Managing Image in a Core-Stigmatized Organization

Abstract

This study examines the nature of the revelation–concealment dialectic faced by Nevada’s legal brothels as these organizations work to strategically build visibility despite external pressures to keep them hidden and internal desires to protect the privacy of certain organizational stakeholders. In addition, in instances of organizational visibility, we examine brothels’ strategies for managing core-stigma while attempting to project a socially acceptable public image. Brothels address this revelation–concealment dialectic by adopting stigma-management strategies of distancing themselves from identities they perceive as socially undesirable and aligning themselves with nonstigmatized industry practices. At the same time, the brothels construct selectively permeable organizational boundaries through the invitation of controlled outsider boundary-crossings and through the promotion of their own community-engagement efforts. These results extend research on hidden organizations to consider the particular image-management challenges faced by shadowed organizations.