About

Social media is filled with calls to boycott products for political reasons. These boycotts represent a new form of transnational participation in political life, as citizen-consumers target the marketplace to create social and political change. These campaigns have benefited from the rise of digital media, which has changed the cost and structure of communication.

The PCCP Project examines some of the following research questions:

• What are the targets (products, services, countries) of boycott campaigns on social media?

• What motivates people to participate in boycott campaigns (e.g., to promote animal rights, environmental sustainability, fair trade, or fair labor practices)?

• In what ways does digital and social media use inform, motivate, mobilize, and/or reinforce participation in political consumerism?

• How does political consumerism fit into people's political participation toolkit? Is it distinctive as a form of transnational activism?

To answer these questions, the PCCP project uses a mixed-methods approach that includes nationally representative survey data from Canada, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, and computational analyses of data from the Twitter API.