Digital Knowledge Flow Platforms for Regional Innovation Systems

Abstract

For the first time in history, practically all the information required to navigate the oceans of a globalising knowledge economy are embodied in the Internet. Yet the demand for proximity to sources of economically valuable knowledge has never been greater. The rise of knowledge clusters like Oulu in Finland, Kista in Sweden, Cambridge in UK, and Cambridge, Massachusetts, let alone Silicon Valley, are testimony to the human desire for face-to-face and handshaking business contact. This paradox is widely commented upon by leading economists and business analysts (Chesbrough, 2003; Krugman, 1995; Porter, 1998) who show that the age of the hierarchical, vertically integrated production function embodied in the fabric of the multinational firm has changed significantly. Ushered in to replace it is a system, we have called Globalisation 2 (Cooke, 2005) based on externalised “node and network” forms of interaction. The Internet and other digital means of managing such informational complexity were said to be essential if we would but learn its rubric and adapt practice accordingly. But, rather like “e-learning” and “online learning” as means to do this, much less is heard of their virtues now than hitherto. The reason is that they underplayed and even ignored the important corollary regarding “learning organisations,” which is that good knowledge management also requires “developing organisations.” By that is meant reconfiguring inherited hierarchies and their associated technologies and incentive systems.