IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/buseth/v34y2025i4p1998-2012.html

Publics' Expectation Toward Ethical Leadership and Ethical Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): Evidence From the U.S. and South Korea

Author

Listed:
  • Keonyoung Park
  • Hyejoon Rim

Abstract

Despite continuous academic attempts to investigate the relationship between public expectations of ethical leadership and corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts, little research has demonstrated the subliminal process of the relationship. This study focuses on the publics' power distance perceptions as a key driver to lead individuals to prioritize CSR, mediated by the expectations of corporate ethical leadership. To further understand the mechanism and the way power distance perception influences public attitudes toward CSR operations, this study suggests a theoretical model illustrating the relationships among power distance perception, expectancy of ethical leadership, expectancy of ethical CSR, and willingness to support socially responsible companies. A cross‐national survey was conducted to provide empirical evidence from the United States (U.S.) and South Korea. Given that strategic approaches of CSR prioritize meeting public expectations toward corporate social roles, this study provides meaningful implications on public relations practice and CSR scholarship by demonstrating how public expectations of corporate ethical operations are shaped and how these expectations influence the public evaluation of corporate behaviors.

Suggested Citation

  • Keonyoung Park & Hyejoon Rim, 2025. "Publics' Expectation Toward Ethical Leadership and Ethical Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): Evidence From the U.S. and South Korea," Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(4), pages 1998-2012, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:buseth:v:34:y:2025:i:4:p:1998-2012
    DOI: 10.1111/beer.12749
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/beer.12749
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/beer.12749?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jain, Shalini Sarin & Jain, Shailendra Pratap, 2018. "Power distance belief and preference for transparency," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 135-142.
    2. Karianne Kalshoven & Deanne Den Hartog & Annebel De Hoogh, 2011. "Ethical Leader Behavior and Big Five Factors of Personality," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 100(2), pages 349-366, May.
    3. Karen Page Winterich & Yinlong Zhang, 2014. "Accepting Inequality Deters Responsibility: How Power Distance Decreases Charitable Behavior," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(2), pages 274-293.
    4. Oliver, Richard L, 1993. "Cognitive, Affective, and Attribute BAses of the Satisfaction Response," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 20(3), pages 418-430, December.
    5. Minh-Hieu Le & Wen-Min Lu & Qian Long Kweh, 2023. "The moderating effects of power distance on corporate social responsibility and multinational enterprises performance," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 17(7), pages 2503-2533, October.
    6. Wasim Nasir & Arshad Hassan & Mushtaq Hussain Khan, 2023. "Corporate social responsibility and firm performance nexus: Moderating role of CEO chair duality," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(8), pages 1-10, August.
    7. Hyejoon Rim & Chuqing Dong, 2018. "Trust and distrust in society and public perception of CSR: a cross-cultural study," Social Responsibility Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 14(1), pages 1-19, March.
    8. Archie B. Carroll, 2016. "Carroll’s pyramid of CSR: taking another look," International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 1-8, December.
    9. Bala Ramasamy & Matthew Yeung & Alan Au, 2010. "Consumer Support for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): The Role of Religion and Values," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 91(1), pages 61-72, February.
    10. Baskentli, Sara & Sen, Sankar & Du, Shuili & Bhattacharya, C.B., 2019. "Consumer reactions to corporate social responsibility: The role of CSR domains," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 502-513.
    11. Hannah Oh & John Bae & Sang-Joon Kim, 2017. "Can Sinful Firms Benefit from Advertising Their CSR Efforts? Adverse Effect of Advertising Sinful Firms’ CSR Engagements on Firm Performance," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 143(4), pages 643-663, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Luger, Michaela & Hofer, Katharina Maria & Floh, Arne, 2022. "Support for corporate social responsibility among generation Y consumers in advanced versus emerging markets," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 31(2).
