{"title":"Technology in the time of corona: A critical institutional reading","authors":"Tammar B. Zilber , Yehuda C. Goodman","doi":"10.1016/j.infoandorg.2021.100342","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Drawing on institutional theory and using examples from Israel, we offer a critique of technology's deployment in responses to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). We distinguish between technologies-in-use (“small ‘t' technologies”), the bundle of artifacts and practices that bring them into being, and “Big ‘T' Technology,” the latter being technology as an institution – shared meanings, structures, and practices that govern thought and action. Using the conceptual tool kit of institutional theory, we make three interrelated arguments. First, the deployment of technologies-in-use in response to the pandemic is embedded in diverse and contradictory institutions, the institution of technology among them. These technologies participate in the very construction of crisis, which fosters the revert to known and established ways of being and doing. Thus, technologies-in-use are not necessarily the most efficient and rational but rather the most legitimate and readily available. Second, putting certain technologies into action has not been happening by itself. Instead, we have witnessed contestations among relevant agents – like politicians and experts – who engage in institutional work to serve their interests. Third, despite its global reach, technology is locally adapted and implemented in specific contexts. All in all, institutional theory helps us to explore further and critique the naïve belief, common in public discourse, in technology as a remedy of all things. Instead, it offers a more critical understanding of the cultural dynamics involved in putting technology to work in the coronavirus crisis. This critical lens carries implications for policymaking and implementation in times of crisis.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":47253,"journal":{"name":"Information and Organization","volume":"31 1","pages":"Article 100342"},"PeriodicalIF":5.7000,"publicationDate":"2021-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1016/j.infoandorg.2021.100342","citationCount":"7","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Information and Organization","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1471772721000087","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"INFORMATION SCIENCE & LIBRARY SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 7
Abstract
Drawing on institutional theory and using examples from Israel, we offer a critique of technology's deployment in responses to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). We distinguish between technologies-in-use (“small ‘t' technologies”), the bundle of artifacts and practices that bring them into being, and “Big ‘T' Technology,” the latter being technology as an institution – shared meanings, structures, and practices that govern thought and action. Using the conceptual tool kit of institutional theory, we make three interrelated arguments. First, the deployment of technologies-in-use in response to the pandemic is embedded in diverse and contradictory institutions, the institution of technology among them. These technologies participate in the very construction of crisis, which fosters the revert to known and established ways of being and doing. Thus, technologies-in-use are not necessarily the most efficient and rational but rather the most legitimate and readily available. Second, putting certain technologies into action has not been happening by itself. Instead, we have witnessed contestations among relevant agents – like politicians and experts – who engage in institutional work to serve their interests. Third, despite its global reach, technology is locally adapted and implemented in specific contexts. All in all, institutional theory helps us to explore further and critique the naïve belief, common in public discourse, in technology as a remedy of all things. Instead, it offers a more critical understanding of the cultural dynamics involved in putting technology to work in the coronavirus crisis. This critical lens carries implications for policymaking and implementation in times of crisis.
期刊介绍:
Advances in information and communication technologies are associated with a wide and increasing range of social consequences, which are experienced by individuals, work groups, organizations, interorganizational networks, and societies at large. Information technologies are implicated in all industries and in public as well as private enterprises. Understanding the relationships between information technologies and social organization is an increasingly important and urgent social and scholarly concern in many disciplinary fields.Information and Organization seeks to publish original scholarly articles on the relationships between information technologies and social organization. It seeks a scholarly understanding that is based on empirical research and relevant theory.