Producing leadership legitimacy in civil society – A study of online presentations of leaders in Sweden

ABSTRACT This article investigates how Swedish civil society organizations (CSOs) legitimize their leaders through online press releases presenting newly elected or recruited leaders, and which leadership ideals that are reproduced. The aim is to analyze how leaders are socially legitimized through leadership ideals in a time of increased demands on CSOs. The study moves away from the dominant perspective on leaders as actors contributing to the organizations, in favour of studying leaders as organizational assets whose image needs to be handled by the organizations. The article is based on a qualitative analysis of 54 online statements from Swedish peak CSOs, focusing on how the leaders are presented concerning personal characteristics, qualifications and missions. The results of the study indicate that Swedish CSO leaders are mainly legitimized with reference to traditional popular movement leadership ideals. Such ideals seem to serve as legitimators regardless of the type of organization. However, there are also legitimacy claims linked to managerial and administrative skills in line with third sector leadership ideals, suggesting potentially conflicting expectations on CSO leaders. These findings can be related to trends such as New Public Management, which push civil society actors to develop new skills and networks and to become more business-like.


Introduction
We interpret the presentation of a new leader as part of a process of legitimation, as described by Meyer et al. (2012;see also, Greenwood et al., 2002). Changing leadership might in fact be a sensitive issue for many organizations regardless of whether the change has been sudden or gradual. After election or recruitment, the new leadership needs to be consented and institutionalized in the organization, which involves explaining why a particular new individual is the best replacement for the old leader by appealing to the ideals and values the new leader generates (Meyer et al., 2012). These leadership ideals and values are also determined by the societal context and changes in the cultural and political environment.
Although the presentation of new leaders is of key importance for the CSOs' legitimacy and the leaders' capacity to act, we know very little about these processes. The aim of this article is to explore how civil society leaders in Sweden are socially legitimized through online communication and to analyze which leadership ideals are reproduced.
To pursue this aim, this study examines how Swedish peak CSOs present and legitimize their leaders through online statements. By peak organizations, we mean national organizations with a wide network, holding close collaborative relations with many stakeholders. Trends of increasing expectations on and professionalization of CSOs are apparent in many countries, including in Sweden (see e. g. Åberg et al., 2019;Harding, 2019). In Sweden, such trends have been described as a shift 'from voice to service' (Lundström & Wijkström, 2012) or 'from nation state to business' (Wijkström & Einarsson, 2006), in contrast with Swedish CSO's traditional role of channelling their constituencies' voices and advocating for target groups' rights (Lundström & Svedberg, 2003). The organizations included in the study are active in the social welfare and integration policy area, in which new expectations of CSOs are particularly evident, especially when it comes to delivering services on behalf of or in collaboration with public authorities (Johansson et al., 2015;Jönsson & Scaramuzzino, 2022). We expect these organizations to be particularly active in legitimizing their leaders towards different stakeholders in order to meet the many and perhaps contrasting internal and external expectations.

Some Notes on Previous Research
There is abundant research on leaders in particular types of CSOs, for instance in social movements and in NGOs (e.g., De Cesare, 2013;Miller-Stevens et al., 2018;Nepstad & Bob, 2006;Norris-Tirell et al., 2018;Schmid, 2006). But unlike much research on different leadership typologies and styles in the literature on corporate and public management leadership (e.g., Kippenberger & NetLibrary, 2002), the literature on civil society tends to focus on the distinctiveness of leadership in civil society in comparison to the other spheres (e.g., Anheier, 2000;Schröer, 2010). Concerning leadership ideals, the literature on leadership in civil society has often applied a management perspective and sometimes make distinctions between voluntary and paid leaders as two different types of leaders following different logics (e.g., Kreutzer & Jäger, 2010;O'Regan & Oster, 2005). By focusing on the legitimizing function of leaders, we expect leadership ideals to be linked not only to organizational positions in terms of paid or unpaid leaders but also to organizational identities, goals and missions. Considering the diversity of organizational types, as have been captured by the typologies of CSOs in the literature (e.g., Wollebaek & Selle, 2008), there are reasons to expect a variety of leadership ideals.
Research about legitimacy in civil society is vast and includes many perspectives. Since many CSO's are dependent on support by different stakeholders, not least for funding, research has drawn attention to processes of legitimation and accountability. Relations based on resource dependency, contract-based service production and evaluations are often assessed as potentially undermining CSOs' core values and independence (e.g., Arvidson & Linde, 2021;Ebrahim, 2003;Meyer et al., 2012;Pfeffer & Salacnik, 1978;Linde et al., 2020). A tension between organizational core values and external stakeholders' expectations can be expected to be reflected also in the processes of legitimization of the leaders.
When research on legitimacy in civil society focuses on leaders, it is often about how leaders fulfil the strategic role as intermediaries, for instance, between the organization and the state or between the organization and the grassroots (see e.g., Ganz, 2000;Kohler-Koch, 2013). Despite the crucial role of the leaders for CSOs' legitimacy and the potential inherent tensions between different leadership ideals, the processes of legitimizing leaders in civil society have almost never been addressed.

