TY - JOUR T1 - The uses of knowledge in global health JF - BMJ Global Health JO - BMJ Global Health DO - 10.1136/bmjgh-2021-005802 VL - 6 IS - 4 SP - e005802 AU - Seye Abimbola Y1 - 2021/04/01 UR - http://gh.bmj.com/content/6/4/e005802.abstract N2 - If …the problem of society is mainly one of rapid adaptation to changes in the particular circumstances of time and place… [then] the ultimate decisions must be left to the people who are familiar with these circumstances, who know directly of the relevant changes and of the resources immediately available to meet them. We cannot expect that this problem will be solved by first communicating all this knowledge to a central board which, after integrating all knowledge, issues its orders. We must solve [the problem] by some form of decentralization…But the ‘[people] on the spot’ cannot decide solely on the basis of [their] limited but intimate knowledge of the facts of [their] immediate surroundings. There still remains the problem of communicating to [them] such further information as [they need] to fit [their] decisions into the whole pattern of changes of the larger […] system. How much knowledge [do they] need to do so successfully? Which of the events which happen beyond the horizon of [their] immediate knowledge are of relevance to [their] immediate decision, and how much of them need [they] know?—F. A. Hayek (1899–1992)1Like any academic involved in global health—and especially as a journal editor—I am frequently called on to make judgements on research papers.2 Like anyone reading such papers, I rely on the declared aim, usually at the end of the introduction or background section. The declared aim can reveal whom we imagine we write for (ie, gaze or audience) and the standpoint from which we write (ie, pose or positionality).3 But much too often, it reads like an afterthought, as though it was written in pretence or in tenuous hope, like an item thrown aimlessly into deep space in the hope that it might hit a target called equity. The declared aim of research papers … ER -