Abstract/Summary

Information sharing in policing enables proactive and preventative work to enhance welfare, security and safety for the public; however, achieving these goals requires having an effective and efficient mechanism for sharing information within and between organisations. There is currently no systematic approach to specifically analyse the requirements of an information sharing system, which motivates the need to develop such an approach. In this research, the Activity Theory was taken as a basis to identify the requirements of the approach and design a suitable framework, which was then evaluated through the use of two case studies in the public sector in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This research aims to design an information sharing framework that takes proper account of the actors and their activities to improve the information sharing system. To this end, it presents the development of the Activity Theory-based Information Sharing Analysis (AcTIShA) Framework, proposing a mechanism for analysing the information need and supporting the information sharing. This framework incorporates the concept of information analysis adopted from the Activity Theory, which is used for understanding the information. The Activity Theory plays a crucial role in analysing the elements concerned with the information, such as actors, actions, information artefacts and purposes within the organisation’s activities. To illustrate the application of the AcTIShAFramework, a system design based on its use is demonstrated. The design science research paradigm is adopted to evaluate the outcomes of the framework through two case studies. These were carried out in two different public sectors of the UAE, namely the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Health, to evaluate the AcTIShA-Framework. The focus group method was conducted with a variety of participants from both sectors to discuss and evaluate the information sharing mechanism. It is demonstrated that the framework provides a systematic and versatile approach to be utilised to improve the sharing of the information among organisations, and that it will benefit the development of information sharing systems. The conclusions, contributions and suggestions drawn from this study are used to extend the activities of information sharing. Finally, the research provides guidance for developing information sharing systems.