Introduction This issue of the European Journal of Information Systems (EJIS) is a special issue on Business Process Management and Digital Innovation. Guest editors Jan Mendling, Brian Pentland, and Jan Recker, have done a great job in explaining the complementariness of these two approaches (Mendling et al., 2020) and present three articles that vindicate this proposition. However, before leaving the word to the guest editors and special issue authors, we want to take the opportunity to reflect upon an urgent topic and present a recently initiated EJIS initiative.The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has changed our world forever.Thousands of people are dying, millions of people are in lockdown, and many businesses will not survive. Although several countries are already lifting some of the restrictions put in place to slow down the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, we can expect a continued impact on individuals, organisations and governments for a long time. As scholars in many disciplines around the world are collaborating in a “war” against an invisible enemy, how can information systems scholars contribute to this global effort? While information systems scholars might not be able to solve the crisis directly, we believe that we can provide knowledge and insights that might be helpful in the fight against COVID-19 and, indeed, during future pandemics. To provide an opportunity for information systems scholars to contribute timely knowledge contributions that can help the current COVID-19 situation, EJIS is calling for special communications on Information Systems in the Age of Pandemics (https://bit.ly/3b8EfaG).These special communications will focus on the design, use and impact of information systems during pandemics such as the current COVID-19 crisis. We welcome all kinds of contributions, both empirical and conceptual, as well as design science research. Studies of individual and organisational responses in terms of new or changed digital practices are of particular interest. Work on digital information infrastructures for crisis management and information modelling approaches to help solve or mitigate pandemics, such as COVID-19, would also be welcome. We furthermore welcome issues and opinion pieces and critical articles that look at the short and potential long-term impacts of newly developed systems on people, organisations and society. For example, will short-term fixes (e.g., monitoring of infected people via an app) lead to a permanent state of surveillance? As individuals, organisations and governments are forced to make quick decisions with far-reaching consequences, what are the longer-term societal implications of these decisions and their resultant digital solutions and practices?In this editorial, we elaborate further on the thinking behind these special communications and give some further examples of where we believe information systems scholars can contribute. Full paper available at https://doi.org/10.1080/0960085X.2020.1771968
