Toolkit: Legitimacy Lens – A guide for building and maintaining legitimacy of new institutions

How much legitimacy is needed?

There is no clear-cut answer. It depends on various issues, some of which you have more control over than others in setting up or updating an institution that helps advance your larger goals.

• How many people or distinct groups need to accept the institution for it to achieve its purpose? (Can you advance your broader goals by framing the specific specific purpose of your institution in a narrow way?) 
• How intense is the change that you seek to create? (Can you advance your broader goals by starting with a less intense change?) 
• Is there a crisis in the background? (Crises may create openings for new institutions by lowering the relative legitimacy of existing institutions. Maintaining legitimacy over the long run may be challenging since expectations around performance are likely to be high.)
• What other sources of legitimacy can you draw on? Or, conversely, are you starting in legitimacy debt? (Are there ways to start a new or updated institution with borrowed legitimacy?) 

Section 3 of the accompanying paper elaborates on these conditions.

An institution’s legitimacy, like a hot air balloon’s lift, must match its context and purpose. The weight of the balloon — or the threshold of legitimacy required — depends on several factors, some of which are within the control of institutional designers.

• Broad acceptance may be necessary when many stakeholders are involved, whereas narrower purposes may allow for fewer approvals. 
• The intensity of the behavior change sought also affects the lift required; institutions aiming for significant change must cultivate deeper legitimacy to get off the ground. 
• Crises can reduce the weight by increasing people’s willingness to accept alternatives that are different from the status quo, but this effect can be temporary. 
• Institutions can lighten their load by borrowing legitimacy from existing frameworks or partnerships. Conversely, starting in legitimacy debt — being initially viewed with skepticism — can increase the challenge. 

Each of these considerations, among others, shapes how institutions can generate enough lift to achieve their purpose and stay afloat.

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Module I: Understanding strategic conditions
for building legitimacy

You start with assessing where you are currently in regard to the new or updated institution you’d like to create. 

This phase helps in recognizing your options regarding the next phases — choosing the entry point and understanding your sources of legitimacy — and how to make meaningful decisions.

The first part of module contains a series of projects for you to reflect on the foundations:

1. Understand what your purpose is
2. Understand your position in regard to the purpose
3. Anticipate key features of the context in which you operate

After covering the foundations, you should be able to better identify promising options for building legitimacy: 

• Reflect on your entry point for building legitimacy
• Explore sources through which you can build legitimacy
• Anticipate dynamics of legitimacy over time

1. Understanding your purpose

Every institution has a purpose and that purpose has implications for how to build legitimacy.

For instance, in a highly contested matter such as how to redistribute global wealth, routes towards building legitimacy are likely very different to an institution focusing on a purpose that is not contested at all (or even ignored). For the first, legitimacy is likely a constant priority; for the second, something to keep in mind and build as needed over time. 

Key questions to consider are:

• Have there been prior institutions with similar purpose? What is their history of legitimacy? 
• How contested is the purpose you’re dealing with?
• How many people are influenced by the purpose?
• How much control do you have in getting towards your purpose?

2. Understanding your position

You, as the institutional entrepreneur, and the institution you are creating have implications for legitimacy. 

For instance, a new NGO with grassroot support is in a different position to a international entity such as the United Nations. The NGO may have more room to maneuver and greater legitimacy among groups that believe in the value of bottom-up initiatives. The United Nations entity is likely to have legitimacy with those who believe in the UN’s right to create such an initiative — but also a more constraining legacy of precedent. 

Key questions to consider are:

• How much room to maneuver do you have, e.g., in fine-tuning goals, approach, bases of support, and more? 
• What are the lock-ins (e.g., the implications of any existing  institutional form)?
• Does your legacy (e.g., previous work, affiliations, reputation) significantly influence the legitimacy of the institution you are designing? Do you have a “legitimacy debt” or “credit” based on who you are?

3. Anticipating key features of the context in which you operate

The context in which the institution operates has significant implications on how to build legitimacy. For instance, an institution that operates in a local context in which there is very little support or competition is options for different strategies and tactics in building legitimacy to an institution that operates in a congested global domain such as climate mitigation. The first can focus in getting the foundations right and ensuring engagement with local stakeholders. The second must prioritize understanding the nuances of the context and also likely have contingencies in place for building legitimacy.

Key questions to consider are:

• How much competition and/or support is there in your operative context?
• How static vs. dynamic do you perceive the context in which you operate? What are the scenarios you can identify?
• What are the risks and also emerging opportunities in the context? How about unlikely events?

