COE NEWSJAPANADVANCED INSTITUTE OFSCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
1990

Newsletter of the Center for Strategic Development of Science andTechnology, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST)

Vol. 3 No. 2

Winter 2006

Table of Contents
Robert Kneller
Knowledge Creation and Application in a Local
Context: Creation of New Companies and Increased
Cooperation with Local Industry
Page 1
Nico StehrWorlds of Knowledge and Democracy: Is Civil Society
a Daughter of Knowledge?
Page 4
Michael C. Jackson
Reflection on Knowledge Management from a Critical
Systems Perspective
Page 8
Ikujiro Nonaka
The Strategy of a Knowledge-creating Company:
Management by Distributed Phronesis
Page 12

Nov. 10-11, 2006. Prof. Andrzej P. Wierzbicki, Robert
Kneller, Nico Stehr, Michael C. Jackson and Ikujiro
Nonaka (listed in the speech order) were invited topresent on the first day of forum papers on the topic ofknowledge creation and social innovation. This wasfollowed on the second day by discussions of detailed
projects and recent developments of the COE Program.
This issue represents the main content of the lectures on
the forum, which are published here in the speech order,
with one exception. Prof. Wierzbicki gave twopresentations on these two days of the forum. Since thecontent of his first speech－“Knowledge Science andNanatsudaki Model of Knowledge Creation Processes”－was already presented in previous COE Newsletter(Vol.2, No.4), here we publish his presentation from thesecond day.

Andrzej P. Wierzbicki
The Integrated Episteme of Evolutionary Constructive
Objectivism
Page 14
Call for Papers
IJCKS 2007 (KSS2007/KICSS2007)

Page 18

Editorial(by Jing Tian)
As Prof. Wierzbicki said in his speech at JAIST
Forum 2006, “we are living in times of an informational
revolution and this revolution leads to a new civilizationera, in which knowledge plays a more and more
important role than just information. We might say a
new knowledge civilization era is starting”. It is clear
that, in order to keep sustaining competitivecompetencies, new knowledge and technologies appear
to be faster required by individual, organizations, evennations in this new era. Along with knowledge creationand technical innovation, social innovation also takes
place as either known or unknown ways. Social
innovation refers to new strategies, concepts, ideas andorganizations that meet social needs of all kinds andthat extend and strengthen civil society. Thus, in theknowledge civilization era, we have to understand well
how knowledge is created in hard sciences andtechnology, and its relationship and interaction withsocial innovation. For this purpose, we hold a forum on
Knowledge Creation and Social Innovation at JAIST on

Knowledge Creation and Application in a
Local Context: Cooperation with Local
Industry and Creation of New Companies
Robert Kneller
The University of Tokyokneller@ip.rcast.jp

Prof. Nakamori, thank you very much for inviting me tocome to the charming town at this beautiful time of theyear. My talk will focus on knowledge creation and its
application in a local context, for example, Tokyo
regional context. In the first part of this talk, I want togive a micro picture that would show the challenges
facing regional universities in terms of knowledge

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology
creation and transfer. The second part will deal with thesteps needed to be taken to address such challenges
based on the experience of JAIST. I also want to saythat I am not a knowledge expert; my background is
medicine, bio-medical research, and more recently,
technology transfer and startup formation. So, it is more
about bio-science, science policy and business, rather
than knowledge science.
I would like to start by the practical point, i.e.,
what is knowledge creation and exploitation in terms ofcareer opportunities and career incentives as well as thefinancing of R&D. With respect to these factors, there
are two questions I want to discuss: how do peripheral
regions in Japan compare with Japan’s major
metropolitan centers? And how do Japanese venturescompare with ventures in US?
Do you know what “Kakenhi” is? “Kakenhi” canbe translated as grant-in-aid and is the main funding
source by MEXT (Japanese Ministry of Education,
Culture, Sports, Science and Technology) for university
research. Roughly, it accounts for about 40% of all
government aids for university research, so it is a big
part of funding. Table 1 shows the distribution of thisfunding over ten-year period. The University of Tokyo(UT) has a really large share both in 1995 and 2005.
The same you can find for Kyoto University and Osaka
University. You also see the same universities appear
across the ten-year period. The funding is very
exclusive for few universities, and the order has notbeen changed very much, if you compare these 12
universities in 1995 and 2005.And if you look at allthese research resources, it includes COE programs,
national funds and so on.
1995
Rank University

University

U of Tokyo 125.5

13.6

U of Tokyo 201.2

2

Kyoto U

72.7

7.9

Kyoto U

131.1

7.6

3

Osaka U

61.3

6.6

Tohoku U

94.8

5.5

4

Tohoku U

41.6

4.5

Osaka U

89.8

5.2

5

Nagoya U

34.9

3.8

Nagoya U

64.6

3.8

6

Kyushu U

30.0

3.3

Kyushu U

56.8

3.3

3.2

56.1

3.3

45.4

2.7

30.2

1.8

1.4

Hokkaido
U
Tokyo Inst.
Tech
U of
Tsukuba
Riken

26.3

1.5

11

Tokyo Inst. 30.0
Tech
Hokkaido 28.5
U
U of
22.2
Tsukuba
Hiroshima 13.2
U
Okayama U 9.5

1.0

Keio U

24.9

1.5

12

Keio U

9.1

0.9

Kobe U

24.7

1.4

924.0

100

1714.4

100

8
9
10

Total

All source rank and
All Federal % total State/loc
Industry
sources
university name
gov't Federal
gov't
1. Johns Hopkins U.
1,244 1,007
4.47
3
20
incl. APL (private)
4 U. of Washington–
685
566
2.29
12
48
Seattle2 U. of
780
517
2.09
17
36
Michigan all
campuses
8 Stanford U.(private)
603
484
2
4
31
2 U. of California–
849
421
1.7
67
30
Los Angeles
9 U. of Pennsylvania
565
416
1.68
2
27
(private)
6 U. of California–
647
400
1.62
24
29
San Diego
3 U. of Wisconsin–
721
396
1.6
41
16
Madison23 Columbia U.
438
386
1.56
2
5
(private)
24 U. of Colorado, all
437
378
1.53
8
10
campuses
6 U. of California–
671
372
1.5
27
37
San Francisco

Amount %of
total(108yen)

1

7

I do not want to put America forward as a goodalternative model. Nevertheless, I think it is helpful tocompare the situation in USA. I am sorry I do not havedata for two different years. This is the most recent datafrom 2003, showing university ranking by government
funding (Table 2). There is almost equal share between
private universities and national universities. And it isalso a good geography mix between east coast, west
coast, and central section, between private and state
universities.
Now I put all of these contexts (university grantsin-aid, joint research, startup and population) into
Japanese regions. I divided Japan into three regions interms of metro area analysis (see Fig. 1). The first threelargest areas are Kansai, Kanto, and Nagoya areas. In
this case, Kanto area includes Tokyo, Yokohama, andSaitama; Kansai area includes Kobe, Osaka, and Kyoto.
The next four areas are defined by Sapporo, Sendai,
Hiroshima, and Fukuoka. The mauve is population; theblue is “Kakenhi” (grants-in-aid); the yellow is joint
research finding from private companies; and the lightblue is startup companies. You see that the big
concentration (of university grants-in-aid, joint research,
startups) in these three largest areas is also overconcentration in terms of population of these three areas,
and then with the other parts, less, especially less withrespect to the government funding, not so much withrespect to startups.

2005

Amount %of
total(108yen)

3.1
2.4

Winter, 2006

11.7

Table 2. US academic institutions ranked by 2003 Federal
R&D funds ($ million)

Table 1. Monbusho/MEXT Grants-in-aid (all types, new andcontinuing projects)

2

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology

Here I would like to read a comment from thedirector of the university-industry liaison office of amajor Canadian university: “Canada has no large[pharmaceutical] companies, The only alternative tolicensing our university’s [biomedical] discoveries to
US companies is to create our own startups and to help
them grow. This is the only way to keep good jobs andvalue-added development in our region.” If you change
Canada here to any of prefectures, for example,
Ishikawa, the situation is same. In Japan as a whole, therole of high technology startups is more limited than in
the America.
Fig. 3 shows the nano patents issued by USPTO(U.S. Patent and Trademark Office) and JPO (Japan
Patent Office) in the year of 1995 and 2003, and theirdomestic applications. The yellow is the ventures fromuniversities; the mauve is the ventures from small or
new high-technology companies; and the blue is thelarge and old companies. When we look at Japan, we
see that almost all of the ventures come fromuniversities or research-supporting organizations andbig companies. Compared with America, there is small
difference between universities, and big companies, but
small or new companies are clearly underrepresented inJapan.

Figure 1. University Grants-in-aid, Joint Research, Startups andPopulation by Metro-area-defined Regions
70
60
50% Grants in aid ¥% Joint Res ¥% Startups% 2000 Pop.

40
30
20
10
0

3 largestareas

4 next largest

otherregions

Figure 2. University Grants-in-aid, Joint Research, Startups
and Population by Prefecture-defined Regions
70
60
50% Grants in aid \% Joint Res \% Startups% 2006 Pop.

