Voting with Their Feet and Wallets: How Consumers Respond to Corporations' Political Speech

• In Event: 512 - Section on Consumers and Consumption Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 03. Consumption and Social Movements

Abstract

In the post-Citizens United era, corporations may contribute to political causes and speak out on political issues; nevertheless, citizens may respond by boycotting a politically objectionable corporation or by buycotting---or deliberately patronizing---a politically congenial corporation. New technologies and a polarized political climate facilitate these behaviors, which are known collectively as political consumerism; and data from cross-sectional, national surveys indicate that consumerism is on the rise. Nevertheless, we know relatively little about how growing political consumerism relates to high levels of political activities by corporations in the post- Citizens United environment. Employing data from two new survey experiments, I find evidence that consumers are sensitive to new information about the political speech of corporations. Across both data sets, partisan consumers are especially likely to penalize corporations who give to the opposite party. These partisans are less likely to recommend that a friend patronize the corporation, they give more negative evaluations of the corporation, and they are more likely to say that they would be embarrassed to be affiliated with the corporation. Nevertheless, in the second experiment, I find that much of these negative feelings and attitudes can be reversed if the corporation is instead discovered to have given to both sides strategically. The findings offer predictions for when we should see consumer boycotts, but also provide for corporations a strategy to avoid boycotts by demonstrating to political consumers a diversity of contributions.

Author

• Steven Andrew Snell, Social Science Research Institute