Knowledge Management and Czech Self-Governments: Empirical Investigations into the Application of Knowledge Management to Public Administration in the Czech Republic

Abstract

Abstract Although knowledge management has become the subject of an enormous quantity of articles and books in recent times, certain more problematic aspects of it remain neglected. Firstly, literature addressing knowledge management concentrates almost exclusively on business organizations and fails to provide details or recommendations adequate to effective application within the sphere of public administration. This holds especially true for Czech academic literature. Secondly, despite a reasonable number of articles on knowledge management in scientific journals, information about perceptions of knowledge-management activities, procedures and tools within organizations lacks detail. The purpose of this article is to investigate and summarize the activities, procedures and tools in use for dealing with knowledge within Czech self-governments and to discuss the main empirical findings. Although the quantitative survey herein does not provide fully representative data, it is still in a position to indicate that knowledge management in Czech public administration tends to be underdeveloped as well as undervalued.