Manufacturing and consuming knowledge: african libraries and publishing

The article examines the problems facing African scholars and publishers, in the context of rapid developments in information technology and a deepening economic gulf between industrialised and Third World countries. Many of these problems, and conventional responses to them from libraries, publishers, and donors, are themselves a legacy of colonial relations; the most significant of which is the deepening dependence on western forms of knowledge and systems for its validation. Questioning the terms `information-rich' and `information-poor', the author stresses the need for Africans to develop the means to generate, value, and disseminate their own forms of knowledge.