INTRODUCTION TO INFORMATION

SYSTEMS – THEORIES 1

Silvia Masiero
University of Oslo, Department of Informatics
silvima@ifi.uio.no

25 August 2021
IN5210 – Information Systems
Overview

 Introductions
 IS: what sort of science is it?
 IS: main research themes
 IS: theoretical perspectives
 Ongoing debates!
 Who am I?

 Dr Silvia Masiero

 Research interests: information & communication

technology for development (ICT4D), ICT use for
emergency management, digital platforms for
socio-economic development

 Email: silvima@ifi.uio.no
Information Systems (IS):
What sort of science is it?
Information Systems
(from Avgerou, 2000)

 The academic field of Information Systems (IS) is

concerned with a large range of questions regarding the
development, use and implications of information and
communication technologies (ICTs) in organisations.

 Substantial evolution of the field over time!

But…

 Issue-oriented rather than theory-driven – defined by

its objects of interest rather that its theories

 As a result, the field of IS is not always well

understood by academics and professionals in other
fields, even in fields related to IS, such as Operational
Research, Management, or Psychology.

 Therefore, we will introduce the field through a brief

history, its core objects of interest, and the
theoretical approaches that prevail in it.
The IS field
(from Avgerou, 2000)
 The IS field has its origins in the applied computer
science studies of the 1960s, aimed at systematising the
design of data processing applications in organisations.

 Origins: in 1972, the American Computer Society (ACM)

published a curriculum for a two-year Masters degree on
computing in a business context. In 1974, the
International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP)
built a curriculum on design of computer based
information systems.

 Other landmarks: two major research journals (MIS

Quarterly 1977, Information Systems Research 1987), 1st
International Conference on Information Systems (1980)
…IS today!
(from Sørensen, 2016)

 From the mainframe to platforms: an evolving range of topics

 Geographical focus expanded (from North America to Europe
and – increasingly - Asia, Latin America and Africa)
 …what sort of science is it?
 «Social study of technology» (Land & Hirschheim, 1987)

 The field has broadened in scope, to study the efforts

organisations make to respond to the challenge of
continuous innovation in ICTs. (Avgerou, 2000)

 How did employees respond to the introduction of

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)?
 What organisational power shifts does a new Decision
Support System (DSS) imply?
 How does a digital health platform affect a government’s
ability to address the needs of vulnerable users?

…all these are IS questions!

So…

 …not the technology alone, but its participation to, and

impact on, organisations and society, is the centre of
attention in IS research.

 What thematic areas does IS engage?

IS: Research Objects
IS Research Objects
(from Avgerou, 2000)

Five main thematic areas of IS research:

 Applications of IT to support organisational functioning
 The process of systems development
 Information systems management
 The organisational value of information systems
 The societal impact of information systems
Theme 1: Applications of IT to Support
Organisational Functioning

 In the early 1970s, data processing applications for

"commercial organisations" emerged as a distinct area
of computing. Over time these have included database
technology, decision support systems (DSS), expert
systems, electronic data interchange (EDI), multimedia
systems, enterprise resource planning (ERP).

 Main question: how to combine technical components

to form a useful application?
Theme 2: The Process of Systems
Development
Focus: methodical practices
for developing reliable and
effective systems in cost-
efficient, beneficial ways

Tension between an
engineering and a social
intervention perspective

Today: studies of systems

development in the context
of global infrastructures
(Sørensen, 2016)
Theme 3: Information Systems
Management
 In the days of the mainframe a centralised
department (usually EDP, from Electronic Data
Processing) was the ‘natural’ way to organise
expertise and control investment

 The diffusion of ever more powerful computing and

software packages raised questions on diverse ways of
managing IS, regarding especially: (a) centralised vs.
decentralised architectures; (b) intra-organisational
power distributions in IS management

 These concerns are alive and well for present-day

objects of IS research! (e.g. platform architectures)
Theme 4: The Organisational Value of
Information Systems

 Over time, organisations became aware of the

significance of effects of a non-straightforward
economic nature, such as organisational structure
or the morale of the employees who have to cope
with new information procedures.

