The international visibility of South African IS research : an author-affiliation analysis in the top-ranked IS-Centric journals

Brown, I; Tanner, M

The international visibility of South African IS research : an author-affiliation analysis in the top-ranked IS-Centric journals

Journal Article

2008

Journal Title

South African Computer Journal

Link to Journal

http://sacj.cs.uct.ac.za/

Publisher

University of Cape Town

Department

Department of Information Systems

Faculty

Faculty of Commerce

Abstract

Information systems (IS) has a well-known tradition of being multi-disciplinary. IS research has been published in a diversity of outlets. As the discipline has evolved, there have been several scientometric studies aimed at identifying and ranking a core set of high quality IS-centric journals. This effort has spawned additional investigations aimed at profiling IS research in different regions and countries across the globe. The purpose of this study is to add to the body of knowledge in this domain by investigating the international visibility of South African IS research. The scope of the study was limited to investigating journal publications. The approach used was to identify from the literature a basket of IS-centric journals ranked as the top set in the field. The affiliations of authors in these journals for the period 2003 to 2007 were examined, and South African-authored publications identified. The analysis revealed that South African-affiliated authors have published in only a small portion of these IS-centric journals. The total number of articles published has also been small. These findings may explain why South African IS research has been perceived as largely unknown by the international IS academic community. This is despite numerous publications in outlets outside of the commonly ranked IS-centric journal set. If South African IS researchers are to increase international visibility, one strategy is to explicitly target the commonly accepted top-ranked IS-centric journals. Other strategies for achieving this are proffered in this paper, and ideas for future research are put forward.