​​

Working Group: Avinash Jha(Convener), J K Suresh, R.Goswami, A Shanmukha,  Meti Mallikarjuna, Sunil Sahasrabudhey

The term ‘Knowledge’ today is used to refer to formal and specialized knowledge which is transmitted and learnt in educational institutions like schools, colleges and universities and produced in research institutes. The existence of knowledge amongst ordinary people is considered knowledge only in a qualified sense – traditional knowledge, folk knowledge, local knowledge etc. Even when acknowledged, such knowledge in society is explained away as aphorisms and techniques learnt by imitation, rote, practice, or as unscientific folk wisdom etc.  However, this knowledge in society continues to provide sustenance to a majority of ‘uneducated’ Indians by equipping them to serve large numbers of people in areas as diverse as indigenous medicine, agriculture, transport, construction, restaurants and food etc. Management of enterprises based on small and very small capital is an important part of knowledge in society. So is the knowledge that is evident in life patterns and aesthetic activities of ordinary people.

Moving away from the paradigm which considers  ‘science’ and its cognates as knowledge per se and the rest as knowledge in an inferior sense, this session seeks to stress the significance and vitality of knowledge in society which might have its own organizing principles for acquiring, renewing and practicing knowledge in ways not always anticipated by the practitioners of formal and specialized knowledge.

​

Background

​

As human beings we are largely products of our learning and the ability to transmit our learning to the next generation, which also serves to distinguish us from all other animals. Hence, it is a truism to say that all human beings are knowledge beings. It is this endowment of knowledge in human society that makes possible the building up of human civilizations over millennia.

This trivial truth is in itself not very useful in understanding or explicating the nature and evolution of societies across centuries. Although as knowledge beings we all are equal, it must also be clear that there have been hierarchies in human societies and hence also of knowledge. No knowledge is innocent. Our knowledge has not only given us the power to dominate nature and control it to serve our needs but also to dominate other human beings. That knowledge is power is not only a Baconian or Western concept but was perhaps a larger understanding of human societies everywhere. However it must also be recognized that knowledge serves as a major resource providing strength to people to resist external domination and oppression in society.

In terms of their spread, various types of knowledge – of tools and machines, materials and minerals, agriculture, horticulture, behavior and interactions, social life, economics, arts, administration and politics, philosophy, spirituality etc. – that served the evolving needs of societies over time in history were situated partly within the society at large and partly within specialist groups. In terms of diversity, each region possessed its own version of knowledge types that best suited its environment, both human and natural. Interactions between communities enabled their development even as differences between them persisted. A common feature of knowledge was that it was not beyond social scrutiny and control, i.e., social norms would determine the scope and limits of its practice. For example, the village commons or forest patches would not be completely denuded even if it was an economically attractive proposition; open and strip mines would not be massively exploited so as to render the land around it infertile or degraded. And so on. In a distributed and de-centralized society such as pre-modern India, it is evident therefore that knowledge in society was diverse and multi-dimensional, while being largely governed by its endogenous values.

​

Today’s Scenario

​

An important development of the previous two hundred years is the growth of a nexus between power and knowledge. Power and knowledge were perhaps largely independent in pre-modern society. However, from the time of the industrial revolution, they have attained a growing degree of affinity. Over time, every major development in the sphere of knowledge has come to be co-opted by power, whilst every new affirmation of power leads to a greater control over the process of knowledge creation and use. Power as we understand it, goes beyond political power symbolized by the State and its institutions. It constitutes in addition an ecosystem that is driven by the logic of Capital and utilizes instruments mediated by knowledge for social, economic and cultural influence and control.

The separation of human knowledge from its location advanced rapidly during and after the industrial revolution in Europe along with the capability to embed a progressively larger amount of complexity (i.e., knowledge) into machines; this capability gradually extended to areas such as large scale manufacture of iron, textiles, steam and machine tools in the 19th century and to mass manufacturing of cars in the 20th, enabling the reduction of human effort to mere manual labor to a large part. In the 21st century, global manufacture and services have triggered the development of vast, hyper-real and virtual devices to feed the demand for their production. Together, they have created a new global empire, whose knowledge intensive hubs exercise complete control over societies which in theory are independent and sovereign, but are subservient to the demands of consumption and progress, as exemplified by the empire and its physical and knowledge capital.

The consequences of the above developments are two-fold: one, a weakening of knowledge in society that leads to the society’s inability to control the distribution of the fruits of its knowledge; which in turn leads to a general de-skilling and de-education of the majority. Two, it enables a few to monopolize the knowledge development process, overturn all norms in society and create great disruptions and inequities in society in their drive to maximize the return on Capital, which has become the ruling mantra of the World.

​

What this Session aims to do

​

How is Knowledge in Society constituted, what are its strengths and dynamics, how does it help fight oppression, can it help us envisage a society where a life of dignity and fulfillment is created for all without (much) capital are the central questions that will be explored in this session, in the form of the following topics:
  a) What do we mean by Knowledge in Society? How is it different from the Knowledge in the University, or of specialist groups, etc.?
    b) What are the organizing principles of this knowledge?
  c) How does it relate to the foundations of different knowledge traditions in society?
  d) How does Knowledge in society resist external domination and internal oppression?
  e) What is the relationship between Knowledge in society and modern political, social and economic processes?

​​