40
30
20
10
0

3 largest regions

4 next largest
regions

Winter, 2006

other regions

Figure 3. Nano patents issued by USPTO and JPO todomestic applicants

I also tried to divide Japan into three regions byprefecture base and got the similar pattern (Fig. 2). The
three largest areas are Kanto, Kansai, and Aichi. Kanto
area consists of Chiba, Saitama, Tokyo, and Kanagawa(Yokohama). Kansai area consists of Shiga, Hyogo(Kobe), Kyoto, and Osaka. Aichi area includes Nagoya.
The next 4 largest regions are defined as all of Miyagi
Ken (Sendai), all of Hiroshima Ken, all of Fukuoka Ken,and also Sapporo. I do not want to include all of
Hokkaido. Again, you still see the similar result with
Fig. 1. To sum up, over 80% of government funding foruniversity R&D, and 70% of entrepreneurial activity
are concentrated in seven population centers that
account for about half Japanese population. Thus, there
is an imbalance, higher than US.
Now I want to talk a little about startup in general,
because I think startups are a part of issue and also apart of solution. I think the startups might be especially
important for regional universities, as a means to
explore university power. This is because:• Few existing local companies can develop
regional university discoveries.
• Even if university discoveries are picked up by
regional companies, such as the big companies inTokyo or Osaka, the controls of those discoveries
always are simply away from the region. There are few
high value added jobs created locally and there are
reduced opportunities for technological development inregion.
• Reflecting on previous slides (Fig. 1 and 2),
entrepreneurial drive may be more evenly distributed
than governmental or corporate R&D support.

100%
80%

univ/GRIs
small/newcolarge & old
co

60%
40%
20%
0%

2003 US(~171)

1995 US 2003 Jpn 1995 Jpn
(~40)
(39)
(0)

What are the challenges facing ventures in Japan? I
think the big challenge is the recruitment of skilled
managers and R&D personnel for Japanese hightechnology ventures. We found the most numerous andsuccessful startups are in biomedicine, but the total
employment in therapeutic-oriented ventures in 2005
was less than half in US bio ventures of equivalent age
in 1987 and 1998. And the average employment percompany in 2005 is about one third that in equivalentage bio ventures in US.
What are the options for strong regional
universities, such us JAIST, to increase knowledge
creation and exploitation? One is to increase coreacademic capabilities, the other two are to increasecooperation with existing companies as well as toincrease and nourish startups. The isolation of regional
universities may paradoxically be an advantage forstartups.

3

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology

Winter, 2006
Program, which currently focuses on new business
opportunities
in
forestryandrelatedindustries/technologies, especially renewable resources.
There is one forestry researcher who works closely with
the VBL.
Except for the above five steps, there are somepossible supplemental steps as follows:• Strengthen
existing
industry-university
cooperation center, IP center, and internship programs• Encourage guest lectures from industry
researchers & craftsmen• Intensify entrepreneurship training for faculty
and students (it could be developed as branches of
BA/MOT programs.)• Work with local leaders too Facilitate equity investments in startups
o Increase cooperation with outside venture
capitalo Maybe establish a pool of investor/managers• Intensify training and recruitment of managers
for startups
o Begin to build this into BA/MOT programso Use links with financial institutions and otherbusinesses
There are just some suggestions for supplemental
work. My impression is that the steps have been alreadytaken here indicate a good progress in trying to ensurethat discoveries made in this university are developed
for the development of society.

What are the practical steps for regional
universities to increase knowledge creation, and inparticular knowledge transportation? I just listed five
steps. These steps are independently conceived by
JAIST faculty. Much of the following reflects the ideas
and actual accomplishments of JAIST as a part of the
JAIST COE project.
A. Outreach to industry
Industry-university cooperation center has been
established in JAIST. Two staff members work as anindustry coordinator from prefectural government and abusinessman. Their work focuses on linking materialscience faculty with the local business. There is at least
one on-going collaboration related to ceramic dyes.
B. Streamlining joint research administration
Intellectual property (IP) office has been
established within the industry-university cooperation
center as JAIST TLO (Technology Licensing Office) or
TTO (Technology Transfer Office). It also manages
personnel & financial aspects of joint/collaborative
research contracts. One staff member works here.
JAIST has already applied for a patent on at least one
invention (ceramics related), which is in the process oflicensing now.
C. Internships in industry for students
With 80 joint research projects (mainly with privatecompanies) at JAIST, I supposed the most professors
who maintain Ph.D. students are in one or two joint
research projects and I believe that most of the Ph.D.
students do work in somebody’s projects, whichbroadens their research perspective. The collaboration
between universities and companies is not only helpful
for companies but also usually very helpful for
education of graduate students. As for the masterstudents, about 10% of them do internships each year.
The length and location of the internships vary; about
half of them may be outside local region. Of course, it isvery helpful, especially for the master students, in job
matching.
D. Business Administration (BA) and MOT
programs
Most students of MOT programs at JAIST are in
40s and from local businesses. They are interested in
R&D management, including management of university
collaborations and management of patents andintellectual property (IP); interested in use of softwareand related business management tools; and interested
in the issue how to deal with globalization. BA andMOT programs could not only educate students andlocal businessmen, but also promote links between local
companies and improve local businesses.
E. Facilitate startup formation and support
JAIST has about 10 startups currently, which puts
JAIST in top one third of national universities. The
government backed regional banks and credit
institutions have been important sources of finance.
This is actually continuing in a long (and probably
successful) historical practice. JAIST also has Venture
Business Laboratory (VBL) established under COE

Worlds of Knowledge and Democracy
Is Civil Society a Daughter of Knowledge?
Nico Stehr
Zeppelin University, Germany
nico.stehr@t-online.de

Introduction
There are of course a large number of more or less rival
hypotheses that refer to the reasons for the emergenceand persistence of democratic regimes and the strength4

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology

Winter, 2006
measurement in major social institutions. The
observations by Foucault are based on a view ofknowledge that assigns much power to knowledge or to
the agencies in which it is embedded. Foucault
underestimates the malleability of knowledge, theextent to which knowledge is contested and capacity of
individuals and civil society organizations to deploy
knowledge in order to resist, oppose and restrain majorsocial institutions in society.
There are various societal restraints that affect thewide dissemination of knowledge in society andtherefore hinder the effective role of knowledge fordemocracy. I will refer to three barriers under theheading of the following questions: (1) it is possible toreconcile democracy and expertise, (2) it is possible toreconcile democracy and knowledge as property and (3)it is possible to reconcile democracy and the knowledge
divide?

of civil societies within such social systems; forexample, Francis Fukuyama explicates his thesis about
the end of competing ideologies in the last century by
stressing, “there are fundamental economic and politicalimperatives pushing history in one direction, towards
greater democracy.” But other scholars argue that
democracies can take a hold in countries that are poorand that democracy therefore does not follow economic
development. But as claims for the war in Iraq haveshown, democracy is also expected to follow from thebarrel of guns.
In contrast to these modern claims, John StuartMill, in The Spirit of the Age (1831), published after his
return to England from France, affirms his convictionthat the intellectual accomplishments of his own age
make social progress inevitable. But progress in the
improvement of social conditions is not, Mill argues,
the outcome of an “increase in wisdom” or of thecollective accomplishments of science. It is rather
linked to a general diffusion of knowledge.
Mill’s observations in the mid-nineteenth century,a period he regarded as an age of moral and politicaltransition, and in particular his expectation that
increased individual choice (and hence emancipationfrom “custom”) will result from a broad diffusion ofknowledge and education, strongly resonates with thenotion of present-day society -- the social structure thatis emerging as industrial society gives way -- as aknowledge society.
John Stuart Mill was a great admirer of the classic
study of American Society by Alexis de Tocqueville; asa matter of fact, Mill wrote a review of Democracy inAmerica (1835-40) that was published almost at thesame time as his The Spirit of the Age.
But there are decisive differences between Mill andde Tocqueville in their judgment of democracy,
especially of the role of knowledge of its citizens forand in democratic regimes.
De Tocqueville closes his observations about
American society by observing that the educational
attainment of its citizens is an influential force in themaintaining democracy in America. While Mills has
considerable confidence in the independent capacity ofenlightenment, education and knowledge andintellectual skills as the necessary condition for thestrength of democratic regimes, for De Tocquevilleknowledge is the sufficient condition for democracy.
From Mills assumption it follows that intellectuals
and scientists play a significant political role indemocracies; in the case of De Tocqueville, it is theordinary citizen and his or her immediate politicalpractice that strengthens democratic political systems.
Without taking side abut the specifics of the dispute
between de Tocqueville and Mill, I generally concurwith their general observation about the importancesocial role of knowledge for democracy.
I therefore reject the microphysics of power as
elaborated by Foucault. As is well known, in his
genealogical work, Foucault describes the one-sided
shaping of the individual by scientific disciplines suchas penology, psychoanalysis etc. and the enormous,
micromanaged
powerof
regimentation
andReconciling democracy and expertise
Many observers are convinced that the gap between
expertise, that is, powerful agencies that harbor expert
knowledge and the knowledge of laypersons in modern
societies have dramatically and irreversible widened.
On the other hand, it is evident that the social deference,
the unquestioned respect and the taken-for-granted
authority based on knowledge of the major professions(teachers, doctors, lawyers) at least in modern Western
society has declined since at least the 1960s.
Nonetheless, there is still widespread support for the“scientist” perspective of nature of knowledge claims,
namely that knowledge is universal and universally
useful. The acceptance of a scientist conception
probably enhances the power of those who are seen as
representing authoritative scientific knowledge.
Yet, the rising tempo with which knowledge isadded has the opposite effect, instead of enhancing theuniversality of knowledge, a massive cleavage between
those who directly participate in the process ofknowledge production and those who are not part of thesame process can be noted. The same observers
therefore argue for the presence of a deficit model
among different publics and stress the serious
consequences the asymmetry between expert
knowledge and the public has for the nature of civilsociety.
I will describe the deficit model in somewhat
greater detail: The ease with which one delegates, ofcourse aside from one’s own specialty, judgment to theexpert is seen to have hardened in all social institutions
in modern society, not only in science. At the sametime, it is widely assumed, for example, in the field of
the “public understanding of science” that scientificilliteracy decreases the public’s democratic capacities.
As a result, the “loss of contact” between scienceand the public emerges as one of the salient attribute of
the interrelation between specialized knowledge andsociety. Large segments of the public have become
disenfranchisedanddisabledfromeffective
involvement in democratic processes that increasingly
require a certain level of scientific literacy. This loss of5

