Disentangling the relationship between sociotropic and egotropic trade attitudes: A survey experiment in Japan

Hearn, Eddie

doi:10.1017/s1468109919000124

Cited by 5 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 50 publications

(71 reference statements)

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“…An individual living in a community that is harmed by trade may also suffer as a result and thus have a negative perception of trade. Furthermore, experimental evidence supports the claim that sociotropic attitudes toward trade influence perceptions of self‐interest (Hearn ). To account for sociotropic concerns, a dummy variable gauging trade's effect on society is created.…”

Section: Empirical Examination Of Trade Perceptionssupporting

confidence: 61%

Buying Globalization: Consumer Orientation and Perceptions about Trade

Hearn

2020

Politics & Policy

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Individual attitudes toward trade are typically analyzed through trade's consequences on labor markets. Few studies directly consider the impact of trade on consumers, who are commonly assumed to benefit from liberalization. Trade protection, however, provides welfare gains for heavy consumers of domestic goods by ensuring the availability of domestically produced products and by dispersing the cost of maintaining inefficient sectors across all members of the economy. Variations in consumer preferences thus impact the perceived personal pocketbook effects of trade. By integrating theory from political economy and consumer psychology, this article provides a framework for understanding consumer interests toward trade liberalization. An analysis of U.S. public opinion lends support to the importance of consumer orientation in individual perceptions of trade. Future work examining the role of self‐interest in trade attitude formation should carefully consider consumer tastes as well as labor markets and sociotropic concerns. Related Articles Anderson, Bret, Brian S. Krueger, and Ping Xu. 2016. “Does Global Market Integration Weaken Opinion‐Policy Congruence in the American States?” Politics & Policy 44 (4): 677‐711. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12167 Gruber, Lloyd. 2013. “Trade, Growth, Poverty, and Politics: Toward a Unified Theory.” Politics & Policy 41 (5): 723‐764. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12034 Jackson, Sarita. 2012. “Building Transnational Networks: Civil Society and the Politics of Trade in the Americas—By Marisa von Bülow.” Politics & Policy 40 (3): 539‐541. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-1346.2012.00362.x Related Media US Consumer Product Safety Commission: https://www.cpsc.gov/ Fair Trade USA: https://www.fairtradecertified.org/

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Section: Empirical Examination Of Trade Perceptionssupporting

confidence: 61%

Buying Globalization: Consumer Orientation and Perceptions about Trade

Hearn

2020

Politics & Policy

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“…18 It follows that a win-win trade policy where 8. Fordham 2008;Guisinger 2017;Hearn 2020;Mansfield and Mutz 2009. 9.…”

Section: Trade Preferences and Relative Gainsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…5. For example, Guisinger 2017;Hearn 2020;Lü, Scheve, and Slaughter 2012;Mansfield and Mutz 2009. 6.…”

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confidence: 99%

Relative Gains in the Shadow of a Trade War

Yeung¹,

Quek²

2022

Int Org

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When do people care about relative gains in trade? Much of the international relations scholarship—and much of the political rhetoric on trade—would lead us to expect support for a trade policy that benefits ourselves more than it benefits others. Yet, a large interdisciplinary literature also points to the prevalence and importance of other-regarding preferences, rendering the conventional wisdom contestable. We investigate whether and how relative gains influence trade preferences through an original survey experiment in the midst of the China–US trade war. We find that in a win-win scenario, relative gains shape trade opinion: if both sides are gaining, people want to gain more than their foreign trade partner. However, these considerations are offset in a win-lose scenario where the other side is losing out. Relative-gains considerations causally affect opinion on trade, but not in a “beggar-thy-neighbor” or even a “beggar-thy-rival” situation. These findings contribute to our understanding of the role of relative gains in international relations and provide the first experimental evidence that relative-gains considerations can be offset by other-regarding preferences in international trade.

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“…Past studies have shown the importance of sociotropic concerns on trade preferences, but largely in terms of individuals' concerns for their national economy or their national in-group (Guisinger 2017;Hearn 2020;Lü et al 2012;Mansfield and Mutz 2009;Mutz and Kim 2017;Naoi and Kume 2011; see also Hainmueller and Hiscox 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Past studies have shown the importance of sociotropic concerns on trade preferences, but largely in terms of individuals’ concerns for their national economy or their national in-group (Guisinger 2017; Hearn 2020; Lü et al 2012; Mansfield and Mutz 2009; Mutz and Kim 2017; Naoi and Kume 2011; see also Hainmueller and Hiscox 2010). Less is known about whether and how an individual’s concern for foreign countries can influence trade preferences, particularly the effect of prosocial concerns arising from international disparities in economic capacities.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Asymmetrical fairness in trade preferences

Sohn

Quek

2023

Research & Politics

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Asymmetric capacities across nations are a persistent reality in the global economy, but little is known about how people respond to these disparities. We provide the first experimental evidence on the phenomenon of asymmetrical fairness in trade preferences. We find that trade opinion divides over the relative economic capacity of the trade partner: Citizens treat smaller and less developed economies very differently in trade, even when the asymmetric treatment is disadvantageous to their own country. Across different experimental tests on a national sample in China, we find strong effects on trade opinion that are statistically and substantively significant. We also show that asymmetrical fairness is a phenomenon that applies in both positive (gains) and negative (losses) domains. Thus, while International Relations scholarship often assumes self-centered actors seeking benefits for themselves or their national in-groups, our results show that prosocial considerations over the limited capacities of the weak can influence the preferences of the strong—a phenomenon that refines our understanding of international power asymmetry and its consequences.

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Disentangling the relationship between sociotropic and egotropic trade attitudes: A survey experiment in Japan

Cited by 5 publications

References 50 publications

Buying Globalization: Consumer Orientation and Perceptions about Trade

Buying Globalization: Consumer Orientation and Perceptions about Trade

Relative Gains in the Shadow of a Trade War

Asymmetrical fairness in trade preferences

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