A Realist Social Theory of Information Systems

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Rose, Jones and Truex (2005) (RST) call for a re-examination of the relationship between the IT artefact and the organization. This paper responds to that call. It first recognizes that existing approaches such as structuration theory (ST) and actor-network theory (ANT) have difficulties accommodating information systems within organizations and thus create issues in analyzing the relationship between agencies and information systems. To address these deficiencies, this paper suggests that the realist Morphogenetic Social Theory (MST) be adopted. The paper summarizes Rose, Jones and Truex (2005), highlights issues with ST and ANT, then gives an introduction to MST. Then, it extends MST by adding a typology of technological artefacts and placing them within MST. Finally, the paper shows how MST explains information system development and implementation activities. 
Original languageAmerican English
JournalAmericas Conference on Information Systems Proceedings
StatePublished - 2007

Keywords

  • Actor-Network Theory
  • Morphogenetic Social Theory
  • Structuration Theory
  • structure-agency controversy

DC Disciplines

  • Business
  • Technology and Innovation

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