Exponential Knowledge, Narrowing Worlds: Justice in an Unequal Global Order, by Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

Exponential Knowledge, Narrowing Worlds: Justice in an Unequal Global Order

By

Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

April 28, 2026

Scholars who study the growth of knowledge have consistently found that it expands at an exponential rate. The foundational figure in this field is Derek J. de Solla Price, whose landmark book Little Science, Big Science demonstrated that scientific publications, journals, and research communities have historically doubled approximately every 10 to 15 years in the modern era (Price, 1963). 

Author: Derek J. de Solla Price

Price showed that science does not grow linearly but compounds: each generation of researchers builds upon an expanding archive of prior work, producing accelerating output. Subsequent bibliometric research has confirmed sustained exponential growth in scientific publishing, particularly in the post–World War II period and into the digital age (e.g., Bornmann & Mutz, 2015).

However, when viewed through the lens of epistemic coloniality, this exponential growth appears far less neutral. Knowledge does not reproduce itself evenly across the globe. The infrastructure that enables exponential growth—research universities, funding systems, indexed journals, citation databases, and English-language dominance—is heavily concentrated in the Global North. 

What counts as “knowledge” in these measurements is typically what is published in recognized scientific outlets and indexed in dominant databases. Thus, exponential growth reflects not only intellectual vitality but also geopolitical concentration.

Decolonial thinkers such as Walter D. Mignolo and Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni argue that modern knowledge production has long been structured by colonial matrices of power (Mignolo, 2011; Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2018). The metrics used to measure growth—journal counts, citation indexes, and impact factors—privilege Euro-American institutions and epistemologies. 

Meanwhile, knowledge traditions rooted in Indigenous, African, and other marginalized cosmologies often circulate outside these measurable systems or are incorporated only through translation into Western disciplinary frameworks.

In this sense, the exponential reproduction of knowledge can also entail the exponential reproduction of hierarchy. As global publication output accelerates, so too can the consolidation of epistemic authority in already dominant regions and languages. 

The growth curve identified by Price (1963) remains empirically compelling. Yet when situated within analyses of coloniality, it becomes clear that expansion does not automatically translate into epistemic plurality. Instead, it may intensify asymmetries of recognition, visibility, and institutional power.

References

Bornmann, L., & Mutz, R. (2015). Growth rates of modern science: A bibliometric analysis based on the number of publications and cited references. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 66(11), 2215–2222. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.23329

Mignolo, W. D. (2011). The darker side of Western modernity: Global futures, decolonial options. Duke University Press.

Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J. (2018). Epistemic freedom in Africa: Deprovincialization and decolonization. Routledge.

Price, D. J. de S. (1963). Little science, big science. Columbia University Press.