Theoretical Perspectives
Legitimacy is a 'relational concept' reflecting how the social context perceives the organization (Brown, 2010). Two different conceptualizations of legitimacy are present in previous research: legitimacy as an attribute of and resource for the organization and legitimacy as a process of social construction (see literature review by Egholm et al., 2019;see also, Suddaby et al., 2017). In this article, we examine both how leaders are portrayed in terms of personal characteristics, experiences and assignments, and how they are socially legitimized in relation to different leadership ideals. As our focus is on how the leaders are portrayed by their organizations and legitimacy constructed, we draw mostly on the second conceptualization.
It has traditionally been considered important that civil society leaders remain independent from other elite groups in society (Etzioni-Halevy, 2001). Scholars have questioned this independence because many leaders of prominent CSOs tend to have close connections to other social spheres and since leading positions in CSOs are increasingly occupied by executives rather than by elected leaders (Skocpol, 2003). CSOs today act in a complex political environment where they are expected to interact with many stakeholders: with the community, politicians, authorities, and the business sphereboth at domestic and international levels. This is likely to affect what constitutes good leadership, challenging the status of the elected CSO leader in favour of the professional leader, drawing legitimacy more on qualifications than on value alignment, charisma and anchoring at the grassroots level. These new expectations put pressure on CSOs not only to seek social legitimacy within their constituencies, but also among other stakeholders such as governments, enterprises, clients, users, media, and the general public. Leaders' legitimacy is therefore essentially linked to their capacity to live up to different stakeholders' sometimes contrasting expectations.
Meeting these new expectations is demanding, both for organizations and individual leaders. Professionalization of leaders can allow civil society actors to work more at national and international levels, to engage in inter-organizational cooperation, to build coalitions, and to be present and visible in the media (Edwards & McCarthy, 2007;Morris & Staggenborg, 2004). Such professionalization might, however, also reinforce social stratification within CSO's and social movements (Edwards & McCarthy, 2007). In CSO's for disadvantaged groups, it might enhance the role of 'conscience constituents' who feel solidarity with the represented group without sharing the experience of being marginalized in society (ibid.). Such a shift in leadership ideals could in turn contribute to legitimacy being based more on status in other social spheres beyond civil society (e.g., politics, business, or media) than on status within civil society, for instance among constituencies (cf., Etzioni-Halevy, 2001). At a time of increasing distance between CSOs and their grassroots, the leaders' legitimacy is thus also related to their capacity to over bridge the gap.
The way in which the leaders need to be presented in order to achieve legitimacy depends on the organization's core mission and the expectations of internal and external stakeholders (e.g., members, volunteers, donors and public authorities). The social legitimacy of leaders in civil society is drawn from their perceived capacity to live up to these often-conflicting expectations (cf., Pallas et al., 2015). Organizations representing disadvantaged groups might, for instance, be caught up in the dilemma of either producing leaders who can appeal to donors and supporters by reassuring them that they will contain potential social unrest, or producing leaders who can mobilize the grassroots' support for the organization with the promise of social change (cf., Wooten, 2010). This dilemma could be interpreted as a tension between a bottom-up and a top-down approach to legitimacy as different pathways for CSOs to gain legitimacy as a resource (cf. Walton et al., 2016) Leadership Ideals and Changing Expectations on Swedish Civil Society Swedish civil society is characterized by a relatively large number of organizations and a large share of the population who are members of organizations (Statistics Sweden, 2019; Vogel et al., 2003;Wijkström & Einarsson, 2006;Scaramuzzino & Meeuwisse, 2017). Traditionally, non-professional, democratic organizations have dominated Swedish civil society through large membership-based CSOs involved in representing groups' interests and organizing activities complementary to the welfare state (Lundström & Svedberg, 2003). The ideal of a strong link between leaders and the grassroots has been upheld by democratic internal structures for elections and decision-making. Opinions about what should characterize civil society leadership have, however, sometimes varied, partly depending on which social functions CSOs fulfil (Wijkström & Åkerblom, 2002).
Over the last twenty years, the Swedish state has raised its expectations that civil society actors will partner up in solving societal challenges through partnership arrangements both in policy formation and service delivery (Erikson & Larsson, 2022;Johansson et al., 2011;Jönsson & Scaramuzzino 2022). The development of New Public Management models, a broadening contract-culture, and increased public expectation of 'value-for-money' have created the opportunity for CSOs to act as professional deliverers of public services and to step in when the state fails to deliver (Johansson et al., 2015). Swedish CSOs are also acting within a multi-level organizational and political environment that is characterized by a sharp growth in the number of European and international networks and associations of CSOs (Ahrne & Brunsson, 2008;Johansson & Kalm, 2015) that have created new opportunities for Swedish CSOs to access knowledge and expertise, resources, and recognition (Meeuwisse & Scaramuzzino, 2019).
New roles for CSOs might require new types of leaders with a different kind of expertise (Lee & Scaramuzzino, 2022). Studies of the leaders in large Swedish CSOs at the national level have shown that civil society leaders' socio-cultural composition is more diverse than in most other sectors (e.g., politics and business) (Jonsson & Lagerlöf Nilsson, 2007). However, the distance between civil society leaders and the general population has increased since the 1990s, especially when it comes to the level of education required to achieve top positions in resourceful organizations. This might be linked to the rise of new opportunity structures that are only accessible to resource-strong and well-embedded organizations (Hedling & Meeuwisse, 2019) whose leaders and staff have the competence and the personal and professional networks to navigate the outer expectations.
When the CSOs present their newly appointed leaders, we expect them to try to handle the tension between a traditional popular movement model and the new expectations that Swedish civil society faces. We depart from a typology distinguishing between two types of CSOs having their origin in different welfare regimes. The typology differentiates between organizations built on self-organization and self-help and those that organize activities and perform services for others (Lundström & Svedberg, 2003;Meeuwisse & Sunesson, 1998). The differences between them can be represented by two distinct types of organizations -'the Scandinavian non-professional, democratic type of organization' and the 'the Anglo-Saxon voluntary organization', which are found as empirical phenomena in most welfare states (Lundström & Svedberg, 2003). Considering the changes in the expectations of Swedish civil society, we expect a strong presence of leadership ideals linked to the second type of organization, potentially challenging or even replacing the traditional popular movement leadership ideals.

