Vocabularies of Divergent Legitimizing Strategies and their Effect on Ethical Standardization

Abstract

Due to increasing environmental complexity firms can no longer rely on their taken-for-granted legitimacy but instead have to actively manage their image in society through communication. This is particularly true for firms operating in industries characterized by severe ethical challenges such as commodity farming. With the help of quantitative text analysis, this paper seeks to scrutinize the firms’ legitimizing strategies in the coffee, tea and chocolate industry, assessed through archival website content. Based on the institutional logics literature and the French Pragmatist Sociology, my theorizing suggests that firms will mostly rely on vocabulary associated with two distinct worlds, the ‘domestic world’ and the ‘civic world,’ when seeking to maintain their legitimacy vis-à-vis western consumers. I argue that the prevalence of each world within firm communication affects the organization’s effort to ensure work standards by collaborating with ethical labeling organizations. The impact of the firm’s legitimizing strategy on the organization’s standardization effort in turn depends on whether the firm can be classified as family firm as the latter is less likely to engage in decoupling.