Knowledge equity is a

social science Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among members within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the ...

concept referring to social change concerning expanding what is valued as

knowledge Knowledge is an Declarative knowledge, awareness of facts, a Knowledge by acquaintance, familiarity with individuals and situations, or a Procedural knowledge, practical skill. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is oft ...

and how communities may have been excluded from this discourse through imbalanced structures of power and privilege. Issues related to knowledge equity is disscused in fields such as

standpoint theory Standpoint theory, also known as standpoint epistemology, is a foundational framework in feminist social theory that examines how individuals' social identities (i.e. race, gender, disability status), influence their understanding of the world. ...

or decolonial research.

History

Knowledge equity developed from the discipline of

knowledge management Knowledge management (KM) is the set of procedures for producing, disseminating, utilizing, and overseeing an organization's knowledge and data. It alludes to a multidisciplinary strategy that maximizes knowledge utilization to accomplish organ ...

, and referred to the knowledge measurement process where tacit or subjective information is included to more traditional structures of information management. This developed into ways of applying a valuation to knowledge, including both those who know and the processes involving accessing, making sense of, and organizing it. The connection with accessing various areas of knowledge creation are often connected to

open access Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which nominally copyrightable publications are delivered to readers free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 de ...

publications, allowing equitable

access Access may refer to: Companies and organizations * ACCESS (Australia), an Australian youth network * Access (credit card), a former credit card in the United Kingdom * Access Co., a Japanese software company * Access International Advisors, a hed ...

to those who may need. Access to knowledge and beliefs about what counts for knowledge has continued to shift within the

social sciences Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of society, societies and the Social relation, relationships among members within those societies. The term was former ...

, leading to a recognition that those who control what counts as knowledge and how that influences hierarchy and knowledge imbalance. Acknowledging beliefs that some forms of knowledge may be perceived to be better than others establishes an inequity and lack of justice for those who are excluded from systems that privilege discursive knowledge over other forms. The

Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. (WMF) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, and registered there as foundation (United States law), a charitable foundation. It is the host of Wikipedia, th ...

has identified knowledge equity as a key element toward its strategic direction for an ecosystem of open and inclusive knowledge, where everybody has the access to create and consume knowledge. This has been connected with education as a social strategy for expanding knowledge equity.

Challenges

Challenges to this notion includes who is involved in the discourse where knowledge is understood and accepted, how tacit and explicit knowledge interact and get integrated into the larger systems that value multiple perspectives, and difficulties expanding beyond language and cultural limitations on knowledge assumptions. The challenge for social movements to expand entrenched beliefs related to open and free knowledge in a politicized society involves social justice challenges in practice.

Knowledge democracy

In the context of knowledge equity, the idea of knowledge democracy promote the regognition and preservation of a diversity of knowledge systems, notably non-occidental ones. This idea is in opposition with the ethnocentric knowledge that can be created when one culture dominate the others.

References

{{Reflist Social justice Knowledge economy Knowledge management