Abstract
Three perspectives have dominated research on IT adoption, implementation, use, and impacts: technological determinism, organizational imperatives, and the emergent perspective. While the last is most realistic in its assumptions, it falls short in two respects. First, structuration theory, which has served as the underpinning for most research based on this perspective, while acknowledging the potentially constraining effects of structure, presumes that all agency is equally unconstrained within a set of structures. Given this presumption, a second shortfall of the emergent perspective is that it fails to shed light on the systematic manner in which agency is constrained.
In this paper, we first consider the advantages of field theory in augmenting our current understanding of IT in organizations. We then identify three specific organizational fields that may be useful in modeling the disparate constraints on entities’ agency vis-à-vis IT. The first is the production field, which encompasses organizations’ core or primary business processes. The second is the coordination field, comprised of organizations’ activities at the interface of various core activities as well as supportive activities and internal relationship management, The third is the field of co-opetition, i.e., the arena of organizations’ management of its relationships with external entities.
Chapter PDF
Keywords
References
Adler, P. (1995) “Interdepartmental Interdependence and Coordination: The Case of the Design/Manufacturing Interface.” Organization Science, 6(2), 147–167.
Albert, S. and D.A. Whetten (1985) “Organizational Identity.” In L.L. Cummings and B.M. Staw (eds.), Research in Organizational Behavior, 7, 263–295, Greenwich, CT: JAI Press.
Bloomfield, B.P. and T. Vurdubakis (1994) “Re-presenting Technology: IT Consultancy Reports as Textual Reality Constructions.” Sociology, 28(2), 455–477.
Boltanski, L. and L. Thevenot (1987) “Judgment in a Multi-Natured Universe: The Problem of Agreement in a Complex Society.” Symposium on Political Communication: Foundations and New Approaches, Paris, May 14–15.
Bourdieu, P. (1980) The Logic of Practice. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Bourdieu, P. (1983) “The Forms of Capital.” In J.G. Richardson (ed.) Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, NY: Greenwood Press, 241–258.
Bourdieu, P. (1984) Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Bourdieu, P. (1988) “Flaubert’s Point of View.” Critical Inquiry, 14, 539–562.
Bourdieu, P. and L.J.D. Wacquant (1992) An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Brandenburger, A.M. and B.J. Nalebuff (1996) “Co-opetition.” New York, NY: Currency Doubleday.
Brown, A.D. and K. Starkey, 2000 “Organizational Identity and Learning: A Psychodynamic Perspective.” Academy of Management Review, 25(1), 102–120.
Brynjolfsson, E., T.W. Malone, V. Gurbaxani, and A. Kambil (1994) “Does Information Technology Lead to Smaller Firms?” Management Science, 40(12), 1628–1644.
Churchman, C.W. (1971) The Design of Inquiring Systems: Basic Concepts of Systems and Organization. New York, NY: Basic Books, Inc.
Ciborra, C.U. (1996) “The Platform Organization: Recombining Strategies, Structures, and Surprises.” Organization Science, 7(2), 103–118.
Ciborra, C.U. (1993) Teams, Markets, and Systems: Business Innovation and Information Technology, Cambridge University Press.
Crowston, K. (1997) “A Coordination Theory Approach to Organizational Process Design.” Organization Science, 157–175.
Dedrick, J. and J. West (2003) “Why Firms Adopt Platform Standards: A Grounded Theory of Open Source Platforms.” MISQ Special Issue Workshop on Standards, WA: Seattle.
DeSanctis, G. and M.S. Poole (1994) “Capturing the Complexity in Advanced Technology Use: Adaptive Structuration Theory.” Organization Science, 5(2), 121–147.
DiMaggio, P.J. and W.W. Powell (1983) “The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields.” American Sociological Review, 48, 147–160.
Dosi, G., R.R. Nelson, and S.G. Winter (2002) The Nature and Dynamics of Organizational Capabilities. Oxford University Press.
