Active learning and development assistance

Examines assistance to economic and social development as a problem in knowledge management (KM) and focuses on how the World Bank promotes developmental learning in developing countries. Since much of the knowledge about successful practices is tacit and local, the best model for knowledge transfer is less hub to spokes, or North to South, and more South to South, with the development agency in more of a broker role (instead of a “high priest” disseminating truths). The communication of the context of knowledge requires narrative modes of communication to supplement abstract forms of thought. Concludes that the complexity and uncertainty of development work entails that projects be designed in a highly adaptive learning mode as opposed to a blueprint mode. Shows how the best laid KM plans can be frustrated by organizational “imperatives” and identifies some of those barriers to knowledge‐based development assistance.

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