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Are We Discovering or Making Concepts? Performativity in Concept Defining




TekijätNiemimaa Marko, Zimmer Markus Philipp

Konferenssin vakiintunut nimiPacific Asia Conference on Information Systems

Julkaisuvuosi2022

Lehti:Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems

Kokoomateoksen nimiPACIS 2022 Proceedings

ISBN978-1-958200-01-8

ISSN2689-6354

Verkko-osoitehttps://aisel.aisnet.org/pacis2022/97/


Tiivistelmä

Alongside the emergence of new technologies and management trends, new concepts such as Artificial Intelligence, Digital Transformation and Cybersecurity appear. Once introduced, scholars debate these concepts’ definitions. Often, a uniform definition remains elusive in these debates but several different - sometimes conflicting - definitions result. In this short paper, we take a philosophical perspective to concept defining and ask why is it that we end up in these situations where a plurality of definitions exists? We outline two perspectives to concept defining: 1) concept-discovery; and 2) concept-making. We argue that concept defining is largely ill-conceived as an activity of concept-discovery according to which concepts are mirrors of the outside world. In contrast, we argue that viewing concept defining as an act of concept-making will sensitize IS researchers on the practices and processes which make concepts and their ethical as well as political implications.



Last updated on 2024-26-11 at 16:33