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology

Winter, 2006
as an issue remains a contested matter, especially apublicly contentious matter, the power and influence ofexperts and counter-experts is limited; once a decision
has been made and a question settled, the authority ofexperts becomes almost uncontested as well. The workrequired to transform a contested matter into an
uncontested issue is linked to the ability of experts tomobilize social and cultural resources in relevant
contexts.
From the point of view of the scientific community,
the lack of cognitive proximity to the general public has
advantages and disadvantages. The loss of contact
between science and the public can perhaps explain, atleast in part, why the scientific community, in view of
its attractiveness and usefulness for corporations, themilitary and the state, has been able to preserve a
considerable degree of intellectual autonomy. Suchautonomy, however, is contingent on a host of factors
within and without the scientific community. The loss ofcontact is a resource for the scientific community. It
signals a symbolic detachment and independence thatcan be translated into an asset vis-à-vis the state andother societal agencies. Science becomes anauthoritative voice in policy matters; or it represents, inideological and material struggles with other politicalsystems, the openness of society. But the cognitive
distance also limits the immediate effectiveness of the“voice of science” in civil society organizations as wellas in policy matters, and extensive autonomy andindependence of science may result in an excessive
celebration of “normal” scientific activity and lead to alack of innovativeness.

contact is not only the result of a growing cognitive
distance between science and everyday knowledge; it isalso affected by the ever increasing speed of knowledge
expansion based on a growing division of labor inscience and by the deployment of knowledge as a
productive capacity. The decreasing cognitive proximity
increases the political distance from science, forexample by restricting public reflection on both
anticipated and unanticipated transformations of socialand cultural realities resulting from the application of
new knowledge. The scientific community shares
responsibility for this diminishing intellectual proximity,
since the preferred self-image of science as a consensual,even monolithic and monologic, enterprise isincreasingly in conflict with both its public role and its
own internal struggles about research priorities, as wellas the generation of data and their interpretation.
However, on political and moral grounds manygroups, constituencies and institutions must be
consulted before decisions are made about issues that
affect the regulation of knowledge and indirectly thedevelopment of science and technology. It would be
misleading to think that the distance from and the lossof contact with science, or the considerable scientificilliteracy in modern societies, is somehow a ‘potentiallyfatal flaw in the self-conception of the people today’ (asGerald Holton suggests) and/or signals the possibility ofa dramatic collapse in public support for science.
It is more accurate to speak of a state of precarious
balance affecting the autonomy and dependence of
science in modern society. A loss of close intellectual
contact between science and the public is perfectlycompatible with both a diffuse support for science inmodern society and an assent to legal and politicalefforts to control the impact of science and technology.
In another sense, however, the loss of cognitive contact
is almost irrelevant, and highly controversial; forexample, when ‘contact’ is meant to refer to closecognitive proximity as a prerequisite of public
participation in decisions affecting scientific andtechnological knowledge. Such a claim is practicallymeaningless because it almost requires public
engagement in science-in-progress.
In arriving at judgment about expertise and civilsociety, one needs to take specific contexts into account.
The conditions under which different publics may makesense of specialized knowledge vary considerably.
Rather than treating the relations between expertise andthe public as a series of relations that involve individual,
isolated actors, we need to think of the interaction
between expertise and the public as mediated bycultural identities and the resourcefulness of civilsociety organizations reconstructing science andtechnology in distinct ways.
Moreover, without some element of trust exhibitedby ordinary members towards experts, expertise would
vanish. Nonetheless, experts today are constantly
involved in a remarkable number of controversies. The
growing policy field of setting limits to the presence of
certain ingredients in foodstuffs, of safety regulations,risk management and the control of hazards has had theside effect of ruining the reputation of experts. As long

Reconciling democracy and knowledge as property
In testimony before the U.S. Congress more than acentury ago, John Powell, a pioneer in the field of theearth sciences, put his finger on one of the mostintriguing features of knowledge, namely “thepossession of property is exclusive; possession ofknowledge is not exclusive”. In spite of Powell’s thesis,
some forms of knowledge are exclusive and become
private goods as the result of legal restraints such as
patents or copyright restriction attached to knowledge.
Whether knowledge is treated as a public or private
good has many noteworthy consequences; for example,
it is most likely incremental or new knowledge that is
protected. In the context of economic systems but also
science, this raises a serious dilemma: The basis of thegrowth of knowledge is knowledge. If knowledge is
protected the growth of knowledge is hampered. But if
knowledge is not protected, economist will argue, theincentive to invest in new knowledge disappears;
monopoly rights are essential for the growth ofknowledge and inventions.
In contrast to incremental knowledge, the generalmundane and routinized stock of knowledge consists
mostly of knowledge that is non-rival as well as nonexcludable, that is, these forms of knowledge may very
well constitute public goods.
Scientific knowledge constitutes one of the mostimportant conditions for the possibility of6

JAIST-COE News
Strategic Development of Science and Technology

Winter, 2006
The lengthy New York court cases were mainly
about state responsibilities toward the collectivity ofchildren, it does not address its responsibility toward
individual pupils, especially in as much as such
responsibilities may arise from what I would call the“knowledge divide.” Thus, in stark contrast to the rulingof the New York Appeal Court, courts in other US
jurisdictions have tackled the “knowledge divide”. The
New Jersey Supreme Court for example takes the viewthat state schools should be responsible for remedying
educational deficits that might have their roots in larger
problems, such as social inequality, ethnic or family
backgrounds.
Public policies that follow from these different
approaches are significant. In the latter case,redistribution of property-tax is in order and affirmative
actions programs are justified while in the case of theformer approach enormous inequalities in outcome ofschooling standards are acceptable.

modernization in the sense of a persistent extension andenlargement of social and economic action that scienceand not any social system in modern society generates.
I do not want to discuss the contentious issue of
trade-offs that may exist between assigning proprietary
rights to knowledge and the gains in the overall welfare
of society or the trade-offs between treating knowledge
as a public good and the loss of welfare for those thatcannot reap the benefits from their inventions anddiscoveries.
Economists, legal scholars and major internationalorganizations such as the World Bank make the casethat knowledge must be a (global) public asset. From an
economic viewpoint this means that knowledge shouldlack the characteristics, otherwise typical for economic
assets, namely rivalry and excludability. That someforms of knowledge are public goods is least likely thecase for additional, that is, new knowledge. And it isadditional knowledge that turns a profit.
Thus, the age-old dilemma whether property
generates power and thereby fashions human relations
or whether it is the other way around continues to beplayed out even in knowledge societies.

Concluding remarks
My presentation concentrated on questions concernedwith how to gain knowledge in modern society and lesson what to do with it. That is the topic of another lecture.
The basic claim for the moment however is that
democratization in modern societies as knowledge
societies increasingly extend to the democratization andnegotiation of knowledge claims.
I assume that scientific knowledge is much more
malleable and accessible than is suggested in theclassical perspective of the relations between scienceand society. The new sociology of scientific knowledge
has familiarized us with the perspective that the
production of scientific knowledge is in many ways
very similar to other social practices. The boundaries
between expertise and everyday knowledge are muchless fixed and robust than is often surmised, especiallyin observations that lament about a growing distance
between expert knowledge and the public’s knowledge.
Knowledge ability has social externationalities throughthe production a more participatory democracy or
citizenship from which civil society organizations
benefit most.
This produces particular challenges, for example,
in terms of access to knowledge but also in the form of
new modes of participation. And here civil society
organizations will be challenged.

Reconciling democracy and the knowledge divide?
For almost a decade, the State of New York and the Cityof New York are embroiled in a legal battle overwhether the state is paying its fair share toward New
York City’s public school system. The contested issue isless about money although in the end it also is aboutmoney, it is about the minimal obligation governments
have to educate its children. The dispute revolves
around the intriguing question what exactly is meant by
the constitutional promise of a “sound, basic education”
for the children in the state.
The very first sentence in the June 2003 decisionof the appeals court affirms, “we begin (our ruling) witha unanimous recognition of the importance of educationin our democracy. The fundamental value of education
is embedded in the Education Article of the New YorkState constitution by this simple sentence: ‘The
legislature shall provide for the maintenance andsupport of a system of free common schools, wherein
all the children of this state may be educated.”
The plaintiffs of course contend that the State fails
to afford New York City’s public schoolchildren the
educational opportunity guaranteed by the constitution.
But what exactly is the constitutional human right toeducation, what is a sound basic education? Stateschools, a previous court ruling suggested, are“obligated by the state Constitution to do nothing morethan prepare students for low-level-jobs, for serving ona jury and for reading campaign literature, that is theequivalent of an eighth- or ninth-grade education. And
in this respect, New York City, however troubled its
schools, met that standard, however limited thatstandard. The court decision did not please the plaintiffs
and they appealed. A subsequent 2003 decision of the
Court of Appeals held that as one judge put it, “a highschool education is now all but indispensable.”(A complete list of references is available electronicallyon request via the COE Center’s email addresses.)

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creators, owners or controllers, and neither its parts nor
itself are purposeful. Animated models pictureorganisations as being like organisms. The organisation
itself is seen as being purposeful (like a human being)but, again, the parts (equivalent to the heart, liver, lungs,etc.) are not. Socialsystemic models represent
organisations as being purposeful at three levels. They
are themselves purposeful systems and have their own
goals, objectives and ideals that should be taken into
account. However, they also contain, as parts, otherpurposeful systems, individuals, whose aspirations need
to be met. And they exist, themselves, as parts of wider
purposeful systems whose interests also should beserved. Ackoff and Gharajedaghi have no doubt that, inmodern society, it is harmful to treat organisations as if
they were machines or organisms, and only socialsystemic models are legitimate and beneficial: Oursociety and the principal private and publicorganizations that it contains have reached a level ofmaturity that eliminates whatever effectiveness applying
deterministic and animalistic models to social systems
may once have had.

