From information islands to a knowledge society The case of Egypt

Men by nature desire knowledge as claimed by Aristotle (384-322 BC). Whereas at one time the decisive factor of production was land, and later became capital; today the decisive factor is increasingly people themselves, human resources and the amount of information flow that they absorb and use in their daily interactions both business and personal; that is, their knowledge. Today, the world is living in the information age, where products, services and organizations rely on information, information management, communication and information technology tools and techniques. Consequently, developed and industrialized nations are using their intangible assets better and faster, which enable them not only to realize a significant competitive advantage but also to achieve sustainability and continuous development and growth. The key to that achievement is the ability to capitalize on information in various developmental objectives. Information and knowledge are nowadays the drivers in the global society, much more than land, capital or labor. The capacity to manage knowledge-based intellect is the critical skill of this era (Quinn, 1992). The wealth-creating capacity of the enterprise will be based on the knowledge and capabilities of its people (Savage, 1990). Nations that are thriving in the new strategic environment see themselves as learning nations pursuing the mission of continuous improvement in their knowledge assets both in tangible and intangible forms (Senge, 1990). Moreover, knowledge and information are possible venues for increasing benefits and returns as opposed to decreasing rewards from traditional and tangible resources, which renders them more attractive to nations than before. The ability to have a good base of knowledge means that a firm can in future years start leveraging that base to create further knowledge; thus, increasing its advantage over its competitors (Arthur, 1996). The paper tackles the importance of knowledge as a strategic asset for nations, especially developing nations, those who lack resources and have a good base of human capital as sources of knowledge both explicitly and implicitly. The paper covers Egypt as a case, which has a potential to build its knowledge-based society capitalizing on its human resources "humanware". However, to realize that objective, a conceptual framework needs to be developed to enable Egypt to frog-leap to such promising land.