Boycott or buycott? Understanding political consumerism

Abstract

This research addresses the question of how boycotting (punishing business for unfavorable behavior) differs from buycotting (rewarding business for favorable behavior). This analysis of 21 535 adults from the 2002/2003 European Social Survey (ESS) compares the effects of social capital, altruism, and gender on different categories of political consumers. Logistic regression analyses reveal that boycotters do indeed differ from buycotters. Specifically, women and people who are more trusting, involved in more voluntary associations, or more altruistic are more likely to buycott than boycott. These differences support the inclusion of both boycott and buycott measures in future studies of political consumerism.

Ethical Consumers in Greece: Who Are They?

“…Positive ethical buying has been examined under various terminologies regarding the main dependent variables, such as socially conscious consumption [Pepper et al, 2009], buycotting [Neilson, 2010;Carfagna et al, 2014], positive buying [Koos, 2012], conscious consumption [Carr et al, 2012], positive ethical consumption [Delistavrou & Tilikidou, 2012], political consumption [Copeland, 2014]. The aspect of ecological behaviours gained most of the research attention while very limited studies focused on purchasing fair trade products.…”

“…With reference to the antecedents of behaviour, all relevant efforts incorporated demographics [Klein et al, 2004;Gardberg & Newburry, 2009;Neilson, 2010;Carr et al, 2012;Delistavrou & Tilikidou, 2012, Koos, 2012, Carfagna et al, 2014Copeland, 2014], but the demographical picture of ethical consumers is still a rather ambiguous one. Values or other psychographics have been also utilized, e.g.…”

“…Values or other psychographics have been also utilized, e.g. Inglehart's (1977) materialism/postmaterialism [Pepper et al, 2009;Copeland, 2014], Schwartz's (1992 list of values [Stern et al, 1995;Pepper et al, 2009;Neilson, 2010;Koos, 2012;Delistavrou & Tilikidou, 2012] and some other politically oriented variables [Neilson, 2010;Koos, 2012;Copeland, 2014], such as locus of control over politics [McCarty & Shrum, 2001;Tilikidou & Delistavrou, 2008]. It is to be underlined that surprisingly attitudes seem to be rather absent from the research designs of previous research studies with regards to the aggregate concept of ethical behaviour although attitudinal measures have been always a part of the ecologically oriented consumer research [see among others: Roberts, 1996;Schlegelmilch et al, 1996;Follows & Jobber, 2000;Fotopoulos & Krystallis, 2002;Tilikidou & Delistavrou, 2005.…”

Clustering consumers who engage in boycotting: New insights into the relationship between political consumerism and institutional trust

“…In most studies of political consumerism, boycotters and buycotters are treated indifferently, and yet there is some empirical evidence that the characteristics and motivations of political consumers may vary significantly (Neilson 2010). As such, these differences stress the need to research separately each type of political consumerism manifestation.…”

The Effect of Online Protests and Firm Responses on Shareholder and Consumer Evaluation

“…While extant research demonstrates the impact of offline protests targeted at firms (Braunsberger and Buckler 2011;Chavis and Leslie 2009;Friedman 1999;Klein et al 2004;Koku et al 1997;Neilson 2010;Yuksel and Mryteza 2009), we know little about the effects of online protests on firm and brand value (Koku 2012), and about how firms should respond to mitigate the potential damage (Xia 2013). Although CSR managers are increasingly aware of the power of the internet to inform their stakeholders about their CSR policies and practices (Palazzo and Basu 2007), activist groups' requests are often not dealt with effectively.…”