Negative Offshoring Sentiments: An Exploratory Study Using Twitter Data

Offshoring (i.e. relocation of existing business activities and jobs from one country to another) is a central topic in international business research, but also a polarizing topic in the society. As the public is an important actor when companies make decisions to internationalize, it is indeed critical to understand the public sentiment about offshoring. To address this, I rely on Twitter data and text analytics tools. I find that offshoring sentiments are rather negative, which is associated with higher levels of tweet popularity, but also that the extent to which a tweet is negative is related to other language characteristics. Namely, a higher degree of focus on past and social issues in the used language are associated with increased levels of negative emotions. However, the more cognitive processes are present in the written text, the lower the degree of negative emotions. With populism on the rise, this study addresses the public sentiment implications of company offshoring decisions and contributes to international business research, but has implications also for politicians and managers.