Legitimacy building in crisis: how citizen-led mutual aid self-organizations emerged and survived during Shanghai’s COVID-19 Outbreak
研究了上海2022年新冠疫情期间公民互助自组织如何通过教育、信任和角色分化建立认知、规范与实用合法性，并借助小管理团队的结构调整在危机后存活，对理解非正式组织在危机中的作用有参考价值。
This study examines how citizen-led mutual aid self-organizations established legitimacy during Shanghai’s 2022 COVID-19 outbreak. Through an analysis of 1,010 questionnaires and 21 interviews, we find that cognitive legitimacy emerged through education and trust. Normative and pragmatic legitimacy developed simultaneously via role differentiation. Small management teams enabled post-crisis organizational survival by maintaining legitimacy through structural adaptation. The findings extend institutional theory by demonstrating how crisis-born self-organizations operate within hierarchical governance systems while building multiple forms of legitimacy. The study reveals how informal citizen-led organizations complement formal administrative structures during crises.