Qualitative Research in Information Systems : A Reader

Qualitative research has become a legitimate approach within the information systems community, but researchers have traditionally drawn upon material from the social sciences given the absence of a single source relevant to them. Qualitative Research in Information Systems: A Reader represents just such a volume and is both timely and relevant.

Information systems and qualitative research articles are now widely used for teaching on many upper level courses in information systems, and there is demand for a definitive collection of these readings as a basic reader and teaching text. This book expertly brings together the seminal works in the field, along with editorial introductions to assist the reader in understanding the essential principles of qualitative research.

The book is organised according to the following thematic sections:

· Part I: Overview of Qualitative Research

· Part II: Philosophical Perspectives

· Part III: Qualitative Research Methods

· Part IV: Modes of Analyzing and Interpreting Qualitative Data

Qualitative Research in Information Systems: A Reader should become the benchmark reference point for students and researchers in information systems, management science and others involved in information technology needing to learn about qualitative research.

Michael D. Myers is Professor of Information Systems and Head of the Department of Information Systems and Operations Management at the University of Auckland Business School, Auckland, New Zealand. He has won numerous awards including Best Paper award for the most outstanding paper published in MIS Quarterly in 1999. He served as President of the Association for Information Systems (AIS) in 2006-2007 and is a Fellow of AIS.

David Avison is Distinguished Professor of Information Systems at ESSEC Business School, near Paris, France after being Professor at the School of Management at Southampton University for nine years. He has also held posts at Brunel and Aston Universities in England, and the University of Technology Sydney and University of New South Wales in Australia, and elsewhere. He is President-elect of the Association of Information Systems (AIS). He is joint editor of Blackwell Science′s Information Systems Journal now in its eighteenth volume, rated as a ′core′ international journal. So far, twenty-five books are to his credit including the fourth edition of the well-used text Information Systems Development: Methodologies, Techniques and Tools (jointly authored with Guy Fitzgerald).  He has published a large number of research papers in learned journals, edited texts and conference papers. He was Chair of the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP) 8.2 group on the impact of IS/IT on organisations and society and is now vice chair of IFIP technical committee 8. He was past President of the UK Academy for Information Systems and also chair of the UK Heads and Professors of IS and is presently member of the IS Senior Scholars Forum. He was joint programme chair of the International Conference in Information Systems (ICIS) in Las Vegas (previously also research programme stream chair at ICIS Atlanta), joint programme chair of IFIP TC8 conference at Santiago Chile, programme chair of the IFIPWG8.2 conference in Amsterdam, panels chair for the European Conference in Information Systems at Copenhagen and publicity chair for the entity-relationship conference in Paris and chair of several other UK and European conferences. He will be joint program chair of the IFIP TC8 conference in Milan, Italy in 2008. He also acts as consultant and has most recently worked with a leading manufacturer developing their IT/IS strategy. He researches in the area of information systems development and more generally on information systems in their natural organizational setting, in particular using action research, though he has also used a number of other qualitative research approaches.