Criteria for Conducting and Evaluating Critical Interpretive Research in the IS Field

The collection, analysis and interpretation of empirical materials are always conducted within some broader understanding of what constitutes legitimate inquiry and valid knowledge (Doolin, 1998). In the Information Systems (IS) field, there are well-known and widely accepted methodological principles consistent with the conventions of positivism. However, the same is not yet true of interpretive research. The emergence of interpretivism in IS research was advocated by Walsham (1995) and corroborated by a series of special issues in outstanding IS journals. An example of the effort to advance the legitimacy of studies grounded in an interpretive position is the set of principles suggested by Klein and Myers (1999). Their principles are consistent with a considerable part of the philosophical base of literature on interpretivism, offering guidelines for the conduct and evaluation of interpretive research and, hence, meaningfully contributing to the improvement of IS research. However, the particular set of principles they have suggested applies mostly to hermeneutics, and not all interpretive studies follow a hermeneutical philosophical base. They recommended that other researchers, representing other forms of interpretivism, suggest additional principles. A number of IS interpretive researchers have started to use Golden-Biddle and Locke’s (1993) three criteria for ethnographic writing as the basis for evaluating their own research. This paper follows in this vein, advocating the timely emergence of a critical interpretive perspective in IS research and pressing the argument that an extended version of GB&L (Golden-Biddle and Locke) criteria is not only appropriate but comprehensive as an initial framework for conducting and evaluating critical interpretive research.