Understanding the Why, What, and How of Theories in IS Research

Researchers have emphasized theory’s pivotal importance in the information systems (IS) discipline since its inception. As in many science disciplines, IS scholars’ ability to understand and contribute to theory is an important qualification in research practice. As a discipline, we require solid foundations for why we engage with theory, what theory is for us, and how we work with theory. We synthesize and reflect on the debates on theories and theorizing in the IS discipline. In doing so, we inform (particularly new) authors about the current state of the IS discipline’s debate on theory and theorizing and help them identify opportunities in theorizing to put theory to work. We do not intend to advocate or cement that status quo we portray but rather, through informing the community about it, to support early efforts to further develop and move beyond the current state of the debate on theory and theorizing in IS research

Towards a Framework for Structuring Theory in IS Research

In the past, IS research has been criticized for its inability to build a cumulative tradition of IS-specific theory. We suggest that the difficulty in structuring theoretical contributions in IS is one facet of that problem. This has led to a situation in which a lot of theory generation in IS is not made apparent as such. Based on a conceptual review on theory, we design a framework to structure theoretical contributions in IS. Applying our framework, we show that IS research does offer a broad basis of early, substantive theories and even some more comprehensive theoretical accounts specific to our discipline that IS scholars could build on in a cumulative tradition. We use the context of theory generation in and for IS based on the Grounded Theory approach. In doing so, we hope to enable a more structured discourse on the current state of theory generation in IS