Abstract Based on the theory of cognition, we developed a legitimacy model of social enterprise. The model indicates legitimacy is a result of mutual construction between social enterprises and public. The public make judgments on legitimacy based on intuition as well as evaluation. Rhetorical and product strategies are effective strategies for social enterprises to gain moral legitimacy and pragmatic legitimacy, which will be influenced by environmental factors such as identity construction, situational embedding and development stage. These findings will benefit the research on the theory of social entrepreneurship and legitimacy, which also provide academic support for Chinese social enterprises implementing differentiating strategies to obtain legitimacy based on Chinese environment.
CHEN Yun,CHEN Xin. Legitimacy Mechanism and Acquisition Strategy of Social Enterprise Based on Cognitive Perspective[J]. Chinese Journal of Management, 2018, 15(9): 1304-.