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Module II: Understanding entry points for building legitimacy

Understanding and articulating the core aspects of the institution—its purpose, your role, and the operating context—enhances your ability to approach the task of building legitimacy as an institutional designer. 

Now, by utilizing two specific frameworks, you will be guided towards comprehending the choices involved in positioning the institution.

From strategic conditions to → Understanding entry points for building legitimacy

The foundations of your institution (purpose, position and context) have implications for how much and what types of legitimacy (and other aspects of institutional design) you will likely need to get started. 

You may have the opportunity to choose an entry point for building legitimacy. This can be, for instance, an initial focus in order to require fewer entities to perceive the institution as legitimate, or in order to be able to start from a lower level of legitimacy. The entry point can sit in between the axis and change over time.

The framework will help you to reflect on your entry point by positioning your institution on:

• Breadth of purpose: Is the purpose of the institution general or narrow?
• Frame: Is the institution framed technically or is it explicitly political?

The importance of context for your entry point

Every institution sits in a set of background narratives, beliefs, and complementary or competing organizations. This context shapes your possible entry points. And it can change. You can choose a matter that is apparently technical, only to have it become a source of competition between, say, differing technology standards. You can choose a narrow purpose that becomes an illustration or an example of a wider general divide. 

Understanding the axis: Political-Technical

Political entry point means that you start building legitimacy by engaging with questions of power and decision-making, setting agendas and directionality. An example from a national context would be a Ministry of Finance in a given country that sets fiscal frameworks that steer decision-making. 

Technical entry point means that you start building legitimacy by engaging with questions on effectiveness, implementation and creating conditions for being successful. An example from a national context would be a Statistics Agency with a specific task in providing data and knowledge for the society and decision-making.

There are many historical examples of choosing an entry point and evolving over time to another one. For instance, the EU in many ways built its legitimacy through technical arrangements and, with that, evolved into a political entity.

Understanding the axis: Narrow Purpose-General Purpose

Narrow purpose means that the institution has a specific task and with that likely also limited amount of stakeholders and activities. An example would be the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) which purpose is to promote peaceful use of nuclear technology.

General purpose means that the institution has broad range of tasks and also stakeholders and activities it needs to engage with. An example would be the United Nations which in itself has 15 different agencies.

Again, there are examples of evolution over time. For instance, the World Health Organization (WHO) started out by focusing on infectious diseases and health emergencies but currently has a broad range of tasks and activities related to health issues globally.

Choosing your entry point: Political-Narrow Purpose

Institutions in this quadrant have a sharply defined political role, focusing on specific regulatory or governance functions. They ensure specialized oversight and accountability in a particular area of the political landscape.

It’s likely that you’re dealing with an issue affecting tangible items in people’s lives and while they are extremely aware of the end result, how to get there may be less visible. The understanding of the importance of legitimacy should be immediate.

Example: An electoral commission dedicated to overseeing and ensuring the integrity of elections. It sets rules for voter registration, candidate eligibility, and vote counting, and enforces these regulations. Its focus is strictly on the electoral process, making sure that elections are conducted fairly and transparently.

Choosing your entry point: Political-General Purpose

Institutions in this quadrant play a broad, strategic role, influencing a wide array of policy areas. They set national priorities, guide overall governance, and implement long-term plans affecting multiple sectors and aspects of society.

It is likely that you need to build legitimacy with people not  engaged with what you’re trying to achieve. The understanding of the importance of legitimacy can have latencies.

Example: A National Planning Commission that plays a broad and strategic role in shaping national policy. It develops long-term plans for economic, social, and infrastructural development. It sets national priorities, allocates resources, and provides direction on a wide range of issues, influencing the overall trajectory of the country’s growth and development.

Choosing your entry point: Technical-General Purpose

Institutions in this quadrant handle a broad spectrum of technical issues and services. They integrate various technical functions to address complex systems, ensuring that diverse technical needs and challenges are comprehensively managed and supported.

It is likely that you need to engage with people that understand the basics of the issue, and, more importantly how the engagement should be conducted. The understanding of the importance of legitimacy can have latencies.

Example: A National Health Service responsible for delivering a wide array of healthcare services to the population. The focus is on the technical aspects of providing comprehensive medical care, improving public health, and ensuring access to healthcare services for all citizens, covering a broad spectrum of health-related needs and issues.

Choosing your entry point: Technical-Narrow Purpose

Institutions in this quadrant are dedicated to specific technical tasks within a narrowly defined field. They utilize specialized knowledge and expertise to achieve precise and focused objectives, ensuring efficient and effective technical operations.