Dos Santos, B.L. and K. Peffers (1995) “Rewards to Investors in Innovative Information Technology Applications: First Movers and Early Followers in ATMs.” Organization Science, 6(3), 241–259.
Dos Santos, B.L., K. Peffers, and D.C. Mauer (1993) “The Impact of Information Technology Investment Announcements on the Market Value of the Firm.” Information Systems Research, 4(1), 1–23.
Feldman, M.S. and B. Pentland (2003) “Reconceptualizing Organizational Routines as a Source of Flexibility and Change.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 48(1), 94–118.
Ferguson, P.P. (1998) “A Cultural Field in the Making: Gastronomy in 19th-Century France.” American Journal of Sociology, 104(3), 597–641.
Garvin, D.A. (1995) “Leveraging Processes for Strategic Advantage.” Harvard Business Review, 73(5), 77–90.
Garvin, D.A. (1998) “The Processes of Organization and Management.” Sloan Management Review, 33–50.
Ghoshal, S. and C.A. Bartlett (1995) “Changing the Role of Top Management: Beyond Structure to Processes.” Harvard Business Review, January–February, 86–96.
Giddens, A. (1991) Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Gill, T.G. (1996) “Expert Systems Usage: Task Change and Intrinsic Motivation.” MIS Quarterly, 20(3). 301–330.
Gill, T.G. (1995a) “High-Tech Hidebound: Case Studies of Information Technologies that Inhibited Organizational Learning.” Accounting, Management, and Information Technology, 5(1), 41–60.
Gill, T.G. (1995b) “Early Expert Systems: Where are They Now?” MIS Quarterly, 19(1), 51–81.
Gioia, D.A., M. Schultz, and K.G. Corley (2000) “Organizational Identity, Image, and Adaptive Instability.” Academy of Management Review, 25(1), 63–81.
Hamel, G. and C.K. Prahalad (1991) “Corporate Imagination and Expeditionary Marketing.” Harvard Business Review, 69(4), 81–92.
Kelley, M.R. (1990) “New Process Technology, Job Design, and Work Organization: A Contingency Model.” American Sociological Review, 55(2), 191–208.
Lamb, R. and R. Kling (2003) “Reconceptualizing Users as Social Actors in Information Systems Research.” MIS Quarterly, 27(2), 197–236.
Law, J. and J. Hassard (1999) Actor-Network Theory and After. Blackwell Publishers.
Lewin, K. (1951) Field Theory in Social Science, New York, NY: Harper and Brothers.
Malone, T. W. (1987) “Modeling Coordination in Organizations and Markets.” Management Science, 33(10), 1317–1331.
Malone, T.W. (1997) “Is Empowerment Just a Fad? Control, Decision-making, and IT.” Sloan Management Review, 38(2), 23–35.
Markus, M.L., C.W. Steinfield, and R.T Wigand (2003) “The Evolution of Vertical IS Standards: Electronic Interchange Standards in the U.S. Home Mortgage Industry.” MISQ Special Issue Workshop on Standards, WA: Seattle.
Markus, M.L. and J. Pfeffer (1983) “Power and the Design and Implementation of Accounting and Control Systems.” Accounting, Organizations, and Society, 8(2), 205–218.
Martin, J.L. (2003) “What is Field Theory?” American Journal of Sociology, 109(1), 1–49.
Meyer, M.H. and J.M. Utterback (1993) “The Product Family and the Dynamics of Core Capability.” Sloan Management Review, 34(3), 29–47.
Myers, M.D. and L.W. Young (1997) “Hidden Agendas, Power, and Managerial Assumptions in Information Systems Development: An Ethnographic Study.” Information Technology and People, 10(3), 224-.
Orlikowski, W.J. (2000) “Using Technology and Constituting Structures: A Practice Lens for Studying Technology in Organizations.” Organization Science, 11(4), 404–428.
