[AISWorld] [External] Re: "IS not capable of coming up with native theories" says its senior scholar

[Nik Rushdi Hassan]

Dear all,
Interesting discussions folks. Quite revealing!
My two cents (even cheaper than Kalle's 5 cents) opinion revolves around
the notion of "native" theory, which is the same thing as saying "original"
theories from the IS field, as opposed to derivative, borrowed theories
that are rather prevalent. We want native theories because we think we have
the unique training and capabilities to bridge the technical and the social
(see Supra's sociotechnical axes of cohesion article in MISQ) and therefore
offer solutions (Mikko's empirical successes) that other disciplines might
not be able to address. The division of labor of expertise has always
worked that way since time immemorial. The question is, if we are in an
interdisciplinary team with other disciplines, how do we articulate what we
bring to the plate by way of expertise? That's where native theories come
into picture.
Nik

On Sun, Dec 12, 2021 at 2:59 PM Kalle Lyytinen <kjl13 at case.edu> wrote:

> Hi
>
> My five cents on this which we have elaborated in our 2015 piece with
> Varun and forthcoming piece in JIT. The reason for ‘inviting’ native theory
> is not the reason to have just one ( though you can make institutional and
> political claims why this matters) but that they have poor accuracy in
> explaining and or predicting Digital phenomena. Whether we call them IS
> specific is secondary- most of the argument about native theory is not so
> much about owning it but explain understand and predict new types of
> digital phenomena.
>
> — Kalle
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> > On Dec 12, 2021, at 2:49 PM, Jeet Gupta <guptaj at uah.edu> wrote:
> >
> > Hello Mikko and Nik:
> >
> > Are you suggesting that empirical success cannot be "native" theory?
> > Consider for example, some of the work of the early philosophers whose
> > concepts and theories were based on empirical observations.  Would their
> > theories won't be considered "native"?  Even Newton's theory of
> gravitation
> > was based on his empirical observation of the falling apple from a tree.
> >
> > Thus, I think we do need to think about these aspects.  Of course it
> still
> > is an open question if the IS discipline is ready for a formal theory,
> > native or not; but to success that empirical theory building cannot be
> based
> > on or lead to "native" theories seems far fetched.
> >
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > Jatinder (Jeet) N. D. Gupta, PhD, CFPIM
> > Director, Integrated Enterprise Lab
> > Eminent Scholar and Professor
> > College of Business
> > The University of Alabama in Huntsville
> > 301 Sparkman Drive
> > Huntsville, AL 35899
> > Phone: 256-824-6593 (office)
> >           256-520-0175 (cell)
> > FAX:    256-824-6328
> > E-mail: guptaj at uah.edu
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: AISWorld <aisworld-bounces at lists.aisnet.org> On Behalf Of Siponen,
> > Mikko
> > Sent: Sunday, December 12, 2021 2:23 PM
> > To: Nik Rushdi Hassan <nhassan at d.umn.edu>
> > Cc: AISWorld <aisworld at lists.aisnet.org>
> > Subject: [External] Re: [AISWorld] "IS not capable of coming up with
> native
> > theories" says its senior scholar
> >
> > Hi Nik
> >
> > Thank you for asking. To quickly make a long story very short:
> >
> > 1) The role of “native” theories is overplayed in Organizational and
> > Management Research as well as in IS.  The philosophy of science does not
> > suggest that the success of sciences or disciplines (in general) is
> related
> > to the “native” theories. Lets give a simple example familiar with most
> > people:
> > - e.g. for Covid vaccines: Which one of you asked, when taking the
> vaccine,
> > if it was based on a “native theory”? I bet you did not ask this.
> >
> > For Covid vaccines, the issue is not to ask "did anyone develop a
> ‘native’”
> > theory, but to ask the degree of EMPIRICAL SUCCESS, i.e., how
> successfully
> > are these vaccines. In this specific case, you may want to have high
> Average
> > Treatment Effect (ATF; usually presented as statistical generalisation of
> > the predictive effect, e.g., 60% effect), minimal side effects, long time
> > effect window, etc. Further, you would like to know the empirical
> success of
> > each vaccine against different virus variants. These matters - not
> whether
> > there was (or was not) a “native theory”.
> >
> >
> > 2) usually (in the philosophy of science) fundamental scientific goals
> > relate to “understanding”, OR “explanation” OR “prediction”. E.g. again,
> we
> > want to know the empirical success of a CoVid vaccine as illustrated
> above,
> > which is predictive success. IF e.g. predictive success is the
> fundamental
> > scientific goal, as it is often the case in applied sciences, then (to
> > simplify) this is what matters. If a “non-native” theory offers a better
> > track record of EMPIRICAL SUCCESS for some phenomenon, then we go with
> it.
> >
> >
> > By and large, e.g. medical research did not became successful by
> developing
> > native theories, but with a track record of empirical success.
> >
> > IS community has a lot of competence. But is the search for “native
> > theories” the best way to use this competence? If IS is an applied field,
> > perhaps we should put our key focus on empirical success. Later we will
> see
> > if “native” theories offer better empirical success in different IS cases
> > than non-native theory.
> >
> > This is the short story, from a less senior IS scholar....
> >
> >
> > Mikko Siponen
> > D. Soc. Sc., Ph.D.
> > Member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters Professor of
> > Information Systems University of Jyväskylä Tel. +358 505588128
> >
> >
> >
> > On 12. Dec 2021, at 17.43, Nik Rushdi Hassan
> > <nhassan at d.umn.edu<mailto:nhassan at d.umn.edu>> wrote:
> >
> > Dear colleagues,
> > A very distinguished senior IS scholar who has a long string of
> > accomplishments including chief editorship of top IS journals shared
> with me
> > that "I have been doubtful that the IS discipline can come up with Native
> > Theories. I believe that the IS discipline is simply not ready, not yet
> > sufficiently developed to come up with Native Theories."
> > Today, the SIGPHIL at ICIS workshop
> > that starts at 1pm CST virtually on Zoom addresses that claim, one way or
> > another. Will the list of work-in-progress papers, mostly by younger
> > researchers, vying for a place in the Journal of Information Technology
> > Special Issue on Products of Theorizing: Towards Native Theories of
> Emerging
> > IT
> > show that we just don't have what it takes?
> >
> > What do you think?
> >
> > --
> > Nik Rushdi Hassan, PhD and Assoc. Professor of MIS Labovitz School of
> > Business and Economics University of Minnesota Duluth
> > 1318 Kirby Drive, LSBE 385A
> > Duluth MN 55812
> > Office Phone: (218) 726-7453
> > Fax: (218) 726-7578
> > Home Page:
>

-- 
Nik Rushdi Hassan, PhD and Assoc. Professor of MIS
Labovitz School of Business and Economics
University of Minnesota Duluth
1318 Kirby Drive, LSBE 385A
Duluth MN 55812
Office Phone: (218) 726-7453
Fax: (218) 726-7578
Home Page: www.d.umn.edu/~nhassan
Email: nhassan at d.umn.edu
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/nikrushdi/