Developing the core principles of responsible knowledge management (rKM): Chapter 2 – Theoretical foundations, evolution, and limits of knowledge management

This article introduces Chapter 2 of a series featuring my Master’s thesis The Emerging Concept of Responsible Knowledge Management (rKM): Identifying and Formulating the Core Principles of rKM.

This chapter outlines the theoretical foundations of knowledge (KM) by situating the field in its historical and practical contexts. Rather than beginning with a fixed definition, it examines how the field has emerged, how it is commonly understood, and what purposes it is seen to serve.

The chapter traces KM’s development in response to organisational needs for creating, acquiring, sharing, and utilising knowledge, and examines how knowledge has been framed, often as a strategic asset, to support efficiency, innovation, and competitive advantage. It also highlights internal tensions that continue to influence how knowledge is understood and managed, providing a conceptual backdrop for more recent developments.

Because rKM does not yet have a settled theoretical foundation of its own, this chapter aims to map the field’s general development and tensions. In doing so, it sensitises the reader to the assumptions and problematics that later chapters will revisit in light of emerging perspectives.

The sections of Chapter 2 are:

• 2.1 – The emergence & evolution of knowledge management
• 2.2 – A field or fields? The ongoing struggle to define KM
• 2.3 – What has knowledge management given us so far?
  • 2.3.1 – Knowledge management: The concept
  • 2.3.2 – Focus areas of knowledge management
• 2.4 – Some recent areas of interest in knowledge management
• 2.5 – Knowledge as an asset: Problems & Inconsistencies
  • 2.5.1 – The explicit/tacit binary
  • 2.5.2 – The data information knowledge wisdom (DIKW) model
• 2.6 – The will to metrics: KM’s economic telos
• 2.7 – The vacuum of ethics in KM: A marginalised concept
• 2.8 – Affirming life: Systems thinking as ethical worldview
  • 2.8.1 – Systems thinking in practice: Wicked problems
  • 2.8.2 – Post-normal science: Ethics for complex systems

Next part: Section 2.1 – The emergence & evolution of knowledge management.

Article source: Koskinen, H. M. (2025). The Emerging Concept of Responsible Knowledge Management (rKM): Identifying and Formulating the Core Principles of rKM. (Master’s Thesis, LUT University).

Header image source: Created by Hanna M. Koskinen using ChatGPT.