25th Anniversary Edition

Abstract

At the Journal of Information Technology (JIT), we print an editorial only for special issues and special occasions.This issue sees the completion of our 25th full volume and as such we are treating it as cause for celebration -hence our silver anniversary cover.It is all too obvious that the world of information technology (IT), has been transformed since 1986.Indeed, the technology then was hardly pervasive -personal computers were in their infancy.While there were many predictions, nobody could say with confidence how the technology and its use in organisations and society would play out.E-mail was clunky, expert systems were attracting much attention and artificial intelligence was the sexy field in which to work.Nobody talked of knowledge management, business process re-engineering, websites or browsers, enterprise systems or social networking.Indeed, though outsourcing had existed since the very start of business computing, in 1986 the term had not yet entered common currency.So, the last 25 years have given those working in the field of information systems (IS) an enormously stimulating roller coaster ride.So, with the dominant issues in the field changing by the year it has been exhilarating but also very challenging to take the JIT on a journey to establish its identity and place among the leading journals in information systems.And just as the past has been unpredictable, the signs are that the future will not be easy either for academic journals or for the field of information systems.Time, then, to do some reflection.This issue aims to capture that unpredictability while this editorial takes some of the points in the articles and relates them to the journal's aspirations for the future.While we may not be able to say precisely where we are going or where we will be 25 years from now, we know the compass by which we shall navigate.Starting, then, with this issue, we asked Allen Lee if he would, as a senior scholar, write both a retrospective and a prospective assessment of the information systems field.He has produced -Retrospect and Prospect: Information Systems Research in the Last and Next 25 Years.Here, he poses a challenge -that our development of knowledge should be more constructivist and design science oriented than at present but from within our typical locus in universities, viz in the business schools and commerce faculties.Unlike, say, organisational behaviour, the field has not been stable for long enough for all its knowledge to be built cumulatively by hypothetico-deductive research.But, this is a provocation to the established disciplines and also a challenge to the IS journals.Can we achieve and retain sufficient respectability in the eyes of our peers while operating under different epistemic norms?Allen Lee shows that taken-for-granted concepts such as 'information',