Context in Design Science Research: Taxonomy and Framework

Abstract

One of the open methodological concerns for design science research (DSR) in information systems is how to think about and deal with the notion of context. This paper takes an important step toward clarifying the notion of context and elaborates how it can be dealt with from a DSR perspective. In particular, we present a coherent theoretical account of context grounded in pragmatism. Moreover, we also reify this understanding into a context taxonomy and context framework for DSR. Altogether, we intend to provide a sound foundation and a fruitful platform for DSR that is more attuned to the particularities of context.

Ethics in Information Systems and Design Science Research: Five Perspectives

“…The very nature of DSR, aimed at designing innovative artifacts and solving real world problems, may, in fact, need to be defined in terms of such value considerations (see also Churchman, 1995;Ulrich, 2006). The panelists further agree, and the preceding review of prior work provides the rationale to point out, that this can be challenging for a number of reasons, including the need to be more reflective (Purao & Wu, 2013), more anticipatory (Brey, 2012), more aware (Herwix & Zur Heiden, 2022), and more informed about the many different perspectives and contemporary debates about the nature of ethics and values (e.g., Singer, 2019).…”

“…Thus, we must become experts at justifying and documenting the boundary judgements we are making, if we are to hope for moral progress. As such, they view ethics as inherently and intimately related to the practice of doing DSR which is itself concerned with the question of how to improve our actions in the world through the design of useful artifacts (Herwix & Zur Heiden, 2022;Hevner et al, 2004). They agree that in a very real sense, "science and ethics ultimately converge" (Ulrich, 2006, p. 67).…”

“…First, we encourage individuals and teams of researchers to systematically engage in ethics-conscious problem prioritization in the context of their own work. Several researchers already provide useful starting points for informing such efforts (e.g., Herwix & Haj-Bolouri, 2021Herwix & Zur Heiden, 2022;Purao, 2021;Rai, 2017). Second, we hope that the IS community as a whole will proactively support further development of mechanisms and approaches that can help to establish systematic and ethics-conscious problem prioritization as a self-organizing feature of the IS field.…”