Firm value impact of corporate activism: Facebook and the stop hate for profit campaign

A Processual Model of CEO Activism: Activities, Frames, and Phases

“…Recently, management scholars have started to investigate socio-political activism as an organization-level activity done by companies (Burbano, 2021; Gulbrandsen et al, 2022; He et al, 2021; Villagra et al, 2021). Both CEO and company activities have been defined similarly as taking a stance or speaking out in public, and also organization-level activism by companies revolves around the same sensitive socio-political issues, such as racism, sexual minority rights, climate policies, and immigration (Burbano, 2021; Chatterji & Toffel, 2019; Hambrick & Wowak, 2021; Korschun et al, 2019; Villagra et al, 2021). A recent example of organizational-level activism is 1,100 companies stopping their advertisements on Facebook to demand better prevention of racism and hate speech on the platform (He et al, 2021; see also Villagra et al, 2021).…”

“…Despite the aforementioned similarities, there is not much consensus on how to situate organization-level activism and CEO activism in comparison to each other. Terms such as corporate activism (Gulbrandsen et al, 2022; Villagra et al, 2021) and corporate socio-political activism (Burbano, 2021; He et al, 2021) have been suggested as umbrella terms for any type of activism done by a business actor (CEOs, companies, or brands) but also as terms that set organization-level agency apart from other types of involvement (see Gulbrandsen et al, 2022; Villagra et al, 2021). As organization-level concepts sometimes include and sometimes exclude CEO activism, it is not clear whether corporate activism and CEO activism can be used as synonyms (cf.…”

“…Such blind spots can occur especially because advertisements and campaigns are not the only way to take a stance as a company, as organization-level activities may include activities such as providing support to social movements or publicizing stance-related company policies, such as establishing gender-neutral bathrooms or introducing gun prohibitions (Bhagwat et al, 2020), or collectively boycotting certain actors (He et al, 2021; Villagra et al, 2021). Thus, activism by business actors on the organizational level may turn out to be a much more diverse activity than a new marketing strategy, especially as the phenomenon is constantly expanding to involve new topics, practices, and companies that start to engage.…”

The impact of organizational statements of support for the black community in the wake of a racial mega‐threat on organizational attraction and revenue

“…It has become increasingly common for companies to take a stance on social issues by providing such statements—actions that may have monumental consequences for employees and organizations (Farrell, 2016). Although previous research has explored reactions to corporate stances on social issues in general (e.g., Parcha & Kingsley Westerman, 2020; Villagra et al, 2021), there are important differences between general signals of organizational stances (e.g., a company's diversity statements) and corporate statements that specifically respond to highly salient, negative events that disproportionately affect members of a certain identity group (i.e., mega‐threats, Leigh & Melwani). Mega‐threats both heighten the salience of a social issue such as anti‐Black violence and increase the strain experienced by members of the marginalized group – throwing workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)—or their absence—into stark relief (Leigh & Melwani, 2019).…”

The effect of corporate political advocacy on brand perception: an event study analysis

“…Despite these initial insights, many questions remain regarding responses to CPA, and a more nuanced understanding of its effects is necessary from both an academic and a practitioner perspective. For instance, while Hydock et al (2020) focused on how CPA affects choice share among consumers generally, Bhagwat et al (2020) and Villagra et al (2021) focused on the initial stock market response and Mukherjee and Althuizen (2020) investigated the differences between consumers who agreed and those who disagreed with CPA regarding brand attitude in an experimental setting. However, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no research has examined the effect of CPA on brand perceptions with real in-market consumer response data, the specific effects of CPA on customers’ (vs non-customers’ [2]) brand perceptions and the role of online protests.…”