On the Reflexive Relations Between Knowledge, Governance, and Space

Abstract

Governance is both a contested concept and an increasingly empirical concern. On the one hand, it has become an almost universal and all-encompassing concept, which has attracted scholarly interest from many disciplines and over many decades to tackle the dilemmas of collective action and to facilitate effective coordination of interests and resources toward commonly accepted goals. On the other hand, conceptions of governance vary considerably, and their meanings depend on disciplinary perspectives, theoretical traditions, and empirical focus. Although it is easy to agree what governance is not, it is more challenging to create broad consensus on what it is and how it works effectively. Most capaciously, governance denotes the coordination of collective action. These actions take place in institutionally or physically organized spaces of interaction, where knowledge is needed to shape governance appropriately. Organized spaces and knowledge are both conditions as well as consequences of the governance process.

Network Governance at the Margin of the State: Rural Drinking Water Communities in Chile

“…Governance may be conceived as a form of coordination that ranges between social institutions on one end and management on the other end of a duality of coordinating collective action (Glückler Herrigel and Handke 2020 ). Whereas institutions are long-term patterns of social order that are difficult to control or purposively change by individuals, management often refers to short-term decision making under the mandate of a legitimate authority.…”

The Place of Civil Society in the Creation of Knowledge

“…Whereas bits of data or parcels of commodity can be transferred, knowledge requires comprehension to be translated from one person to the other and from one place to the other. Though being bound to the individual, the creation and interpretation of knowledge remains a relational social process, often collaborative and situated within the confines of symbolic, cultural, and institutional frames (Glückler, Herrigel, & Handke, 2020;Meusburger, 2008). Hence, learning and knowing are geographically situated and contingent social practices (Bathelt & Glückler, 2011).…”