Editorial : knowledge-based development of cities : a myth or reality?

Urban development in the first decade of the 21st century has faced many challenges ranging from rapid to shrinking urbanisation, from emerging knowledge economy to global division of labour and from globalisation to climate change. Along with these challenges new concepts, such as essentialism, environmentalism and dematerialism, are emerged and started to influence the way urban development plans are prepared and visions for the development of cities are made. Beyond this, scholars, practitioners and decision-makers have also started to discuss the need for an new urban planning and development approach in order to achieve a development that is sustainable and knowledge-based. Limited successful examples of alternative planning and development approaches showcased potentials of moving towards a new plan-making mindset in the era of knowledge economy. This paper presents a new urban planning and development approach that is taking application ground in many parts of the globe, namely knowledge-based urban development. After providing the theoretical foundation and conceptual framework of knowledge-based urban development the paper discusses whether knowledge-based development of cities is a myth or a reality.

Knowledge-based development of cities : a myth or reality?

Urban development in the 21st decade of the 21st century has faced many challenges ranging from rapid to shrinking urbanisation, from emerging knowledge economy to global division of labour and from globalisation to climate change. Along with with these challenges new concepts, such as essentialism, environmentalism and dematerialism, are emerged and started to influence the way urban development plans are prepared and visions for the development of cities are made. Beyond this, scholars, practitioners and decision-makers have also started to discuss the need for an new urban planning and development approach in order to achieve a development that is sustainable and knowledge-based. Limited successful examples of alternative planning and development approaches showcased potentials of moving towards a new plan-making mindset in the era of knowledge economy. This paper presents a new urban planning and development approach that is taking application ground in many parts of the globe, namely knowledge-based urban development. After providing the theoretical foundation and conceptual framework of knowledge-based urban development the paper discusses whether knowledge-based development of cities is a myth or a reality.

Investigating challenges and opportunities of water sensitive urban design for knowledge based development of Australian cities

A new approach that is slowly replacing neoclassical models of economic growth and commodity based industrial activities, knowledge based urban development (KBUD) aims to provide opportunities for citiesw to foster knowledge creation, exchange and innovation, and is based on the concepts of both sustainable urban development and economic prosperity; sustainable uses and protection of natural resources are therefore integral parts of KBUD. As such, stormwater, which has been recognised as one of the main culprits of aquatic ecosystem pollution and as therefore a significant threat to the goal of sustainable urban development, needs to be managed in a manner that produces ecologically sound outcomes. Water sensitive urban design (WSUD) is one of the key responses to the need to better management urban stormwater runoff and supports KBUD by providing an alternative, innovative and effective strategy to traditional stormwater management.

Does size matter? Knowledge-based development of second-order city-regions in Finland

Achieving knowledge-based urban development (KBUD) profoundly depends on not only encouraging the development of economic activities, but also strengthening the societal, environmental and governance bases of city-regions. In recent years, a number of global city-regions have been investigated from the angle of this multidimensional perspective, which has provided a new comprehension in the development processes of primate city-regions. However, there is a knowledge gap in understanding how KBUD works in the second-order city-region (SOCR) context. This warrants more attention as SOCRs potentially help secure balanced development and territorial cohesion. This paper aims to empirically investigate KBUD performances of SOCRs in order to generate new insights. An assessment framework is utilised in the Finnish context, where the findings provide a nationally benchmarked snapshot of the degree of achievements of SOCRs based on numerous KBUD performance areas. The results shed light on the unique Finnish urban and regional development process, and provide lessons for other SOCRs.

Knowledge-based clinical pathway for medical quality improvement

Clinical pathways have been adopted for various diseases in clinical departments for quality improvement as a result of standardization of medical activities in treatment process. Using knowledge-based decision support on the basis of clinical pathways is a promising strategy to improve medical quality effectively. However, the clinical pathway knowledge has not been fully integrated into treatment process and thus cannot provide comprehensive support to the actual work practice. Therefore this paper proposes a knowledgebased clinical pathway management method which contributes to make use of clinical knowledge to support and optimize medical practice. We have developed a knowledgebased clinical pathway management system to demonstrate how the clinical pathway knowledge comprehensively supports the treatment process. The experiences from the use of this system show that the treatment quality can be effectively improved by the extracted and classified clinical pathway knowledge, seamless integration of patient-specific clinical pathway recommendations with medical tasks and the evaluating pathway deviations for optimization.