Data and Method
The media largely create and channel the image of CSOs, and thus contribute to reinforce or undermine leaders' power and authority (Marberg et al., 2016;Morris & Staggenborg, 2004;Nepstad & Bob, 2006). The rise of the Internet and social media has provided CSOs with new channels to communicate with the environment (Enjolras et al., 2012;Scaramuzzino & Meeuwisse, 2017) and new opportunities to engage in proactive strategies to legitimize the organization. One of these strategies is to present newly elected or recruited leaders through self-produced press releases. These are supposed to be picked up by traditional media and spread through social media channels to legitimize the leader and hence the organization in the eyes of various stakeholders. This study focuses on press releases of new leaders for national peak CSOs that are active in the social welfare and/or integration policy area. In Sweden, this policy area involves many CSOs, approximately 40% of formally organized civil society (Scaramuzzino & Wennerhag, 2019). This policy area faces many challenges today due to changes in the welfare system and with contracting out of public services. It is hence likely that leadership ideals in this policy area have been affected. We have chosen organizations at the national level because it makes the presentation of the CSO leaders more comparable as they act in the same political environment. It is also at this policy level that the most powerful and resourceful organizations (peak organizations) are active, something that has been acknowledged in studies on leaders and power elites carried out in Sweden (Göransson, 2007;Swedish Government, 1990).
In addition to the fact that the chairman or the secretary-general would have been presented online at the time of election or recruitment, we had two conditions for the organizations to be included in our sample: (1) being a national CSO and (2) being active in the social welfare and/or integration policy area. To identify the peak organizations (N. 82) we screened the lists of the CSOs that participated in one deliberative process and in three conferences at the national level in the welfare and integration policy area during 2015 and 2016. Then we studied the organizations' webpages for the names of the topleaders. Some organizations had only one leader, the chairperson ('ordförande'), while most of them also had a second leader, often titled secretary-general ('generalsekreterare'), executive ('VD'), principal ('rector'), or the like. In the next step, we searched the Internet for press releases announcing the appointment of the leaders. We were able to find 54 presentations. The press releases were often published on the CSOs' own websites or on press release platforms such as mynewsdesk.com.
Among the 54 presentations, 30 concerned chairpersons and 24 secretaries-general. These are quite different types of leaders. The chairman is elected to represent the organization and is often head of the board. The need for an additional leader who is responsible for the activities, the administration and the staff might in itself be seen as a consequence of the increased professionalization of CSOs and of a development of their activities into more complex structures with several workplaces and project-run activities. The leaders had been appointed between the years 2003-2017 although only five of them before 2010. The gender distribution was even for both types of leaders. They represented 32 organizations with different focus and target groups. Among these were CSOs oriented towards adult education, human rights, social welfare, victim support, culture and recreation, development, religion and various types of interest group organizations (e.g., women's, tenants, pensioners, LGBT, volunteers).
The organizations included are only those that were able to and had an interest in publishing a press release. This denotes a certain organizational capacity and a media strategy on part of the organization that many CSOs in Sweden are lacking. Our selection consists of the largest and most resourceful organizations within their policy area, characteristics that stand out when considering that 70% of the CSOs in the social welfare policy area do not have any employed staff (Scaramuzzino & Wennerhag, 2019). The fact that organizations representing immigrant groups are absent from the study might for example partly be a consequence of an inward orientation towards the organization's own community rather than the general public, but also of a lack of organizational and communication resources (cf. Scaramuzzino, 2012).

