Argumentation in shareholder activism

Abstract The present contribution systematically explores the argumentative dimension of activist investor campaigns, which constitute a very important and underexplored argumentative activity type in the domain of financial communication. Using the controversy between an activist investor ( AltaFox ) and Hasbro company as a case in point, we adapt the stock issue model to identity strategically relevant argumentative patterns. To do so, each issue is connected to key contextual features and characterised for the type of standpoint and argumentation advanced by the two contending institutional arguers. The findings reveal, in particular, the strategic role of some loci in relation to specific sub-issues of an investor activist’s proposal (e.g., analogy to discuss the alleged underperformance; efficient cause to attribute managerial responsibility, authority to legitimise the intervention of proxy advisory firms). Furthermore, we found trust to be one of the main points at issue, marking an important difference between these corporate controversies and the context of political policy debates out of which the stock issue model originated. We suggest that the proposed analytic approach to the analysis argumentative patterns represents a crucial starting point for the formulation of possible explanations for the outcome of a campaign. We conclude the paper by drawing implications from these findings for the study of argumentation in context and for strategic communication research.