"Commercial Casualties: Political Boycotts and International Disputes" - by CWP alum Jessica Chen Weiss
We explore whether international disputes harm commerce by galvanizing consumer boycotts of foreign products. Boycotts increase the social penalty of owning goods associated with a foreign adversary, offsetting individual incentives to free ride or discount the utility of participation. By harming international commerce, boycotts reveal information about resolve and help avoid more costly forms of conflict. We demonstrate that the consumer boycott that arose amid tensions between China and Japan over a territorial dispute in 2012 had significant and persistent effects, especially in cities that witnessed anti-Japanese street demonstrations. Using administrative data on the universe of passenger vehicle registration records in China from 2009 to 2015, we find that the market share of Japanese automobile brands dropped substantially while Chinese and American brands benefitted, with long lasting effects. Our analysis provides concrete evidence of the short- and long-term impacts of international tensions on economic activities.
JEA volume 23 issue 3 - Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 January 2024 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-east-asian-studies/article/jea-volume-23-issue-3-cover-and-back-matter/A15A92C10EFC59071EAEEC07CF30EFEA
Jessica Chen Weiss, Panle Jia Barwick, Shanjun Li, Jeremy Wallace.
Jessica Chen Weiss is the Michael J. Zak Professor for China and Asia-Pacific Studies in the Department of Government at Cornell University. From August 2021 to July 2022, she served as senior advisor to the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. State Department on a Council on Foreign Relations Fellowship for Tenured International Relations Scholars (IAF-TIRS). Weiss is the author of Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in China’s Foreign Relations (Oxford University Press, 2014). Her research appears in International Organization, China Quarterly, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, and Review of International Political Economy, as well as in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Quarterly. Weiss was previously an assistant professor at Yale University and founded FACES, the Forum for American/Chinese Exchange at Stanford University. Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, she received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego in 2008, where her dissertation won the 2009 American Political Science Association Award for best dissertation in international relations, law and politics.
Photo Credit: By VOA - http://www.voacantonese.com/content/hk-activists-to-hold-march-on-defending-diaoyu-islands-live-qa/1508949.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21419087