The Analysis of the Empirical Materials
We analyzed the empirical material using a qualitative discourse analytical approach (Potter, 1996), although not involving systematic close analyzes of the entire material. The starting point was to interpret the presentations of the leaders as part of a social legitimation process, where people responsible for the presentations want to convince the reader that the newly appointed leader is the right person for the job. We were interested in how this was done and which leadership ideals were thereby reproduced. We therefore both examined the formal structure of the presentations and the discursive strategies used, for example which legitimizing claims were made, which experiences or characteristics were emphasized (or downplayed), elements repeated, etc.
We started by analyzing the structure and form of the press releases for general patterns. They were rather similar and standard in format, and were generally a half to a few printed pages. The following elements were as a rule included: (1) personal characteristics, often linked to previous civil society involvement and work experiences, but sometimes also referring to personal life and personality traits, (2) a short presentation of the qualifications of the person such as their education, employment history, and previous engagement within the movement or civil society in general and (3) the mission of the leader understood as expected tasks and what the leader wanted to accomplish, often presented against the background of various challenges facing the organization. Sometimes these elements were presented in the same sentence as personal characteristics were related to the leader's background and previous experiences, and qualifications were related to the leader's mission or the tasks at hand. These elements were either presented as general statements, e.g., 'X is very committed to … ', or intertwined with first-person statements by the former leader or other central figures in the organizations or by the newly appointed leaders themselves, e.g., 'I am very honored by the appointment and eager to start working … .' In order to analyze leadership ideals, both of us first studied separate statements in terms of characteristics, experiences and missions, based on the main elements of the presentations. We then compared our results, addressed inconsistencies, and decided to analyze the legitimizing function of the statements in terms of whether they drew legitimacy primarily from within civil society or beyond civil society. Drawing legitimacy from within civil society means emphasizing internal career trajectories and commitment to the values and mission of the organization or the movement. Drawing legitimacy from beyond civil society means emphasizing cross-sectoral personal networks and experiences as well as formal education.
Our analysis allowed us to develop two ideal types: 'the popular movement leader' whose legitimacy is drawn from within civil society, and 'the third sector leader' whose legitimacy is drawn from beyond civil society. We chose the concept of 'third sector' as it resounds with contexts in which CSOs have a clear role as service-producers, employers and part of the economy.
Although the press releases are public statements by the organizations aimed at the general public, we have chosen to omit the names of the leaders as well as other personal information (e.g., place of residence) in the reporting of the results. We have done so to protect the leaders' integrity and because their names are of little relevance for this study. We do however disclose the names of the organizations in order to compare leadership ideals in different types of CSOs.

Personal Characteristics
It is clear from the press releases that personal involvement and values in accordance with the organization's goals are perceived as crucial to CSO leaders' legitimacy. This applies regardless of position or type of organization, although it might be given varying degrees of emphasis.

