Knowledge management for sustainable development in the web 2.0 era: the Triangle of Dichotomies

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present a conceptual framework that will support the international development community in its efforts to establish web-based knowledge management platforms that maximise the opportunities offered by the recent surge of web 2.0 technologies. In order to develop such a framework, the paper reviews the key concepts that define knowledge management practices, and attempts to understand the constraints that currently limit the application of these practices in the development sector, as well as the emerging opportunities offered by the growth of web 2.0 technologies. The result of this effort has been the establishment of the Triangle of Dichotomies. By moulding the strengths of web 2.0 technologies to the uniqueness of the development sector, the Triangle of Dichotomies offers development practitioners a lens to assess strengths, weaknesses and latent opportunities of web-based knowledge management structures according to specific user needs and contextual particularities. You can't manage knowledge – nobody can. What you can do is to manage the environment in which knowledge can be created, discovered, captured, shared, distilled, validated, transferred, adopted, adapted and applied. (Collins and Parcell2007, pp. 24–25)