[AISWorld] European Journal of Information Systems 21(3) is out. 1st article: A case study of the legitimation process undertaken to gain support for an information system in a Chinese university

[Myriam RAYMOND]

Dear IS colleagues,

The current issue of the European Journal of Information Systems (vol. 21,
issue 3) has been made available for free viewing on the European Journal
of Information Systems website by courtesy of the OR Society and Palgrave
MacMillan.  The following link will take you directly to the issue:

http://www.palgrave-journals.com/ejis/index.html

This issue of EJIS presents seven articles that address a wide range of
interesting topics, including a legitimation process for gaining support
for an information system, cross-organizational conceptual modelling, a
balanced-score card for the adoption of RFID, enterprise content
management, designing IS architectures, user behaviour in virtual world,
and online game addiction Executive summaries of the articles are provided
below.

In the first article 'A case study of the legitimation process undertaken
to gain support for an information system in a Chinese university', Donal
Flynn of University of Manchester and Yongqin Du of Shell's IT Application
Development & Projects division examines the Legitimation Acceptance Model
(LAM) and its associated activities and strategies through an in-depth
case study that involved the introduction of a multi-function smartcard at
a Chinese University. The study adopted and extended the Suchman’s (1995)
basic description of gaining legitimation to having four distinct phases
drawing on the LAM activities: (1) Construct target, (2) Identify LP and
learn norms, (3) Compare target and close gap, and (4) Grant legitimation.
The findings of this research provide new insights regarding previously
unexplored LAM activities and strategies associated with the three
legitimation processes (gaining, maintaining, and repairing legitimation).
 Such new insights regarding legitimation-gaining strategies include
allowing more time for users to realize benefits, expanding system
coverage, formalizing relevant procedures to encourage system usage by
bringing previously voluntary, marginal activities under official control,
and integrating irreplaceable functions to institutionalize the use of the
system.  In addition, the findings of this research bring attention to the
dynamic nature of the LAM, which has been assumed to reflect a static
process by many researchers.  The article's main contribution therefore
concerns a finer comprehension of the LAM dynamic framework that underlies
information system implementation, diffusion, and adoption.
-- 
Myriam Raymond
Research Assistant & PhD Student
Université de Nantes