Socioemotional Wealth and Proactive Stakeholder Engagement: Why Family-Controlled Firms Care More About Their Stakeholders

Family firms are motivated by financial, but also non-financial factors like the preservation and enhancement of the stock of affect related value, or socioemational wealth (SEW), including identity, the ability to exercise family influence, and the perpetuation of family dynasty. This paper argues that family firms are more prone to engage actively with their stakeholders, who often have non-pecuniary demands, because by doing so they preserve and enhance their socioemotional wealth. We identify distinctive logics that explain the adoption of such practices and offer a set of topics for future studies.