It is likely that you need to engage with an expert community that has a good sense of what is expected, the limitations and opportunities. The understanding of the importance of legitimacy should be immediate.

Example: A Weather Bureau which specializes in the technical field of meteorology. Its activities are narrowly defined but technically complex, serving sectors such as agriculture, aviation, and public safety.

Reflect on a meaningful entry point for building legitimacy

How do you see your institution in the context of the framework?

There is a lot that is defined by the premises of the institution but adding temporality as an additional dimension, there are more options. For instance, do you see room to maneuver in regard to the political-technical dimension? Or starting out with narrow purpose and gradually building legitimacy and moving towards a broader, general-purpose institution? 

There are not right or wrong answers. This exercise helps you to explicate, and with that, reflect on the entry point you have for building legitimacy.

The following section helps to reflect on its implications.

Implications based on the entry point

• Political-Narrow purpose: It is likely that you are dealing with an issue affecting people’s lives and, while they are aware of the end result, how to get there may be less visible. The work done by the institution may need to be perceived to be more effective than alternatives. How things operate may need to be transparent and understandable for the key stakeholders and be considered fair. 
• Political-General purpose: It is likely that you need to build legitimacy with people not engaged with what you are trying to achieve. The institution has a broad range of goals and the ability to achieve impact is important. How the institution operates doesn’t have to be overly detailed but there may need to be understandable principles. Legitimacy is perceived through narratives and few people have visibility or access on how the institution actually works.
• Technical-Narrow purpose: It is likely that you need to engage with an expert community that has a good sense of what is expected, the limitations and opportunities. The institution has specific goals that it is expected to deliver. They are under detailed scrutiny. The group of stakeholders is limited and there may be an expectation of fair treatment due to established relationships and trust.
• Technical-General purpose: It is likely that you need to engage with people that understand the basics of the issue, and, more importantly how they should be engaged with. The institution’s capacity to deliver varies a lot. Public engagement and narratives matter in regard to perceptions. This dynamic can lead into overemphasizing the process and how the institution operates, as professional and high-quality delivery is an effective way for building legitimacy.

Module III: Understanding sources of legitimacy

In this section, we focus on laying out broad categories of ways that institutional entrepreneurs can accumulate more legitimacy. Sources of legitimacy can be: 

• Fairness
• Outcomes
• Process

At the end, you should be able to indicate where you expect your institution to gain legitimacy from, which should also affect its final shape.

From entry points to → Understanding sources of legitimacy

Based on literature, there are three distinctive sources for building legitimacy:

1. Outcomes: securing impact based on the purpose of the institution
2. Process: choosing ways of working that are considered to be correct for the purpose of the institution. 
3. Fairness: staying committed to principle of fairness and just treatment

On the following slides, there is more detail on how to think about building legitimacy depending on these three sources. It’s important to highlight that these exist dependent on each other. For instance, it is difficult to solely focus on outcomes as the source without taking needed considerations into account regarding processes. Also, there might be requirements coming from who you are as an actor, your funders or other stakeholders.

In addition to the three sources for building legitimacy, one should also reflect whether you have “legitimacy debt” so whether due to legacy conditions, previous attempts or any other reason you start from a position of less legitimacy. Reflections on the implications can be found on slide 30. 

At the end of this segment, you are asked to reflect how you see your institution’s balance regarding these three sources for building legitimacy.

Potential source: Outcomes 

This source for building legitimacy emphasizes getting things done and actual impact in regard to the purpose of the institution. For new institutions without a track record, this can amount to convincing key constituencies that you can produce outcomes. 

• Will you have outcomes to demonstrate soon? 
• How will you convince key constituencies  that you can deliver outcomes? 

Focusing on outcomes highlights the importance of prioritization in delivery and external communications and engagement.

You might be dealing with an issue in which there is a recognition that it is difficult to achieve the ultimate outcomes. An example would be an institution aiming to renew the global climate adaptation financing framework. In this case, you may be able to gain legitimacy by setting and achieving intermediate outcomes. 

Potential source: Correct Process 

“Correct” is subtly distinct from “fair”. It is a source of legitimacy based on the perception that you are addressing the problem in what is perceived by your stakeholders to be the right way: e.g., with investment in evidence or, in other cases, transparently.

• For your issue focus: Is there an established “best practice” in approach? How different is your approach from that? 
• Are there established operational processes, e.g., transparency around controversial research? If so, following them is one way to build legitimacy. 

