Legitimacy research suggests that companies obtain moral legitimacy when acting in accordance with commonly held norms and values of the social system. In recent years, more attention has been paid to the fact that such systems are heterogeneous. Assumptions about what is morally right and wrong differ, not only between normative contexts but also within them. For that reason, the issue of moral legitimation becomes complex. The focus of the chapter is on the nature of the normative contexts in which companies attain legitimacy. Light is shed on the variety of normative contexts and the way that companies relate to these. It is argued that normative contexts differ with regard to both the number of competing normative ideas and the strength of these ideas. In addition, multinational companies face a multitude of social systems in which moral legitimation takes place. The chapter provides a model for understanding various normative contexts. It is argued that depending on the nature of the contexts, moral legitimation will operate differently.

This article offers new knowledge on the role of industry as external facilitators in the case of designing responsible management education (RME). Drawing on a case of a Swedish business school that developed a two year master's profile in sustainable business, we find that industry partners acted as external facilitators in the form of ‘Legitimizers’. This type of external facilitator, Legitimizer, complements Vazquez-Brust and Yakovleva’s (2017) existing categories: ‘Guides’, ‘Monitors’, ‘Enablers’, and ‘Networkers’. Based on the findings, we propose that business can take on four types of legitimizing roles in academia – business collaboration: The Visitor, The Planner, The Co-operator, and The Co-educator. We further identify various forms of legitimacy, particularly cognitive and pragmatic, that the corporate activities and interactions generate. Interestingly, in the case of RME, companies are instrumental to legitimizing the education, rather than being the ones seeking legitimacy.

Critical educational literature suggests that an increased reliance upon neoliberally inspired management technologies transforms the very foundations from which images of the ideal teacher are constructed. The purpose of this paper is to add to this literature by (i) identifying and analysing a number of theoretical qualities associated with performative technologies, and (ii) discussing how such qualities contribute to the emergence of performative teacher subjectivities. Drawing upon the findings from a qualitative interview study into the extensive use of performative technologies in a Swedish upper secondary school, we discuss four key roles of performative technologies—referred to as territorializing, mediating, adjudicating, and subjectivizing—and the intensity by which they play out such roles. A key conclusion is that the intensity by which performative technologies territorialize, mediate, and adjudicate educational practices affects self-reflection and internalization among teachers and, hence, is important for understanding the subjectivizing role of performative technologies.

Following the introduction of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), many companies claim to adopt them in one way or the other. Guided by the ‘SDG Compass’ and other tools, companies are advised to go through a process of trying to understand the SDGs, defining priorities, setting goals, integrating, and reporting and communicating the results. The article points to the nature of implementing the SDGs in business, including going from macro to micro goals, managerialism, and instrumental rationality, all implicitly present in the discourse of SDGs. Such an understanding on how to implement the SDGs, however, requires a strong role of the accounting system of the firm. Based on a framework by Miller and Power (2013), the various roles of accounting assumed in the managerial and instrumental approach to the SDGs are discussed. These roles include the potential of the accounting system to territorialize (sustainability) issues, mediate these to other arenas or higher-order contexts, adjudicate between success and failure, and subjectivize or incentivize people within the organization. The problem of playing out these roles with regard to the SDGs is discussed, and also the perils of doing it, including the risk of losing sight of ethical business conduct as action-guiding principle.

Despite some two decades of research on Responsible Management Education (RME) relatively little is known about RME within business. In particular, different variants of RME in business have not been studied enough to give us a thorough understanding of the nature, role and function of RME in business. To provide some remedy, this article studies RME from an internal business perspective. Through action research, it shows how a specific form of RME, building on the Shared Value (SV) concept, is shaped, developed and manifested within the life-insurance and savings company Skandia. Furthermore, it develops a model for a holistic understanding of RME in business, taking into account RME actors, concepts, methods, and use. Apart from being an empirical illustration from within business of how RME becomes a tool for strategy, identity and innovation, and constructing a model for understanding RME, the article also highlights SV as the conceptual basis for RME.