The Pervasive Identity of Knowledge Management: Consolidation or Dilution?

Ettore Bolisani (), Enrico Scarso () and Tomas Cherkos Kassaneh
Additional contact information
Ettore Bolisani: University of Padova
Enrico Scarso: University of Padova
Tomas Cherkos Kassaneh: University of Padova

A chapter in The Future of Knowledge Management, 2023, pp 23-45 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract It is a widespread opinion that knowledge management (KM) is a strongly interdisciplinary field of study. Over the years, this characteristic has become more marked, and it is now possible to identify more than one hundred different definitions of the term coming from distinct subject areas, e.g., business management, accounting, education, human resources, information, computer science, healthcare, and library science. The number of papers related to KM has grown notably, and they now amount to tens of thousands. Looking at the literature, KM appears to be a pervasive concept that can be applied to any human activity, and conversely, any dimension related to human activity affects the adoption of KM. Although multidiscipinarity is not necessrily a negative characteristic, there is a risk that the concept itself of KM becomes misunderstood or used in a generic way and may lose its original significance. In other words, the proliferation of works that refer to KM is a positive signal but also raises the question of whether the discipline is consolidating or diluting its identity. The paper stimulates a discussion on this by going a little deeper into the abovementioned pervasiveness. An analysis of various reviews of the literature on KM is done to verify if KM is conceptualized and applied in a common way or if it is splitting into different but increasingly inconsistent streams.

Keywords: Knowledge management; Identity; Meta-review; Scientific discipline; Recognition (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:kmochp:978-3-031-38696-1_2

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783031386961

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-38696-1_2

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().