Tacit knowledge and the economic geography of context, or The undefinable tacitness of being (there)
批判分析经济地理学中隐性知识的主流观点，指出其忽视社会语境和制度基础，并基于卡尔·波兰尼的思想提出更全面的分析框架，对研究知识地理和创新政策的学者有参考价值。
Within economic geography and industrial economics, interest in the concept of tacit knowledge has grown steadily in recent years. Nelson and Winter helped revive this interest in the work of Michael Polanyi by using the idea of tacit knowledge to inform their analysis of routines and evolutionary dynamics of technological change. More recently, the concept has received closer scrutiny. This paper offers a further contribution to this project by offering a critical analysis of the prevailing implicit and explicit economic geographies of tacit knowledge, focusing on the relationship between tacit knowledge and institutions. While much of the innovation literature focuses on a single question – can tacit knowledge be effectively shared over long distances – the paper argues that this issue cannot be properly addressed without considering a broader range of related questions. It highlights three tacit knowledge problems which, together, provide a more complete view of this issue. First, how is tacit knowledge produced? Second, how do firms find and appropriate tacit knowledge? Third, how is tacit knowledge reproduced or shared – that is, how does tacit knowledge promote social learning processes, and must the participants be geographically proximate in order for effective learning to occur? The paper revisits Michael Polanyi's original conception of tacit knowledge, showing it to be limited by its experiential and cognitive emphasis, with insufficient attention devoted to the role and origins of social context. Alternatively, the paper argues that one cannot sort out the geography of tacit knowledge without inquiring into the foundations of context and culture, and the institutional underpinnings of economic activity, taking the work of another Polanyi – Karl – as the logical starting point.