Computerization, institutional maturation, and qualitative change: Analysis of a Ghanaian public corporation

Abstract This article uses the social interactionist conceptual framework to analyse computerization in the Volta River Authority, a public corporation in Ghana. It first analyses the initial phase of ICT adoption in the organization, and shows how limited personnel skills, unplanned and uncoordinated innovations, and overwhelming organizational defects resulted in the inability of the technology to produce intended results. The article then proceeds to discuss how these initial problems were dealt within the subsequent phase to produce more positive outcomes. Reasons for this success included comprehensive feasibility studies, departmental representation in planning, and corporate support for the technologies at the highest organizational levels. It suggests, however, that certain socio‐cultural, political and organizational problems continue to hinder effective use of ICTs. Based on these findings the article concludes that institutions should be understood as social systems with contingent configurations of reality that determine the success or failure of technological innovations. The unique contingencies that constitute a particular system should, therefore, be taken into account when designing, adopting, and implementing innovations. This is not only to ensure the sensitivity of the innovations to the social milieux into which they are planted, but also to address any militating factors that might constrain the effectiveness of the innovations.