Rather than a means of accumulating facts, knowledge can be a tool for mutually beneficial coexistence. Its most important function does not consist of reflecting a supposedly objective truth, modifying our perception of exterior reality, but in becoming the most powerful device with which one can create a democratic shared space with fellow human beings. Because our main collective problems are not, as is often claimed, related to will, indecision or immorality; we should actually consider ourselves to be cognitive failures. A failure whose origin lies in poorly organized knowledge about democratic legitimacy.
This book expounds the theory that knowledge and its associated disciplines (science and innovation policies, political assessment of governments, evaluation of public policies, comprehension of current social transformations and the cognitive competence of regulators) are areas which decide not only economic prosperity but the fundamental quality of democracy.
Policies related to and about knowledge have become matters that concern the democratic citizency in which many different theoretical problems are considered, especially the quality of public space.