IT investment: Rationalizing ERP adoption

This thesis explores how organisations justify adopting Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. The data used for the study are electronically mediated justifications for ERP adoption presented by universities. An interpretive study of these using grounded theory is made, from which a model of ERP adoption is constructed. This model is then examined to explore the underlying values that support the rationales contained in the model. The perspectives on communication, rationality, legitimacy and domination provided by Max Weber and Jurgen Habermas are employed in this analysis. The conclusions reached are that in the context of ERP adoption, people occupy a subservient role to technology, process and organisation; that technology is intrinsically valued and that fundamental organisational values can be subverted.