 To whom is the technology beneficial?

 For example: which new information flows has

email enabled? What about employees whose
working practices have been disrupted by the
introduction of new systems, such as ERP?
Theme 5: The Societal Impact of
Information Systems

 Explores impacts of ICTs

beyond the organisation, and
on society at large – including
contexts of human and
economic vulnerability (ICT
for Development – ICT4D)

 For example: which impacts

does a digital health platform
have on healthcare systems in
developing nations? How is
such a platform governed?
To recap…

Five main thematic areas of IS research:

 Applications of IT to support organisational functioning
 The process of systems development
 Information systems management
 The organisational value of information systems
 The societal impact of information systems

…all characterised by evolving research objects!

IS: Theoretical Underpinnings
What’s a Theory?

Theoretical
Epistemology Methodology Methods
perspective

Structuring elements of social research

(Crotty, 1998)
Structuring Elements of Social
Research (Crotty, 1998)
 Epistemology: our assumptions about knowledge and how
it can be obtained

 Theoretical perspective: the philosophical stance

informing the methodology and providing context for
the process and grounding its logic and criteria

 Methodology: the plan of action, process or design lying

behind the choice and use of particular methods

 Methods: the techniques or procedures used to gather

and analyse data
IS Theoretical Perspectives
(from Avgerou, 2000)
Multiple theoretical perspectives in IS research – an issue-
oriented field, whose diversity of theoretical visions
increased through the 1980s and 1990s

Four perspectives can be seen as dominant:

 Systems theory
 Organisational rationalism
 Structuration theory
 Critical theory
Systems Theory

 Systems theory is a perspective that addresses issues of

interrelations within a ‘whole’: the ‘whole’ of interest is
the organisation, considered as ‘purposeful system’

 Challenges the principles of classical science to break

down problems into as many separate parts as possible,
trying to discover one-way causality between them

 For example: Ackoff (1971) on the relationship between

a systems and its parts, and its implications for the study
of modern organisations
Organisational Rationalism
 A perspective centred on identification of the principles
of deploying the resources of organisations in order to
survive and excel in the market economy

 “With its origins in the work of Max Weber, Taylor and

Fayol, organisational rationalism emerged as the theory
committed to improving organisational efficiency. It is a
rather mixed bag of general approaches to social
phenomena in organisations and specialised research
fields, such as decision making theory, management
theory, administration science, industrial and
organisational psychology.” (Avgerou, 2000)

 For example: Keen (1981) on decision support systems as

means to increasing managerial productivity
Structuration Theory
 The socio-technical tradition of IS research and
practice has maintained the complementarity between
technology and the social context

 Structuration theory reinforces this position: uses

concepts of structure and agency to theorise the
relation between the technical and the social

 For example: Orlikowski (1992) proposes a view of

“duality of technology” that balances its organisational
properties (structure) with its human aspects (agency)
Critical Theory

 Critical research combines the different, but interlinked

purposes of theorisation and transformation of a status
quo characterised by socially oppressive conditions.

 Its theoretical intent is that of generating social critique,

where “the restrictive and alienating conditions of the
status quo are brought to light” (Myers, 1997)

 For example: Trauth & Howcroft (2006) critical theory

study of women in the US IT industry - engages under-
representation of women in the industry (theorisation)
and interventions to increase it (transformation)
Ongoing Debates!
(An introduction…)

 Transcending the mainframe heritage (Sørensen, 2016):

digitalisation leading to new object of interest in IS

 New theoretical approaches: from the four-pronged

paradigm (Avgerou, 2000) to the emergence of localised
approaches and indigenous theories

 Thematic & geographic boundaries of the IS field: (how)

have these evolved over time?
To Recap…

 We have introduced the field of Information Systems (IS)

as centred on the participation of information and
communication technology to, and impact on,
organisations and society

 We have discussed five main thematic areas of interest

in IS research, and four main theoretical perspectives on
which IS research is based

 This equips us to deal with the methodologies and

methods of IS research!
THANK YOU!