The second phase of the IS-in-Oz study, reported in this book, has sought to address several constraints and limitations in the first phase. To begin with, it was felt that the potential long-term significance of this first examination of the IS discipline across Australia warranted a more permanent documentation of its findings to complement the medium of the AJIS publication. A main aim of the IS-in-Oz study is to initiate a continuing, longitudinal evaluation of the state of the IS academic discipline in Australia. A book offers an appropriate form to set down an initial long-term reference.
A book format also offered the opportunity to extend the work. A limitation of the first phase of the study was that—from necessity rather than choice—the theory framework continued to evolve in parallel with the progress of the individual research tasks. Hence, there was some variation among first-phase papers in relation to application of the theoretical framework. The second phase of the study allowed the researchers to further analyse the data in terms of the more complete theoretical Ridley framework described in Chapter 3.
Articles in the first phase of the study were subject to the standard length constraint of the AJIS. These constraints are eased by describing the research outcomes in a book. A feature of the case studies reported in this volume is the addition of vignettes from selected, significant people in the development of the IS discipline. In the second phase of the IS-in-Oz study, it was decided that the history of the progress of IS in the Australian states could be honoured through brief vignettes of a sample of the men and women who had made major contributions to the advancement of IS in those states.
The first phase of the IS-in-Oz study did not extend to a consolidated analysis across the individual completed sub-studies. In phase two, a group of researchers undertook to examine the individual revised studies, with a view to arriving at an Australia-wide perspective. This analysis sought to evaluate collectively the data from the individual states in relation to the revised Ridley framework. The consolidated analysis also sought to highlight more striking Australian characteristics that emerged from the data but that could not be applied readily to the a priori theoretical framework.
This chapter presents the contextual framework for the study described in this book. As such, it provides an overview to put the following chapters in perspective. The chapter examines the place of the IS-in-Oz study as a pilot and subset of a wider study. It reviews the overall design of the study and the role of the component studies described in individual chapters of this book. Finally, it provides the reader with some understanding of the main focus of each of the sub-studies described in the following chapters.
This Australian study was derived from a broader study of the state of the IS academic discipline in Pacific-Asia (‘IS-in-PA’), the results of which have been published in a special issue of Communications of the AIS (CAIS). Note that the Association for Information Systems (AIS)—the main international association of IS academics, and sponsor of the IS-in-PA study—organises its activities around three world regions: 1) the Americas; 2) Europe, Africa and the Middle East; and 3) Pacific-Asia. Figure 1.1 depicts the main components of the ‘parent’ IS-in-PA study. The Pacific-Asia study (and its component Australian study) is motivated by a recognition that IS as an academic discipline has evolved differentially around the world. For example, there is regional variation in the strength of its presence as an academic discipline; it could take on identifiably different local forms—for example, from a soft-systems emphasis to a more technical focus; there could be regional differences in topics taught and researched (as was observed across Europe by Avgerou et al. 1999).
The IS-in-PA study includes nine main study components (see Figure 1.1), the principal of which is a multiple case study across six states of the Pacific-Asia (PA) region. It was decided early on to restrict the first iteration of the IS-in-PA study to those areas in the region where IS is relatively more visible internationally—Australia, Hong Kong (China), Korea, New Zealand, Singapore and Taiwan—the intent being in future to extend the study incrementally to other parts of the region (the study is currently being extended to Mainland China, with study initiation also in place in Japan, India, Malaysia, Pakistan and Thailand, for which tentative state study team leaders have been identified). Table 1.1 lists the main IS-in-PA study leaders.
|
State |
Study leader |
|---|---|
|
Australia |
Professor Guy G. Gable, Queensland University of Technology |
|
Hong Kong (China) |
Professor Patrick Chau, University of Hong Kong |
|
Korea |
Professor Jae-Nam Lee, Korea University |
|
New Zealand |
Professor Sid Huff, Victoria University of Wellington |
|
Singapore |
Professor Bernard Tan, National University of Singapore |
|
Taiwan |
Professor T. P. Liang, National Sun Yat-Sen University |
The IS-in-PA and the IS-in-Oz studies have, from the outset, been designed and executed with the expectation that they will be extended and repeated over time. Shaded ovals in Figure 1.1 represent those components that were completed in the first execution, with the detailed Australian results reported in a special issue of AJIS. Unshaded ovals represent components that are in progress—for example, Mainland China Case Study, IS Research Issues Delphi Study—and dashed ovals represent planned components soon to begin (note that further study components are expected to evolve).
A meeting of a subgroup of the IS-in-PA study team in Auckland in January 2004 (Gable, Huff and Felix Tan, Auckland University of Technology, who was then the elected AIS Region 3 Council Representative) resulted in a proposal to conduct a multiple-case study of the Australian states—the IS-in-Oz study. Table 1.2 lists the main IS-in-Oz study team members. The components of the IS-in-Oz study are shown in Figure 1.2. Shaded ovals represent those components that were reported in the special issue of AJIS. Unshaded ovals represent components that were in progress at the time of the AJIS special issue. Initial findings of the IS Research Issues Delphi Study have since been reported elsewhere. Preliminary results of the Australasian Conference on Information Systems (ACIS) Archival Analysis are now available and are included later in this chapter rather than reported as a separate chapter.
