Social Media as a Tool for Anti-Racist Corporate Activism in the Fashion Industry

Social media is increasingly one of the most frequently viewed types of media in our society, and allows individuals to produce and promote their own messages with greater ease than other forms of media. Thus, social media is also one of the most powerful platforms for sparking change, spreading messages, and starting important conversations. The rise of social media has changed the ways in which corporate social disruption, or a disruption in a brand’s political agenda, can occur, allowing for a faster spread of information than ever. Individuals can use social media platforms to spread messages about unjust practices within corporations and brands in effective ways, sometimes even eliciting responses and actions from the corporations they are calling out. One industry in which social media has effectively served as a tool for corporate social disruption is the fashion industry. Specifically, as a result of networked activism, many fashion corporations faced backlash in the wake of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests for promoting and tolerating racist corporate cultures. Drawing upon Caroline Heldman’s research on corporate social activism, Sarah Banet-Weiser’s theories on political branding, and William McGuire’s inoculation and immunization theories, fashion brands Everlane, Aritzia, Brandy Melville, and Boyish Jeans will be analyzed as examples of the different ways that networked activism can serve as a tool for anti-racist corporate social disruption. Through these analyses, it will be shown that networked activism via social media is an effective tool for activism against the hegemonic norms that uphold racism within the fashion industry, that it is more effective at sparking change in organizations that practice corporate social responsibility than those who do not, and that inoculation serves as an effective corporate marketing tool for mitigating backlash from public criticism.