Reflections on Knowledge Managementfrom a Critical Systems Perspective
Mike C. Jackson
Hull University Business School
m.c.jackson@hull.ac.uk

1. Theoretical Reflections

KM and the machine model
According to Nonaka (1991) and Takeuchi (1998),
Western management thinking is dominated by themodel of the organisation as a machine for information
processing, a model originally derived from Taylor andSimon. Individuals require information from theenvironment to be broken down into pieces relevant to
the tasks they are performing as parts of the machine.
Nobody needs to know what anyone else is doing
because these tasks are carefully co-ordinated by themachine to ensure that the organisation as a wholeachieves the purposes of its designers.
The dominance of the machine model leads KM
theory and practice in the West, Nonaka and Takeuchi
argue, to concentrate almost exclusively on ‘explicit
knowledge’, on measuring and managing existingknowledge, and to seeing KM initiatives as the preserveof a select few (Takeuchi, 1998). Explicit knowledge as
defined by Nonaka & Takeuchi (1995), following
Polanyi, is codified knowledge that is transmittable informal, systematic language. It is seen as ‘hard’,‘objective’ and ‘static’ knowledge that can be expressedin words or numbers and shared with others in, forexample, the form of manuals, data or scientificformulas. It can be processed by computer and so easilytransmitted to appropriate individuals in a mechanicaland systematic manner. In the West, therefore, it is theinformation technology aspects of KM that areemphasised – matters such as knowledge capture,storage, retrieval and distribution. The limitations of
KM in the West derive from the machine model oforganisation that it implicitly embraces.

Critical Systems Perspective (CST) employs a variety
of devices to unearth the theoretical assumptions
underlying different systems approaches. For example,
Jackson (1991, 2000) uses Habermas’ work on
knowledge constitutive interests, Burrell and Morgan’sclassification of sociological paradigms, Morgan’s
enumeration of various metaphors or models oforganisation, Jackson and Keys’ ‘system of systems
methodologies’ and the distinction between modernism
and postmodernism. Lehaney et al. (2004), following a
critical systems agenda, have already sought to apply
the schemas provided by Habermas and Burrell andMorgan to understand KM from a theoreticalperspective. For the purposes of this paper, I will try tounderstand KM better in terms of the ‘models oforganisation’ on which it is based. The reason for thischoice is that both Nonaka (1991) and Takeuchi (1998)
frequently relate different forms of KM to different
organisational models, and so we have a good starting
point for our analysis.
We begin these theoretical reflections, therefore,by considering three common models of organisation,
as defined by Ackoff & Gharajedaghi (1996). The KM
literature is then related to each of the three models in
turn, and particular strengths and weaknesses in KM are
identified as being due to adherence to different models.
The section concludes with an argument, based on CST,
that KM should embrace an even wider range of modelsof organisation than the three specified by Ackoff andGharajedaghi, and should adopt a pluralist stance.
Three models of organisation
Ackoff & Gharajedaghi (1996) recognise three basic
kinds of model that are commonly applied toorganizations – ‘deterministic’, ‘animated’ and ‘social’.
To view an organisation using a deterministic model isto see it as like a machine. It is set up to pursue
purposes which are external to itself, those of its

KM and the organismic model
By way of contrast, Nonaka (1991) and Takeuchi (1998)
argue, Japanese managers are more at home with aholistic approach, which pictures the organisation not asa machine but as a living organism: Much like anindividual, it can have a collective sense of identity andfundamental purpose (Nonaka, 1991).

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dialectical process. In industrial society managers,
influenced by Taylor’s ‘scientific management’ theory,sought to eliminate contradictions. In today’s
knowledge society, however, paradox is something toembrace and cultivate because it is the fount fromwhich new knowledge is derived. This is true at thelevels of the individual and group, and organisation andenvironment.
According to Nonaka & Takeuchi (1995),
knowledge begins with the individual and is subjective,
deeply rooted in individual beliefs and value systems. It
is developed actively, in a specific context, throughsocial interaction in groups. In their relations withothers, individuals came across alternative viewpoints,
stemming from the diverse backgrounds andexperiences of those involved. Dialectical debate canensue in which individuals confront their own mostcherished assumptions and a synthesis of different
perspectives emerges. This synthesis represents a fusionof mental models, which goes beyond what is currently
known. New social knowledge is created which canspread throughout the organisation. In describing theseprocesses, Nonaka & Toyama (2004) refer to thephenomenological method of ‘letting the reality
emerge’, and Nonaka & Takeuchi (1995) draw on thework of the phenomenological sociologists Berger andLuckman, and the hermeneutic philosopher Gadamer.
The worlds of phenomenology and hermeneutics aremuch more closely related to Ackoff andGharajedaghi’s social-systemic model than they are to
any organismic model.
At the organisational level, too, firms must manage
the rich interplay between thesis and antithesis, whether
enacted internally or with their environments, if they areto survive and succeed. Summarising their account ofknowledge creation as a synthesising process, Nonaka& Toyama (2004) conceptualise it as a dialectic process,in which various contradictions are synthesized throughdynamic interactions among individuals, theorganization, and the environment.
There is little that is biological about this. Rather, itfits perfectly with Ackoff and Gharajedaghi’s preference
for the social-systemic model that sees organisations asnecessarily having to overcome conflicts between
purposes at three levels.
It seems, therefore, that having recognised some of
the limitations of the organismic model, Nonaka,
Takeuchi and their followers are willing to explore
alternatives. In all but name, the formulations they
employ in their knowledge creation theory fit more
comfortably with Ackoff and Gharajedaghi’s socialsystemic model. This is good news, but it would no
doubt assist further progress if such a change inorientation was more clearly signaled and explained bythem.

Attention is devoted to developing a sharedunderstanding of the nature of a company, what it wants
to achieve in the world and how it is going to achieve it.
In order to deal with the complexity of theirenvironments, organisations conceived as organisms
should reject hierarchy and adopt flat and flexible
structures.
Because of the dominance of the model of theorganisation as an organism in their culture, Japanese
KM specialists emphasise ‘tacit knowledge’ and the
involvement of all in the creation of new knowledge(Takeuchi, 1998). It is seen as ‘soft’, ‘subjective’ and‘context-specific’. There are two kinds of tacitknowledge. One derives from bodily experience andencompasses the sort of know-how or skills passed
down by a master craftsperson to an apprentice. The
second, ‘cognitive’ dimension, consists of the ‘beliefs,
perceptions, ideals, values, emotions and mental
models’ (Takeuchi & Nonaka, 2004b) that we find hardto describe but which shape the way we perceive andact in the world.
In Japan, therefore, it is the ‘people’ aspects of KM
that are emphasised. Knowledge is highly personal,
derives from beliefs and commitments, and is forgeddynamically in purposeful endeavour. Organisations
should encourage the kinds of actions and interactions,particularly involving relations between tacit andexplicit knowledge, which give rise to a ‘knowledge
creation spiral’. They should be structured not as
information － processing machines but as organic
configurations of ba – spaces where people interact witheach other at a specific time and space and createknowledge (Nonaka & Toyama, 2002).
So how much more useful is this organismic model
than the machine model? Takeuchi & Nonaka (2004b)
are, in fact, well aware of the dangers of overemphasising the organismic model and the reliance ontacit knowledge that it promotes. The dinosaur is citedas an example of a living organism that, because ofover-adaptation to past success, could not adjust tochanges in its environment. They fear that cultural traits
that have benefited Japanese companies in the past
might give rise to a ‘group think’ mentality, which isinappropriate in today’s diverse global economy. Nor
can Japanese companies afford to fall behind in the race
to develop and exploit advanced information technology,
which can enhance the combination, storage anddistribution of explicit knowledge. In their view,
successful companies in the future need to synthesise
the best of the Western and Japanese approaches toknowledge creation and management.
KM and the social-systemic model
In fact, most of Nonaka and Takeuchi’s formulations
regarding the future shape of organisational knowledge
creation fit more closely with Ackoff andGharajedaghi’s social-systemic model than they do theorganismic model. The importance of recognising andresponding to diverse purposes at the individual,organisational and environmental levels is fullyrecognised. Asking the question, ‘What is a firm, andhow does it function?’, Nonaka & Toyama (2002) argue
that, in a knowledge-creating company, knowledge isdynamically created out of contradictions in a

2. Methodological Reflections
Drucker (1999) has argued that the most important
contribution management can make in the 21st century
is to increase the productivity of knowledge work andknowledge workers. There have been attempts in the9JAIST-COE News
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use it, without thinking, in their day-to-day activities.
Thus, if the SECI process is operationalised successfully,
knowledge ‘spirals’ up from the individual, to the group,to the organisation and back down again. An iterative
cycle should always start over at a higher level and isnever ending.

literature to elucidate approaches to achieve this, forexample, brainstorming and the use of metaphor andanalogy (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995), employing
sketching designs, visual analogies and diversity
enhancement techniques (Leonard & Sensiper, 1998),
and providing computerised support for groupargumentation (Tang & Liu, 2004). Most commentators,
however (e.g. Cole, 1998; Leonard & Sensiper, 1998),
still regard KM as being in its infancy here – a long way
from developing explicit methodologies and methods
that can consistently deliver knowledge creation. In thissection, we argue that CST, because of its historicalemphasis on the importance of methodology, can help
enrich KM in this respect. To illustrate the point, we
take four of the more practically orientatedrecommendations proposed by KM – namely, theknowledge-creating spiral (SECI), knowledge-enabling
characteristics, ba and dialectics – and demonstrate howvarious systems methodologies and methods can help
realise them in practice. In making this case, I draw
upon earlier suggestions in the work of Gao et al.(2002a,b).

