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Information Technology and Organizational Transformation
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Information Technology and Organizational Transformation
History, Rhetoric and Preface

Edited by:
  • JoAnne Yates - Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA
  • John Van Maanen - Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA


December 2000 | 383 pages | SAGE Publications, Inc

This book provides one of the first clear-headed assessments of information technology and organizational transformation. Its virtue is not so much in its recognition of the importance of the subject; speculations on this topic have been rampant for more than a decade. Rather, it is unusual and unusually useful, because it avoids speculation in favor of conceptually coherent accounts grounded in empirical study of actual organizations. The chapters contained in this volume move beyond the superficial glorification of information technology as an extraordinary instrument of social change, and straight to the heart of the mechanisms of change as they play out in everyday organizational life. In the process, they reaffirm that the real story of information technology in organizations is more about people than about technology. Taken together, they provide an important contribution to the intellectual foundations of one of the most interesting developments in decades.

Information Technology and Organizational Transformation consists of three parts. The first consists of studies that take an historical perspective on informational technology and organizational transformation. The second set of chapters deals with the rhetoric of information technology and organizational transformation. The third section concerns the practices that emerge when a new information technology is made available to organizational members. Do practices change? How so? These are the questions that in our view are central to any serious consideration of organizational transformation.

This volume contains several important articles first published in the Spring 1996 special issue of ISR co-edited by Yates and Van Maanen, and subsequently in several cases updated for this volume. In addition, four new articles were added and the book was divided into the three sections highlighted in the subtitle: history, rhetoric, and practice. New articles include three focused on the rhetoric surrounding IT and organizational change: Suzanne Iacono and Robert Kling on "...The Rise of the Internet and Distant Forms of Work"; by John R. Weeks, on IT "...in a Culture of Complaint:...:; and Charles Bazerman on "Political Participation in the Age of the Internet." In addition, there is a paper in the Practice section by Brian Pentland, entitled "Big Brother Goes Portable: Enduser Computing in the Internal Revenue Service." Includes a preface by John King, now Dean of the School of Information, University of Michigan.


John King
Preface
JoAnne Yates and John Van Maanen
Introduction
 
PART ONE: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES ON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND ORGANIZATIONAL TRANSFORMATION
JoAnne Yates and John Van Maanen
Introduction
Susan J Winter and S Lynne Taylor
The Role of Information Technology in the Transformation of Work
A Comparison of Post-Industrial, Industrial and Proto-Industrial Organization

 
Martin Campbell Kelly
Information Technology and Organizational Change in the British Census, 1801-1911
Jonathan Coopersmith
Texas Politics and the Fax Revolution
 
PART TWO: THE RHETORIC OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND ORGANIZATIONAL TRANSFORMATION
John Van Maanen and JoAnne Yates
Introduction
Suzanne Iacono and Robert Kling
Computerization Movements
The Rise of the Internet and Distant Forms of Work

 
Charles Bazerman
Politically Wired
The Changing Places of Political Participation in the Age of the Internet

 
John R Weeks
Information Technology in a Culture of Complaint
Derogation, Deprecation and the Appropriationn of Organizational Transformation

 
 
PART THREE: THE PRACTICE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND ORGANIZATIONAL TRANSFORMATION
John Van Maanen and JoAnne Yates
Introduction
Brian Pentland
Big Brother Goes Portable
Enduser Computing in the Internal Revenue Service

 
Peter K Manning
Information Technology in the Police Context
The 'Sailor' Phone

 
Wanda J Orlikowski
Improvising Organizational Transformation over Time
A Situated Change Perspective

 
Daniel Robey and Sundeep Sahay
Transforming Work through Information Technology
A Comparative Case Study of Geographic Information Systems in County Government

 
Susan Leigh Star and Karen Ruhleder
Steps toward an Ecology of Infrastructure
Design and Access for Large Information Spaces

 

"A fascinating and challenging set of essays, this book will be of use to anyone interested in the ongoing development of organizations as they adopt new electronic technologies." 

David Morton
IEEE History Center, Rutgers University

"The chapters move beyond the superficial glorification of technology as an instrument of social change and go straight to the heart of mechanisms of change as they act as an instrument of social change."

Abstract of Public Administration Development and Environment
Indiana University

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