Testable theory development for small-N studies: Critical realism and middle-range theory

International Journal of Information Technologies and Systems Approach

Volumn 3, Issue 1, 2010, Pages 41-56

  Smith, Matthew L ^a  

^a INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH CENTRE   (Canada)

Author keywords

Case study; Critical realism; E government; Hypothesis testing; Middle range theory; Trust

Indexed keywords

BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH; E-GOVERNMENT; ONTOLOGY;

CRITICAL REALISMS; HYPOTHESIS GENERATION; HYPOTHESIS TESTING; MIDDLE-RANGE THEORY; RESEARCH DESIGNS; TESTABLE THEORY; THEORY DEVELOPMENT; TRUST;

ABSTRACTING;

EID: 77956141658     PISSN: 1935570X     EISSN: 19355718     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.4018/jitsa.2010100203     Document Type: Article

References (84)

1. Archer, M. (1995). Realist social theory: the morphogenetic approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
2. Archer, M. (1998). Introduction: realism in the social sciences. In M. Archer, R. Bhaskar, A. Collier, T. Lawson, & A. Norrie (Eds.), Critical realism: essential readings (pp. 189-205). London: Routledge.
3. Archer, M. (2000). Being human: the problem of agency. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
4. Avgerou, C., Ciborra, C., Cordella, A., Kallinikos, J., & Smith, M. L. (2005). The role of information and communication technology in building trust in governance: toward effectiveness and results. Washington, D.C.: Inter-American Development Bank.
5. Avgerou, C., Ciborra, C., & Land, F. (2004). Introduction. In C. Avgerou, C. Ciborra & F. Land (Eds.), The Social Study of Information and Communication Technology: Innovation, Actors, and Contexts (pp. 1-14). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
6. Barber, B. (1983). The logic and limits of trust. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
7. Befani, B. (2005). The mechanisms of suicide: a realist approach. International Review of Sociology, 15(1), 51-75. doi:10.1080/03906700500038504
8. Bhaskar, R. (1978). A realist theory of science (Second ed.). Sussex: The Harvester Press Limited.
9. Bhaskar, R. (1998a). Philosophy and scientific realism. In M. Archer, R. Bhaskar, A. Collier, T. Lawson & A. Norrie (Eds.), Critical realism: Essential readings (pp. 16-47). London: Routledge.
10. Bhaskar, R. (1998b). The possibility of naturalism: a philosophical critique of the contemporary human sciences (Third ed.). London: Routledge.
11. Bhaskar, R. (2002). From science to emancipation: alienation and the actuality of enlightenment. Delhi: Sage Publications India Pvt Ltd.
12. Bhatnagar, S. (2004). E-government: from vision to implementation. London: Sage Publications Ltd.
13. Blackburn, S. (1998). Trust, cooperation, and human psychology. In V. Braithwaite & M. Levi (Eds.), Trust and Governance (pp. 28-45). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
14. Braithwaite, V. (1998). Communal and exchange trust norms: their value base and relevance to institutional trust. In V. Braithwaite & M. Levi (Eds.), Trust and Governance (pp. 46-74). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
15. Bunge, M. (2004a). Clarifying some misunderstandings about social systems and their mechanisms. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 34(3), 371-381. doi:10.1177/0048393104266860
16. Bunge, M. (2004b). How does it work? The search for explanatory mechanisms. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 34(2), 182-210. doi:10.1177/0048393103262550
17. Bygstad, B. (2008, December 14-17). Information infrastructure as organization: a critical realist view. Paper presented at the International Conference on Information Systems, Paris.
18. Carlsson, S. A. (2003). Advancing information systems evaluation (research): a critical realist approach. Electronic Journal of Information Systems Evaluation, 6(2), 11-20.
19. Carlsson, S. A. (2004). Using critical realism in IS research. In M. E. Whitman & A. B. Woszczynski (Eds.), The hanbook of information systems research (pp. 323-338). Hershey: Idea Group Inc (IGI).
20. Carter, B., & New, C. (Eds.). (2004). Making realism work: realist social theory and empirical research. Oxfordshire: Routledge.
21. Cartwright, N. (2003). Causation one word many things. London: Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science.
22. Cartwright, N. (2004). From causation to explanation and back. In B. Leiter (Ed.), The Future for Philosophy (pp. 230-245). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
23. Collier, D., Seawright, J., & Munch, G. L. (2004). The quest for standards: King, Keohane, and Verba's designing social inquiry. In H. E. Brady & D. Collier (Eds.), Rethinking social inquiry: diverse tools, shared standards (pp. 21-50). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
