178 Ethics in Higher Education: Values-driven Leaders for the Future
- that there is a need for a vigorous and informed, constructive
intercultural and democratic debate on the production and use of
scientific knowledge - that ways must be found to link modern science to the broader
heritage of humankind - that any kind of central monitoring, whether political, ethical, or
economic, needs to take into account the increasingly diverse
actors entering into the social tissue of science (Unesco 2000).
10.6 Confronting the Epistemological Irresponsibility
So what are those emerging propositions and conceptual reversals
that are emerging in the groundswell of an alternative project of
globalization in confronting the epistemological triage?
Here I will outline several new points of departure in rethinking the
future of knowledge, innovation, social justice and human agency within
a new conception of knowledge economy and information society; in
other words, epistemological responsibility.
10.6.1 Knowledge and Innovation
Innovations go beyond the formal systems of innovation done in
universities and industrial research and development laboratories. For
proper development to occur, innovations from below have to be taken
into account and appropriate support at national level accorded
(Mashelkar R.A. 2002).
By innovation from below is meant taking into account the full
participation of all producers of knowledge including in informal
settings of rural areas. Indeed many societies in the developing world
have nurtured and refined systems of knowledge of their own, relating to
such diverse domains as geology, ecology, botany, agriculture,
physiology and health. Within this, the emergence of terms such as
“parallel”, “indigenous” and “civilizational” knowledge systems are also