Introducing a spectrum of moral evaluation: integrating organizational stigmatization and moral legitimacy

Audiences frequently change how they evaluate organizations, and these judgments often have a moral basis. For example, audiences may shift their evaluation from stigmatization to legitimacy or vice versa. These radical shifts in audience evaluation can have a major impact on organizations, yet organization theory struggles to account for them. We offer a solution to this problem by proposing a spectrum of moral evaluation that situates key moral judgments relative to each other. Our core argument is that integrating stigmatization and moral legitimacy into a broader spectrum of moral evaluation provides organization theorists with a much-needed toolkit to explore the consequential normative transformations often experienced by contemporary organizations. Specifically, it allows for a graded conception of moral evaluation, connects concepts – stigma and legitimacy – that are often considered in isolation, and offers opportunities for theoretical cross-fertilization

Marginalized to Mainstream: A Study Into Emerging Industry Under Stigma

This explorative study attempts to identify norms and practices of new businesses within the emerging industry of recreational cannabis retailers; specifically in the context of their entrepreneurial characteristics, start-up behaviors, and firm behaviors and strategies (Duchesneau & Gartner, 1990). Due to the nature of emerging industries, there are many opportunities for firms to create a successful position in a new market. However, firms in emerging industries face an innate “liability of newness”, increasing the challenge and risk of new venture creation (Stinchcombe, 1965). This risk and stigma is increased when the industry lacks legitimacy in the eyes of consumers and other established industries or organizations. The lack of definitive legitimacy besets this industry with a unique challenge. Therefore, in addition to the measures mentioned above, this study seeks to identify the extent of stigma in the new industry and how firms may have been impacted or addressed it

An Ounce of Prevention – Understanding the role of IS in ending Interpersonal Violence

This paper presents the findings of an investigation into the role of social technologies in violence prevention non-profitorganizational networks. The research was conducted with the cooperation of a partner organization that serves as aknowledge hub connecting various providers of services related to the treatment and prevention of instances of interpersonalviolence. From our time working with this project we developed the SASA (Share and Share Alike) Framework of SustainedKnowledge sharing among non-profit partner networks. This paper presents an overview of the SASA framework anddiscusses its role in facilitating the creation of a sustainable knowledge contribution network for non-profit service providers

Stigma and Reputation: Exploring the Lingering Effects of Organizational Stigma

Stigmas have been widely used to describe organizations and individuals that have negative reputations or that have engaged in illegitimate practices. Extensive research has been done on the effects of positive reputation and personal reputation. However, there is still much to learn about the effects and consequences of organizational stigmas. The purpose of this paper is to provide a theoretical overview of the consequences of organizational stigmas, particularly in the area of employee mobility, and to help understand the relationship between negative organizational reputation and personal reputation. Contributions of this research, the limitations and directions for future research are discussed as well

Anti-fossil fuel norms

Historically, climate governance initiatives and associated scholarship have all but ignored the potential for “global moral norms” to bring about changes in the political conditions for global climate mitigation. This is surprising, since global moral norms are widely employed—as both a mode of governance and an analytical framework—in other domains of global governance, from international security to human rights. However, recent national-level fossil fuel divestments, moratoria on new coal mines and bans on gas fracking, among other developments, suggest the promise of global moral norms prohibiting fossil fuel-related activities, which this article terms “anti-fossil fuel norms” (AFFNs). The article interprets recent examples of such activities in the light of international relations theory on moral norms to provide a general framework for understanding how AFFNs originate, spread and affect states. Specifically, the article argues that there are: (i) influential agents that are originating, and likely to continue to originate, AFFNs; and (ii) international and domestic mechanisms by which AFFNs are likely to spread widely among states and have a significant causal effect on the identity-related considerations or rational calculations of states in the direction of limiting or reducing the production or consumption of fossil fuels. The article also shows that, because they spread and affect state behaviour through mechanisms of “international socialization” and domestic “political mobilization”, AFFNs cohere with and build upon the new paradigm of global climate governance crystallized in the Paris Agreement. AFFNs, the article concludes, represent a promising new frontier in climate governance

Good to be Disliked? Exploring the Relationship Between Disapproval of Organizations and Job Satisfaction in the French context.