24. Cook, K. S., Hardin, R., & Levi, M. (2005). Cooperation without trust? New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
25. Danermark, B., Ekstrom, M., Jokobsen, L., & Karlsson, J. C. (2003). Explaining society: critical realism in the social sciences. London: Routledge.
26. Dobson, P. J. (2002). Critical realism and information systems research: why bother with philosophy? Information Research, 7(2).
27. Dobson, P. J., Myles, J., & Jackson, P. (2007). Making the case for critical realism: examining the implementation of automated performance management systems. Information Resources Management Journal, 20(2), 138-152.
28. Dunleavy, P., Margetts, H., Bastow, S., & Tinkler, J. (2006). Digital era governance: IT corporations, the state, and e-government. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
29. Eisenhardt, K. M. (1989). Building theories from case study research. Academy of Management Review, 14(4), 532-550. doi:10.2307/258557
30. Espinal, R., Hartlyn, J., & Kelley, J. M. (2006). Performance still matters: explaining trust in government in the Dominican Republic. Comparative Political Studies, 39(2), 200-223. doi:10.1177/0010414005281933
31. Fay, B. (1994). General laws and explaining human behaviour. In M. Martin & L. C. McIntyre (Eds.), Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science (pp. 91-110). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
32. Fleetwood, S. (2001). Causal laws, functional relations and tendencies. Review of Political Economy, 13, 201-220. doi:10.1080/09538250120036646
33. Fountain, J. E. (2001). Building the virtual state: information technology and institutional change. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press.
34. Fukuyama, F. (1995). Trust: the social virtues and the creation of prosperity. London: Penguin Books Ltd.
35. Gambetta, D. (1988). Can we trust trust? In D. Gambetta (Ed.), Trust: making and breaking cooperative relations (pp. xi-xiv). New York: Basil Blackwell, Inc.
36. Gambetta, D., & Hamill, H. (2005). Streetwise: how taxi drivers establish their customers' trustworthiness. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
37. George, A. L., & Bennett, A. (2005). Case studies and theory development in the social sciences. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
38. Gerring, J. (2007). Case study research: principles and practices. New York: Cambridge University Press.
39. Giddens, A. (1990). The consequences of modernity. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
40. Gregor, S. D. (2006). The nature of theory in information systems. MIS Quarterly, 30(3), 611-642.
41. Groff, R. (2004). Critical realism, post-positivism and the possibility of knowledge. London: Routledge.
42. Hardin, R. (1993). The street-level epistemology of trust. Politics & Society, 21(4), 505-529. doi:10.1177/0032329293021004006
43. Hardin, R. (1996). Trustworthiness. Ethics, 107(1), 26-42. doi:10.1086/233695
44. Hardin, R. (2002). Trust & trustworthiness. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
45. Hardin, R. (2004). Distrust: manifestations and management. In R. Hardin (Ed.), Distrust (pp. 3-33). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
46. Harré, R. (1999). Trust and its surrogates: psychological foundations of political process. In M. E. Warren (Ed.), Democracy and Trust (pp. 249-272). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
47. Heeks, R. (1999). Reinventing government in the information age. In R. Heeks (Ed.), Reinventing government in the information age: international practice in IT-enabled public sector reform (pp. 9-21). London: Routledge.
48. Houston, S. (2001). Beyond social constructionism: critical realism and social work. British Journal of Social Work, 31(6), 845-861. doi:10.1093/bjsw/31.6.845
49. Kallinikos, J. (2004). The social foundations of the bureaucratic order. Organization, 11(1), 13-36. doi:10.1177/1350508404039657
50. Kazi, M. A. F. (2003). Realist evaluation in practice: health and social work. London: Sage Publications.
51. Klein, H. K., & Myers, M. D. (1999). A set of principles for conducting and evaluating interpretive field studies in information systems. MIS Quarterly, 23(1), 67-94. doi:10.2307/249410
52. Lawson, T. (2004). A conception of ontology. University of Cambridge: Faculty of Economics.
53. Levi, M. (1998). A state of trust. In V. Braithwaite & M. Levi (Eds.), Trust and Governance (pp. 77-101). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
54. Luhmann, N. (1979). Trust and power: two works by Niklas Luhmann. Avon: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
55. Luhmann, N. (1988). Familiarity, confidence, trust: problems and alternatives. In D. Gambetta (Ed.), Trust: making and breaking cooperative relations (pp. 94-108). Oxford: Basil Blackwell, Ltd.
