May 30, 2002

ECIS Standing Committee Meeting, June 5, 2002

Gdansk, Poland

Agenda Item – Relationship Between ECIS and AIS

Proposed:

To open discussion between AIS and ECIS on developing the relationship between them.

Rationale:

The goal of AIS is to be the premier international academic organization in Information Systems. In pursuit of this goal AIS seeks to achieve as much balance as possible in membership and activities between its three regions –Region 1 (the Americas), Region 2 (Europe Africa, Middle east), and Region 3 (Asia/Pacific). A number of actions have been taken in order to foster global balance within AIS. These include greatly reduced subscription fees for members from non-high income countries (as defined by the World Bank), an outreach program to Eastern European countries at last year’s ECIS, and a forthcoming meeting of academics from Central and South America to reach out to those parts of the world. Furthermore, AIS is pursuing alignments with a number of national IS associations.

In similar vein, AIS is interested in expanding its cooperation with important IS activities around the globe. As ECIS is the leading IS conference in AIS’ Region2, close cooperation between them would be of advantage to both and to the IS discipline as a whole.

Current situation:

AIS consistently supports the Doctoral Consortia of ECIS and this support is budgeted annually. AIS views ECIS as serving its membership in Region 2. In the interest of achieving truly global status, AIS is interested in achieving closer ties with this important regional conference.