• Identify and explain the theories presented in the course, including their underlying assumptions and approaches.
• Understand, combine and critically discuss these theories with respect to a social analysis of information systems.
• Apply these theories on IS cases and demonstrate skills at analyzing IS in their social and organizational context.
• Evaluate problems, challenges, and propose solutions at an independent and reflected academic level.

Developing and implementing information systems (IS) in and across organizational contexts is a rather multifaceted challenge that does not only involve their design, but also the development of supportive social frameworks and institutional structures as well as normative conventions that complement and reinforce their adoption and diffusion at large. Therefore, investigating the technological nature of IS without examining their prevalent social aspects yields an incomplete and somewhat shortsighted understanding of the underlying issues at stake.
Thus far, the prevailing discourse on IS has had a techno-centric orientation in spite of the far-reaching social ramifications of these systems. Subsequently, the aim of this course is to explore social and organizational aspects of IS by building on theories such as actor-network theory, social construction of technology, institutional theory, structuration theory, and other theories used in organization studies. In particular, the course builds on literature that explains, applies, builds on, or compares social aspects of information systems.
The unifying themes that we wish to discuss in the course are: what assumptions about the design, implementation, and use of information systems are embedded in these strands of literature? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the approaches in terms of conducting a social analysis of information systems, including individual and collective practices with respect to the design and use of IS? How can the theories be applied to real cases of IS in organizations and what are the practical implications?

The course’s development of personal competences:
This course will develop the students’ skills in analyzing how information systems impact social relations and organizational structures in organizations, and how social relations influence the design, implementation and adoption of IS. In this respect, the course will enhance the students’ understanding of the complexity of information systems.