Exploration of metaphors as a way to understand socio-technical phenomena: An emergent framework

Abstract

The intangible and (often) young nature of socio-technical phenomena makes them difficult to understand and communicate. Researchers and practitioners have responded by applying metaphors, prescribing an epistemological structure to these phenomena. While metaphors are frequently applied, researchers have paid limited attention to their applications and limitations. To address this gap, we applied a mixed-method approach, exploring the communities’ applications of metaphors for the conceptual development of socio-technical phenomena, using two communities: Open Government Data and IT Development and Maintenance. We synthesised 21 articles and two books into an emergent analytical framework, Communities’ Applications Of Metaphors (CAOM). We collected empirical material for each community’s academic and practical sides between 2015–2020, resulting in 100 articles and 263 documents. We conducted a word frequency analysis and an in-depth analysis of the empirical material, drawing on CAOM. The contributions are the emergent CAOM framework with the key concepts of metaphors’ usage, expression, and assemblages of metaphors. We conclude that the application of metaphors in communities is influenced by community type and metaphors’ role, while the topic influences metaphor selection. Metaphors are combined to create new ways of reasoning. We recommend that governments draw on action-oriented metaphors when writing policies for socio-technical phenomena, while digital government researchers should include action-oriented elements when they develop metaphors, which can help practitioners put new knowledge into practice.