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  • Organization & Environment

Assessing the Impact of CEO Activism

By: Aaron K Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel
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Abstract

CEO activism refers to corporate leaders speaking out on social and environmental policy issues not directly related to their company’s core business. Distinct from nonmarket strategy and traditional corporate social responsibility, the recent wave of CEO activism focuses on social issues unrelated to their core business, ranging from environmental issues to LGBTQ rights and race relations. In the first study of this phenomenon, we implement two framed field experiments to provide evidence on how CEO activism can influence public opinions about government policies and consumer attitudes regarding the CEO’s company.

Keywords

Business And Society; Leadership; Policy; Ethics; Values And Beliefs; Governance; Social Issues; Corporate Social Responsibility And Impact; Public Opinion

Citation

Chatterji, Aaron K., and Michael W. Toffel. "Assessing the Impact of CEO Activism." Organization & Environment 32, no. 2 (June 2019): 159–185. (Profiled in the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Chief Executive magazine, CEO magazine, and by Edelman and Weber Shandwick.)
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About The Author

Michael W. Toffel

Technology and Operations Management
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