Towards a Pluralist Approach in Design Science: Case Study of an Agricultural DSS

Abstract

Multiple standpoints on design science exist. In this paper, the authors espouse a pluralist approach to design science, allowing an interpretive view of the human factors to complement the more prescriptive view of the IT artefact. To better comprehend the processes of IT design, development, practice, and incremental improvement, a study of CottonLOGIC, an agricultural decision support system (DSS) for the Australian cotton industry, was reassessed from a design science framework. In the study, the duality of technology, Orlikowski's (1992) adaptation of the social science theory, structuration theory, was used as the overarching perspective to overcome the dichotomy between technology as an objective force and technology as a socially constructed product which the study found to be inextricably linked. The contribution of the paper is to advocate a pluralist approach in design science thus allowing both the immediate situation and the wider context of agricultural institutions and environment to be taken into account in the interpretation of the users' proposals for improvements to the DSS, while not ignoring the functionality of the IT artefact.