Background: The adoption of microservice architectures is driven by the promise of agility, scalability, and independent deployability. However, this architectural style introduces significant complexity in integration testing. Traditional end-to-end (E2E) testing strategies are often slow, brittle, and create development bottlenecks, undermining the very agility microservices aim to achieve.

Objective: This article provides a socio-technical analysis of Consumer-Driven Contract Testing (CDCT) as a strategic alternative to traditional E2E testing. We aim to (1) synthesize the technical mechanisms of CDCT, (2) analyze the critical organizational and cultural shifts required for its successful adoption, and (3) propose a framework for its integration at scale.

Methods: A systematic literature review and thematic analysis were conducted, synthesizing insights from peer-reviewed academic sources, seminal industry publications, and technical white papers. The analysis focuses on identifying the failures of traditional paradigms and the technical and socio-technical components of a successful CDCT implementation.

Results: The analysis reveals that CDCT, exemplified by tools like Pact, effectively shifts integration testing left, enabling asynchronous development by verifying interactions via executable "contracts." We find that the primary challenges to adoption are not technical but socio-technical, relating to team communication, code ownership, and cultural resistance. The role of a central "contract broker" is identified as critical for managing contract versioning and enabling scalable CI/CD integration.

Conclusion: CDCT is a fundamental enabler of independent deployability in microservice ecosystems. However, its implementation must be treated as a strategic shift in engineering culture, not merely the adoption of a new tool. We conclude that organizations must invest in fostering shared responsibility and communication alongside the technical infrastructure to realize the full benefits of CDCT.

Microservices, Consumer-Driven Contract Testing, Integration Testing

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