An integrative theory of organizational legitimation

The concept of legitimation has been used in the organizational analysis literature to refer either to processes by which power relations are mystified through the manipulation of symbols or to processes by which organizations conform to consensually defined standards of evaluation. This article traces the intellectual lineage of these approaches in the management literature and current and classic literature of the social sciences, and demonstrates the complementarity of their strengths and weaknesses. An integrative theory of legitimation, based on semiotics, is then presented which identifies the articulation of these approaches and allows a richer basis for the analysis of legitimation phenomena.