Paper Number
ECIS2026-2910
Paper Type
CRP
Abstract
The development of Shared Care Records is a complex interorganisational process, through which institutional arrangements, professional jurisdictions, and governance regimes require continual negotiation. This paper examines how actors formalise Information Sharing Agreements (ISAs) as infrastructural work in the creation of digital infrastructures for integrated care. We frame ISAs as infrastructural boundary objects that translate legal, moral, and technical logics into a workable collaboration. Drawing on a comparative, interpretive case study of two early Shared Care Records initiatives in England’s National Health Service, we identify two modes of infrastructuring: an emergent mode, where new governance forums, artefacts, and routines are created, and a mediated mode, in which coordination is shaped by existing socio-technical infrastructures. We introduce ‘recursive infrastructuring’ to explain how governance artefacts, once established, become part of the installed base that shapes subsequent coordination. We use the notion of ‘boundary-object stacks’ to describe how multiple governance artefacts interact in practice.
Recommended Citation
Elizondo, Andrey; Wilson, Louise C.; and Wilson, Rob, "Negotiating Boundaries For Digital Infrastructures: Infrastructural Work In Data Sharing Care Ecosystems" (2026). ECIS 2026 Proceedings. 13.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2026/isd_pm/isd_pm/13
Negotiating Boundaries For Digital Infrastructures: Infrastructural Work In Data Sharing Care Ecosystems
The development of Shared Care Records is a complex interorganisational process, through which institutional arrangements, professional jurisdictions, and governance regimes require continual negotiation. This paper examines how actors formalise Information Sharing Agreements (ISAs) as infrastructural work in the creation of digital infrastructures for integrated care. We frame ISAs as infrastructural boundary objects that translate legal, moral, and technical logics into a workable collaboration. Drawing on a comparative, interpretive case study of two early Shared Care Records initiatives in England’s National Health Service, we identify two modes of infrastructuring: an emergent mode, where new governance forums, artefacts, and routines are created, and a mediated mode, in which coordination is shaped by existing socio-technical infrastructures. We introduce ‘recursive infrastructuring’ to explain how governance artefacts, once established, become part of the installed base that shapes subsequent coordination. We use the notion of ‘boundary-object stacks’ to describe how multiple governance artefacts interact in practice.
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