Values Alignment, Long-term Commitment and Similarity to the Members
Values alignment and commitment was often expressed through descriptions of how the leader throughout his or her life has been engaged in the issues or activities that the organization represented, either through direct involvement in the movement or as a sympathizer, conveying an impression of leaders who practice what they preach: I have lived close to popular adult education ['folkbildningen'] my entire life. I joined my first study circle with my mother and sister-in-law when I was 12 or 13 years old, in mushroom picking.
The personal experience of being introduced to the organization at a young age seems to be very important for many leaders' social legitimacy, and this was sometimes presented as being linked to the leader's capacity to pass this experience on to new generations: The Church has been important in my life since my childhood years. As secretary-general, I want to contribute so that the Church continues to be a fellow traveler in many people's lives, says X.
Not only long-term commitment, but also having had a leading position in the organization since its foundation seemed to function as a legitimizing: I was one of the founders of the organization Woman to Woman, and I was a member of the board at the beginning of the organization's history. I have also been part of the advisory council. Specific tasks that I have had include traveling to the Balkans and holding courses on political campaign work for the organization's network. It's one of the most rewarding things I've done! The leaders themselves usually expressed their strong affiliation to the organization through statements such as how the appointment 'felt right from the start', how it felt like 'coming home', and how it is the 'finest mission you can get'. Terms like 'true popular movement person', 'strongly rooted in the movement', 'good inner compass' and 'sense for value-based leadership' were also used in the press releases to convey the image of well-anchored leaders with appropriate values.
As regards the personality of the leaders, their similarity to the members of the organization was often emphasized, even if they at the same time were described as unusually committed to the cause or highly successful in various respects: She has a strong commitment to housing policy and the tenant association as a popular movement, of course. X lives in a rented apartment in the residential area Y in Z and has previously worked as communications manager at LO [the main body of the labor movement].
The leaders were thus legitimized as being a 'primus inter pares', someone who shares the same experience of those represented but with a particularly strong commitment to the mission. Sharing the same experience appears to be particularly important for organizations representing specific interests, e.g., living in a rental apartment for the leader of the tenants' organization. The personal engagement also seems especially crucial when the previous working experience of the new leader was very distant from the civil society sector: Xcurrently the Marketing Director of [company]will be the new secretary-general for the Swedish Football Association. / … / -Football has always meant a lot to me. My wife Y has also played football in Z, and together we coach our daughters' team now, he says.
The leaders were recurrently described as 'passionate about' the issue at stake, yet being 'humble' and 'cooperative' rather than competitive, even if they appreciated 'exciting challenges'. The traits described above are clearly part of a legitimizing strategy that relates to ideals from the popular movement tradition. This ideal was very strong in our material when it comes to values and personality traits.

Wide Networks and Expertise
Another distinctive feature that instead seems to draw legitimacy and status from beyond civil society, is that the leaders were often described as outgoing and as having 'wide networks'. This legitimizing strategy can be related to a perceived need for modernization and adaptation to new demands in society: Over the past year, we have carried out major changes and developed a whole new foundation for Friluftsfrämjandet's [The Outdoor Association] marketing, education, and IT activities, including a brand-new IT platform, he said. / … / We are convinced that X has the experience and skills needed to guide the organization further and ensure that we take the next step in our development.
Within this leadership ideal, the following qualities were often emphasized in the press releases: expertise gained from politics and business, experience of cross-sector and international cooperation, and expertise in IT, communication, and marketing. Skills related to advocacy work could also be emphasized, suggesting that political influence is not something that is achieved only by commitment and by identifying with the cause, but also through 'professional' advocacy-skills: X's broad and long-standing experience of interest-driven politics and political handicraft fits well into Famna's [an umbrella organization for social enterprises] next strategic phase. The conditions for social enterprises ['idéburna vårdgivare'] need to be further improved.
New leaders were furthermore sometimes legitimized by presenting them as committed to internationalization: X has a strong commitment to international issues, something she will also promote as secretary-general. -The core values of Folkuniversitetet [The Adult Educational Association] are independence, university engagement, and innovation. I want to highlight the international perspective and make it one of our characteristics, says X.
In this way, the CSOs represented themselves as progressive, and the new leaders were legitimized by presenting them as capable, through their skills and experiences, of infusing the 'new energy' and the 'extra engine' necessary for the 'next step' in the organization's development.

Female Gender, Youth and Celebrity Highlighted
Not only the right personality and background were highlighted in the legitimizing strategies, but also suitability in terms of age and gender. In addressing various challenges facing the organization, these characteristics were sometimes presented as a resource. Older age was usually not mentioned, but youth was highlighted to signal renewal, creativity and vitality: X's energy and passion for the countryside is impressive, and that a young woman from the Northern part of Sweden leads our movement also shows a renewal of the organization.
In this quotation both age (young) and gender (female) seem to function to legitimize the new leader. We found other examples in which female leaders were sometimes described as an important asset for the renewal of the organization: Women at the top should make IM [a development organization] more visible. IM will be more visible and outgoing, and much commitment will be placed on the member movement. IM joins a new era with two young female leaders, secretary-general X and Chairman Y.
Appointing a woman as the new leader for the first time could also be presented as a milestone for the organization giving legitimacy to the leader as 'the first': A unanimous congress appointed on Saturday morning X as new chairman of PRO [the Swedish National Pensioners' Organization]the first woman in PRO's history to hold the chairman's post.
Remarkably we found no mention of ethnicity as a legitimizing ground for the leaders. Judging from the names, only very few of the leaders seemed to have an experience of migration. One possible explanation is that people with migrant backgrounds are mostly represented by ethnic organizations that were absent in our empirical data.
The extent to which presenting leaders as young or female is related to status within or beyond civil society is difficult to discern. Social legitimacy within civil society might be achieved if there is a strong expectation and perhaps even a critique within the movement that there are too few women in top positions. This might especially be a pre-condition for legitimacy in a women's organization. On the other hand, it might be legitimizing of the leader beyond civil society if the environment were to hold such expectations. In a country like Sweden, where gender equality is a priority on the political agenda, it is reasonable to think that a female leader might give such legitimacy beyond civil society, particularly because power elites still are dominated by men (Göransson, 2007).
A feature that is more clearly related to legitimacy and status beyond civil society is fame. Some of the newly appointed leaders were known to the public because of their role in the public arena, often through media exposure. Among them were, for example, a well-known author and public debater as well as a scholar who had been very active in public debates and popular science. These leaders were already known to the general public and enjoyed prestige that could be expected to give the organization legitimacy towards many stakeholders.