Different communities may have different norms: the “correct” way to handle risk in public health may be distinct from communities organized around digital technologies. 

This form of legitimacy can also mean that deviations from precedent or established “best practice” in tackling a problem can be challenging and may require effort to invest in other sources of legitimacy such as fairness or outcomes.  

Potential source: Fairness 

This source of legitimacy emphasizes fair and just behavior in regard to the actions of the institution. 

• Will you have consistency and commitment in fairness? 
• Are you able to portray the ethos of fairness both internally and externally?

You might be in a situation in which the decided outcomes can be unclear at the start, such as an institution responsible for mediation in a local community. 

Focusing on fairness highlights the importance of cultural consistency and close relationships with key stakeholders.

Reflect on the balance of the sources 

• Are the different sources of legitimacy are relevant for your institution? How? Go through them one by one. 

• What do you see as the most important source for building legitimacy with your institution? Why is that? 

• How do you balance between the priority source and other sources? 

• How do you see the different sources for legitimacy evolving over time with your institution?

Legitimacy is also a relational concept, a matter of how those you seek to attract or influence see you against this shifting background. Maintaining legitimacy is thus a function of how you communicate, how you interact with others, and how your outcomes or attributes are positioned and made visible.

Module IV: Dynamics

While initial choices about entry points and forms of legitimacy can create a strong foundation for a new or updated institution; legitimacy ebbs and flows over a longer time horizon. 

This section seeks to provide an overview of some considerations for institutional entrepreneurs seeking to anticipate and navigate the dynamics of legitimacy. It focuses on context — aspects of the institution’s setting that may shape dynamics of legitimacy — and on choices — steps that the institutional entrepreneur (or subsequent leaders) may consider to be more resilient. 

This module draws on Sections 5 and 6 of the accompanying paper. 

Competition

Failure

Contagion

Shocks

Narratives

Temporality

Looking ahead: Design implications

Everything your institution does is important from the perspective of building legitimacy.

Here we focus on four key functions:

• Decision-making
• Financial model
• Communications and external engagement
• HR and people policies

The following slides will highlight the types of questions one should reflect on when designing a new institution. This section will be updated with life examples during spring 2025. 

1. Decision-making

This will be defined depending on the focus on outcomes as a source of legitimacy. Also, with political nature of the institution, certain amount of transparency and inclusion is easily emphasized.

How should the institution balance between transparency and inclusion vs. effectiveness?

2. Financial model

Alignment between the financial model of the institution and its purpose is important for the legitimacy of the institution. While there is some leeway, there should be consistency in regards to the key decisions (e.g., whether to be non-profit or not).

How should the financial model of institution be set up?

3. Communications and external engagement

Depending on what aspect of legitimacy should be emphasized, communications and external engagement has different roles. For instance, if there is emphasis on outcomes, communication and external engagement capacity should be prioritized significantly. 

What emphasis should there be on communications and external engagement?

4. HR and People policies

Different emphasis on legitimacy prioritizes different HR and people policies. For instance, a focus on fairness emphasizes ethics; a focus on process emphasizes consistency and firmness in delivery and documentation; and a focus on outcomes emphasizes effectiveness and flexibility.

What should the premises of HR and people policies be? 

Key reflection

Legitimacy stems from how institutions engage, communicate, and interact with their context, other initiatives and stakeholders.

A message from us

• The Legitimacy Lens serves as a guide for institutional entrepreneurs navigating the process of building and maintaining legitimacy. By framing legitimacy as a dynamic, relational, and contextual endeavor, this resource encourages reflection, adaptation, and thoughtful decision-making throughout the lifecycle of institutional design.
• Rather than providing definitive answers or fixed templates, the lens offers frameworks and questions to illuminate critical aspects of institutional legitimacy. From identifying entry points to exploring sources and dynamics of legitimacy, this resource is designed to spark meaningful conversations, surface new insights, and refine strategies for impactful institutional development.
• Institutional design is rarely linear—it requires constant reflection, iteration, and adaptation. As you work to transform advocacy into institutions your constituents trust and believe in, this lens invites you to engage deeply with the challenges and opportunities of legitimacy in your specific context. Ultimately, we hope it supports you in crafting institutions that are robust, relevant, and capable of addressing the needs of their time and place, and serve public benefit.
• Our journey toward understanding institutional design is ongoing, and we invite you to contribute to this exploration. Together, we can deepen this thriving field and develop practical approaches to shaping institutions that endure, evolve, and make a lasting difference.
• You can always reach out to us:
  info@tial.org
  institute@berggruen.org