Information Sharing at National Borders: Extending the Utility of Border Theory

Celene Navarrete A., Sehl Mellouli, Theresa A. Pardo, and J. Ramon Gil-Garcia
Feb. 15, 2009

Abstract

Proceedings of the 42nd Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences - 2009, Sun, 15 Feb 2009.

Research has identified the potential and challenges of information sharing in government settings mostly within the context of a single country. The challenges facing inter-governmental information exchanges that take place across national border governments, however, are thought to be different. To date, research has failed to provide theoretical guidance in understanding the complexities that the cross border environment brings to information sharing initiatives. This paper brings together Brunet- Jailly’s theory of borders [10] and definitions of crossboundary information sharing from Gil-Garcia et al. [39] to develop a framework that incorporates the information sharing and technology dimension with the economic, political and cultural contextual factors impacting border regions. This study is an initial step toward understanding the challenges that the border environment brings to information sharing initiatives. Future research is necessary to empirically test the utility of the proposed theory as a tool for understanding this new area of both practical and theoretical importance.

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