Who Won the U.S. Presidential Debate?

Fighting for social justice often takes root in the workplace—evidenced when there is advocacy for pay equity, diversity and inclusion, and similar initiatives. But to ensure that this advocacy is effective, who should be doing the advocating?

Debra Shapiro at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business has co-authored research that answers this question. "Social justice movements aren't going away anytime soon because they're needed," she says. "We wanted to reconcile the mixed findings regarding who tends to garner more support for social justice issues."

Shapiro, the Dean's Chair in Organizational Behavior and the Clarice Smith Professor of Management for the Smith School, collaborated with Jigyashu Shukla, assistant professor at the Willie A. Deese College of Business and Economics at North Carolina A&T State University and Deshani Ganegoda, associate professor at the Melbourne Business School at the University of Melbourne. They investigated when and why a social justice appeal gains support depending on "who" is issuing the appeal.

The advocate is either someone who belongs to the marginalized group seeking social justice— a disadvantaged group advocate (DGA)—or an ally. That's someone who doesn't belong to the marginalized group.

There have been several studies on allyship, but Shapiro says, "No one until our paper has looked at how strongly the people receiving the social justice appeal identify with the disadvantaged group named in it." Their paper finds when the appeal receiver identifies with the group, the DGA is more persuasive. When the receiver does not identify with the group, the ally is.

• Read More