IDIA2010 Conference
Let’s Stop and Rethink IS Research in the Sub-Saharan African Context
Victor Mbarika
Prof. Victor Mbarika
President, The ICT University and Executive Director/IT professor, ICITD, Southern University
Abstract
In the past two years, our research center, The International Center for IT and Development(www.icitd.com) has been pondering on where the IS society stands in terms of research in IS with the focus on Sub-Saharan Africa. As a follow up with our call for such a focus in the Journal of the Association for Information Systems some five years back (Mbarika et al., 2005), we have developed a framework to rethink research directions as we enter a new decade in this century. Hence, in this keynote address, I will discuss these issues as we take a look back at what has been done and what we may want to consider as next steps in this context-specific research domain.
References Mbarika, V., Okoli, C., Byrd, T., & Datta, P. (2005).The neglected continent of IS research: a research agenda for Sub-Saharan Africa. Journal of the Association for Information Systems (JAIS), 6(5), 130-170.
Bio
Prof. Victor W. Mbarika, Ph.D. is President of The ICT University. He is on faculty in the College of Business at Southern University and A&M College and is founding director of the University’s International Center for Information Technology and Development (ICITD). He is also Visiting Professor at The University of Buea in Cameroon, Makerere University Business School in Uganda, as well as external examiner at several other Universities internationally. He is an information and communications technology (ICT) consultant with various governmental and private agencies. He holds a B.S. in Management Information Systems from the U.S. International University, a M.S. in MIS from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and a Ph.D. in MIS from Auburn University.
Prof. Mbarika has authored over 125 academic publications in the form of books, peer reviewed journal articles, conference proceedings and book chapters. Much of his research is in the area of ICT transfer in developing economies as well as in resource-poor settings of developed economies.He was cited as being “in the forefront of academic research into ICT implementation in Africa, and has provided a theoretically-informed framework for understanding ICTs in less developed countries...” His scholarly publications have appeared in journals such as Journal of the Association for Information Systems, European Journal of Information Systems, Information Systems Journal, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, IEEE Transactions on Education, IEEE Transactions on IT in Biomedicine, IEEE Spectrum, Communications of the ACM, The Information Society, and Journal of the American Society for Information Sciences. His work has also appeared in major media outlets such as Reuters and The Associated Press (AP), including numerous radio and TV appearances such as the BBC. He has received multiple research and teaching grants and fellowships, amounting to over $1.5million, from the National Science Foundation, NASA, KPMG, Microsoft, Southern Regional Education Board and the Louisiana Board of Regents.
Dr. Mbarika has also received the prestigious Fulbright grant. He is Editor-in-Chief of The African Journal of Information Systems and serves as senior board member for several other journals such as IEEE Transactions on IT in Biomedicine. Prof. Mbarika is member of the Association of Information Systems (AIS), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the Information Resources Management Association (IRMA). He holds over 20 research, teaching and service excellence awards and has been featured on the cover page of several magazines highlighting his ICT research and consulting activities.
