Narcissism, Identity, And Legitimacy

The theory of narcissism can be employed usefully to analyze the dynamics of group and organizational behavior. Just as individuals seek to regulate their self-esteem through such ego-defense mechanisms as denial, rationalization, attributional egotism, sense of entitlement, and ego aggrandizement, which ameliorate anxiety, so too do groups and organizations. An understanding of the behaviors by which groups and organizations regulate self-esteem is important, because it sheds light on the dynamics underlying the legitimacy attributions made by organizational participants. In this article I enlarge and illustrate these arguments.