Structuration Theory

The theory, which has received broad application in research regarding adoption of ICT in organisations, including educational institutions, is the Adaptive Structuration Theory (AST) developed by DeSanctis and Poole (1994) based on the rationale of Giddens' (1984) structuration theory (Naik & Kim, 2010). In brief, Giddens (1984)

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postulated that his theory was based on the analysis of the concept of structuration (Falkheimer, 2009), which focuses on a process that involves the reciprocal interaction of human actors and structural features of a social system (Naik & Kim, 2010). The rationale of Giddens' (1984) structuration theory is that a social system (such as an organisation like a university) can be understood, based on the analysis of the nature of its structure and agency (Pavlou & Majchrzak, 2002; Workman, Ford & Allen, 2008). Agency refers to the capacity of members of a social system to act on and/or through its structure, which, itself, refers to the resources, rules, regulations, norms and procedures that define or are introduced to define the social system (Parker, 2000).

The rationale of Giddens' (1984) structuration theory assists in analysing and understanding how a social system changes as a result of the interaction of its structure and agency. It helps to explain how social systems change as a result of member use of rules, procedures/processes and resources in interaction (MacCallum, 2010; Orlikowski, 2000; Parker, 2000; Stillman, 2006; Stones, 2005). It is, however, very generalised, does not offer a practical methodology of how to analyse the change, and does not pay attention to changes that come about in a social system as a result of introducing an innovation or a technology such as ICT.

Notwithstanding the above-mentioned weaknesses, the tenets of Giddens' (1984) structuration theory, that is, structure and agency, were adapted by DeSanctis and Poole (1994) to develop the Adaptive Structuration Theory (AST), which has since been applied to study the changing structure and agency of organisations as a result of introducing and using advanced information technology (Wang, Wang & Yang, 2010).

AST adapted the tenets based on the argument that understanding the role of technology should not be based on the technology itself; rather, this understanding should be based on the use of the technology (Poole & DeSanctis, 2004). AST, therefore, takes a socio-technical perspective (Bostrom, Gupta & Thomas, 2009). Human actors and organisational context are introduced within this perspective as moderators of the technology impact. The adoption of advanced technology,

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therefore, is a process of organisational change resulting from the mutual influence of the technology and social processes (DeSanctis & Poole, 1994).

The premise of AST is that the purpose of adopting ICT is to automate the functions of a social system (like an organisation or university) (Zhu, Dong, Xu & Kraemer, 2006). The subsequently realised level of automation changes both the structure (norms, regulations, procedures, operations) and agency (human activities) of the system (Zhu, Kraemer & Xu, 2003). Accordingly, the rationale of AST focuses on analysing, establishing and understanding these changes (Maznevski & Chudoba, 2000). AST guides this analysis based on a view that organisations that adopt ICT for their work, dynamically create perceptions about the nature and utility of the adopted ICT (Zhu & Kraemer, 2005; Zhu, Kraemer & Xu, 2006). These perceptions influence the way technology is used, thereby influencing the outcomes of the technology. The perceptions are created about the type and usefulness, or contribution of the introduced ICT to the human activities carried out in a social system (Matovu, 2009; Rao & Perry, 2003). The perceptions are also based on the technological context of the social system and indicate the level of satisfaction that the adopted ICT yields to the members of the social system as far as realising expected changes in the system’s processes and outcomes or effectiveness. (Stillman, 2006).

The rationale of AST suggests that a better understanding of the role of ICT in an organisation should be based not only on an analysis of the type of ICT equipment and programmes introduced to automate a social system’s structure and agency (organisational processes and human activities). It should also be based on an analysis of the services and outcomes that emerge from human activities carried out using the introduced ICT (Stillman, 2006). In other words, AST uses the perceptions of organisational members who interact with the introduced ICT to analyse its (ICT’s) role from two perspectives: (1) The types of ICT equipment (hardware) and programmes (software) adopted to automate the structure of an organisation.(2) How the adopted ICT is used and how it enables members to realise expectedoutcomes (Matovu, 2009). This way, AST establishes the role of ICT regarding the installed ICT equipment and programmes, the ICT services that the

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adopted equipment and programmes are perceived to provide, and the perceived contribution of these services to the anticipated improvement in organisational processes and the outputs (Janardhanam et al., 2011). AST advances further that the findings obtained from the conducted analysis can then be used to develop strategies regarding how members may use ICT better for better ends (Stillman, 2006).

The rationale of AST has been applied to analyse the changes caused to social systems by the adoption of various innovations such as the printed press, electricity, telegraph, mass transportation, radio, telephone, TV, the Internet, and other forms of ICT. It also shows how the social system responds to modify the innovations and realise their original intent (Falkheimer, 2009; Maznevski & Chudoba, 2000; Naik & Kim, 2010). AST is criticised in that it considers too many techno and social variables which may make it a rather involving theory to apply (Naik & Kim, 2010). Notwithstanding this criticism, AST is adopted to provide the theoretical framework of this study as explained in the next section.