IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orisre/v10y1999i1p38-69.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Colonial Systems

Author

Listed:
  • Jaana Porra

    (Department of Management Science and Information Systems, CBA 5.202, College and Graduate School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712-1175)

Abstract

Colonial systems are presented as an alternative to the mechanistic and organic systems paradigms. They are based upon the inclusion of an evolutionary social history (Ernst Mayr), species-level evolution (Eldredge and Gould), and local context (Martin Heidegger) as central premises in the definition of human systems. The colonial viewpoint of systems is differentiated from the mechanistic and organic models by ten different axioms that define how systems operate during both homeostasis (stability) and radical change. From the axiomatic descriptions of colonial systems, the method of punctuated prototyping is derived to clarify how local colonies survive and prosper by creating and adopting isolated prototypes. This change mechanism (1) requires the self-awareness to recognize the necessity for change, and (2) describes the empowerment necessary for the colonists to build and adopt successful prototypes. The colonial systems model can be applied to explanations about how information systems, organizations, and social institutions change. Further, colonies can be used as a metaphor to design new human systems that capture a greater degree of humanness than do the models of machines and organisms.

Suggested Citation

  • Jaana Porra, 1999. "Colonial Systems," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 10(1), pages 38-69, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:10:y:1999:i:1:p:38-69
    DOI: 10.1287/isre.10.1.38
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/isre.10.1.38
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/isre.10.1.38?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard O. Mason & Ian I. Mitroff, 1973. "A Program for Research on Management Information Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 19(5), pages 475-487, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Deborah Bunker, 2001. "A Philosophy of Information Technology and Systems (IT & S) as Tools: Tool Development Context, Associated Skills and the Global Technology Transfer (GTT) Process," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 3(2), pages 185-197, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. O'Keefe, Robert M., 2016. "Experimental behavioural research in operational research: What we know and what we might come to know," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 249(3), pages 899-907.
    2. Nuthall, Peter L., 2012. "The intuitive world of farmers – The case of grazing management systems and experts," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 65-73.
    3. Mauldin, Elaine G. & Ruchala, Linda V., 1999. "Towards a meta-theory of accounting information systems," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 317-331, May.
    4. Petersen, Knut & Patzke, Henning, 1986. "Individuelles Informationsverhalten als Gegenstand des "Behavioral Accounting": Eine Meta-Analyse der empirischen Forschung," Manuskripte aus den Instituten für Betriebswirtschaftslehre der Universität Kiel 177, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Institut für Betriebswirtschaftslehre.
    5. Manis, K.T. & Madhavaram, Sreedhar, 2023. "AI-Enabled marketing capabilities and the hierarchy of capabilities: Conceptualization, proposition development, and research avenues," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    6. Denis Travaillé & Christine Marsal, 2007. "Automation of dashboards and the coherence of organizations: paradoxes and ambiguities based on two particular case studies," Working Papers CREGO 1070601, Université de Bourgogne - CREGO EA7317 Centre de recherches en gestion des organisations.
    7. Montazemi, A. R. & Gupta, K. M., 1997. "On the effectiveness of cognitive feedback from an interface agent," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 643-658, December.
    8. Berend Wierenga & Gerrit H. Van Bruggen & Richard Staelin, 1999. "The Success of Marketing Management Support Systems," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 18(3), pages 196-207.
    9. Lazhar El Orf & Eric Tort, 2006. "Une synthèse des travaux sur les systèmes d'information comptables en France : état des lieux et pistes de recherche," Post-Print halshs-00548123, HAL.
    10. Goles, Tim & Hirschheim, Rudy, 2000. "The paradigm is dead, the paradigm is dead...long live the paradigm: the legacy of Burrell and Morgan," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 249-268, June.
    11. Norese, Maria Franca, 1995. "MACRAME: A problem formulation and model structuring assistant in multiactorial contexts," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 25-34, July.
    12. Denis Travaillé & Christine Marsal, 2007. "Automatisation des tableaux de bord et cohérence du contrôle de gestion : à propos de deux cas," ACCRA, Association francophone de comptabilité, vol. 13(2), pages 75-96.
    13. Mihail Cocosila & Alexander Serenko & Ofir Turel, 2011. "Exploring the management information systems discipline: a scientometric study of ICIS, PACIS and ASAC," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 87(1), pages 1-16, April.
    14. Thomas J. Housel & Waymond Rodgers, 1994. "A Multi‐Stage Model of Decision Bias: Implications for Expert Systems," Intelligent Systems in Accounting, Finance and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 3(3), pages 165-186, August.
    15. Rajiv D. Banker & Robert J. Kauffman, 2004. "50th Anniversary Article: The Evolution of Research on Information Systems: A Fiftieth-Year Survey of the Literature in Management Science," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(3), pages 281-298, March.
    16. Eom, Sean B., 1998. "Relationships between the decision support system subspecialities and reference disciplines: An empirical investigation," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 104(1), pages 31-45, January.
    17. Rahul Kumar & Rahul Thakurta, 2021. "Exfoliating decision support system: a synthesis of themes using text mining," Information Systems and e-Business Management, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 247-279, March.
    18. Roman Lukyanenko & Jeffrey Parsons & Yolanda F. Wiersma, 2014. "The IQ of the Crowd: Understanding and Improving Information Quality in Structured User-Generated Content," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 25(4), pages 669-689, December.
    19. repec:dau:papers:123456789/8792 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Fons Wijnhoven, 2012. "The Hegelian inquiring system and a critical triangulation tool for the Internet information slave: A design science study," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(6), pages 1168-1182, June.
    21. Fuming Jiang & Subramaniam Ananthram & Jizhong Li, 2018. "Global Mindset and Entry Mode Decisions: Moderating Roles of Managers’ Decision-Making Style and Managerial Experience," Management International Review, Springer, vol. 58(3), pages 413-447, June.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:10:y:1999:i:1:p:38-69. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.