An Institutional Perspective on Climate Change, Markets, and Consumption across Three Countries

Abstract

This manuscript enriches knowledge about consumers’ responses to climate change actions. Through the lens of institutional theory, it examines the findings of three studies run in France, Morocco and the United States. In Morocco, consumers are more responsive to climate change actions when they are managed at the level of their country, and company. Moroccan consumers express ambivalent emotions when their supermarket engages in actions to combat climate change. In France, consumers are less responsive when their country engage in climate change actions, but they display positive responses towards their supermarkets’ climate change actions. In the United States, the responses are mitigated. As shown in the three studies, institutional contexts have an impact on consumers’ responses to climate change actions. The manuscript further provides managerial implications to support marketing actions that combat climate change. It further raises climate-related issues, like corporate hypocrisy, and discusses the role of educators and other agents of change to address climate change.