Organizational Guilt Management: A Paradox Perspective
研究了企业在不确定是否违法时，如何通过话语策略管理利益相关者对其可能内疚的印象，识别出修正、归因等策略，对危机公关和CSR研究者有参考价值。
Alleged organizational wrongdoings are often characterized by high levels of uncertainty about what happened, which can take years to be established judicially. In this study, we examine organizations’ efforts to manage their stakeholders’ impressions of their possible guilt in this period of uncertainty. The study examines the discursive guilt-management strategies organizations employ in such situations to embrace the paradoxical tensions that emerge between their routine, positive self-presentations as responsible organizations and their communication about their possible guilt. Taking departure in impression management and a paradox perspective, we conceptualize guilt management as a discursive practice enacted in times of uncertainty. Specifically, we conduct a microlevel discourse analysis of corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports published by large US banks after the financial crisis and analyze how these banks managed impressions of their possible guilt, before they eventually agreed to legal settlements. We identify amending, bracketing, shifting locus of control, implicating, as well as reattributing and extending moral agency as central guilt-management strategies that embrace the paradoxical tensions between the banks’ positive self-presentations and their communication about their possible guilt. We conclude with a discussion of theoretical and methodological contributions to organization studies.