Continuities and Ruptures in Knowledge Management Practices

There is little in the extensive literature on knowledge management, or in the related new business practices, to indicate what is new. The many historical examples suggest that there have always been elaborate forms of knowledge management, whether in the context of the network of Cistercian abbeys that constituted an effective system for the dissemination of new agricultural techniques (Gimpel, 1995); the company craft guilds in the Middle Ages that took on the essential functions of embodying and transmitting practical knowledge (Epstein, 1998); or, finally, the large metallurgical and chemical companies in the early 20th century which ensured the links between research and development and learning through application by doing (Caron, 1997). Knowledge and learning have thus always been central to the economy and “learning organizations” have always existed. Why, then, talk about new developments and ruptures?2’