politics and culture of knowledge

Wikipedia represents the democratization of knowledge itself, on a global scale, something possible for the first time in human history. Wikipedia allows everyone equal authority in stating what is known about any given topic. Their new politics of knowledge is deeply, passionately egalitarian. Today's Establishment is nervous about Web 2.0 and Establishment-bashers love it, and for the same reason: its egalitarianism about knowledge means that, with the chorus (or cacophony) of voices out there, there is so much dissent, about everything, that there is a lot less of what "we all know." Insofar as the unity of our culture depends on a large body of background knowledge, handing a megaphone to everyone has the effect of fracturing our culture.

And the rider to that is:

As wonderful as it might be that the hegemony of professionals over knowledge is lessening, there is a downside: our grasp of and respect for reliable information suffers. With the rejection of professionalism has come a widespread rejection of expertise—of the proper role in society of people who make it their life's work to know stuff. This, I maintain, is not a positive development; but it is also not a necessary one. We can imagine a Web 2.0 with experts. We can imagine an Internet that is still egalitarian, but which is more open and welcoming to specialists. The new politics of knowledge that I advocate would place experts at the head of the table, but—unlike the old order—gives the general public a place at the table as well.

I suspect that is right: we are entering a period of a new negotiation where the way that we assess the bona fides of 'experts' opens up to a wider audience. It may be that knowledge professionals still get the benefit of the doubt, but in a world where problematisation is more to the forefront and awareness of the possibilities of seeing things differently. We need therefore to educate people to think and to do so Christianly. That does not mean parroting opinions but having a sense of the shape of doctrine and biblical history as well as being well-informed about matters of cultural significance such as science, politics and philosophy.

Of course the other issue implicated in this is that most people don't have the time, inclination or sometimes ability to be able to participate fully in the creation or dissemination of knowledge, so we have to rely on those who do. So it becomes an issue of accountability structures.

The article goes on to discuss the issue of Wikipedia's apparent 'epistemic egalitarianism'. The age long debate on knowledge, 'plausibility' and accessibility goes on.
Edge 208

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