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Avenues of influence: on the political expenditures of corporations and their directors and executives
Open accessAbstract
The literature on corporate political influence has primarily focused on expenditures made by corporations and their PACs but has largely ignored the political activities of the individuals who lead these firms. To better understand the role of corporate elites in political advocacy, I introduce a new database of campaign contributions made by corporate directors and executives of Fortune 500 firms. Donating to political campaigns is nearly universal among corporate elites. When compared to corporate PACs, corporate elites are more ideological, more willing to support non-incumbents, and less likely to target powerful legislators. The results also reveal substantial heterogeneity in the political preferences of directors both across and within firms. In addition to challenging widely held beliefs about the political leanings of corporate elites, the prevalence of bipartisan boardrooms has important implications for how the preferences of key decision-makers within a firm shape its political activities.
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“Bonica (2016) shows that whereas corporate political action committees tend to have moderate CF scores, the scores of corporate executives and directors are decidedly more ideological, with a strong majority of these elites giving to GOP candidates and having relatively high (i.e., conservative) CF scores.”
From Importing Political Polarization? The Electoral Consequences of Rising Trade Exposure (2020) · cites this paper as Bonica 2016
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Importing Political Polarization? The Electoral Consequences of Rising Trade Exposure
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Metadata
- Authors
- Bonica, A.
- Affiliations
- Stanford University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Bonica, Adam
- ORCID
- Bonica, Adam
- Venue
- Business and Politics
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2016-12
- Volume
- 18
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 367-394
- ISSN
- 1369-5258 (ISSN-L)
- 1469-3569
- OpenAlex
- W3122715298
- Cited by
- 147
- References
- 48
- Citations by year
- 2026: 12 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 23 · 2023: 18 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 14 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 4
- FWCI
- 24.05
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- doi.org
- Locations
- Business and Politics (publishedVersion)
- SSRN Electronic Journal (acceptedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Stanford Institute for Research in the Social Sciences
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Strategy and Management › Political Influence and Corporate Strategies
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Elite Sociology and Global Capitalism
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Electoral Systems and Political Participation
- Keywords
- corporate political activity, campaign contributions, corporate directors, business executives, Fortune 500 companies, business elites, political ideology
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