Politics and AIS: Where Do We Draw the Line?

The Association for Information Systems (AIS) is the preeminent global professional association for academics in the Information Systems (IS) discipline. Throughout its more than 20-year history, AIS governance documents have included no guidance on matters related to national or international politics. However, recent events have challenged AIS to reconsider its responsibility as a political or moral advocate for its members and the discipline it serves. A panel at ECIS 2017 explored the ways in which AIS has inadvertently or intentionally entered the political fray and debated the benefits and drawbacks of taking on a more formal political position. This paper presents the positions that each panelist raised and summarizes the active discussion that followed. It concludes with a set of questions that constitute a “call to action” to the AIS council to enact a politically acceptable set of core values to benefit its members.