A Critical Realist Perspective on Organizations’ Approach to Blockchain
Nadine Ostern, Friedrich Holotiuk, Jürgen Moormann · Academy of Management Proceedings · 2020
Blockchain technology, a decentralized infrastructure validating tamper-resistant transactions, was introduced roughly one decade ago. Till today, numerous financial serviceproviders (FSPs) claim to have developed and test use cases as well as prototypes of blockchain-based solutions. However, hitherto organizations do not scale their existing solutions. As a result, the actual business value of blockchain falls short of the expected business value of the technology. Information systems (IS) researchers increasingly criticize this situation and develop recommendations for FSPs how to foster the adoption of the technology, thereby trying to realize their dream of a fully decentralized blockchain-economy. This paper asserts, however, that despite having good intentions, IS researchers currently neglect an essential characteristic of blockchain technology, i.e., equivocality. IS researchers should consider that FSPs apply the technology not only in different ways but also because of a plethora of reasons and causes, which is why we cannot treat FSPs as equal based on the assumption that they are all ‘adopters’. Using a critical realist perspective, we found divergences between FSPs’ actions taken toward the adoption of blockchain technology, i.e., what they do, and why and how they adopt the technology. Our results disclose the need to develop more differentiated recommendations that take into account the impact of sensemaking activities as well as the divergent motives of FSPs which induce them to adopt blockchain technology.