Experiences
In the press releases, all the new leaders were portrayed as specially qualified for the task. This might apply to formal qualifications such as a high level of education within a field that is considered highly relevant to the organization or about documented, valuable experiences from previous positions as leaders. Such merits were often presented as a simplified CV.

Leaders Well Anchored Within the Popular Movement
In some cases, it was clear that the leader was socially legitimized through a leadership career with increasing responsibility within the movement or organization. This is evident from how the new chairmen and the secretaries general of the church communities were presented, but also in the description of the new chairman of, for example, Verdandi (a Swedish workers' organization striving for social justice and a society free from alcohol-related injuries): X, Verdandi Y-city, and former vice-chairman, was elected Verdandi's new chairman with acclamation at Verdandi's 47th Congress in Z-city. X has been working for more than 40 years in Verdandi in many different roles, including as a leader in Verdandi Y-city, district chairman of Verdandi in the N-district, and vice-chairman.
If the leader did not have a background in the organization, something that might be potentially de-legitimizing, it sometimes seemed necessary to comment on this matter, like in the presentation of the new secretary-general of ABF (the Worker's Educational Association): Although X has not previously worked in ABF, she has worked closely with the organization. -Both through my engagement in the labor movement and as a principal at Y-Folk High School, I have been close to ABF, and, as I see it, it is a strong organization that is also ready to take new steps and to seek new groups, partnerships, and activities.

Combining Commitment and Cross-sectoral Experiences
However, for many CSOs it seems important that the leaders can claim themselves as highly qualified both within and beyond civil society. The general impression is that the leaders were legitimized by being individuals who combine strong anchoring within the organization with relevant education and valuable work experiences from other sectors. This was usually motivated by the organization's need for both stability and renewal. For example, the new secretary general of the Scouts was described as follows: X has a long background within the Scouts, most recently as deputy secretary-general. In addition to her scout experience, X has a ten-year business background in international groups where she has worked with change work and streamlining in banking and finance and industry. / … / We know that X will be a major asset in our work and that she will lead the Scouts with both stability and ambition.
Often, leaders' previous experience of cross-border collaboration was in fact highlighted as a special asset for the organization. This is clearly illustrated in, for example, the following quotation from the presentation of the newly elected chairman of The Swedish Association of Voluntary Community Workers (RFS): And my entire career has had the same focusthe border between public and voluntary work. I have literally sat on both sides of the desk: as a volunteer and as a responsible official. I understand both worlds and I can interpret between them.
The popular movement 'Folkets Hus och Parker', an association of over 500 public cultural centres and parks around Sweden, announced that it had appointed a member of parliament of the Social Democrats and vice-chairman of the Cultural Affairs Committee as the new chairman of the organization and that it had appointed a cultural director at a county council to be the new CEO. The press release described the new CEO's qualifications mainly in terms of negotiation skills and collaboration with municipalities, departments and authorities: -I see many development areas and opportunitiesnot least in terms of cooperation with municipalities, regions and other actors, says X. X's personal network and skills are wideranging, with many years of common negotiation and contacts with departments and authorities being naturally mixed with assignments in culture and society.
Qualifications from the public sector and politics were quite often used to legitimize the leaders in our material. There were, however, also examples where qualifications from the business sphere were brought up as in the case of the new chairperson and the new secretary-general (both men) of the Swedish Football Association, which is Sweden's largest specialist sports federation and includes more than 3000 football clubs. The two were also described more exhaustively than the other new leaders in the press releases. In addition to a careful review of the new leaders' previous positions in the football world, the press releases included a detailed description of their professional careers and their current family situations. It was also stated that the Nomination Committee had been guided by a list of criteria in the recruitment process. This signals hard competition for the posts and the need for well-motivated decisions.
Both new leaders were recruited from the business sphere, which is probably not a coincidence as the Swedish sports movement has increasingly been affected by the logic and commercial impetus of the markets (Norberg, 2010). The new chairman of the Swedish Football Association ran a consulting company (focusing on leadership development and education) and the new secretary-general was the marketing director of a large business chain. The link to business is presented in a quotation from the secretary-general as a legitimizing asset: X talks about the role of football in a societal perspective, but also as a strong player in the market. -Swedish football is the market-leading sport that engages a lot of people, which is amazing, but it is also an exciting business challenge with one of Sweden's strongest trademarks, he says. Some organizations indicated complementary roles of the chairman and the secretarygeneral in their presentation of the new leaders, for example, that the chairperson comes from within civil society with a firm foundation in the organization's values, while the secretary-general contributes with special skills and experience from other sectors (or vice versa). Here the dual leadership was used to legitimize the leaders according to different leadership ideals.

