This paper investigates the relationship between Corporate Social Performance (CSP) and Financial Performance (FP) as a deliberate social and cognitive construction. We argue that the demonstration of a positive CSP-FP relationship is a business necessity for managers developing the markets for virtue because their legitimacy is closely associated to the belief that 'social responsibility pays'. Accordingly, we develop a framework explaining how institutional processes can enact a positive CSP-FP link that may eventually be self-realized.