Return to Babel: Emergent Diversity, Digital Resources, and Local Knowledge

Information system research that recognizes, supports, and enables access of diverse knowledge communities online has become a major concern. Of particular concern is how these digital resources can support and preserve local identities and promote grass-roots involvement in creating the infrastructure of devolved governance. The aim of this article is to expose some of the conceptual obstacles to programs of devolved and local knowledge resources, and to provide an account of agency that recognizes that online communities, and community identity, are essential for eliciting, managing, and sharing local knowledges. Further, this article demonstrates how the implications of these issues impact institutions for managing knowledge that may be extended to all sorts of knowledge communities.