기업은 ESG를 통해 어떻게 정당성을 확보하는가? 질적 면담을 통한 실무자 인식의 탐색

Companies are subject to legitimacy pressures from stakeholders. This is because stakeholders expect and demand that ESG management should be practiced to secure legitimacy, since survival and competitiveness can only be enhanced when corporate practices are recognized as appropriate by complying with social norms. By conducting qualitative interviews with 15 practitioners in related fields based on the theory of legitimacy, this study tried to examine how companies secure legitimacy through ESG in response to stakeholder pressure. Results of the analysis found that the pressures on ESG were stronger than those of CSR because investment-related evaluation was involved, and that the pressures came in various ways from various stakeholders including global evaluation agencies and investors. In responding to the legitimacy pressures, practitioners communicated through various channels, including the sustainability report, pointed out several problems, such as decoupling between ESG reality and its representation, and suggested future direction of ESG. Compared with previous studies that have focused on effect analysis without a clear theoretical basis, this study is significant in that it examined a specific mechanism of the corporate legitimation process from a deontological perspective.