It is now widely recognized that the effective management of knowledge assets is a key requirement for securing competitive advantage in the emerging information economy. Yet the physical and institutional differences between tangible assets and knowledge assets remain poorly understood. In the case of knowledge, the ownership and control of assets are becoming ever more separate, a phenomenon that is actually exacerbated by the phenomenon of learning. If we are to meet the challenges of the information economy, then we need a new approach to property rights based on a deeper theoretical understanding of knowledge assets. Max Boisot writes clearly and in accessible language providing some of the key building blocks which are needed for a theory of knowledge assets. He develops a powerful conceptual framework, the Information-Space or I-Space, for exploring the way knowledge flows within and between organizations. This framework will enable managers and students to explore and understand how knowledge and information assets differ from physical assets, and how to deal with them at a strategic level within their organizations.

馬剋斯・H・博伊索特：巴塞羅那ESADE商學院的戰略管理教授。他還曾擔任賓夕法尼亞大學沃頓商學院索爾・斯耐德企業傢研究中心的研究員、劍橋大學賈奇管理研究所的高級研究員和倫敦大學帝國理工學院管理研究生院的客座研究員。他是世界銀行和聯閤國開發計劃署等國際機構和一些歐洲大企業的顧問，還曾在北京主持和指導瞭中國第一個MBA課程即中國一歐共體管理項目達五年之久。他著有《信息與組織：作為人類學者的管理者》（1987）、《信息空間：認識組織、製度和文化的一種學習框架》（1995）等著作。