Speaking up in Brand Activism : The Impact of Perceived Brand Legitimacy on Consumer Behavior

The current political landscape has a profound impact on brands, influencing their strategies, positioning, and consumer perceptions. The political environment shapes the context in which brands operate, affecting their decision-making processes and interactions with stakeholders. Political instability, partisan media, and sociopolitical dynamics have significant implications for brand activism and consumer behavior. Consequently, brands aim to attract consumers who are aligned with the same sociopolitical cause. Brands seek to convey legitimacy alongside their activism efforts. Using a quantitative approach through Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) on different experimental groups. The present research expands on a general model, draws a comparison between legitimate and opportunistic brands in the brand activism context. The mechanism influencing parameters such as consumer-brand engagement, purchase intentions and brand equity. Therefore, we seek to demonstrate if the presence or lack of brand legitimacy does have an impact on dependent variables in brand activism. Our research model exhibits the moderating effects of three additional factors: psychological distance, consumer-cause fit, and internal locus of control.