Previous research has found that a positive relationship exists between favourable perception of a firm and employees’ job satisfaction: the more positively an organization is perceived, the happier are its workers. However, the current literature has overlooked the consequences of a negative corporate image or disapproval of organizations. Building on the concept of organizational identification and the social identity literature, we fill in this gap and counterintuitively argue that employees are more likely to identify and align with their organizations when it faces illegitimate criticism. We test our hypotheses on a large-scale survey collected in France and find that perception of disapproval of an organization has indeed an adverse effect on job satisfaction. However, if employees perceive criticism as illegitimate, job satisfaction is positively impacted. This study suggests the existence of micro-level social identity reactions in case of unjustified disapprobation: employees stick together and hold the line against criticism, strengthening the collective identity and adding positive emotional value to the work experience.</jats:p

Abracadabra, Making the Visible Less Visible: Reducing the Effects of Stigma Through Invisible Work

Dirty work involves tasks that are considered disgusting or degrading. Individuals engaged in dirty work are often stigmatized, and this stigma may negatively affect the workers’ job-related attitudes. Although dirty work is often cast in a negative light, we explore an aspect of jobs that might lessen the detrimental effects of performing dirty work: invisibility. Using a sample of 329 working adults, we investigate the impact of invisibility on job satisfaction and occupational identification of marginalized dirty workers. Results indicate that performing dirty work, and being marginalized, each negatively impact job-related attitudes. In dirty occupations, relationships were weaker for employees reporting higher levels of invisibility with invisible employees reporting higher levels of occupational identification than their more visible counterparts. These findings shed new light on developing positive workplace experiences by suggesting that invisibility may be the key to reducing the stigmas associated with dirty work. Theoretical implications, directions for future research, and practical implications are discussed

The organizational stigma of motorcycle groups

Since scholars have come into contact with Erving Goffman's work, "Stigma: Notes on the Handling of Deteriorated Identity," many issues have been discussed in an interdisciplinary way on the subject of stigma, at the individual level and, more recently, in the organizational level. At this level, there are studies on organizations that have been stigmatized since its inception; have become stigmatized; developed actions to circumvent stigma; and, they obtained the destigmatization. This is the level of analysis chosen for the development of this study. The general objective of this article is to describe how motorcycling groups respond to the organizational stigma that is typical of this urban tribe. And, the specific objectives were to identify and compare the emotional, social and collective responses and motivations that underlie and drive the actions used by motorcycling groups in the Brazilian context. Through an exploratory study, conducted through interviews with members of Brazilian motorcycling groups (some belonging to the motorcycle club), it was found that, surprisingly, despite the ethnic and cultural diversity among Brazilian motorcyclists, there are few women, blacks and homosexuals who drive and are members of motorcycle groups. Most motorcyclists encourage / collaborate on fraternization and philanthropic events, some of which are designed to circumvent the stigma of the organizations of which they are part and thus reduce the individual stigma they carry when they publicly show themselves as motorcyclists belonging to these groups

Are network effects really all about size? The role of structure and conduct

Rooted in neoclassical economics, network effects research has revolved around size, arguing that the more users a network has, the more valuable that network will be to each user. I argue that a network's structure (feasibility of transactions, centrality of members, structural holes, network ties, the number of roles each member plays) and its conduct (opportunistic behavior, reputation signaling, perceptions of trust) also have significant impacts on a network's value to users and to network providers. Network research that neglects structure and conduct and focuses only on size can lead to wrong strategies or a misleading research agenda. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96333/1/smj2013.pd

Fueling climate (in)action:How organizations engage in hegemonization to avoid transformational action on climate change

This study examines how organizations avoid the urgent need for transformational action on climate change by engaging in a hegemonization process. To show how this unfolds, we draw from Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory, focusing on the case of BP and its engagement with the climate change debate from 1990 to 2015. Our study takes a longitudinal approach to illustrate how BP defended its core business of producing and selling fossil fuel products by enacting three sequential hegemonization strategies. These included: adopting new signifiers; building ‘win-win’ relationships; and adapting nodal points. In doing so, we demonstrate how hegemonic construction enables organizations to both incorporate and evade various types of stakeholder critique, which, we argue, reproduces business-as-usual. Our study contributes to organization studies literature on hegemony by highlighting how the construction of hegemony operates accumulatively over an extended period of time. We also contribute more broadly to conversations around political contests and the natural environment by illustrating how the lack of effective climate responses is shaped by temporal dynamics