Public discussion over the past few decades has increasingly highlighted shopping for a better world, as people have come to expect environmentally friendly and ethically sound goods and services. Businesses have come under mounting pressure to burnish their image, address employee well-being and fulfill corporate responsibilities, as labor rights and social consciousness go hand-in-hand with economic development.
For example, as people become more aware of environmental sustainability and opt for “green” products, they pressure firms into reducing pollution and decrease the environmental burden of manufacturing, marketing, waste disposal and recycling goods.
Through ethical consumption, people promote their values, such as opposition to labor exploitation and unscrupulous business practices, which has spawned ethical investment products and fair-trade products, among others.
An increasing number of companies are emphasizing their efforts to promote a sustainable and ethical marketplace, showing that they are keeping pace with public awareness, fulfilling their social responsibilities as corporations and gaining a competitive edge over their peers.
This explains why more companies are paying attention to the public backlash, financial risks or legal penalties of using labor or materials from countries where personal freedoms and human rights are being seriously violated.
However, consumer nationalism has also been a growing phenomenon in the marketplace. This type of consumerism awakens people’s national identity and prompts them to express nationalistic beliefs in their encounters with products and brands. Especially during an era of rising anti-globalization, consumer responses based on social awareness and nationalism are increasingly intense.
For example, the Nielsen Global Brand-Origin Survey for 2016 found that national pride was one of the reasons people favored local brands over foreign brands, with nearly 75 percent of global respondents saying that brand origin was as important as other purchasing criteria, such as price and quality.
While nationalistic sentiment has varied by country and business category over the past few years, consumer nationalism has unsurprisingly risen amid political rhetoric that increasingly includes economic nationalism, skepticism over globalization and trade protectionism.
Consumer nationalism drove some Indians to boycott Chinese goods after clashes between the two nations along their disputed Himalayan border, while it also drove some Chinese to target Swedish clothing giant Hennes & Mauritz on social media after a company statement resurfaced saying that it was “deeply concerned” about reports of forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region.
Although corporations have faced setbacks after such incidents, experience suggests that the effects on their businesses tend to be short term.
Seeing how ethical consumerism and consumer nationalism unfold and their effects on the marketplace would be interesting.
Market research has shown that people increasingly prefer local brands out of national pride and from a desire to support local companies, but ethical consumption is on its way to becoming a universal value. The consumer power displayed by people making purchasing decisions in line with their ethics might eventually outdistance consumer action generated by political mobilization or incited by nationalistic zealotry.
Ultimately, in an era of fierce global competition, corporations that place a higher emphasis on ethics and quality, and focus more on brand image and social responsibility, will have the advantage in any given market.
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