Knowledge-based integrated production management model

Purpose - This paper aims to propose a model of production management that integrates knowledge management, as a third dimension, to the production and work dimensions and to identify factors that promote a favorable context for knowledge sharing and results achievement in the production operations shop floor environment.Design/methodology/approach - The model proposed is built from opportunities identified in the literature review.Findings - The factors in the model integrate its three main components: knowledge management, production organization and work organization, providing a representation of the dynamics of the workplace and shop floor environment.Practical implications - The proposed model and its factors allow managers to better understand and to improve the organization activities, because it integrates knowledge management with the production organization and work organization components of traditional models.Originality/value - Literature acknowledges the role of knowledge as competitive advantage, but it is still dealt in an implicit way within the traditional models of production management. This paper proposes a model and factors that provide a favorable context for tacit knowledge sharing and results achievement in the production operations shop floor environment. The model explicitly integrates knowledge management with traditional models' components.

The Repairing of Misconceptions through the Use of Inquiry-Based Activities

Misconceptions exist in all fields of learning and develop through a person’s preconception of how the world works. Students with misconceptions in chemical engineering are not capable of correctly transferring knowledge to a new situation and will likely arrive at an incorrect solution. The purpose of this thesis was to repair misconceptions in thermodynamics by using inquiry-based activities. Inquiry-based learning is a method of teaching that involves hands-on learning and self-discovery. Previous work has shown inquiry-based methods result in better conceptual understanding by students relative to traditional lectures. The thermodynamics activities were designed to guide students towards the correct conceptual understanding through observing a preconception fail to hold up through an experiment or simulation. The developed activities focus on the following topics in thermodynamics: “internal energy versus enthalpy”, “equilibrium versus steady state”, and “entropy”. For each topic, two activities were designed to clarify the concept and assure it was properly grasped. Each activity was coupled with an instructions packet containing experimental procedure as well as pre- and post-analysis questions, which were used to analyze the effect of the activities on the students’ responses. Concept inventories were used to monitor students’ conceptual understanding at the beginning and end of the semester. The results did not show a statistically significant increase in the overall concept inventory scores for students who performed the activities compared to traditional learning. There was a statistically significant increase in concept area scores for “internal energy versus enthalpy” and “equilibrium versus steady state”. Although there was not a significant increase in concept inventory scores for “entropy”, written analyses showed most students’ misconceptions were repaired. Students transferred knowledge effectively and retained most of the information in the concept areas of “internal energy versus enthalpy” and “equilibrium versus steady state”.

Identifying the role of natural resources in knowledge-based strategies of development

Knowledge has adopted a preferential role in the explanation of development while the evidence about the effect of natural resources in countries’ performance is more controversial in the economic literature. This paper tries to demonstrate that natural resources may positively affect growth in countries with a strong natural resources specialization pattern although the magnitude of these effects depend on the type of resources and on other aspects related to the production and innovation systems. The positive trajectory described by a set of national economies mainly specialized in natural resources and low-tech industries invites us to analyze what is the combination of factors that serves as engine for a sustainable development process. With panel data for the period 1996-2008 we estimate an applied growth model where both traditional factors and other more related to innovation and absorptive capabilities are taken into account. Our empirical findings show that according to the postulates of a knowledge-based approach, a framework that combines physical and intangible factors is more suitable for the definition of development strategies in those prosperous economies dominated by natural resources and connected activities, while the internationalization process of activities and technologies become also a very relevant aspect.

