HERE ARE THE READINGS FROM LAST TIME Username: inf9200 , password: spring2005
The idea behind this proposal is to outline a list of literature that all our Ph.D. students should be familiar with and at the same time define the group’s canon. The literature is of two kinds:


Basic theories we should be familiar with
The state-of-the-art of research in the domains within IS where we primarily want to make contributions.
The literature is composed on the assumptions that we shall primarily make contributions within the IS field, and that our uniqueness as a group is characterized by our
 Focus on complexity (large scale information systems and infrastructures), and in
 particular
The role of technology (theorizing technology)
The students are supposed to read the literature individually. The readings will be discussed during a two-week seminar, starting Monday March 23. External speakers will also be invited to hold lectures on each topic.
A final essay of 7000 words is required. This essay should discuss the theoretical base of your research, resembling a “theory chapter” in your thesis. The deadline will be announced later.
Main lecturer: Sundeep Sahay
Facilitator: Johan Sæbø/Selam Molla

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Venue: The multimediaroom “Infra” at Forskningsparken. Access is through main entrance at building 4, which is where the professors from IFI are. Infra is to the right at the same floor as the entrance.
Time: March 23 - April 3
Timetable
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The readings marked with a * will be compiled in a compendium by the course administration and handed out at the beginning of the semester. The rest of the readings the students are expected to get from other sources, such as the University Library
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Lecture note
* Wanda Orlikowski and Suzanne Iacono Desperately seeking the "IT"in IT Research - A
Call to Theorizing the IT Artifact
* Eric Monteiro and Ole Hanseth Social shaping of information infrastructure: on being specific about the technology.
In Orlikowski, Wanda J., Geoff Walsham, Matthew R.
Jones and Janice I DeGross. Information Technology and Changes in Organizational
Work. Chapman & Hall, 1995, p.325 - 343.
* SJIS debate on Agency VOLUME 17, No. 1 (2005) :
: Socio-Theoretic Accounts of IS: The Problem of Agency
: Agency Theory: Integration or a Thousand Flowers?
: Beyond Metaphysics and Theory Consumerism: A comment to Rose, Jones, and Truex "Socio-Theoretic Accounts of IS: The Problem of Agency"
: Theorizing in IS Research: What Came Before and What Comes Next?
: The Agency of Hybrids: Overcoming the Symmetrophobic Block

: Material Works: Exploring the Situated Entanglement of
Technological Performativity and Human Agency
: The Problem of Agency Re-visited
* John Van Maanen - Style as Theory
* John Van Maanen - Chapter 4 Confessional Tales
* John Van Maanen - Chapter 5 Some Notes on the Importance of Writing in
Organization Studies
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* Langdon Winner “Autonomous Technology” MIT Press, 1977. INTRODUCTION only
* Barley, S.R. “Technology as an Occasion for Structuring: Evidence from Observations of CT Scanners and the Social Order of Radiology Departments“ Administrative Science
Quarterly, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Mar., 1986), pp. 78-108
* Robey and Bodreau “Accounting for the Contradictory Organizational Consequences of
Information Technology: Theoretical Directions and Methodological Implications”
Information Systems Research Vol 10, No. 2, June 1999
* Orlikowsky and Robey “Information Technology and the Structuring of Organizations”
Information Systems Research 2:2, 1991
* Bruno Latour “Chapter 2: Circulating references”, in Pandora’s Hope, Harvard
University Press 1999, pp. 24-79
Recommended:
Bruno Latour “A Collective on Humans and Nonhumans”, Chapter 6 from Pandora’s
Hope page 174-215
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* Douglass North “Institutions, institutional change and economic performance” Chapters
1 & 3

* Gianluca Miscione “Telemedicine in the Upper Amazon: Interplay with Local Health
Care Practices” MISQ special issue on Information Systems in Developing Countries,
June 2007
* Piotti, Chilundo, Sahay An Institutional Perspective on Health Sector Reform and the process of reframing health information systems: Case Studies from Mozambique
* DiMaggio Iron cage revisited
* Thornton and Ocasio “Institutional Logics” in SAGE Handbook of Organizational
Institutionalism, Greenwood, Oliver, Sahlin, Suddaby (eds), 2008, Sage publications
* M. Tina Dacin and Peter A. Dacin “Traditions as Institutionalized Practice:
Implications for Deinstitionalization”, in SAGE Handbook of Organizational
Institutionalism, Greenwood, Oliver, Sahlin, Suddaby (eds), 2008, Sage publications, pp.
327-351.
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* Lucy Suchman: Human and Machine Reconfigurations: Plans and Situated Actions.
Cambridge University Press. 2007 INTRODUCTION
* Sahay, Monteiro, and Aanestad “Configurable politics: trying to integrate health information systems in developing countries” working paper, IFI
* Hanseth “Complexity and risk” Chapter 4 in Hanseth and Ciborra “Risk, Complexity, and ICT”, Elgar Publishing 2007
* Osei-Joehene and Ciborra “The duality of risk and the evolution of danger in global
ICT integration” Chapter 8 in Hanseth and Ciborra “Risk, Complexity, and ICT”, Elgar
Publishing 2007
Recommended:
John Urry: Global Complexities, Chapter 7, Polity 2003
Charles Perrow: Normal Accidents Theory
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* Timmermans, S. and Berg, M. 1997. Standardization in Action: Achieving Local
Universality through Medical Protocols. Social Studies of Science 27, p. 273-305.
* Puri, MISQ special issue 2007
* Nicholson, Sahay Embedded knowledge and offshore software development
* Lam “Tacit Knowledge, Organizational Learning and Societal Institutions: An
Integrated Framework” Organization Studies 2000, 21/3
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* Castells “Globalization and Identity in the Network Society” Prometheus 04
* Sen “Development as Freedom” Introduction and Chapter 1
* Escobar “Encountering Development” Chapters 1 & 2
* Walsham and Sahay Research on information systems in developing countries: current landscape and future prospects
* Walsham, Robey, Sahay – MISQ special issue introduction