THE DISCIPLINE OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS: ISSUES AND CHALLENGES

This paper explores challenges of the evolution of the concept of Information Systems (IS) and its implications on IS as a discipline. The concept of IS has come a long way since the first computer applications that automated routine, repetitive tasks, up until todays organisation-wide IS, groupware systems and Internet-based IS that mediate communications. Gradually, IS have penetrated into all organisational processes and all aspects of organisational social life and inter-organisational relationships. As a result IS are coming to be considered as social systems, a component of the much wider domain of human language and social interaction. By addressing this dramatic shift from the first idea of the IS as a technical system to the idea of the IS as a social system, technologically realised, the paper aims to contribute to the understanding of the emergence of the IS discipline

ON METHODS, METHODOLOGIES AND HOW THEY MATTER

The field of Information Systems, it is argued, suffers from identity crisis and faces difficulties in achieving a disciplinary status (Galliers, 2006; Hassan, 2011). The IS research continues to be seen as lacking relevance and impact that negatively affects IS prospects for becoming a discipline. Key charges include the narrow research focus and a rigid application of research methods that constrain investigative possibilities, impede the relevance of IS research and also stifle creativity and the production of relevant knowledge. Given a historical privileging of the positivist research approach and associated methods (survey and experiments in particular) IS research has been slow in adopting other approaches and expanding research methods. While this is gradually happening and IS researchers are seen venturing into non-positivist territories, adopting a broader range of methods (such as ethnographies or action research), the emphasis on research methods and their ‘rigorous’ application remains. After critiquing the narrow focus on methods and drawing attention to limitations of all methods, the paper proposes a broader focus on research methodology that is concerned with the ontological, epistemological, and normative assumptions behind research methods and their inherent limitations. The paper argues for a (re)turn to methodology conceived as a theory of inquiry that is contextually sensitive and evolving within a research project. The return to methodology would involve a continuous interplay between assumptions about the phenomena studied and the practical questions of designing research strategies and selecting and adopting research methods underpinned by the assumptions. The broadening of focus and the questioning of both metatheoretical assumptions and methods might open up researchers’ perspectives and stimulate the discovery of new and innovative ways of conducting research and thereby facilitate progress in the IS field

Ethical Implications of IT-enabled Information Flows Conceived as Intermediaries or Mediators

This paper contributes to a better understanding of ethical concerns regarding the deployment of complex public sector IT systems and the information flows they instigate. The paper aims to reveal how different views on IT and IT-enabled information flows allow us to see differently their social implications and to construe different ethical questions. This is achieved by i) defining two opposing views on IT-enabled information flows as ‘intermediaries’ and ‘mediators’; ii) by analysing the controversial case of My School – a web portal that provides performance data of 9,500 Australian schools – that introduces new information flows in the education sector; and iii) by revealing and explaining how some unintended negative social implications emerge and how the articulation of ethical concerns depends on the view on My School-enabled information flows. The paper concludes with theoretical and practical implications, with particular emphasis on responsibilities of all involved, setting up foundations for an important area of future IS research

IS-Organization Coevolution: The Future of Information Systems

How information systems (IS) affect organizations and enable radical organizational change has been explored from a variety of perspectives. Through a case study in the investment banking industry, we will examine the changing nature of ISñorganization relationships focusing on the crucial role that IS play and will continue to play as organizations strive for competitive advantage in a global economy. By expanding on the organizational emergence theoretical framework of Truex et al. (1999) and drawing on the technology evolution literature, we aim to gain a deeper understanding of the coevolution between an IS and an investment banking company

Pre-Investment Information Systems Assessment: An Actor Network Theory Account

The dominant view in the information systems (IS) and software engineering literature is that the application of a rigorous pre-investment evaluation methodology is the key to ensuring the selection of the best IS projects – that is those with the highest expected value for the organisation and with the highest probability of success. While the literature is replete with methodologies for the evaluation of IS projects, there is insufficient attention given to the evaluation process itself and to what constitutes successful IS evaluation. Whilst some within IS argue that the development of more elaborate evaluation methodologies is necessary for the advancement of the field, many report that it is not methodologies as such that need improvement. What is missing is an understanding of IS evaluation processes in practice and how organisations adopt and apply evaluation methodologies. In this paper we focus on the IS evaluation process in a company with a history of IS successes and examine the ways in which the evaluation process shapes and ensures the selection of the best IS projects. By adopting the Actor Network Theory lens we demonstrate a) that the view of pre-investment IS evaluation in the literature is very narrow, b) that the practice of IS evaluation produces the ‘object’ it evaluates, c) that this object, that is the IS project proposal document, is an inscription device produced by relations in the actor network formed around it, and d) that these networks and relations as well as the translation of actors’ expertise, experiences and interests into the document (inscription device) are critical for IS project proposals evaluation and their chances of success

The notion of lifeworld applied to information systems research

The paper revisits the notion of emancipation in Information System Development (ISD) that seems to have lost a battle against functionalist and managerialist approaches dominant in information system (IS) research and practice. Unlike functionalist and managerialist views, the emancipatory view of ISD, informed by Critical Theory, considers ISD as a site of organizational innovation, self-reflection and a struggle for humanization of work and liberation from different forms of domination. Critics of emancipatory project in IS and management literature question the very possibility of the emancipation and deplore its intellectualism, naivety and negativism. The purpose of this paper is to re-consider the notion of emancipatory ISD in the face of these criticisms and develop a more refined and nuanced view of micro-emancipation in ISD that is meaningful in practice. Informed by Alvesson and Willmott (1992, 1996) we explore, question, redefine and ground the micro-emancipatory ISD processes based on a longitudinal (15 year) study of a retail company. Our analysis and critical reflection demonstrate that micro-emancipatory ISD processes have real substance for the people involved, and that their meanings are neither fixed nor universal, but rather local, emergent, uncertain, and sometimes contradictory. This paper contributes an empirically grounded and practically relevant reconceptualization of micro-emancipatory ISD projects which reveals both its benefits and risks for all involved

IS Serving the Community: The Pragmatic, the Ethical and the Moral Questions

Public sector information systems (IS) may produce unintended negative consequences that are challenging to predict in advance. In this paper we seek to answer the following critical research questions: How does a democratic society identify and deal with ethically and morally problematic effects of public sector IS? What does it mean for public sector IS to be ethically and morally justified? What principles and norms should govern the discourse in a society to ensure resolution (and prevention) of these ethically and morally problematic effects? We answer these questions by providing empirical and theoretical argument, based on our investigation of My School – an Australian Government portal providing performance data about more than 9500 schools. By drawing from Habermas’ discourse ethics we identify problems in the current discourse on My School and propose principles for conducting public discourse to ensure resolution of pragmatic, ethical and moral concerns through a democratic process