The knowledge-based perspective of risk management in healthcare organisations

The aim of this research is to investigate how risk management in a healthcare organisation can be supported by knowledge management. The subject of research is the development and management of existing logs called "risk registers", through specific risk management processes employed in a N.H.S. (Foundation) Trust in England, in the U.K. Existing literature on organisational risk management stresses the importance of knowledge for the effective implementation of risk management programmes, claiming that knowledge used to perceive risk is biased by the beliefs of individuals and groups involved in risk management and therefore is considered incomplete. Further, literature on organisational knowledge management presents several definitions and categorisations of knowledge and approaches for knowledge manipulation in the organisational context as a whole. However, there is no specific approach regarding "how to deal" with knowledge in the course of organisational risk management. The research is based on a single case study, on a N.H.S. (Foundation) Trust, is influenced by principles of interpretivism and the frame of mind of Soft Systems Methodology (S.S.M.) to investigate the management of risk registers, from the viewpoint of people involved in the situation. Data revealed that knowledge about risks and about the existing risk management policy and procedures is situated in several locations in the Trust and is neither consolidated nor present where and when required. This study proposes a framework that identifies required knowledge for each of the risk management processes and outlines methods for conversion of this knowledge, based on the SECI knowledge conversion model, and activities to facilitate knowledge conversion so that knowledge is effectively used for the development of risk registers and the monitoring of risks throughout the whole Trust under study. This study has theoretical impact in the management science literature as it addresses the issue of incomplete knowledge raised in the risk management literature using concepts of the knowledge management literature, such as the knowledge conversion model. In essence, the combination of required risk and risk management related knowledge with the required type of communication for risk management creates the proposed methods for the support of each risk management process for the risk registers. Further, the indication of the importance of knowledge in risk management and the presentation of a framework that consolidates knowledge required for the risk management processes and proposes way(s) for the communication of this knowledge within a healthcare organisation have practical impact in the management of healthcare organisations.

Knowledge-Based Urban Development : Planning and Applications in the Information Era

In the globalizing world, knowledge and information (and the social and technological settings for their production and communication) are now seen as keys to economic prosperity. The economy of a knowledge city creates value-added products using research, technology, and brainpower. The social benefit of knowledge-based urban development (KBUD); however, extends beyond aggregate economic growth.

Queensland's Smart State Initiative : a successful knowledge based urban development strategy

The chapter will set out to explain the KBUD and urban policy making processes in Queensland, Australia. This chapter will draw on providing a clear understanding on policy frameworks and relevant ICT applications of the Queensland ‘Smart State’ experience. The chapter is consisted of six sections. The first section following the introduction provides background information. The second section focuses on the KBUD processes in Queensland. The third section offers a comprehensive analysis of the ‘Queensland Smart State’ initiative, and it also identifies actors and goals of the agenda of Smart State experience. The fourth section reviews knowledge based development and ICT applications and policies of the Queensland Smart State and Brisbane Smart City experiences, and their impacts on Brisbane’s successful KBUD. The fifth section discusses knowledge hubs and ICT developments within the Brisbane metropolitan area. Then the chapter concludes with future trends and conclusion sections.

Knowledge-based strategic planning: harnessing (in)tangible assets of city-regions

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to investigate the ways of best managing city-regions’ valuable tangible and intangible assets while pursuing a knowledge-based urban development that is sustainable and competitive. Design/methodology/approach – The paper provides a theoretical framework to conceptualise a new strategic planning mechanism, knowledge-based strategic planning, which has been emerged as a planning mechanism for the knowledge-based urban development of post-industrial city-regions. Originality/value – The paper develops a planning framework entitled 6K1C for knowledge-based strategic planning to be used in the analysis of city-regions’ tangible and intangible assets. Practical implications – The paper discusses the importance of asset mapping of cityregions, and explores the ways of successfully managing city-regions’ tangible/intangible assets to achieve an urban development that is sustainable and knowledge-based. Keywords – Knowledge-based urban development, Knowledge-based strategic planning, Tangible assets, Intangible assets, City-regions. Paper type – Academic Research Paper