Advancing Information Systems Theories Rationale and Processes

The information systems (IS) field represents a multidisciplinary area that links the rapidly changing technology of information (or communications and information technology, ICT) to the business and social environment. Despite the potential that the IS field has to develop its own native theories to address current issues involving ICT it has consistently borrowed theories from its “reference disciplines,” often uncritically, to legitimize its research. This volume is the first of a series intended to advance IS research beyond this form of borrowed legitimization and derivative research towards fresh and original research that naturally comes from its own theories. It is inconceivable for a field so relevant to the era of the hyper-connected society, disruptive technologies, big data, social media, "fake news" and the weaponization of information to not be brimming with its own theories.

The first step in reaching the goal of developing native IS theories is to reachan agreement on the need for theory (its rationale) and its role as the most distinctive product of human intellectual activity. This volume addresses what theories are, why bother with theories and the process of theorizing itself because the process of developing theories cannot be divorced from the product of that process. It will lay out a research agenda for decades to come and will be invaluable reading for any academic in the IS field and related disciplines concerned with information, systems, technology and their management.

1: Why Theories? (Mis)Understanding the Context and Rationale.- 2:  Theoretical, Empirical and Artefactual Contributions in Information Systems Research: Implications Implied.- 3:  Theoretical Diversity in IS Research: A Causal Structure Framework.-4:  Theory Building is Neither Art nor a Science. It is a Craft.- 5:  The Process of Information Systems Theorizing as A Discursive Practice.- 6:  Theorizing Digital Experience: Four Aspects of the Infomaterial.- 7:  Design Science Theorizing: The Contribution of Practical Theory.- 8:  Pathways To IT-Rich Recontextualised Modifying of Borrowed Theories: Illustrations from IS Strategy.- 9:  Pluralist Theory Building: A Methodology for Generalizing from Data to Theory.- 10: Revitalizing Thoughts on Theory, Theorizing, and Philosophizing in Information Systems.- 11: Reviving the Individual in InformationSystems Theorizing.