Mission
Almost all of the press releases studied here addressed the question of how the new leader positioned him or herself in relation to the organization's overall goals and prospects.
Swedish CSOs that are active in the welfare and integration policy area are highly diverse, with missions ranging from carrying out certain services or activities to advocating for a particular cause. The texts often related to overall values such as democracy, equality, justice, individual rights, freedoms, etc. The organizations were said to have an important role in the realization of these overall goals, and the leaders affirmed that the same values also were important guiding principles for them. However, their concrete objectives were usually more vaguely suggested.

Leaders Committed to Social Change
A few of the more recent press releases made explicit reference to challenges and problems associated with increased migration to Sweden, which also provided an opportunity to point out the societal significance of the organization. The newly elected chairman of The Swedish Adult Education Association (Studieförbunden) was quoted as saying: The study associations play an important role in community building, and the mandate as chairman is obliging in view of the major and important efforts that the study associations currently make to provide asylum seekers with a good introduction in Sweden. The tasks for our popular movement are many, and with good support from society we can do even more, both here and now and in the future, X says.
The new vice-chairman of RFSL, which promotes equal rights for homosexuals, bisexuals, trans-persons, and other people with queer identities, also related to the refugee situation and was quoted with a clear statement about the organizations' ideological and migration policy attitude: RFSL should be a strong voice for the LGBTQ people seeking shelter in Sweden. We will take up the debate with those who want to close borders, prevent family reunification and put obstacles in the way of those who escape from threats and violence. Together we will help people not only come out but also get in and live with pleasure as the persons they are says X.
The latter quotation conveys a clear 'voice' orientation where the goal is to influence policy and to improve the conditions for a particular group in society. The press release suggests that such clear positions from the leader can be seen as an asset in this organization. The new chairman of Verdandi expressed in a few words a similar goal of political change: I want to continue to develop the union and fight for better conditions for those who are affected by class society, says X.
The new secretary general for the Swedish National Pensioners' Organization (PRO) provided more concrete messages about her political ambitions in line with a popular movement tradition and its ideals: There are a number of requirements for change on PRO's agenda. The most important are pensions, care for the elderly, and residents for the elderly. She is also worried that the influence of older people in society has decreased, for example, the proportion of elderly MPs does not equal the proportion of elderly in the electorate. She also points out the importance of educating members of the municipal Pensioner's Advisory Council.

Leaders Committed to Efficient Management
While the leaders in the examples just mentioned expressed ambitions for social change, many press releases testified more about objectives such as increased membership and a more efficient organization. For example, the new chairman of the IOGT-NTO, Sweden's largest temperance movement, was quoted as follows: IOGT-NTO is an organization at the forefront of many areas, but we can be even better. My ambition is that we will continue to develop and become an even stronger popular movement. Not least because we are getting more members and more people actively engaged in the movement. Regardless of the level, we will feel like a great and amazing IOGT-NTO that really makes a difference, says X.
For a temperance movement, however, the ambitions of attracting even more members are intimately intertwined with the movement's societal goals. In the same way, it can be argued that the expansion target as expressed in the press release of the new chairman for The Swedish Association for Non-Profit Health and Social Service Providers (Famna) was in line with the organization's goal of strengthening the conditions for non-profit providers of health care in Sweden. In the latter case, the new leader is credited through his successful development work as the executive director of such a non-profit organization: Even in the shadow of large private actors in health and social care, non-profit providers grow, including through new forms such as Voluntary Sector Organization Public Partnership (IOP), but also through procurement and freedom of choice systems. During X's time as CEO, Y has expanded considerably in terms of financial sales, geographically, and with new businesses and personnel.
The goals were sometimes also expressed in terms of visibility of the organization's important role in society. The presentation of the new chairman of the organization The National Forum for Voluntary Organizations (FORUM, formed in the late 1990s) ends with a quotation saying that it is important to safeguard the social respect that the organization has achieved: We are today a respected organization with influence both in politics and within civil society organizations. There are many years of struggle behind this, and this position must be safeguarded, he says.
The new leaders' broad networks and professional skills were not infrequently presented as part of the organization's targeted modernization. In the press release of the new chairman of the Swedish Red Cross, she was presented as a person with 35 years of experience in international humanitarian work and of being in charge of a number of demanding assignments. She described her ambitions for the organization as greater visibility and adaptation to a changing world: Together with volunteers and civil servants, I want to help the Swedish Red Cross to meet the goals the organization itself set up, to become a proactive, distinct and visible humanitarian actor. The reality we live in today poses new demands on us as individuals, as groups and as an organization.
This quotation shows that the new leader of this organization was socially legitimized with explicit reference to her ability to tackle a changing reality and the new demands this reality poses to CSOs.