Enabling conditions for knowledge creation
Nonaka & Takeuchi (1995) and Ichijo (2004) recognise
a number of difficult individual and organisational
barriers that need to be overcome if the SECI process isto proceed. In order to overcome these barriers,
managers should ensure that various enabling
conditions for knowledge creation are put in place. It isremarkable just how many of these conditions can berealised and supported using existing systems
methodologies and methods. Let us take, as examples,‘instilling a knowledge vision’ (or ‘intention’), ‘creating
the right context’ (or‘autonomy’) and ‘fluctuation andcreative chaos’.
According to Nonaka (1991), and Nonaka &Toyama (2002), the desire to create the world according
to a particular ideal is at the heart of innovation. A
knowledge-creating company, therefore, must be about
ideals as well as ideas and should develop andcommunicate a knowledge vision based upon its
conception of an ideal state of being. This vision should
be widely endorsed by members of the organisation. It
will clearly be valueladen and so can provide guidanceon what knowledge is useful and true, and a clear
direction for individual and group action. Of course, it
should not be so inflexible that it prevents change invalues or makes the organization unresponsive to it
environment. Ackoff’s (1981, 1999) ‘ interactiveplanning’ approach, based upon his socialsystemic
model, has as its core component the notion of‘ idealised design’. An organisation that wants todevelop and be innovative should prepare an idealised
design that captures the vision of its diverse
stakeholders. This vision, of a desirable future, focuses
the attention of stakeholders away from petty
differences onto the ends they would all like to see theirorganisation pursue. It unleashes creativity as people
seek to invent ways of bringing about the desirable
future. The idealised design is ‘ideal seeking’, not a
utopia, and can, therefore, adjust as values shift or theenvironment changes.
Both Ichijo (2004) and Nonaka & Takeuchi (1995)
insist that creating the right structural context is crucial
to the success of the SECI process. Knowledge
appropriate to the modern world will not be produced inorganizations designed like machines, with rigid
hierarchies. Flat and flexible structures are necessary,with a diversity capable of matching the variety of theircomplex environments (‘requisite variety’). Suchstructures must allow for ‘redundancy’ of informationand facilitate appropriate conversations amongorganisational members. To ensure that the organisation
generates sufficient variety, individuals must be allowed
as much autonomy as circumstances permit. They

The knowledge-creating spiral (SECI)
Takeuchi & Nonaka (2004a) define KM as the processof continuously creating new knowledge, disseminating
it widely through the organization, and embodying it
quickly in new products/services, technologies, andsystems. This process is operationalised by facilitating
four types of interaction between ‘tacit’ and ‘explicit’knowledge (defined in the previous section). These
interactions involve conversions from tacit knowledge
to tacit knowledge (‘socialisation’), tacit to explicit
knowledge (‘externalisation’), explicit to explicit
knowledge (‘combination’) and explicit to tacitknowledge (‘internalisation’). Taking the first letter ofthe name given to each type of conversion gives rise to
the SECI mnemonic (Takeuchi & Nonaka, 2004b).
In ‘socialisation’ individuals share their tacitknowledge through direct experience. If the process is
successful, their technical skills and/or mental models
become aligned. ‘Externalisation’ is perhaps the mostimportant but least understood form of knowledge
conversion. It requires an individual to articulate theirtacit knowledge through reflection and dialogue in amanner that makes it comprehensible to a group. Thismeans turning difficult to articulate, subjective beliefs,
values and emotions into explicit concepts. Nonaka &Takeuchi (1995) argue that taking individual
perceptions and elaborating them progressively, throughthe stages of metaphor, analogy and model, can be ofhelp. Once explicit concepts are created, which can bebrought together in logical models, a group can makeuse of them to compare and contrast different
viewpoints. In ‘combination’, different bodies of
explicit knowledge, held by groups, are systematised,perhaps on computer databases, so that they areavailable for use by the whole organisation.
‘Internalisation’ sees individuals making the explicit
knowledge of the organisation their own; they learn andacquire the organisation’s explicit knowledge so that it
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particular democratic structure. The process of teamsyntegrity, developed by Beer, integrates, throughdemocratic dialogue, the ideas and experiences ofparticipants, promotes effective synergy and translates
the outcomes into social knowledge. It is a perfectmechanism for generating a good ba.

should be grouped in self-organising teams as part of aholographic structure.
Finally, we consider Nonaka & Takeuchi’s (1995)
enabling condition of ‘fluctuation and creative chaos’.
Fluctuation may be introduced into an organization
naturally, through change in the environment, orinternally as an attempt to bring about ‘creative chaos’.
If handled appropriately such fluctuation can be positive
because it threatens existing habits and mental models,
and leads to a redefining of problematic issues andpossibly of the organisation’s relationships with its
environment. Nonaka and Takeuchi consciously use thelanguage of chaos theory and cite complexity theorists(e.g. Gleick), but they may not be aware just how muchprogress has been made, in the systems and complexity
tradition, in terms of specifying the nature of the highcreativity, ‘edge of chaos’ state; determining the‘control parameters’ necessary to achieve that state; andconceptualizing how changes in ‘attractor patterns’ canbe brought about (see Stacey, 1996, 2003). Again theopportunity for a rich dialogue between KM and CST
emerges, with CST taking the lead on matters of
methodology and method.

Dialectics
In the KM theory of Nonaka, Takeuchi and theircollaborators, the notion of dialectics is crucial.
Dialectics involves opposing a particular ‘thesis’ with
its opposite or negation, called the ‘antithesis’, and in
the process demonstrating that both thesis and antithesis
are limited or inconsistent. It then becomes possible topostulate a ‘synthesis’, which incorporates the thesis
and antithesis but goes beyond, or transcends, them aswell. This becomes a thesis to be challenged by another
antithesis in a never-ending process.
Dialectic dialogue is essential in successful ba
because it allows participants to see things andthemselves from viewpoints that are rooted deep in theirown beliefs and values, and from others’ viewpoints atthe same time (Nonaka & Toyama, 2004).
As we saw earlier in this section, the knowledgecreating, SECI-spiral, also depends upon the dialectic
relationship between tacit and explicit knowledge. Thisis just one of the pairs of opposites that have to bereconciled and synthesised if new knowledge is to becreated: others are body/mind, individual/ organisation,
top-down/bottom-up,
hierarchy/task
force
and
East/West (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). We additionally
met the even more all-embracing idea of the firm as adialectic being, synthesising the manifold paradoxes
and contradictions that arise in the knowledge age – forexample, between short- and long-term, global and local,
efficiency and creativity, flexibility and control,
continuous improvement and disruptive innovation,
operational effectiveness and strategic positioning, etc.
(Nonaka & Toyama, 2002; Takeuchi & Nonaka, 2004b).
In all these cases, and at all these levels, dialectics
offers a way of creating knowledge in pursuit of truth:
The absolute truth may never be found. It may neverexist. However, dialectic tries to approach the elusive‘absolute truth’ through the process of examining anddenying the series of ‘relative truth’. It is this processthat is important, rather than whether one can reach theabsolute truth or not (Nonaka & Toyama, 2004).
According to Churchman (1968), the philosopher
par excellence of systems thinking: The systems
approach begins when first you see the world throughthe eyes of another. This aphorism, which makes
subjectivity central to systems thinking, could equally
stand, surely, as a motto for Nonaka and Takeuchi’s
version of KM.
The case that CST can supply KM with useful
methodologies and methods, to help implement its
insights, has surely been made. CST harnesses practices
and procedures from across the spectrum of systems
approaches and seeks to employ them appropriately toassist application (see Jackson, 2000, 2003, 2005). Onlysome of the main links between system methodologies
and methods and KM have been highlighted here –Ba
The concept of Ba, which roughly translates as “space”,
is defined by Nonaka & Toyama (2002). Ba is a sharedcontext where meaning creation and knowledge
conversion take place. It can embrace a physical space,like a meeting room, but must be conceived much more
broadly to include the interactions that take place inworking groups, project teams, informal meetings, email groups, with customers, etc. The key is thatinteractions are occurring at a specific time and place,and that knowledge emerges in the form of ‘a stream of
meaning’.
Many of the things that are necessary for good baecho the enabling characteristics for knowledge creationthat we have already discussed. It follows that thesystems methodologies and methods adduced as means
for facilitating knowledge creation can also be used toprovide energy and quality to interactions in a ba. For
example, Ackoff’s interactive planning can provide
intention and mission; SSM can facilitate multiviewpoint dialogue; the viable system model
demonstrates how enterprises can be configured asorganically connected ba, with various ba structured in
fractal relationships. Here, we simply want to draw
attention to another remarkable correspondence
between the idea of a ba as a ‘moving sphere’ andBeer’s (1994) approach to democratic dialogue, known
as ‘team syntegrity’.
In searching for rules that would promote
democratic dialogue, Beer made use of an analogy to
Buckminster Fuller’s geodesic dome, based upon the
icosahedron. He recognised that no structure could beless hierarchical than a regular polyhedron, of which heregarded the icosahedron as the most interesting type.
Using this analogy, he thought, democratic dialogue andthe robustness and effectiveness of debate could beguaranteed by organising discussion according to this11

