Sacred values as role-constitutive norms in social groups.

Abstract

Jara-Ettinger and Dunham propose that institutional cognition tracks roles and their normative expectations. I argue that decentralized roles lacking formal authority require an additional mechanism to stabilize legitimacy. Sacred values - nonnegotiable commitments that impose costly obligations - function as role-constitutive norms that signal intrinsic devotion, thereby determining legitimate role occupancy and preventing free riding on group identities.