Scholars have become increasingly interested in the importance of corporate social advocacy to an organization’s bottom line. However, few researchers have investigated the subliminal mechanism with which corporations’ political engagement attracts public attention and creates positive corporate-public relationships. This study examines corporations’ identification with sociopolitical issues as an identity signaling practice. Rooted in the signaling and social identity theories, this study proposes a model that demonstrates the positive effects of corporate social advocacy activities on brand loyalty. This study sheds light on the role of brand community engagement as a signal verification process. Public-company identification leads to brand loyalty, which indicates the public’s acceptance of a corporation’s signal. We tested our proposed model through an online survey with participants recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk ( N = 960). Theoretical and practical contributions of this study were discussed.

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To facilitate the immediate effects of social media activism, some activists adopt a deceptive strategy, swaying lay individuals’ perceptions and manipulating their behavior despite ethical considerations. This study identified instant activism, which targets lay individuals’ effortless supportive actions (e.g., clicking) on social media and examined its effects in the context of GMO (genetically modified organisms) labeling issues in the United States. Grounded in the situational theory of problem solving, this study investigated who engages in instant activism and what their behavioral consequences are. Results of an online survey ( n = 483) suggested that (a) individuals with a low level of issue knowledge but a high level of issue involvement tend to believe a social media hoax and (b) belief in the hoax leads individuals to engage in active communicative activities that involve problem solving and behavioral changes when mediated by situational motivation. Theoretical and practical implications were discussed.

The study attempts to understand corporations’ efforts to communicate their values and commitment to stakeholders after a crisis. Specifically, the study explores the characteristics of communication efforts that may differ depending on the reputational crisis types: corporate ability (CA) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) crises. Employing a series of semantic network analyses, the study examined the sustainability annual reports of two Korean airlines (i.e., Korean Air and Asiana Airlines) published before and after their recent crises. Results showed how sustainability reports’ central keywords, social issues the companies support, and prioritized stakeholders varied in response to the different types of crises. Word frequency results showed that there was an increasing trend in emphasizing the word “safety” after both types of crisis, while a noticeable decrease in emphasis on the word “ethics” was observed after CA crisis. The results of semantic network analyses showed that Korean Air’s sustainability reports seemed to focus more on aspects of the relationship with stakeholders after the CSR crisis, while Asiana Airlines appeared to place more emphasis on business-related notions after the CA crisis. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

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