Orlikowski, W.J. (1996) “Improvising Organizational Transformation Over Time: A Situated Change Perspective.” Information Systems Research, 7(1), 63–92.
Orlikowski, W.J. (1993) “CASE Tools as Organizational Change: Investigating Incremental and Radical Changes in Systems Development.” MIS Quarterly, 17(3), 309–340.
Prahalad, C.K. and G. Hamel (1990) “The Core Competence of the Corporation.” Harvard Business Review, 68(3), 79–91.
Pinsonneault, A. and K.L Kraemer (1993) “The Impact of Information Technology on Middle Managers.” MIS Quarterly, 17(3), 271–292.
Pratt, M.G. and P.O. Foreman (2000) “Classifying Managerial Responses to Multiple Organizational Identities.” Academy of Management Review, 25(1), 18–42.
de Rivera, J. (1976) Field Theory as Human-Science. New York, NY: Gardner Press, Inc.
Ruef, M. (2000) “The Emergence of Organizational Forms: A Community Ecology Approach.” The American Journal of Sociology, 106(3), 658–714.
Schein, E.H. (1992) “The Role of the CEO in the Management of Change: The Case of Information Technology.” In T.A. Kochan and U. Useem (eds.), Transforming Organizations. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 80–96.
Stalk, G., P. Evans, and L.E. Shulman (1992) “Competing on Capabilities: The New Rules of Corporate Strategy.” Harvard Business Review, 70(2), 57–69.
Star, S.L. and K. Ruhleder (1996) “Steps Toward an Ecology of Infrastructure: Design and Access for Large Information Spaces.” Information Systems Research, 7(1), 111–134.
Stewart, T.A. (1999) Intellectual Capital: The New Wealth of Organizations. New York, NY: Currency-Doubleday.
Tajel, H. and J.C. Turner (1986) “The Social Identity Thoery of Intergroup Behavior.” In S. Worschel and W.G. Austin (eds.) Psychology of Intergroup Relations, Chicago, IL: Nelson-Hall.
Teece, D.J., G. Pisano, and A. Shuen (1997) “Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management.” Strategic Management Journal, 18, 509–533.
Terwiesch, C., C.H. Loch, and A. Meyer (2002) “Exchanging Preliminary Information in Concurrent Engineering: Alternative Coordination Strategies.” Organization Science, 13(4), 402–422.
Tornatzky, L.G. and M. Fleischer (1990) The Processes of Technological Innovation. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
Weber, M. (1978) Economy and Society. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Weick, K.E. (1995) Sensemaking in Organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Westphal, J.D., R. Gulati, and S.M. Shortell (1997) “Customization or Conformity? An Institutional and Network Perspective on the Content and Consequences of TQM Adoption.” Administrative Science Quarterly, 42, 366–394.
White, H.C. (1992) Identity and Control: A Structural Theory of Social Action. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Books.
Willcocks, L.P. and R. Plant (2001) “Pathways to e-Business Leadership: Getting from Bricks to Clicks.” Sloan Management Review, 42(3), 50–59.
Woodward, J. (1994/1965) Industrial Organization: Theory and Practice (2 nd edition). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Yates, J., W.J. Orlikowski, and K. Okamura (1995) “Constituting Genre Repertoires: Deliberate and Emergent Patterns of Electronic Media Use.” Academy of Management Proceedings, 353–357.
Zimmerman, M.E. (1990) Heidegger’s Confrontation with Modernity, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers
About this paper
Cite this paper
Miranda, S., Zmud, R. (2004). Enriching Views of Information Systems within Organizations: A Field Theory. In: Fitzgerald, B., Wynn, E. (eds) IT Innovation for Adaptability and Competitiveness. TDIT 2004. IFIP International Federation for Information Processing, vol 141. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-8000-X_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-8000-X_2
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-7999-3
Online ISBN: 978-1-4020-8000-5
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive