Are Business Students Buying It? A Theoretical Framework for Measuring Attitudes Toward the Legitimacy of Environmental Sustainability

摘要

Environmental sustainability has begun to penetrate the business school curriculum. Whether it ultimately becomes a key component of managerial decision-making models will depend upon whether it is perceived as legitimate within the context of profit-making enterprises. This paper draws upon the cognitive psychology and organizational legitimacy literatures to develop a conceptual framework for operational-izing perceived legitimacy. This framework can be used to develop survey instruments and simulations that evaluate the effectiveness of various pedagogical approaches to integrating sustainability into business school curricula.