The Context of Introducing IT/IS-Based Innovation into Local Government in Colombia

Abstract

Information technologies (IT) and information systems (IS) provide opportunities for organizations to improve their productivity and effectiveness. Considerable research has been conducted to study the factors and determinants of the adoption and diffusion of IT/IS into organizations’ operations (a sampling: Kwon & Zmud, 1987; Markus & Robey, 1988; Borton & Branchau, 1994; Nidumolu et al., 1996). Most studies support the notion that managerial decisions of IT/IS adoption, and the outcomes of IT/IS introduction in an organization are moderated by the context in which these technologies are introduced (Zmud, 1982; Fichman and Kemere; 1993, Watad and Ospina, 1996). This article adds to this line of research and draws upon theories from the technological innovation literature to explore the contextual factors that shape organizational decisions to adopt IT/IS into Latin American municipalities. A review of the published literature shows that there has been very little research on the determinants of IT adoption in local government (municipalities), in Latin America. Most studies have tended to focus on the national level and have dealt with transfer and implementation of information technologies or with technology policies (Robey and Rodriquez-Diaz, 1996; Montealegre and Applegate 1994; Correa, 1995; Pers-Nunez, 1994). Another line of research has been growing which focuses on technical applications development, such as databases tools and software engineering (see proceedings, SCI 97). Overall, this paper provides a model expounding the contextual factors that facilitate the process of adopting IT/IS-based innovation in local government. There are two main constructs in this study: the adoption decision of an innovation and the context of its adoption. This study analyzes adoption cases in which the decision to adopt was positive. While context itself is a difficult construct to operationalize, it is possible to study particular cases under which decisions are made and analyze the contextual factors that affected the dynamic of the adoption decision.