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Possible Contributions of Dooyeweerd's Philosophy to
Five Areas of Information Systems Research and Practice

This page summarises the wide range of possible contributions that Dooyeweerd might make to the field of Information Systems. Its purpose is to stimulate fresh ideas in research and practice, or even open up new avenues of research.

Introduction

The field of Information Systems, about ICT (information and communication technology) covers at least five areas:

(See Basden [2017], or earlier Basden [2008], for full discussion.)

Whereas most philosophies can speak in single areas or to selected issues (e.g. Foucault to ICT and society), Dooyeweerd can speak in all areas and a wide range of issues. This is because of his different starting-points of everyday experience and of meaningfulness.

The next section outlines how Dooyeweerd might contribute, and then a table of possible contributions is given.

How Dooyeweerd Might Contribute

Dooyeweerd neither acquiesces to extant theory or approaches, nor rejects them. Instead, he treats them as impaired insight. He can thus contribute positively, by enabling us to:

The next section is a table showing possible affirmation, critique and enrichment.

Possible Contributions

Summary of How Dooyeweerd's Philosophy has been Employed to Affirm, Critique and Enrich Discourses and Ideas in Each Area
Affirmation Critique Enrichment
Nature of ICT
See everything as multi-aspectual being:
1. Data, information, knowledge: different aspects of same thing.
2. Program is virtual law-side. It might also be like performance art.
3. Computers, documents are multi-level beings, with many aspects.
4. "Computer = Human?" refer to Dooyeweerdian subject and object functioning in each aspect.
Most "What is?" discourse presumes primacy of being, which leads to antinomies.
1. Much discourse on data, information, knowledge presumes substance idea or subject-object conflation, rather than aspects of one thing.
2. Little discussion on what a program is.
3. Too much focus on certain aspects.
4. AI question unresolvable under dualistic ground-motives. Use Creation, Fall, Redemption ground-motive.
1, 2, 3. Aspects everywhere! Think about law-subject-object relation, especially in aspects not usually considered.
4. AI question has two simultaneous answers, depending on whether we take subject or any functioning. Idea of ICT functioning as subject-by-proxy in lingual aspect.
ICT Use
1. All discourses part of wider picture.
2. Each concerns one or more of three multi-aspectual human engagements with ICT, each a Dooyeweerdian subject-object relationship.
3. Each tends to focus on certain aspects.
1. Too much theorizing, too little recognition of everyday experience.
2. Nature-freedom ground-motive generates problematic dichotomies and reactions.
3. EMC under-researched; few discourses recognise all three engagements.
4. Narrow focus on certain aspects (esp. formative, social, economic).
5. Ethics and normative issues isolated from most discourses.
6. Some discourses missing; little integration.
1. Dooyeweerd enables and encourages an everyday perspective on ICT use.
2. Dooyeweerd's ground-motive might free up more pluralistic approaches.
3. Consider EMC alongside EIT, ELI: all three.
4. Widen the range of aspects that are meaningful in each discourse.
5. By reference to innate normativity of aspects, integrate 'ethics' into all discourses.
6. Widen interest of IS field to applications currently overlooked, and use the aspectual engagements framework to facilitate inter-discourse discourse.
ICT Features
1. Features are seen in light of Dooyeweerdian subject-object relationship.
2. Oceanic meaningfulness provides philosophical grounds for affordance and appropriateness.
3. The materiality of features is seen as encapsulation of aspectual laws in three elements (interaction possibilities, innards, protocols).
1. Nature-freedom ground-motive has led IS scholars to oppose social/human to the 'materiality' of ICT.
2. Cartesian and Heideggerian notions of subject-object cannot explain affordance as experienced in everyday experience.
3. No basis for bringing different kinds and types of affordance together.
4. Normativity (quality, appropriateness) of features is only weakly understood.
1,2. The oceanic view of meaningfulness lets us bring human and materiality together, understood as Dooyeweerdian proximal subject-object relationship in all aspects.
3. Kinds, types of affordance can be understood and situated as aspect triples.
4. Normativity of features are norms of each aspect.
5. This can help design of good features and their elements, and of software libraries.
6. This can link information systems field with computer science.
ICT and Society
1. See impact of widespread ICT use as multiplied functioning in each aspect, with innate normativity.
2. Infrastructures are Umwelten constituted in correlative enkapsis, in which juridical, ethical, pistic aspect are important; examples: digital divide, surveillance, e-government.
3. ICT-society relationship is inter-Umwelt relationship, each functioning in a different range of aspects.
4. See IS field as defined by meaningfulness, with mandate to open up lingual aspect and thereby open up other aspects.
5. See technological progress as aspectual opening.
1. Immanence Standpoint and Nature-freedom ground-motive blind us to oceanic nature of aspects, and narrows our study of widespread use.
Infrastructure issues are viewed through narrow lens of economic, formative, juridical aspects, under-valuing ethical, pistic.
3. Various theories trapped in dualistic ground-motive; socio-critical theory too distant from everyday experience; lack of understanding of Umwelt.
4. Many approaches to IS field look to past; socio-technical ignores lingual aspect.
5. Progress is unquestioningly either rejected or accepted.
1. Recognise all aspects of widespread use, and their normativity.
2. Recognise importance of pistic, ethical aspects of ICT infrastructure, and its multi-aspectual normativity.
3. Offer plurality of aspects to widen extant theories and understand structure-agency nexus, and bring theories closer to everyday experience.
4. See IS field as centring on lingual aspect with neighbouring aspects, with mandate to open up all aspects (Schuurman's liberating vision).
5. Recognise both benefits of aspectual opening, and also dangers of hubris, self-interest and idolatry.
ICT Development
1. All development activity seen as multi-aspectual human functioning, oriented towards future possibility.
2. This emphasises four responsibilities, each of which involves every aspect and its normativity.
3. This view can affirm most extant discourses and most types of development activity.
4. ICT dev. as a largely practical endeavour is affirmed by Dooyeweerd's respect for everyday experience.
1,2. Nature-freedom ground-motive has imposed a tendency to set freedom v control and neglect responsibility.
3. Extant discourses have not sufficiently interacted, partly because of a theorizing tendency in academia.
4. ICT development has little philosophical foundation.
1. Seeing ICT development as responsibility for possibility invites us to consider every aspect of each, including overlooked ones.
2. Design-coding-testing is enriched into artefact-creation; user requirements analysis is enriched into use-anticipation and domain-understanding; project management is enriched into project-orchestration. All developers can exercise several responsibilities.
3. The discourses may understand each other via aspects as spheres of meaning common to all.
4. The everyday-oriented philosophical foundation offered here can be developed further by exploring other portions of Dooyeweerd's thought.

So What?

Over a hundred suggestions for research or for improving practice are made in Chapter 12 of Basden 2017. These are tabulated in Benefiting from Dooyeweerd's Philosophy.

References

Basden A. 2008. Philosophical Frameworks for Understanding Information Systems. IGI Global.

Basden A. 2017. Foundations of Information Systems: Research and Practice. Routledge.


This page is part of a collection that discusses application of Herman Dooyeweerd's ideas, within The Dooyeweerd Pages, which explain, explore and discuss Dooyeweerd's interesting philosophy. Email questions or comments are welcome.

Written on the Amiga and Protext.

You may use this material subject to conditions. Compiled by Andrew Basden.

Created: 14 June 2017 Last updated: