Advocating for good? Individual-level political predictors of attitudes toward corporate sociopolitical activism

Organizations are increasingly engaging in and taking a stance on public debates about controversial sociopolitical issues. This study explores how stakeholders’ political predispositions (i.e., political orientation and political trust) and contextual attitudes (i.e., societal issue salience and CSA skepticism) shape their attitudes toward CSA. The results of a preregistered representative survey in the Netherlands (N = 1,863) showed that stakeholder attitudes toward CSA are more positive when individuals identify less as conservative, trust political institutions more, and are more aware of major social (as opposed to economic or safety-related) issues. Moreover, we found an interaction effect between CSA skepticism and social issue salience on attitudes toward CSA: CSA attitudes become more positive with increasing social issue salience among highly skeptical individuals than among those with moderate or low CSA skepticism. These findings improve our understanding of the determinants of overall (favorable) evaluations of CSA across organizations and issue domains.