Two Ideal Types
In our analysis, the contours of two different ideal types of CSO leadership emerge. The first ideal type draws its legitimacy from the status upheld within the organization and the movement. The principle of self-organization creates the expectation that the leader is part of the group being represented (a pensioner, a woman, etc.), and the democratic representational structure requires the leader to be recruited from within the organization or the movement. Furthermore, the advocacy function and the need for interacting with public authorities in order to achieve political influence raise expectations of having good contacts with politicians and perhaps even direct experience of politics. We call this the popular movement leader.
The second ideal type of leadership draws its legitimacy from the status upheld outside the organization in relation to a large array of stakeholders that might include the users, the funding organizations, the donors and the public authorities on behalf of which they deliver their services. Service demands raise expectations that the leadership has the relevant know-how to lead the organization and has the managerial skills required for the task. The presence of many stakeholders requires a large network spanning across sectors and favours leaders with previous professional experience of working in different sectors, including private enterprises. We call this the third sector leader. The two ideal types and their distinctive features are presented in Table 1.
It should be observed that the two ideal-types are theoretical designs that have been developed inductively through our analysis. The presentations of the leaders are more or less close to the ideal-types but rarely coincide completely with them.

Conclusions
We set out to investigate how peak organizations in civil society socially legitimize their newly elected or recruited leaders through online press releases, based on the premise that leaders are organizational assets whose image needs to be handled. Through a qualitative analysis of 54 press releases, we were able to distinguish two different ideal types: the popular movement leader and the third sector leader.
Because the two ideal types relate to different organizational ideals, it is not surprising that the emphasis on relationships within or outside the movement varies depending on the type of organization. For self-organized, identity-based movements such as RFSLbut also for the churchesdeep involvement and strong identification with the movement appear to be crucial to the leader's social legitimacy. These organizations tend to legitimize their leaders in accordance with the traditional popular movement ideal-type. There are also a number of Swedish CSOs that have a broader target group and carry out specific tasks on behalf of the public. These types of organizations legitimize their leaders with partially different references that relate more to the third sector ideal type.
Although there are differences in emphasis depending on the type of organization, our findings show that Swedish CSOs generally tend to legitimize their leaders with reference to both ideal types, both within civil society among their own members and beyond civil society towards other stakeholders. The tension between these two ideal types does not seem to hinder the CSOs from using both of them simultaneously to enhance their leaders' legitimacy. The similarities between the organizations' presentations of their leaders are in fact rather striking, suggesting that Swedish CSOs tap from the same well when it comes to legitimizing their leaders. This is quite surprising considering that the CSOs included in the study are very diverse when it comes to constituencies, orientation, mission, and relations with public authorities and other stakeholders.
While there are references to changing expectations and the need for new skills, expertise and experiences that are not normally associated with social movements and the civil society sector, most leaders are clearly presented with reference to popular movement leadership ideals. This suggests that the popular movement tradition still has a strong legitimizing function in Swedish civil society, despite recent shifts in public and political discourse and rhetoric concerning CSOs. But our findings suggest that a new layer of expectations has been added on the leaders to be able to keep one foot within and one foot beyond civil society. This means that Swedish civil society leaders risk being caught up in a position in which they need to live up to contrasting and perhaps irreconcilable expectations, for the purpose of upholding their legitimacy as both authentic and competent leaders. Leadership styles and ideals are crucial in CSOs strategies for upholding legitimacy, especially at times in which civil society leaders increasingly are challenged and delegitimized by claims of being part of a societal elite and not being representative of the 'people' as for the leaders of Italian NGOs working with migrants (e.g., Santilli & Scaramuzzino, 2022). Some CSO's seem to try to solve the dilemma by highlighting the complementary roles of the chairman and the secretary-general in their presentations of new leaders. The dual leadership can thus be used to legitimize the leaders according to different leadership ideals.
The two ideal types of leadership elaborated in this article can hopefully provide fruitful heuristic devices in future studies on civil society leadership ideals and the social construction of CSOs legitimacy. These ideal types should also be confronted with other realities such as other policy areas, or civil society sectors in other national contexts, to address their validity beyond the Swedish social welfare policy area.

Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).