Seeing is believing: Performing transparency in the informal organic market in China

Abstract

This article examines how intermediary organizations use both organizational and interpersonal scripts to perform face-to-face transparency in the informal organic market in China. These performances constitute a form of organizational relational work that has the following consequences: (1) framing the relationships between intermediary organizations and consumers as trustworthy by demonstrating the former's competence and honesty; (2) making consumers prioritize long-term trustworthy partnerships over the quality of a single product. The organizational relational work sustains transactions despite quality uncertainty. However, when this performative transparency is found by consumers not reflecting the actual production process, it spoils established trust. This case illustrates how organizational relational work stabilizes transactions amidst market uncertainty by building consumers’ trust in organizational-level institutions. It also highlights the role of dramaturgy in enabling organizational relational work.