Societal Impacts of IS

The proliferation of technology into various aspects of our lives creates a world where Information Systems (IS) have a non-trivial impact on our society, economy, and environment. More often than not, technologies that are created for a positive impact, can produce unintended ill effects and unexpected spillovers. For instance, the introduction of ride sharing services intended to enhance the convenience of personal transportation has created unwarranted traffic jams (and pollution) in certain locations as a result of its enormous demand. It is also true that riding with strangers can be risky, though under some conditions, a point-to-point ride service can be safer for riders. More recently, heated debates over coded biases in black-box algorithms calls to question the ethics of how data and recommendation systems are used and created. Prior to this debate, the convenience of personalization and business value generated from these systems had largely been taken for granted. Given the multifaceted nature of technological impacts and the rapid rate of digitalization, our understanding of the social impact of technologies often lags behind their introduction and widespread use.

The IS community is in a unique position to uncover and shed light on the effects that information technologies have on our society. This track calls for papers that study both the intended/unintended societal impacts of information systems. Studies in this track go a long way to inform regulators, practitioners, and users. This track welcomes innovative, rigorous and relevant theoretical, empirical, and design studies on societal impacts from interactions with and influences of information systems. Empirical (qualitative and quantitative) studies as well as design-oriented research and conceptual/theoretical papers on theory development will be considered. Various dimensions, including social, economic, cultural or ethical aspects, can be involved in these relationships. We encourage submissions at different levels and cross-levels of analysis. The research questions may derive from a broad spectrum of disciplines.

Track Chairs:
Hala Annabi, University of Washington
Jason Chan, University of Minnesota
Chee Wei (David) Phang, University of Nottingham Ningbo China