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know how one could actually build such a car. To create
values, techne is not sufficient since a firm has to knowwhat a good car is in order to offer value to customers.
Episteme can’t answer the question either, because there
is not only one right answer or general rule that
determines that is good. It depends on the context, or
who is perceiving that goodness, and the answer
continuously changes. In short, phronesis is thepractical wisdom that enables one to find a “rightanswer” in a particular context, and to realize thatanswer through action.
In leadership, phronesis is manifested in thecapacity to choose the appropriate goals and tosuccessfully devise means to reach them (Halverson,2004). Phronetic leaders use their sense of the details to“see” or “feel” the problems of their organizations assolvable within local constraints, and they are able todevelop successful plans to address identified problems.
In decision-making, phronetic leaders must be able tosynthesize contextual knowledge accumulated throughexperience, with universal knowledge gained thoughtraining.
Halverson, working in educational theory, statesthat leaders in organizations with collective phronesis
create organizational structures that help them to shape
the problems they are able to identify and the solutions
they offer (Halverson, 2004). As a consequence, theorganization develops shared practices through which it
can detect and process various problems and solve them.
The seemingly effortless integration of political andpersonal phronesis in expert practice is a characteristicof virtuoso performance (Hubert and Stuart Dreyfus,
1986).

much more work needs to be done to bring all thepossible, fruitful interconnections to the fore.
(This article is conposed by selected sections from thepaper with the same title of Prof. Jackson which has
been published on Knowledge Management Research &Practice, 2005, No. 3, pp. 187-196. For the details,
please read the full paper.)The Strategy of a Knowledge-creating
Company: Management by Distributed
Phronesis
Ikujiro Nonaka1,2, Ryoko Toyama3
1
Hitotsubashi University;
2
Xerox Distinguished Faculty Scholar, UC, Berkeley
3
Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology,
School of Knowledge Sciencertoyama@jaist.ac.jp

Abilities to Constitute Phronesis
What constitutes phronesis, and how can anorganization foster it? We have observed at the relevant
companies that phronesis is composed of the following
six abilities.
1. Ability to make a judgment on goodness
This is an ability to exercise moral judgment on apractical level concerning what is “good” in a particularsituation. Every sort of expert knowledge and every
inquiry, and similarly every action and undertaking,seems to seek some good. Because of that, people areright to affirm that the good is “that which all thingsseek”. Judgment of goodness is based on an individual’svalues. If a person does not have their own values orphilosophy, they cannot make decisions on what is good,and hence, cannot make a “good” car.
As Honda founder Souichiro Honda insists,
philosophy is absolutely essential to developing
technologies and utilizing them. He once wrote,“Philosophy is more important than technologies.
Things like money and technologies are merely a means
to serve people…There is no meaning in a technology if,
at the base of it, it does not consider
people…Philosophy is what drives a firm’s growth…A
true technology is a crystal of philosophy.”

Strategy-as-phronesis
Phronesis is inherent in the SECI process. It is
knowledge guided by an ideal and an understanding of
how that idea might be put into practice. Phronesis has
been translated roughly as, prudence, ethics, practical
wisdom, or practical rationality. It is the virtuous habitof making decisions and taking action that serves thecommon good. It is the practical knowledge used tomake the best decisions and take the best action in any
particular context, based on values and ethics.
Phornesis takes into account contextual circumstances,addresses particulars, and shifts arms in process thennecessary (Eisner, 2002). It serves to integrate thepractical knowledge of making things, which is techne,with theoretical knowledge or episteme, which arms toachieve objectivity and universality true beyond any
particular context. If techne is to know how to make a
car well, phronesis is to know what a good car is and to

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one needs an ability to “read” a situation and adapt to it,
impromptu.
The ability to share emotion is not just an ability tounderstand others’ emotions. It is also an ability tocommunicate your own emotions in a way that others
are able to understand. To do this, one has to cultivatesocial capital, through love, care, trust and commitment.

The values or philosophy that is the basis for
judging “goodness” has to be one’s own. It cannot begiven by others. At Honda, the most important questionthat everyone must consider is: What do YOU think?
Honda recognizes that the company’s value is a productof the values or philosophy of each individual in thecompany. Honda’s management principle - Respect for
the individual – acknowledges that every human being
is different and these differences are an importantsource of the values Honda creates. However, what isrequired is the phronetic ability to make “goodness” forthe common good. If that goodness is only good for one
individual, it cannot be a common good. Phronesis
relies on a higher viewpoint that enables one to see what
is good for the whole, even though that judgment ofgoodness stems from one individual’s values.
It is this kind of value of the common good thatgives a firm an absolute value to pursue that is a goal in
itself. It is not simply a means to achieving profit
maximization, which is the goal implicitly set byconventional management scholars in their theories ofthe firm. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle states:“Every sort of expert knowledge and every inquiry, andsimilarly every action and undertaking, seems to seeksome good.” In short, man pursues good for its own
sake, and not because such good leads to profit oradvantage over others. It is an absolute, self-sufficient
good.
The ability to make a judgment on goodness isfostered through life experiences. The importance ofexperience as a source of knowledge has been discussed,
but the experience needed to foster phronesis goesbeyond experiences at the workplace. According toAristotle, phronesis is the character embodied in a goodman. To foster goodness in a man one needs
experiences as a human being in every aspect of life.
Especially important are aesthetic experiences and aculture of philosophy, history, literature, and the arts,
which foster insights into historical and social situations.

3.

Ability to grasp the essence of particularsituations and things.
This is an ability to perceive and grasp intuitively the
essential meaning of particular situations. Sincephronesis is the ability to make a decision that issuitable for each situation, one has to be able to quickly
recognize a situation and understand what is required inthat context. Although each situation is different, one
can still attain universality or absolute value through agrasp of the essential meaning of what is going on ineach situation.
By recognizing the situation correctly and grasping
the essence, one can envision the future and decide on
the action to be taken to realize that future. To do this,one has to be able to see at both the micro and themacro levels simultaneously. One does not observe idly,
but with intent, and an ability to hypothesize about what
is perceived. Souichiro Honda says: “When I look at a
motorcycle, I see many things. I see that I should dosuch and such to maneuver past the curve. And I think
about the next generation machine: I think, if I do this,it will have more speed … I move naturally into thenext process. ” When one is able to perceive
universality through experience, to see the forest andthe trees, that is a phonetic experience.
4.

Ability to reconstruct the particulars into
universals using language/concepts/narratives
This is an ability to illustrate a concept originating fromthe insight of one individual by placing it into a larger
vision, scenario, or historical context. As stated earlier,phronesis requires more than just practical knowledgeof a particular situation. It requires the ability to sense auniversal “truth” from the particular in order todetermine the best way to act for the common good.
Hence, it requires continuous interaction between
subjective insight and objective knowledge.
Souichiro Honda stressed this interaction between
subjectivity and objectivity: “Action without philosophy
is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action ismeaningless.” He also states: “Just to be hard working
has no value. Rather, working hard in the wrong way isworse than laziness. The right theory is the necessary
premise for working hard.” While stressing theimportance of seeing the actual situation or thing,
Hondo Motor Co. also urges a Respect for Sound
Theory. People at Honda are expected to go beyond themere experience of particular situations and find theuniversality that enables them to realize the future theyenvision.
It is also important to be able to use language thatis understandable to everyone so that concepts can betransferred. In order for phronetic knowledge to become
collective, leaders have to be able to articulate their2.

Ability to share contexts with others to createba/shared sense.
This is an ability to create ba or a space where emotions
can be shared with others. Ba roughtly means “place” inJapanese, but we define it as a shared context in motion,
where knowledge is shared, created, and put to use.
Knowledge is context-specific, and therefore, needs aphysical space where it can be created. When
individuals empathize in a shared context, theirindividual knowledge is shared so new knowledge iscreated.
Ba as a shared context means that individual,
subjective views are understood and shared. To
participate in ba means to get involved and transcend
one’s own, limited perspective. In ba, one can see
oneself in relation to others and accept others’ views
and values.
To create ba, one needs an ability to empathize, tounderstand others’ emotions and see things from otherviewpoints. To understand what customers want, one
needs an ability to empathize with customers. To do this,13

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phronetic insights in language and concepts that others
can comprehend. Phronetic leaders must haveimagination, especially historical imagination, to create
and communicate concepts effectively using metaphor,analogy, or simple story-telling.

Winter, 2006

References
Badaracco J. L., Defining Moments: When Managers Must
Choose between Right and Right. Boston: Harvard
Business School Press, 1997.
Eisner E. W., “From Episteme to Phronesis to Artistry in the
Study and Improvement of Teaching”, Teaching andTeacher Education, 18(2002): 375-385.
Halverson R., “Accessing, Documenting, and Communicating
Practical Wisdom: The Phronesis of School Leadership
Practice”, American Journal of Education, 111(2004): 90121.
Hubert and Stuart Dreyfus, Mind over Machine: The Power of
Human Intuition and Expertise in the Era of the Computer.
New York: Free press, 1986.
Steinberger P. The Concept of Political Judgment. Chicago:
Chicago University Press, 1993.

5.

Ability to use any necessary means well to realize
concepts for common goodness
This is the ability to mobilize others to attain thecommon good. It is not enough to simply communicate
concepts to others. Concepts can only be realized bymobilizing their own knowledge and efforts because
strategy here is not just a written plan. It is somethingthat is actualized through practice. To do this, phronetic
leaders have to choose and utilize the means suitable toeach particular situation, including sometimes
Machiavellian means, where shrewdness anddetermination can help to achieve “the good” result(Badaracco, 1997).
The reality of the strategic process is dynamic andfull of confusion and contradictions. Traditional
management theories have tried to resolve there
contradictions through the design of organizational
structures, incentive systems, routines, or organizational
culture. But in the knowledge-creating entity,contradictions are not obstacles to overcome but arenecessary to the creation of knowledge. Rather thanseeing and optimal balance between contradictions,knowledge is created through their synthesis. By
accepting contradiction, one is able to make thedecision best suited to the situation without losing sightof the goodness to be achieved. This dialectical process
is a political process to achieve the goal through social
interaction. What drives the political process is theability to make political judgments. Phronetic leaders
exercise political judgment by understanding others’
emotions through daily communication and by giving
careful consideration to the timing of their interaction
with others (Steinberger, 1993).

