Gaining Legitimacy through Framing A study on how organizations frame sustainability to foster legitimacy

Abstract

Due to the growing societal awareness for sustainable practices, the fashion industry is facing major legitimacy challenges. As of today, the primary focus of organizations should be to preserve and enhance legitimacy. This study related to the fact that legitimacy can be understood as a result of different framing techniques. Correspondingly, this research explained how organizations use sustainability in their framing to foster legitimacy. A content analysis concerning both narratives and visuals was conducted, after which a total of five frames were identified. The findings indicate that each frame is related to one or several pillars of legitimacy, which emphasizes the relationship between framing and legitimacy. Apart from this, an identification of which types of framing are inherent to communication can help organizations to prioritize which narratives and visuals can be used in communicative acts. Therefore, this study can help fashion organizations to make a decision about sharing (sustainability) communication.