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The Social Analysis of Information Systems Implementation: Using an Integrated Perspective of Structuration Theory and a Logic of Opposition

With the coming era of Internet and knowledge economy, the importance of IS/IT(information systems/information technology) to enterprises can not be overemphasized. However, if IS/IT couldn¡¦t be implemented successfully and brings its performance into full play, the effectiveness and usefulness of IS/IT are unmeaningful. The implementation of IS/IT in an organization is a complicated and dynamic process, which is effected by a variety of factors. For instance, technical factors, the psychological and behavior factors of users, even the cultural, political, economic, and institutional factors rest on the level of organization or environment may all cause the critical effects of implementing IS/IT.
For the purpose of understanding the whole picture of IS/IT implementation process, this study integrates the perspective of contradiction/opposition into Structuration Theory and then proposes an interpretive framework, which can contribute to the interpretation of how and why the organization changes and develops. The framework can be used to identify the mechanism behind changing events and the context connected with them, therefore, we can adequately make sense of the complicated and dynamic social process of IS/IT implementation. By distinguishing the contradiction/opposition between structures of agents, between social structures, and between agent structure and social structure, the study interprets how and why agents respond to the enabling/constraint forces caused by structures. According to this, we can understand the unique structuration of IS/IT implementation process in an organization.
For the application of the integrated framework, this study adopts qualitative research methodology and the framework for guidance to study an intensive case of ERP implementation. Through the data collection and analysis, this study identifies all of the contradiction/opposition between social entities, and the enabling/constraint social forces during the process of ERP implementation.
The result reveals that the severe contradictions/oppositions between social entities caused the failure of the ERP project in Phase I. Entering the Phase II, in addition to the transformation of some structures of social entities, the new forming MIS structure exercised its political and expert power to make ERP system finally perform well. In Phase III, the case company went back to the previous stable status, because the ERP project ended and main project members withdrew. At the end of the paper, this study proposes some conclusions and suggestions for practitioners and academia, and also shows the limitation of the study.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0720105-195632
Date20 July 2005
CreatorsLiou, Yung-Chih
Contributorsnone, none, Tung-Chin Lin, none, none
PublisherNSYSU
Source SetsNSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive
LanguageCholon
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
Sourcehttp://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0720105-195632
Rightswithheld, Copyright information available at source archive

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