ABSTRACT Knowledge has emerged as a fundamental driver of economic growth and development by inter alia improving the effectiveness and efficiency of economic projects and boosting the process of finding new avenues of addressing developmental policy syndromes. Recent evidence suggests that Africa is on the threshold of significant and sustainable economic growth if its human and material resources can be effectively mobilised to support the process (Asongu & Tchamyou, 2019; Kuada & Mensah, 2018). Consequently, the World Bank’s Knowledge Economy Framework aims to explore and support the extent to which current policies in African countries affect the knowledge development process (and thereby competitiveness) on the continent. A knowledge economy is an economy in which economic prosperity largely depends on the accessibility, quality and quantity of information available, instead of the means of production (Asongu, 2017a, 2017b). This themed issue of Contemporary Social Science-‘Building Knowledge Economies in Africa’ – consists of papers that focus on, but are not limited to, the four dimensions of the World Bank’s Knowledge Economy Index. These are: information and communication technology, education, economic incentives and institutional regime, and innovation (Tchamyou, 2017). The themed issue engages with high quality contributions which, taken together, address the drivers towards knowledge-based economies. This introduction provides a context for understanding the importance of building knowledge economies in Africa and summarises the main contributions to the themed issue. The paper ends by advising scholars and policy makers regarding the risks associated with a colonial view of knowledge- notably the importance of proposing knowledge-based policies while avoiding hegemonic paradigms and hierarchical constructs. In summary, the issue consists of a set of theoretically informed, empirically robust, policy-relevant and accessible articles for both specialists and non-specialists.

中文翻译：

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建立非洲知识经济：简介

摘要知识已成为经济增长和发展的基本驱动力，其主要途径是提高经济项目的有效性和效率，并促进寻找解决发展政策综合症新途径的过程。最近的证据表明，如果可以有效地调动其人力和物力来支持这一进程，那么非洲就处于重大且可持续的经济增长的门槛上（Asongu＆Tchamyou，2019; Kuada＆Mensah，2018）。因此，世界银行的《知识经济框架》旨在探索和支持非洲国家当前政策在多大程度上影响该大陆的知识发展进程（进而影响竞争力）。知识经济是经济繁荣在很大程度上取决于可及性的经济，信息的质量和数量，而不是生产资料（Asongu，2017a，2017b）。本期《当代社会科学》主题主题为“非洲的知识经济建设”，其中的论文重点是但不限于世界银行知识经济指数的四个方面。它们是：信息和通信技术，教育，经济激励机制和制度制度以及创新（Tchamyou，2017年）。主题问题涉及高质量的贡献，这些贡献共同解决了知识型经济的驱动因素。简介为理解非洲建立知识经济的重要性提供了背景，并总结了对主题问题的主要贡献。本文最后就与殖民主义知识观相关的风险向学者和政策制定者提供建议，尤其是在提出基于知识的政策的同时避免霸权范式和等级结构的重要性。总而言之，该问题由一组针对专家和非专家的理论上有根据，经验丰富，与政策相关且可访问的文章组成。