    2. Park, Sehoon & Kim, Chaeyeong & Park, Jane, 2023. "How power distance belief, self-construal, and relationship norms impact conspicuous consumption," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    3. Petya Koleva, 2021. "Towards the Development of an Empirical Model for Islamic Corporate Social Responsibility: Evidence from the Middle East," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 171(4), pages 789-813, July.
    4. Gianecchini, Martina, 2020. "Strategies and determinants of corporate support to the arts: Insights from the Italian context," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 308-318.
    5. Xie, Quan & Wang, Tianjiao (Grace), 2022. "Promoting corporate social responsibility message in COVID-19 advertising: How threat persuasion affects consumer responses to altruistic versus strategic CSR," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 148(C), pages 315-324.
    6. Tatiana Chopova & Naomi Ellemers & Elena Sinelnikova, 2024. "Morality matters: social psychological perspectives on how and why CSR activities and communications affect stakeholders’ support - experimental design evidence for the mediating role of perceived organizational morality comparing WEIRD (UK) and non-," International Journal of Corporate Social Responsibility, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 1-12, December.
    7. Zhu, Bo & Wang, Yansen, 2024. "Does social trust affect firms' ESG performance?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    8. van Esch, Patrick & Cui, Yuanyuan (Gina) & Sledge, April & Das, Gopal & Pala, Erol, 2023. "Preference for partner or servant brand roles depends on consumers’ power distance belief," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    9. Petya Koleva & Maureen Meadows, 2021. "Inherited Scepticism and Neo-communist CSR-washing: Evidence from a Post-communist Society," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 174(4), pages 783-804, December.
    10. Byung‐Jik Kim & Min‐Jik Kim, 2026. "Beyond Good Intentions: Unraveling the CSR‐Employee Health Nexus Through the Lens of Job Stress and Work Overload: A Three‐Wave Time‐Lagged Study," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 33(1), pages 894-924, January.
    11. Linda Jansen & Peggy Cunningham & Sandra Diehl & Ralf Terlutter, 2024. "Corporate social responsibility in controversial industries: A literature review and research agenda," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 31(5), pages 4398-4427, September.
    12. Mohammed Benlemlih & Jamil Jaballah & Sholom Schochet & Jonathan Peillex, 2023. "Corporate social responsibility and corporate tax avoidance: The channel effect of consumer awareness," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1-2), pages 31-60, January.
    13. Wasib B Latif & Md. Aminul Islam & Idris Bin Mohd Noor, 2014. "A Conceptual Framework to Build Brand Loyalty in the Modern Marketing Environment," Journal of Asian Scientific Research, Asian Economic and Social Society, vol. 4(10), pages 547-557, October.
    14. Priyanka Aggarwal & Archana Singh & Deepali Malhotra, 2025. "ESG Implementation in Indian NIFTY 500 Companies: A Comprehensive Multi-case Analysis of Strategy, Implementation, and Value Creation," South Asian Journal of Business and Management Cases, , vol. 14(3), pages 243-260, December.
    15. Un-Kon Lee, 2021. "The Effect of Confirmation of Nation Brand Image in International Tourism Advertisement on Travel Intention of Foreign Tourists: The Case of Korean ITA for Chinese Tourists," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(1), pages 21582440209, January.
    16. Kumar, V. & D. Hollebeek, Linda & Sharma, Amalesh & Rajan, Bharath & K Srivastava, Rajendra, 2025. "Responsible stakeholder engagement marketing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    17. Pan, Frank C., 2015. "Practical application of importance-performance analysis in determining critical job satisfaction factors of a tourist hotel," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 84-91.
    18. Alessia Acampora & Michele Preziosi & Maria Claudia Lucchetti & Roberto Merli, 2022. "The Role of Hotel Environmental Communication and Guests’ Environmental Concern in Determining Guests’ Behavioral Intentions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(18), pages 1-23, September.
    19. Ahmad, Fayez & Das, Neel & Nafees, Lubna, 2025. "The impact of the linear and threshold matching principles on eliciting donation behavior in communal and exchange-oriented individuals," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    20. Nir Halevy & Sora Jun & Eileen Y. Chou, 2020. "Intergroup Conflict is Our Business: CEOs’ Ethical Intergroup Leadership Fuels Stakeholder Support for Corporate Intergroup Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 229-246, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:buseth:v:34:y:2025:i:4:p:1998-2012. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/26946424 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.