Stakeholder Theory and Organizational Ethics

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Chapter 6Stakeholder Legitimacy

Stakeholder theory should not be used to weave a basket big enough to hold the world’s misery.

—MAX CLARKSON¹⁹⁷

It was argued at the beginning of this project that one of the theoretical shortcomings of previous stakeholder scholarship is the problem of stakeholder identity.¹⁹⁸ For reasons to be adduced in this chapter, this problem may be attributed to a poor understanding of the concept of legitimacy in stakeholder theory. In this and the following chapter I will elaborate on how the problem of stakeholder legitimacy may be remedied using the principle of stakeholder fairness. Rather than merely stakeholders ...