navreme - knowledge development

network name and approach

navreme as a Slavic word, and knowledge development as the English second part of the name, both stand for the cross-roads between Eastern and Western Europe.

navreme stands for over-coming the still existing iron curtain in our heads, and for Europe-wide cooperation, including particularly also experts and partners from the EU’s neighbourhood.

knowledge development, on its side, is a culmination of analysis and review of activities.

navreme is a Slavic term for the Greek ‘kairos’. “Kairos, in the Greek mythology the youngest son of Zeus, is the god for the favourable moment, fortunate opportunity or the right moment” says “Mayers Konversationslexikon – Ein Nachschlagewerk des allgemeinen Wissens” of 1891, a usual starting point for our presentations. Rather than the chronological notion of time (Greek ‘chronos’), it connotes the concept of instantaneous ‘ kairos’, the moment to catch, or of the very right instance, or of internal time.

image kairos Kairos was interpreted by the sculpture artist Lysippos (the preferred sculpturist of Alexander of Macedonia) in the 4 th century BC.: we see a boy with wings, with long hair on his front side and shoulders, but bold on the back head: when the good moment is over, you can not even catch it by its hair from behind. He carries scales and shearing knife, for making and balancing the right decision, and acting by cutting off an opportunity instantaneously.

knowledge development, rather than pure knowledge management of the same already existing knowledge, is the activity of creating fresh, timely and tailor-made knowledge. Activity is not limited to intentional physical movements, but extends to the preceding activity of thinking, but also consists of Making (‘changing something’ – 'poiesis') and Acting (‘in a particular way’ – 'praxis').

In Aristotelian terms of practice (Rämö 1999), making (poiesis) leads to skillfullness and proficiency ('techne' – the name of our Danish partner company!), acting (praxis), promotes wisdom and judgement ('phronesis'). In terms of theory, theoretical activity ('theoria') promotes scientific skills ('episteme'). This is what contemporary research is (only) about. However, both theory and practice are merely two different forms of (an) activity. 'Theoria' means the activity of investigating the world (and not the resulting scientific documents), 'episteme' is the resulting arrangement of words or concepts that describes the state of things and affairs.

network name and activity

The timely development and application of knowledge is in fact based on new interfaces between knowledge production and knowledge utilisation:

‘action research’ and 'accompanying research’ are characterised by certain kind of project-immanent interaction between research project and development initiative (Kämaräinen 2000). However, it is possible to develop complementary interfaces that may be linked to other kinds of research (and development) activities. In the following some ideal types are outlined as different kinds of bilateral interaction fields between researchers, policy-makers and practitioners. All these ideal types can be seen as transformations of one-way communication into a mutual learning process.

Mutual learning via the transformation of research dissemination into collaborative learning processes that is based on the outcomes of certain projects: so far the accustomed concept of ‘dissemination’ has been based on the idea that research results are made available and explained with particular campaigns. However, a more appropriate interaction between the transnational research projects and potential (national) contexts of knowledge utilisation can be achieved via an organised learning process. In such process the participants are challenged to analyse the context of knowledge utilisation (in which they are working) and the lessons from the transnational research project (in view of their analyses).

Mutual learning via the transformation of monitoring into participative accompaniment of research work and knowledge sharing: so far the concept of monitoring (of research projects by the funding agencies) has been based on external relations and on ‘deliverables’ (such as interim reports or papers to monitoring seminars). An alternative mode of monitoring can be developed by making use of electronic communication in communities of practice and knowledge sharing environments. With the help of such instruments and the monitoring relation can be transformed into participative accompaniment of actual steps and knowledge sharing within research work.

Mutual learning via the transformation of valorisation into analysis of knowledge processing within knowledge utilisation: so far the concept of ‘valorisation’ has been overshadowed by different expectations concerning compression of knowledge and/or of immediate reflection of ‘user-positions’. However, it is possible to go beyond these simple solutions and develop ‘valorisation studies’ into analyses on the actual processing of knowledge in particular contexts of knowledge utilisation (with reference to certain conceptual inputs that are coming from transnational research projects).

Finally, activities and knowledge development, in order to contribute to change, and become sustainable and real, need to ubicated not only in space (‘choros’) but in a place (‘topos’). The abstract chronos and chora have to do with science and theoretical knowledge (episteme and techne), whereas kairos and a meaningful topos characterise practical wisdom and judgement (phronesis). The contextual localisation and application of knowledge means interaction with networks of real people (not virtual networks! – Attwell 2005). Place is the “element of an association of ideas, of a conditioning (= consulting?), of a training, of a mnemonics’ (i.e. devices to help us remember or aide memoire) (Barthes 1988). Kairotopos is then the unification of place and time into a condensed, meaningful and concrete wholeness (Ramirez 1995).

‘Evaluation’ of people’s projects, programmes or policies, one of our core fields of expertise, leads to ‘valorisation’ if added value is made visible; dissemination of collected experience means knowledge-sharing; accumulated added value is re-invested as a human and knowledge capital in new undertakings, in order to avoid past pitfalls, and to achieve better results – thus ‘capitalisation’ of experience.

The concepts 'action research' and 'accompanying research' in our work refer to research designs in which research work is linked to development initiatives. The 'action research' approaches involve more directly researchers as key actors within development initiatives and practitioners as essential actors within the related research work. The 'accompanying research' approaches are based an organised interaction and active dialogue between the development team and an accompanying research project.

One of our preferred approaches combines the accompanying research notion with evaluation: ’accompanying evaluation’. Eventually, evaluation and valorisation and capitalisation lead to an improvement over time, better quality, more fun, convincing empowerment – a spiral of improvement.

network name and values

Although navreme is working mainly as a virtual organisation, all of this needs to be done with other – real – people. The virtual organisation demands trustworthiness among the participants as spontaneous physical interaction is often not possible. In a global and virtual setting, trust is crucial (Luhmann 1979, Giddens 1990) for questions of wisdom and judgment in actions undertaken. Trust involves elements of discretionary power beyond instrumental specifications (contracts) and the rule of 'techne' (Rämö 1999). Trust reduces complexity and enhances the efficiency of agency. In order to uphold trust relationships in virtual communications and organisations, instead of control, calls for elements of 'kairos' and 'phronesis', i.e. having features of 'kairochora' (actions no longer ‘take place’, but only ‘time’). Whereas chronotopos relies on clock-time precision in concrete places (project application on spot), kairochora relies on a notion of right time to act in an abstract virtual space (project valorisation for knowledge development).

Aristotle, in ‘de categoriae’ defines chronos as the ‘dating time’, and kairos as the ‘time that gives value’. Kairos is, for Aristotle’s scheme of rhetoric, the “time and space context in which the proof will be delivered”. Moreover, “what happens at the right time (kairos – season) is good”. In contrast, if knowledge is deployed too early, it is not accepted; those who are late, are “punished by history” (cf. Mihajl Gorbacev). Even the best knowledge, developed on purpose on the basis of previous experience, is useless, if not delivered ‘on time’ – i.e. knowledge developed na vreme (“at the right time”).

Trust, value, good (navreme) and skills, judgment, wisdom (knowledge development) – what else could we strive for?