Elite Cues and Economic Policy Attitudes: The Mediating Role of Economic Hardship

Do voters update their attitudes toward economic issues in line with their material self-interest? The consensus among students of public opinion is that material self-interest plays a very limited role and that competing non-material factors, such as partisanship or ideological predispositions, do most of the heavy lifting. This paper moves beyond comparing the role of material and non-material factors. Instead, we examine how these factors combine to shape policy preferences. Specifically, we propose a friendly amendment to Zaller’s influential model according to which attitudinal change results from the interaction between changes in elite messaging on the one hand and individual political predispositions on the other. In Zaller’s model, partisanship and ideological predispositions help explain why some resist and others embrace new elite messaging. We hypothesize that material self-interest also conditions the effect of elite messaging. Using British individual-level panel data collected over more than a decade, we show that material hardship predicts who, among left-wing voters, resist new right-wing partisan cues. Our results highlights the incremental impact of material self-interest on economic attitudes.

Distanced self-talk increases rational self-interest

Does stepping back to evaluate a situation from a distanced perspective lead us to be selfish or fair? This question has been of philosophical interest for centuries, and, more recently, the focus of extensive empirical inquiry. Yet, extant research reveals a puzzle: some studies suggest that adopting a distanced perspective will produce more rationally self-interested behavior, whereas others suggest that it will produce more impartial behavior. Here we adjudicate between these perspectives by testing the effects of adopting a third-person perspective on decision making in a task that pits rational self-interest against impartiality: the dictator game. Aggregating across three experiments (N = 774), participants who used third-person (i.e., distanced) vs. first-person (i.e., immersed) self-talk during the dictator game kept more money for themselves. We discuss these results in light of prior research showing that psychological distance can promote cooperation and fairmindedness and how the effect of psychological distance on moral decision-making may be sensitive to social context.

Creating Autonomy in the Advance of Teacher and Moral Educator Development

The demand for character development in many of the Western World’s public schools is increasing. Yet there are substantive steps being taken beyond manipulating student behavior in rigidly constructed contexts. Unfortunately manipulating behavior only develops self-interest as the measure of all good and might makes right the legitimation of authority. Yet as any anthropologist can explain it is role-modeling family and village elders that decides which of two instincts will dominate human development: self-interest or cooperation (Tomasello, 2019). As Aristotle famously observed, it makes no small difference what habits humans develop rather, it makes all the difference. But to be truly conducive to moral development those habits must reflect autonomous conviction to develop organizational well-being over the pandemonium self-interest leads towards. The Moral Self-assessment Protocol discussed herein creates the conditions for teacher and other leaders to track their own moral development to role model for those growing into organization membership, in schools, cities, states, countries and businesses.

Does Corporate Social Responsibility Impact on Corporate Risk-Taking? Evidence from Emerging Economy

This study analyzes the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) fulfillment on corporate risk-taking to assist stakeholders in identifying the “double-edged sword” role of CSR activities and provide empirical evidence for enterprises to properly carry out CSR activities. The results show that the self-interest instrumentalization of CSR activities intensifies agency conflict, and CSR fulfillment weakens risk-taking to a certain extent. When CSR fulfillment reaches a certain value, CSR activities can improve risk-taking. Then, CSR fulfillment and risk-taking show a U-shaped relationship. Further analysis shows that the impacts of CSR on debt financing and R&D input reflect the U-shaped effect pathways of CSR fulfillment on risk-taking. Finally, it is suggested that CSR activities should be avoided to become the “self-interest tool” of the management. The regulators guide enterprises to break through the inflection point of the U-shaped effect and consider more for the stakeholders’ overall interests. Additionally, the regulators establish an effective compensation system to ensure that the enterprises with adequate CSR fulfillment obtain high-quality capital resources and promote the sustainable development of the capital market.

Enlightened Self Interest And Globalizing Indian

Economists believe that companies exist solely to generate maximum profits for shareholders using all legal and ethical means. However, philosophers and various theories of Ethics talks about that companies have a responsibility to other stakeholders, including their employees, suppliers, customers, and the communities within which they operate. Enlightened self-interest recognizes that a company's prime purpose is to not only making profits, but also this goal can be achieved by fulfilling its social and environmental responsibilities. Collective consciousness view considers the intersubjective realm to understand the enlightened self-interest to maximize the welfare of society. Companies use charitable donations to influence public opinion in their favour and long term wellbeing of society. Social Entrepreneurship promotes both wellbeing of society and creative solution for long-term growth and can earn a profit with goodness.