Knowledge co-creation at the boundaries of communities of practice (CoPs) can lead to heightened tensions and power struggles. This study examines how power struggles among CoPs can begin to structure knowledge creation processes. Drawing on a qualitative case study of a new medical research project, the study shows how power and knowledge negotiations became manifested through conflicting discursive positioning and coercive power affecting knowledge co-creation efforts. One CoP adopted an authoritative leader role, prioritized their own problem definition and knowledge creation process, and engaged in the peripheralization of other CoPs. The power and discursive moves prevented the development of shared problems and interconnected practices contributing to epistemological suspicion among the participating CoPs. The study offers new insights to research on power dynamics in situated learning and knowing by problematizing the relationship between localized practices and emerging interconnected practices, by shedding light on how discursive positioning and coercive power operate together, and by developing peripheralization and epistemological suspicion as potential explanations for how and why knowledge workers struggle to act on opportunities for knowledge co-creation.

在实践社区 (CoP) 的边界上共同创造知识可能会导致紧张局势和权力斗争加剧。本研究考察了 CoP 之间的权力斗争如何开始构建知识创造过程。该研究借鉴了一项新医学研究项目的定性案例研究，展示了权力和知识谈判如何通过影响知识共创努力的话语定位和强制性权力相互冲突而体现出来​​。一个 CoP 采取权威领导角色，优先考虑自己的问题定义和知识创造过程，并参与其他 CoP 的外围化。权力和话语行动阻止了共同问题和相互关联的实践的发展，从而导致参与的 CoP 之间产生认识论上的怀疑。