This article analyzes learning in context through the prism of a sustainable dairy-farming project. The research was performed within a nutrient management project that involved the participation of farmers and scientists. Differences between heterogeneous forms of farmers’ knowledge and scientific knowledge were discursively constructed during conflict and subsequent alignment over the validity and relevance of knowledge. Both conflict and alignment appeared to be essential for learning in context. Conflict spurred learning when disagreeing groups of actors developed their knowledge in order (...) to strengthen their arguments. Conflict caused self-referentiality when the actors no longer listened to each other. This inhibited self-reflection, thus blocking ongoing learning. Nevertheless, after a period of alignment, scientific models and knowledge of farmers were reevaluated and recontextualized. Through determining how to use scientific models and farmers’ knowledge for further learning, aimed at a shared goal, the participating actors also learned how to learn. (shrink)

The nature and impact of authority have been central to social theory since antiquity, and most students of politics, culture and organizations have – in one manner or another – visited the topic. Theorists recognize that the exercise of authority is conditioned by the environment, but their work has not always integrated fundamental changes in communication infrastructure, and in particular the diffusion of mass media. With the daily evolution of telecommunications, this is a good historical moment to re-evaluate the notion (...) of authority. My goal is to assess ways to both preserve extraordinarily useful categories from the past, and at the same time, make those typologies more sensitive to contemporary mediated communication. Here I synthesize American research on media and political communication with recent theoretical approaches to authority, expanding current views of coercion and submission. (shrink)

This article analyzes learning in context through the prism of a sustainable dairy-farming project. The research was performed within a nutrient management project that involved the participation of farmers and scientists. Differences between heterogeneous forms of farmers’ knowledge and scientific knowledge were discursively constructed during conflict and subsequent alignment over the validity and relevance of knowledge. Both conflict and alignment appeared to be essential for learning in context. Conflict spurred learning when disagreeing groups of actors developed their knowledge in order (...) to strengthen their arguments. Conflict caused self-referentiality when the actors no longer listened to each other. This inhibited self-reflection, thus blocking ongoing learning. Nevertheless, after a period of alignment, scientific models and knowledge of farmers were reevaluated and recontextualized. Through determining how to use scientific models and farmers’ knowledge for further learning, aimed at a shared goal, the participating actors also learned how to learn. (shrink)