The Effect of #MeToo on Gender-Related Shareholder Activism

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Degree type
Graduate group
Discipline
Subject
shareholder activism
#metoo
gender
diversity
sexual harassment
corporate governance
Business Law, Public Responsibility, and Ethics
Social Justice
Funder
Grant number
License
Copyright date
Distributor
Related resources
Contributor
Abstract

This study examines the impact of the #MeToo movement on gender-related shareholder proposals. #MeToo was first introduced by Tarana Burke in 2006 as a way to unite female victims of sexual assault. The movement officially took off in October 2017 following the Harvey Weinstein scandals and had significant spillover effects on shifting the legal and corporate culture; states began adopting policies to curb workplace sexual assault and placing quotas on companies to have a minimum number of females directors to be on their boards. A difference-in-differences regression analysis was used to determine if #MeToo also had any effects at raising shareholder support for gender-related proposals. The results show a very slight increase of 2.38% in the percent of votes in support for these proposals, although this estimate is insignificant. Even though #MeToo had no significant impact on gender-related shareholder activism, the level of support for social proposals did increase as a whole after the movement, which is an encouraging trend in the broader space of social activism.

Advisor
Mary-Hunter McDonnell
Date of degree
2021-01-01
Date Range for Data Collection (Start Date)
Date Range for Data Collection (End Date)
Digital Object Identifier
Series name and number
Volume number
Issue number
Publisher
Publisher DOI
Journal Issue
Comments
Recommended citation