Factors inhibiting an interest in theory development abound. Theoretical papers are generally judged to be difficult to conceptualise, difficult to write, and difficult to have published (Hirschheim and Klein, 2003). The performance value placed on rigorous research, numbers of publications and the pursuit of funding are further disincentives, both for the individual academic and for the discipline as a whole. From this perspective, it could even be argued that the IS field has a motive to discourage its leading academics from participating in theory development.
Theory development is inherently an objective to which standard management criteria for evaluation are ill suited. Targets for volumes of publications, the amounts of research funding obtained, and the numbers of new students signed up for courses can be specified, their achievement monitored, and funding rewards calculated, an outcome that accords very well with the contemporary passion for quick evaluation (Laverty, 1996). The investment of time and effort in theory development is in contrast always risky; not only does the activity produce nothing measurable; it may not even generate a viable ‘product’ (Aronowitz, 2000). The time spent in the pursuit of theory could therefore be considered wasted from some perspectives.
Yet Bourdieu’s analysis, considered in conjunction with circumstantial evidence from other fields such as physics and sociology, suggests that the development of grand theory can be invaluable, at least from the broader disciplinary perspective, and that information systems’ ‘acquisition’ of an influential theory would add considerably to the discipline’s symbolic capital. The phrase ‘Einstein’s theory of relativity’ is an example of a phrase which states physics’ claim to be a discipline of the utmost importance every time it is used. People with no understanding whatsoever of its theoretical content can instantly recognise the equation ‘E=mc2’, and interpret it as a description of the forces behind nuclear weapons (Bodanis, 2001). As disciplines jockey for power, influence, and particularly money, in the contemporary university, the theory of relativity is an invaluable symbolic asset; irrefutable evidence of physics’ relevance, importance and intellectual gravitas.
It may be that physics is a questionable example, given its dominant position, though arguing so seems more a tribute to the effects of cultural capital than a reflection of something intrinsic to physics. It can, however, be shown that the same effects can be seen in other disciplines, and that they occur irrespective of whether or not the grand theory in question is assumed to be ‘true’ in some absolute sense. As indicated earlier, sociology has a high recognition factor stemming from debatable concepts such as Marxism, but perhaps psychology provides the best example of a powerful theory with no demonstrable scientific proof to sustain it. Many scientists are still outraged at the lack of evidence to prove that Freud’s theories are ‘correct’ (Webster, 1996), yet psychoanalytical theory survives and thrives.