The Integrated Episteme of Evolutionary
Constructive Objectivism
Andrzej P. Wierzbicki1,2, Yoshiteru Nakamori1
1.
Center for Strategic Development of Science andTechnology, JAIST;
2.
National Institute of Telecommunications, Poland
andrzej@jaist.ac.jp; nakamori@jaist.ac.jp

6.

Ability to foster phronesis in others to build aresilient organization
Unlike the traditional view of strategy as a plan,
strategy as phronesis is not planned nor implemented by
the few leaders in an organization. Phronetic leadershipis embedded and distributed in an organization, where
various members of the organization take up the role ofleader according to the situation.
To make distributed leadership possible, it isnecessary to transfer the phronesis embedded inindividuals to others, and foster phronesis throughout
the organization. It is this distributed phronesis thatmakes a resilient organization possible.
To make phronesis a distributed phenomenon, one
has to present the issues to be worked out, to constantly
ask the question “what is the good”, and provide
examples in each situation that can teach the phronetic
way of thinking in practice. It is an ability to enablepeople to understand what phronesis is through practice,and it is taught through face-to-face interaction.

(This is the shortened account of Prof. Andrzej P.
Wierzbicki speech on the second day of JAIST Forum,
discussing recent developments in the COE Program)
Episteme means the prevalent way of creating andjustifying knowledge, characteristic for a given
historical era or a cultural sphere, see (Foucault 1972).
However, the episteme of the industrial civilization,
called sometimes the modern episteme, was subjected toa destruction process, particularly visible in the last fifty
years. This has lead to a divergent development of
separate episteme of three cultural spheres, see(Wierzbicki 2005): that of social sciences andhumanities, that of hard and natural sciences, and that oftechnology. Thus, (Snow 1960) correctly pointed out
the development of two cultures, but today we should
rather speak about three cultural spheres and identify
that their main differences are epistemic: they use
different languages, but more important is the fact that

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philosophy, then evolved with the empirical evidence ofthe concept of punctuated evolution in biology (seeLorentz 1965), noted also by (Popper 1972); then it was
rationally reinforced by the concept of order emerging
out of chaos (see Lorenz 1963, Prigogine and Stengers
1984, Gleick 1987). In parallel, it was pragmatically
substantiated by technology, in hierarchical systems
theory (Findeisen et al. 1980), as well as in the conceptof seven layers of telecommunication protocols (see,e.g., Wierzbicki and Nakamori 2006). Thus, thereduction principle of the industrial episteme – that the
behaviour of a complex system can be explained by the
reduction to the behaviour of its parts – is valid only if
the level of complexity of the system is rather low. With
very complex systems today, we should use instead:they use different fundamental epistemic concepts anddifferent ways of constructing and justifying knowledge.
In (Wierzbicki and Nakamori 2007), we presented an
attempt to propose a new integration of the episteme,much needed in the beginning era of knowledge
civilization; here we describe it shortly.
We are aware that, after the divergence of
epistemic principles at the end of industrial civilizationera, in the beginning of the knowledge civilization era a
new integrated episteme should emerge; but theformation of a new episteme will take its own historicaltime. Nevertheless, we presented an attempt and an
outline of such an episteme – to be criticised andmodified by future research.
Let us begin with three basic principles that we
believe will be decisive for the change to the new
episteme of the knowledge civilisation era. These are
the (extended) Popperian evolutionary fasification
principle, the emergence principle, and the multimedia
principle, see also (Wierzbicki and Nakamori 2006,2007).
The first basic principle is related tofalsificationism, see (Popper 1972), where the best
recent description of objectivity in science along with amature version of falsificationism was presented:
knowledge and theories evolve and the measure of theirevolutionary fitness is the number of attempted
falsification tests they have successfully passed.
Falsificationism was sharply criticized, especially fromthe postmodern subjectivist position of sociology ofscience, mainly along the line of argumentation thatscientists are interested in validating and promoting
their theories, not in disproving them. We agree thatfalsificationism might be considered only a prescriptive
requirement in the short term development of science,certainly not a descriptive theory; however, it isdescriptive of the long term evolutionary developmentof science and – what distinguishes technology fromscience – it is dominant even in the short term anddescriptive sense in the development of technologicalknowledge, see, e.g., (Wierzbicki 2005). In its criticism
of Popperian falsification, sociology of science did notnote that tools are not theories and technology follows
falsificationism in its everyday practice: technologicalartefacts (e.g., cars) must be submitted to destructive
tests in order to determine their safety and reliability. In
what follows, however, we use the concept offalsification in the possibly broadest sense admissible
also for social sciences, including intersubjective
falsification through critical discussions:

Emergence principle:
new properties of a system emerge with increased
levels of complexity, and these properties are
qualitatively different than and irreducible to theproperties of its parts.
This is a fundamental conceptual and intellectualchange. Even if it might seem that the emergence
principle logically results in the principle of synergy orholism  that the whole is more than the sum of its parts(see Bertallanfy 1956)  this is not necessarily a correctinterpretation. The principle of synergy or holism does
not say that the whole should have essentially different
properties than its parts. Thus, sciences of the 20th
Century, accustomed to the atomistic or sub-atomistic
reasoning of physics, continued to believe in
reductionism: a whole might be slightly greater than,but is still reducible to its parts. This is precisely how
the sociology of science – e.g., (Latour 1987) - attempts
to reduce objectivity to power and money. However,information technology had already provided acounterexample to such reasoning in the middle of the20th Century, but its importance has not been widely
noted: this is the distinction of software from hardware.
Software cannot function without hardware, but its
functions cannot be explained by analysing hardware; it
is simply a quite different level of complexity. Thus, theemergence principle stresses that with an increased
level of complexity, the concepts of synergy and holism
are still applicable, however, the whole is then not only
greater than, but qualitatively different from andirreducible to its parts. In this sense we are saying thatthe emergence principle expresses the essence ofcomplexity and means much more than synergy orholism.
The third fundamental principle is related to anevident trend in web communications and in therecording of our intellectual heritage: to include more
multimedia messages and records. It might take a few
more decades for this trend to fully mature. However,an understanding of its full significance is related
generally to the issue of “the other” of reason or topreverbal, emotive and intuitive knowledge, see, e.g.,(Rorty 1980), and specifically to the rational theory of
powerful but fallible intuition (Wierzbicki 1997, 2004;
Wierzbicki and Nakamori 2006a). This theory explains
why visual and generally preverbal information is much

Evolutionary falsification principle:
hypotheses, theories, models and tools develop
evolutionarily, and the measure of theirevolutionary fitness is the number of either
attempted falsification tests that they havesuccessfully passed,
or of critical discussion tests leading to anintersubjective agreement about their validity.
The second fundamental principle is related to theemergence of new concepts and properties at higher
levels of complexity, which was noticed long ago in

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example, tool making was always based on intuition
and a more comprehensive perception of reality thanjust language.
(4)
The innate curiosity of people about otherpeople and nature results in their constructing
hypotheses about reality, thus creating a structure anddiverse models of the world. Until now, all such
hypotheses turned out to be only approximations; but
we learn evolutionarily about their validity by following
the falsification principle. Since we perceive reality as
more and more complex, and thus devise concepts onhigher and higher levels of complexity according to theemergence principle, we shall probably always workwith approximate hypotheses.
(5)
The origins of culture are both linguistic, suchas stories, myths, and symbols, and technical, such as
tools and devices used for improving human life. Boththese aspects helped in the slow development of science– by testing, abstracting, and accumulating humanexperiences with nature and other people, and testing
and refining the corresponding models and theories.
This development is evolutionary and, as in any
punctuated evolution, includes revolutionary periods.
(6)
The accumulation of human experiences andculture results in and is preserved as the intellectual
heritage of humanity (or the third world according to
Popper) with its emotive, intuitive, and rational parts,
existing independently from the human mind in libraries
and other depositories of knowledge.
(7)
Human thought is imaginative, has emotive,
intuitive, and rational components, and develops out ofperception, sensory experiences, social interaction, andinteraction with the intellectual heritage of humanity,
including interpretive hermeneutic processes.
(8)
Objectivity is a higher value that helps us
interpret the intellectual heritage of humanity and selectthose components that more closely and truthfully
correspond to reality, or that are more useful either
when constructing new tools or analysing social
behaviour.
(9)
A prescriptive interpretation of objectivity is
the falsification principle; when faced cognitively withincreasing complexity, we apply the emergence
principle. The sources of our cognitive power are
related to the multimedia principle.
(10) While the above general principles are equallyapplicable to the hard and natural sciences, social
sciences/humanities, and technology, they might bedifferently interpreted by each of them: the hard andnatural sciences search for theories that are universal,
calling them laws of nature, and are thus influenced byparadigms, exemplars of such theories; the social
sciences and humanities concentrate on the local andmultiple aspects of reality, thus follow multiple
paradigms; technology is the most pragmatic, motivatedby the joy of creating technical artefacts, and following
the principle of falsification more than paradigms in its
everyday practice.
We are aware that the contemporary differences
between the episteme of the three cultural
spheres - social sciences and humanities, hard andmore powerful than verbal: images require at least ten
thousand times more processing capability, and while
the human mind has such capability it has been
suppressed to the subconscious by verbal reasoning and,for the lack of words to describe it, called intuition. The
multimedia principle combines these arguments:
Multimedia principle:
words are just an approximate code to describe amuch more complex reality, visual and preverbal
information in general is much more powerful andrelates to intuitive knowledge and reasoning; thefuture records of the intellectual heritage ofhumanity will have a multimedia character, thus
stimulating creativity.
This is perhaps an even more fundamental
conceptual and intellectual challenge than theemergence principle, since almost all philosophy of the20th Century attached a great role to words,
concentrating on communication to such an extent thatit tried to reduce humanity to discourse. All logic can beinterpreted as rules for correctly using words. On theother hand, all tool-making was originally intuitive andpreverbal; hence the roots of technology are preverbal.
The multimedia principle is perhaps even more
important than the emergence principle, also more
important than other trends such as digital intelligence(which was originally understood only in the verbal
sense), and implies that we should use as much
multimedia content as possible in order to more strongly
stimulate creativity. This will have impacts comparable
or exceeding those resulting from the development ofprinting technology, thus becoming the essence of the
new civilisation age.
Based on these three fundamental principles, we
can give now a detailed description of an
epistemological position that might be called
constructive evolutionary objectivism, closer in fact tothe current episteme of technology than to that of hardsciences.
(1)
People are not alone in the world; in addition
to other people, there exists another part of reality, thatof nature, although part of this reality has been
converted by people to form human-made, mostly
technological systems. There are parts of reality that are
local and multiple, there are parts that are universal.
(2)
People developed both language tocommunicate with others and tools to convert various
aspects of nature according to their needs; in both thesedevelopments, people have been supported by curiosity,
which is not necessarily helpful for an individual’s
evolution, but is essential for the evolution of a group,and has lead to the evolution of science. Humanity canbe defined only when taking into account all these three(language, tools, curiosity) basic human faculties.
(3)
According to the multimedia principle,
language is a simplified code used to describe a much
more complex reality, while human senses (startingwith vision) enable people to perceive the more
complex aspects of reality. This more comprehensive
perception of reality is the basis of human intuition; for

