"Legitimizing Black Business from the Civil War to Civil Rights"

In Wadhwani and Lubinski’s paper “Reinventing Entrepreneurial History”, (Wadhwani and Lubinski, 2017) the authors encouraged the study of legitimacy, the sense that a new organization or venture “belongs”, that it fits within the social construct of its time period. In this paper, the author examines Black businesses in Atlanta from the Civil War to the Civil Rights era and three individual entrepreneurs to see how this legitimization worked in a practical sense. The paper makes three main contributions. One, the paper gives practical examples of three distinct strategies in play: endorsement, authorization, and storytelling. Two, a fourth external actor that has the power to grant validity (collective legitimacy), specifically in the Black community, is explained and discussed. Three, promoters, actors pushing legitimacy for the same of the community, are defined and examples given. In addition, the paper discusses the collaboration that occurred between all elements of this process: the entrepreneurs, the external actors, and the promoters that were all united in the common goal of building the validity of Black business in the South.