Abstract
Using ‘economic pressure’, the first of Garret’s (1987) three benchmarks for measuring the success of a boycott, this study analyzes the financial effect of ethical boycotts, a form of anti-consumption behavior that has gained popularity during the past two decades. The results show that, on average, these boycotts have not been able to inflict a statistically significant financial damage on their targets. The average cumulative abnormal returns were −0.90% with a z-value of −1.071 which is not statistically significant. Specifically, only four out of the twenty targets experienced negative financial effect, and three of the four returns were only marginally significant. It is, however, possible that these boycotts may have succeeded it portraying the targeted organizations in a negative light.
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Koku, P.S. (2022). Are Ethical Boycotts Merely Signaling Value? The Financial Effect of Ethical Boycotts. In: Allen, J., Jochims, B., Wu, S. (eds) Celebrating the Past and Future of Marketing and Discovery with Social Impact. AMSAC-WC 2021. Developments in Marketing Science: Proceedings of the Academy of Marketing Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95346-1_165
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