56. Martins, N. (2006). Capabilities as causal powers. Cambridge Journal of Economics(Advance Access).
57. Meckler, M., & Baillie, J. (2003). The truth about social construction in administrative science. Journal of Management Inquiry, 12(3), 273-284. doi:10.1177/1056492603257724
58. Merton, R. K. (1967). On theoretical sociology: five essays, old and new. New York: The Free Press.
59. Miller, A., & Listhaug, O. (1999). Political performance and institutional trust. In P. Norris (Ed.), Critical citizens: global support for democratic government (pp. 204-216). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
60. Mingers, J. (2000). The contribution of critical realism as an underpinning philosophy for OR/MS and systems. The Journal of the Operational Research Society, 51(111), 1256-1270.
61. Mingers, J. (2004a). Critical realism and information systems: brief responses to Monod and Klein. Information and Organization, 14(2), 145-153. doi:10.1016/j.infoandorg. 2004.02.003
62. Mingers, J. (2004b). Paradigm wars: ceasefire announced who will set up the new administration? Journal of Information Technology, 19(3), 165-171. doi:10.1057/palgrave.jit.2000021
63. Mingers, J. (2004c). Re-establishing the real: critical realism and information systems. In J. Mingers & L. P. Willcocks (Eds.), Social Theory and Philosophy for Information Systems (Vol. 372-406). Sussex: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
64. Mingers, J. (2004d). Real-izing information systems: critical realism as an underpinning philosophy for information systems. Information and Organization, 14(2), 87-103. doi:10.1016/j. infoandorg.2003.06.001
65. Moon, M. J. (2003). Can IT help government to restore public trust? Declining public trust and potential prospects of IT in the public sector. Paper presented at the 36th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, Hawaii.
66. Morton, P. (2006). Using critical realism to explain strategic information systems planning. Journal of Information Technology Theory and Application, 8(1), 1-20.
67. Norris, P. (Ed.). (1999). Critical citizens: global support for democratic government. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
68. Orlikowski, W. J., & Baroudi, J. J. (1991). Studying information technology in organizations: research approaches and assumptions. Information Systems Research, 2(1), 1-28. doi:10.1287/isre.2.1.1
69. Pawson, R., & Tilley, N. (1997). Realistic evaluation. London: SAGE publications Ltd.
70. Pratschke, J. (2003). Realistic models? Critical realism and statistical models in the social sciences. Philosophica, 71(1), 13-38.
71. Reimers, K., & Johnson, R. B. (2008, December 14-17). The use of an explicitly theory-driven data coding method for high-level theory testing in IOIS. Paper presented at the International Conference for Information Systems, Paris.
72. Ron, A. (2002). Regression analysis and the philosophy of social science. Journal of Critical Realism, 1(1), 119-142.
73. Sayer, A. (2000). Realism and social science. London: SAGE Publications Ltd.
74. Seligman, A. B. (1997). The problem of trust. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
75. Shadish, W. R., Cook, T. D., & Campbell, D. T. (2002). Experimental and quasi-experimental designs for generalized causal inference. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.
76. Smith, M. L. (2006). Overcoming theorypractice inconsistencies: critical realism and information systems research. Information and Organization, 16(13), 191-211. doi:10.1016/j. infoandorg.2005.10.003
77. Tolbert, C., & Mossberger, K. (2006). The effects of e-government on trust and confidence in government. Public Administration Review, 66(3), 354-369. doi:10.1111/j.1540-6210.2006.00594.x
78. Tsoukas, H. (1989). The validity of idiographic research explanations. Academy of Management Review, 14(4), 551-561. doi:10.2307/258558
79. Volkoff, O., Strong, D. M., & Elmes, M. B. (2007). Technological embeddedness and organizational change. Organization Science, 18(5), 832-848. doi:10.1287/orsc.1070.0288
80. Warren, M. E. (Ed.). (1999). Democracy and trust. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
81. Warren, M. E. (2004). Trust in democratic institutions. In F. Ankersmit & H. te Velde (Eds.), Trust: Cement of Democracy (Vol. 49-69). Leuven: Peeters.
82. Weber, R. (2004). Editor's comments: the rhetoric of positivism versus interpretivism: a personal view. MIS Quarterly, 28(1), iii-xiii.
83. West, D. M. (2005). Digital government: technology and public sector performance. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
84. Zucker, L. G. (1986). Production of trust: institutional sources of economic structure, 1840-1920. Organizational Behavior, 8, 53-111.