Toward an Autopoietic Approach for Information Systems Development

Abstract

Several weaknesses of information systems development methodologies have been identified and studied in the recent years. These weaknesses can be viewed from different perspectives such as: • The characteristics of the outcomes, i.e., information systems: The current methodologies are producing systems with rigid and inflexible that are difficult to maintain and to evolve (e.g., Loucopoulos, 1991). • The degree of the domain-independence: There is a gap between the way system development methodologies in the mainstream of scientific and technical literature and the way they are carried out in real life situations. This is mainly due to the domain-independence of most of these methodologies (Bansler & Bolker, 1993, Vessy & Glass, 1998). • The conceptual and philosophical bases: The dominance of the functionalistic view in the most of current methodologies (Hirschheim, Klein & Lyytinen, 1995, Iivari, 1991, Iivari, Hirschheim & Klein, 1998). In addition, most of information systems development methodologies under-utilize the richness of concepts and insights provided by new and emerging theories such as autopoiesis, self-organization, and fuzzy logic. Moreover, they do not accommodate the new emerging information systems and technologies such as component and framework technologies, web-enabled information systems and ERP.