postmodern era and its future. The book presents and explains:

• four stages of knowledge creation;
• interconnections among and across micro, meso, and macro arenas of action; and
• how to integrate social science theory, empirical scholarship, policy implications and options, and evaluation research.
The book provides:

• genuine interdisciplinary knowledge integrated across all of the social sciences, breaking down academic silos while identifying crosscutting themes;
• supporting evidence from a full range of social science methods and findings from surveys, in-depth case studies, big data sets, comparative analyses, international and cross-cultural conclusions, and a full range of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed/multiple methods across fields of inquiry; and
• insights generated by triangulating and integrating basic social science knowledge and applied social science findings with social science theory.
The book ensures relevance to problems and solutions by

• attending to both popular and widely disseminated sources and resources as well as less accessible scholarly publications and resources; and
• laying a foundation with the works of great social science pioneers, creating a structural framework with contributions of eminent twentieth-century social scientists, and connecting these classic and enduring breakthroughs in societal understanding with contemporary and leading-edge researchers, theorists, and scholars of the twenty-first century.
To appreciate the dimensions, scale, and significance of this magnum opus , its accomplishments and contributions, consider for a moment how siloed, specialized, fragmented, and polarized institutions are of higher education, public policy, philanthropy, the nonprofit sector, international agencies, and media outlets, to name but a few prominent examples. Our world is filled with trivia, day-to-day sensationalism, celebrity punditry, constant tweets about the mundane, and ever-crescendoing political noise and academic debates all made indecipherable by our short attention spans and vulnerability to selective perception, the confiden