Knowledge and Coordination: A Liberal Interpretation by Daniel Klein

Author:Daniel Klein [Klein, Daniel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

INFORMAL CHANNELS OF KNOWLEDGE SHARING

The housing development where I used to live has a homeowners association that issued a monthly newsletter. In one issue, there appeared recommendations for a plumber, a painter, an electrician, a Volvo mechanic, a window cleaner, a carpet cleaner, a piano tuner, a woodworker, a brick layer, a cabinet builder, a nanny, a handyman, a house cleaner, a furniture transporter, a floorer, two garage-door servicemen, and seven house cleaners. My neighbors provided the recommendations, acting individually and giving their own phone numbers for details. People in the neighborhood know each other well enough to doubt that anyone would take a bribe to recommend a lousy nanny or handyman. The recommended individual was quite likely to be an illegal practitioner, even an illegal alien.

The newsletter served as a sort of community concierge, steering members down happy knowledge paths. The newsletter column existed because there were knowledge problems to be solved. No one would get good-neighbor points or sympathy from the man in the breast for helping to solve a nonexistent problem.

Such a newsletter is a kind of local gossip. Gossip arises among family, friends, acquaintances, neighbors, and coworkers. It takes the forms of chatting, group meetings, correspondence, leaflets, bulletin boards, newsletters, local newspapers, websites, e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter. Anthropologist Sally Merry writes, “gossip can be viewed as a means of storing and retrieving information.” “It forms dossiers on each member of one’s community: who is a good curer, who can be approached for loans … who is a good worker, and who is a thief.” In consequence, “the individual seeks to manage and control the information spread about him or her through gossip” (1984: 275, 279). In the marketplace, promisers do likewise by maintaining quality. If a promiser disappoints or cheats a truster, she is likely to complain about it. Researchers have well documented that consumers are far more likely to spread knowledge about bad experiences than satisfactory experiences.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.