The evolution of legitimacy discourse in corporate social responsibility reporting: evidence from a state-owned Irish energy company (2003-2025)
Martin Quinn, Alonso Moreno, Xinwu HePurpose
This study aims to examine how legitimacy is discursively constructed and stabilised over time in corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting in a state-owned enterprise (SOE) and what these legitimacy dynamics reveal about how an SOE responds to evolving sustainable-development expectations.
Design/methodology/approach
The CSR sections of the Electricity Supply Board’s annual reports from 2003 to 2025 are analysed using a theory-informed computerised content analysis based on Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count categories mapped to Suchman’s (1995) legitimacy framework. To assess the mapping’s interpretive validity, the authors incorporate several robustness analyses.
Findings
Over the 23-year period studied, the reports increasingly and consistently used language that conveyed a sense of the ESB as a natural, accepted part of everyday life. While the report language reflected pragmatic and moral legitimacy, cognitive legitimacy was prominent. This prominence is observed across multiple analytical approaches, suggesting a stable discursive orientation. This finding suggests that in SOE contexts, legitimacy depends less on actively persuading stakeholders and more on being perceived as taken-for-granted in society. Sustainable-development transitions occur through organisations whose historically embedded societal roles can both support continuity and require continuing accountability as sustainable-development expectations change.
Research limitations/implications
The study focuses on a single case. Also, the operationalisation of legitimacy through linguistic proxies involves interpretive judgement. While robustness checks provide support for the findings, the results should be understood as indicative patterns, not precise measurements.
Practical implications
The findings highlight CSR reporting as a component of managing long-term legitimacy, particularly for publicly accountable organisations. Managers may draw on historically embedded narratives and societal connections to enhance trust and alignment with sustainable-development expectations.
Social implications
For policymakers and regulators, the findings suggest that sustainability reporting is more than a compliance exercise – it is part of a wider infrastructure supporting public accountability and long-term societal value, and this should inform how reporting is designed. For organisations, actively cultivating a sense of being a trusted part of society through reporting can strengthen stakeholder ties and support broader sustainable development efforts.
Originality/value
This study provides longitudinal evidence on the configuration of legitimacy forms in CSR reporting, showing that legitimacy dynamics in SOEs differ from prior literature and the relevance of historically accumulated legitimacy to sustainable development. It also contributes methodologically by proxying legitimacy types to automated text analysis.