A boundary object is a concept in sociology to describe information used in different ways by different communities. They are plastic, interpreted differently across communities but with enough immutable content to maintain integrity. The concept was introduced by Susan Leigh Star and James R. Griesemer in a 1989 publication (p. 393):[1]
This paper has since been widely cited and the concept of a boundary object has been adopted in both computer science (particularly computer supported cooperative work) and management. Bowker and Star developed the concept further in the book Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences.[2]
Boundary objects are said to allow coordination without consensus as they can allow an actor's local understanding to be reframed in the context of a some wider collective activity.[3] Similarly, Etienne Wenger describes boundary objects as entities that can link communities together as they allow different groups to collaborate on a common task.[4]
Charlotte Lee has extended the concept of the boundary object to consider periods of unstandardized and destabilized organization where objects are transient and changing, which she coins as "boundary negotiating artifacts".[5][6]