Seeking Legitimacy Through Accountability: Is Institution‐Based Accountability More Legitimate Than Campaign‐Based Accountability?

ABSTRACT While institution‐based accountability, rooted in rational‐legal authority and procedural regularity, is widely seen as the gold standard for ensuring legitimacy, limited empirical evidence supports this belief. Drawing on a preregistered conjoint experiment with 2611 Chinese public servants, this study examines how two distinct approaches of account‐holding, campaign‐based and institution‐based, impact their perceptions of legitimacy. Our study has found that the differences between institution‐based and campaign‐based accountability, in terms of two attributes, information collection methods and the types of implementers involved in discussion, significantly influence public servants' perceived legitimacy. However, the differences in two other attributes, feedback styles on account‐holding decisions and the scope of information disclosure, do not reach statistical significance. These findings challenge the dominant view that emphasizes rational‐legal authority as the main source of legitimacy. This research adds to the current public administration literature by clarifying the complex relationships between authority and legitimacy in accountability practices.