The IS Research Issues Delphi Study—represented as an unshaded oval in Figure 1.1 and again in Figure 1.2—is an international study of the key issues facing IS researchers. The first round of this study resulted in 266 responses, articulating a total of 1241 issues. Analysis of these issues resulted in a comparatively succinct set of 56 issue statements being synthesised for presentation to IS researchers in the second round of the study. The second round of the study in March 2005 yielded more than 800 responses. Various results from this sub-study, although not reported in this book, have been presented at several workshops in Australia, Hong Kong and Shanghai, and as keynotes at the AIS SIG IS in Asia Pacific (ISAP) of ICIS 2005, and at the Information Systems and Management track (ISM ’07) of the IEEE WiCOM 2007 conference in Shanghai (Gable, Stark and Smyth 2007).
|
Home state |
Team member |
|---|---|
|
Queensland |
Professor Guy G. Gable, Queensland University of Technology |
|
Dr Robert Smyth, Queensland University of Technology |
|
|
Australian Capital Territory |
Dr Roger Clarke, Principal, Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd; Visiting Professor, The Australian National University |
|
Professor Shirley Gregor, The Australian National University |
|
|
Professor Ed Lewis, Australian Defence Force Academy, University of New South Wales |
|
|
Associate Professor Craig McDonald, University of Canberra |
|
|
New South Wales |
Professor Ernest Jordan, Macquarie University |
|
Dr Jim Underwood, University of Technology, Sydney |
|
|
Associate Professor David Wilson, University of Technology, Sydney |
|
|
South Australia |
Professor Andy Koronios, University of South Australia |
|
Associate Professor Mike Metcalfe, University of South Australia |
|
|
Professor Paula Swatman, University of South Australia |
|
|
Tasmania |
Dr Gail Ridley, University of Tasmania |
|
Victoria |
Dr Elsie Chan, Australian Catholic University |
|
Associate Professor Carol Pollard, Appalachian State University |
|
|
Professor Graeme Shanks, Monash University |
|
|
Western Australia |
Professor Janice Burn, Edith Cowan University |
|
Dr Chad Lin, Curtin University of Technology |
|
|
Professor Graham Pervan, Curtin University of Technology |
|
|
Professor Craig Standing, Edith Cowan University |
There are 12 shaded ovals in Figure 1.2, corresponding with the 12 completed IS-in-Oz sub-studies reported in the December 2006 special edition of the AJIS. These include three conceptual papers (‘The contextual framework’, ‘The history’ and ‘The theory base’) and nine empirical papers (seven state case studies, a research survey and a ‘contradictions’ piece).
Phase one of the IS-in-Oz study sought to draw on and complement other studies of the state of the IS discipline, notably those of Avgerou et al. (1999) in Europe, and Pervan and Shanks (2004) in Australia. The phase one IS-in-Oz study—being exploratory and descriptive, and to some extent a pilot—did not begin from a highly specific theory base. The Ridley (2006a) theory base evolved throughout the study, largely in parallel with and somewhat influenced by the study.
A key study aim was to evolve and apply (and ‘test’) a process of evidence collection and review, for future extension and possible replication within the region and across other world regions. This was to some extent addressing past concerns expressed—for example, by Phillip Ein-dor (Gable 2002)—about the lack of a methodology and indicators for tracking diffusion of the IS discipline. It was posited that the establishment of measures and indicators of the state of IS, and a baseline snapshot of its current state, would facilitate tracking of the state and monitoring the effect of initiatives to promote IS as a discipline. While emphasis here is on Australia, many of the ideas, mechanisms and aims are generalisable to all AIS regions. Thus, one overarching aim of the study is to contribute to a general methodology with which to describe and monitor the evolving state of the IS discipline in any region or country. Other more specific study aims included:
-
to begin documenting characteristics of IS programs across universities in Australia
-
to begin documenting characteristics of IS research across universities in Australia
-
to begin assessing the strength of the IS presence in Australian universities
-
to evaluate the maturity of IS as an academic discipline in Australia (as per the theory base)
-
to identify emerging trends in IS in Australian universities
-
to identify the main influences on IS in Australian universities.
Study questions and the units of analysis (sometimes the university; sometimes the state) evolved over time—along with the study design—with varying emphasis across the sub-studies.
Broad study questions implicit in the final case study protocol include:
-
what is the relative size of the IS presence at the university
-
what is the administrative placement of IS (including changes over time)
-
to what extent has IS at the university been impacted on by local contingencies
-
to what extent is IS identified as a separate field at the university
-
what are the distinctive features of the IS curriculum at the university
-
what are the distinctive features of IS research at the university
-
who are the key people who have had an impact on IS in universities in the state?
The protocol includes a long list of more specific questions, based on each of these broad questions. The state teams varied in their reliance on the protocol.
Questions posed to intrastate reviewers of the state reports included:
-
what do you believe to be the main challenges facing the IS academic discipline in your state today?
-
what do you believe to be the main opportunities facing the IS academic discipline in your state today?
The next section briefly reviews literature on past studies of the IS discipline and relevant theory. The subsequent section summarises the overall study approach, with emphasis on repeatability—a key study aim. Overall study outcomes are then related. The final section describes study limitations and potential further research.