Overview and Problem Statement

Abstract

Early research found that management accounting information and control systems are not effective under all circumstances, thereby preparing the ground for contingency theory.¹ During the following two decades, variations in those systems were explained by their dependency on key variables, such as a company's technology, structure, and size.² GALLIERS was one of the first to acknowledge the necessity to think beyond the traditional contingency research. In his manifesto for information management research, he postulated broadening the scope of information systems research to include cognate disciplines and the philosophy of the social sciences on one hand, and, on the other, to recognize cross-cultural aspects of information systems by abandoning the Anglo-Saxon perspective.³ Other authors contended that most information systems research was written from a Western, mostly a North-American perspective.⁴ Thus, national culture was identified as an important contingency factor, especially when analyzing global organizations. Moreover, the underlying assumption that existing research findings were culture-free was abandoned, thereby bringing the (cross-national) universality of contingency theory into question.⁵ As a result, national culture has been acknowledged as determinant of equal importance as the traditional contingency variables mentioned above.⁶ Further, a growing interest in cultural specificities arose, itself leading to a substantial increase of cross-cultural studies.⁷