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Winter, 2006
Lorenz E. 1963: Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow. Journal of
the Atmospheric Sciences 20:130-141
Popper K.R. 1972: Objective Knowledge. Oxford University
Press, Oxford
Rorty R. 1980: Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature.
Princeton University Press, Princeton
Snow C.P. 1960: The Two Cultures. Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge
Wierzbicki, A.P. 1997: On the Role of Intuition in Decision
Making and Some Ways of Multicriteria Aid of Intuition.
Multiple Criteria Decision Making 6:65-78.
Wierzbicki, A.P. 2004: Knowledge Creation Theories andRational Theory of Intuition. International Journal for
Knowledge and Systems Science 1:17-25
Wierzbicki A.P. 2005: Technology and Change: the Role ofTechnology in Knowledge Civilization. Ith World
Congress of IFSR, Kobe; extended version in Wierzbicki
AP., Nakamori Y., eds: Creative Environments, op.cit.
Wierzbicki, A.P. and Nakamori Y. 2006: Creative Space:
Models of Creative Processes for the Knowledge
Civilization Age. Springer Verlag, Berlin-Heidelberg
Wierzbicki A.P., Nakamori Y. (eds) 2007: Creative
Environments: Issues of Creativity Support for the
Knowledge Civilization Age. Springer Verlag, BerlinHeidelberg (in print)

natural sciences, and technology - are very great, thus
the acceptance of the principles listed above might takea long time. We are also aware that the principles welisted above might be modified during the adoption
process. But we listed them precisely for that purpose,to present them as an object for discussion and possible
falsification.
References
Bertallanfy L. 1956: General Systems Theory. General
Systems 1: 1-10
Findeisen W., Bailey F.N., Brdyś M., Malinowski K.,
Tatjewski P., Woźniak A. 1980: Control andCoordination in Hierarchical Systems. J. Wiley and Sons,
Chichester
Foucault M. 1972: The Order of Things: An Archeology of
Human Sciences. Routledge, New York
Gleick J. 1987: Chaos: Making a New Science. Viking
Penguin, New York
Latour B. 1987: Science in Action. Milton Keynes: Open
University Press
Lorentz K. 1965: Evolution and Modification of Behavior: aCritical Examination of the Concepts of the "Learned"
and the "Innate" Elements of Behavior. The University of
Chicago Press, Chicago

Call for Papers:

IJCKS 2007 (KSS2007/KICSS2007)
International Joint Conference on Knowledge Science
The 8th International Conference on Knowledge and Systems Science (KSS2007)
jointly with the 2nd International Conference on Knowledge, Information and Creativity Support Systems (KICSS2007)
November 5-7, 2007
Ishikawa High-Tech Exchange Center, Ishikawa, Japan
http://css.jaist.ac.jp/ijcks2007/(Details on page 18)

JAIST-COE News is published by the Center for Strategic Development of Science and Technology, Japan
Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 1-1 Asahidai, Nomi, Ishikawa 923-1292, Japan.
Questions, comments, article proposals and for more information about the JAIST-COE News, contact Jing
TIAN at jtian@jaist.ac.jp, tel. +81-761-51-1839 or go to the link: www.jaist.ac.jp/coe/index.htm
Articles in this newsletter are based on a variety of sources. Signed articles reflect the views of the author.
Unsigned articles are prepared by the editorial staff, which is solely responsible for their content.

17

JAIST-COE News
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Winter, 2006

Call for Papers:

IJCKS 2007 (KSS2007/KICSS2007)
International Joint Conference on Knowledge Science
The 8th International Conference on Knowledge and Systems Science (KSS2007)
jointly with the 2nd International Conference on Knowledge, Information and Creativity Support Systems (KICSS2007)
November 5-7, 2007
Ishikawa High-Tech Exchange Center, Ishikawa, Japan
http://css.jaist.ac.jp/ijcks2007/
IJCKS2007 is a joint hosting conference of KSS2007 and
KICSS2007.

Important Dates
Draft Paper (or extended
abstract) Submission due
Notification of Acceptance
Final Camera-ready Papers due
Early Registration Closes
IJCKS 2007 Joint Conference

The KSS Symposium is an annual conference of theInternational Society for Knowledge and Systems Sciences(ISKSS). Knowledge science and systems science can beused as a methodology or as a tool; and the two fields canbenefit each other. Around these disciplines, the first
International Symposium on Knowledge and Systems
Sciences, initiated and organized by Japan Advanced
Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST), was held in
September 2000 (KSS2000), then KSS2001 (Dalian, China),
KSS2002 (Shanghai, China), KSS2003 (Guangzhou, China),
KSS2004 (JAIST, Japan), KSS2005 (Vienna, Austria), andKSS2006 (Beijing, China) had been held and many scientists
and researchers, from different countries, contributed to all
those symposia. This year, the 8th symposium, KSS2007
will be held in JAIST, Ishikawa, Japan, jointly with KICSS
and still expect to provide excellent opportunities for thepresentation of interesting new research results, anddiscussion about them, leading to knowledge transfer and thesynergetic generation of new ideas.

May 31, 2007
July 30, 2007
September 30, 2007
October 15, 2007
November 5-7, 2007

Paper Submission
4 to 8 pages of extended abstract or paper should besubmitted for reviewing.
Papers must be submitted
electronically as PDF or Word file, via the submission web
site. Camera ready paper should be a maximum of 8 pages.
For format of paper and submission, please refer to:
http://css.jaist.ac.jp/ijcks2007/

Publications
Accepted papers will be published in one of the two hardcopy proceedings (one for KSS2007, and the other for
KICSS2007) and in a CD. Selected papers will be publishedin International Journal of Knowledge and Systems Sciences.

The KICSS conference was initiated to facilitate
technology and knowledge exchange between international
researchers/scholars in the field of knowledge science,
information systems, and systems science and creativity
support systems in 2006. The first conference was held in
Ayutthaya, Thailand (KICSS2006), and more than 50
research results were presented. To promote activities in thisresearch field intensively, we hold the second KICSS
conference jointly with the KSS Symposium.

Organizers and sponsors
School of Knowledge Science, Japan Advanced Institute of
Science and Technology, Japan
International Society for Knowledge and Systems Sciences
Dalian University of Technology (DUT), China
Institute of Systems Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS), China
Tsinghua University, China
University of Hull, United Kingdom
International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA),
Austria

Scope
The presentations at the IJCKS2007 are expected to cover
the following areas:¾ Systems methodology for knowledge integration andcreation¾ Knowledge systems engineering¾ Complex system modeling and analysis¾ Meta-synthesis¾ Creativity support system¾ Cross-cultural learning on systems thinking andknowledge management¾ Social network analysis and knowledge management¾ Decision science and decision support system¾ E-learning, E-content, E-knowledge and Knowledgebased E-commerce¾ Data mining and knowledge discovery¾ Group decision and negotiation¾ Knowledge reuse and ontology¾ Natural language understanding tools¾ Web intelligence tools

Executive Committee
Yoshiteru Nakamori (JAIST, Japan, General chair)
Zhongtuo Wang (DUT, China, IPC Co-chair)
Jifa Gu (CAS, China, IPC Co-chair)
Susumu Kunifuji (JAIST, Japan, IPC Co-chair)Thanaruk Theeramunkong (SIIT, Thailand, IPC Co-chair)
Tieju Ma (JAIST, Japan, IPC Secretary)
Motoki Miura (JAIST, Japan, IPC Secretary)

Contact
Ms. Kawabata, Akiko,
Center for Strategic Development of Science andTechnology, School of Knowledge Science, JAISTEmail: coe-secr@jaist.ac.jp
Phone: +81-761-51-1839
Fax: +81-761-51-176718