Advances in Organizational Justice (Stanford Business Books) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0804741328 ISBN 13: 9780804741323

Publisher: Stanford University Press, 2002

Synopsis

This is a state-of-the-science book about organizational justice, which is the study of people’s perception of fairness in organizations. The volume’s contributors, all acknowledged leaders in this burgeoning field, present new theoretical positions, clarify existing paradigms, and identify future areas of application. The first chapter provides a comprehensive framework that integrates and synthesizes key concepts in the field: distributive justice, procedural justice, and retributive justice. The second chapter is a full theoretical analysis of how people use fairness judgments as means of guiding their reactions to organizations and their authorities. The subsequent two chapters examine the conceptual interrelationships between various forms of organizational justice. First, we are given a definitive review and analysis of interactional justice that critically assesses the evidence bearing on its validity. The next chapter argues that previous research has underemphasized important similarities between distributive and procedural justice, and suggests new research directions for establishing these similarities. The three following chapters focus on the social and interpersonal antecedents of justice judgments: the influence that expectations of justice and injustice can have on work-related attitudes and behavior; the construction of a model of the determinants and consequences of normative beliefs about justice in organizations that emphasizes the role of cross-cultural norms; and the potential impact of diversity and multiculturalism on the viability of organizations. The book’s final chapter identifies seven canons of organizational justice and warns that in the absence of additional conceptual refinement these canons may operate as loose cannons that threaten the existence of justice as a viable construct in the organizational sciences.

About this title

About the Author

Jerald Greenberg is Abramowitz Professor of Business Ethics at The Ohio State University. His most recent publication is the seventh edition of Behavior in Organizations. Russell Cropanzano is Associate Professor and Industrial/Organizational Section Coordinator in the Department of Psychology at Colorado State University.

From the Inside Flap

This is a state-of-the-science book about organizational justice, which is the study of people’s perception of fairness in organizations. The volume’s contributors, all acknowledged leaders in this burgeoning field, present new theoretical positions, clarify existing paradigms, and identify future areas of application.
The first chapter provides a comprehensive framework that integrates and synthesizes key concepts in the field: distributive justice, procedural justice, and retributive justice. The second chapter is a full theoretical analysis of how people use fairness judgments as means of guiding their reactions to organizations and their authorities.
The subsequent two chapters examine the conceptual interrelationships between various forms of organizational justice. First, we are given a definitive review and analysis of interactional justice that critically assesses the evidence bearing on its validity. The next chapter argues that previous research has underemphasized important similarities between distributive and procedural justice, and suggests new research directions for establishing these similarities.
The three following chapters focus on the social and interpersonal antecedents of justice judgments: the influence that expectations of justice and injustice can have on work-related attitudes and behavior; the construction of a model of the determinants and consequences of normative beliefs about justice in organizations that emphasizes the role of cross-cultural norms; and the potential impact of diversity and multiculturalism on the viability of organizations.
The book’s final chapter identifies seven canons of organizational justice and warns that in the absence of additional conceptual refinement these canons may operate as loose cannons that threaten the existence of justice as a viable construct in the organizational sciences.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Advances in Organizational Justice

Stanford University Press

Copyright © 2001 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-4132-3

Contents

Preface.............................................................................................................................................................................viiContributor Biographies.............................................................................................................................................................xiList of Figures and Tables..........................................................................................................................................................xvii1. Fairness Theory: Justice as Accountability Robert Folger and Russell Cropanzano.................................................................................................12. Fairness Heuristic Theory: Justice Judgments as Pivotal Cognitions in Organizational Relations E. Allan Lind....................................................................563. Interactional (In)justice: The Sacred and the Profane Robert J. Bies............................................................................................................894. Procedural and Distributive Justice Are More Similar than You Think: A Monistic Perspective and a Research Agenda Russell Cropanzano and Maureen L. Ambrose.....................1195. Anticipatory Injustice: The Consequences of Expecting Injustice in the Workplace Debra L. Shapiro and Bradley L. Kirkman........................................................1526. When Do Elements of Procedural Fairness Make a Difference? A Classification of Moderating Differences Joel Brockner, Grant Ackerman, and Gregory Fairchild......................1797. Ethnic Diversity and the Viability of Organizations: The Role of Procedural Justice in Bridging Differences Yuen J. Huo and Tom R. Tyler........................................2138. The Seven Loose Can(n)ons of Organizational Justice Jerald Greenberg............................................................................................................245Index...............................................................................................................................................................................273

Chapter One

Fairness Theory: Justice as Accountability

Robert Folger and Russell Cropanzano

WHAT IS FAIRNESS? What do people mean when they say that they've been treated rightly or wrongly? In this chapter, we try to answer such questions by presenting a new model of justice called fairness theory. The theory presumes that the central topic of social justice is the assignment of blame. When people identify an instance of unfair treatment, they are holding someone accountable for an action (or inaction) that threatens another person's material or psychological well-being. If no one is to blame, there is no social injustice. For this reason, the process of accountability, or how another social entity comes to be considered blameworthy, is fundamental to justice. When people ascertain the fairness of someone's actions, they are trying to decide whether to hold that person accountable for those actions.

Despite the pivotal role played by accountability in feelings of injustice, previous research has been surprisingly silent on the topic. Some theories of organizational fairness begin one step back from the accountability decision and emphasize those aspects of the situation that eventually lead to blaming someone else. Other theories go one step forward, emphasizing the consequences of blaming someone. Nevertheless, the central role of accountability is at least implicit in many theories of justice.

Referent cognitions theory (RCT) is an example of a "one step back" theory. As discussed by Folger (e.g., 1987, 1993), RCT maintains that people are most likely to experience a sense of injustice when they are disadvantaged in relation to some point of comparison (such as another person; for details, see Folger & Kass, in press; Kulik & Ambrose, 1992). The role of accountability, however, is not explicit in RCT. Nor, as we will indicate, does RCT take into account all of the conditions necessary to attribute blame. Similarly, Lind and Tyler's (1988) group value model of authority (which was later elaborated as a relational model by Tyler & Lind, 1992) holds that a sense of justice is engendered when decision makers address individuals' relational concerns. These concerns can be addressed by being trustworthy and benevolent in intention, by recognizing other people's standing as group members, and by showing neutrality (Lind, 1995). These three rules make accountability implicit, especially with regard to intention.

Equity theory (e.g., Adams, 1965) is "one step forward" in that it tends to emphasize the consequences of holding someone accountable for unfair treatment. Adams (1965), for example, asked whether a disadvantageous inequity would result in more than mere feelings of dissatisfaction. Anger toward the perpetrator, he noted, could lead to equity-restoration attempts, which might include such actions as work slowdowns and theft.

An interesting mixed model was introduced by Bies and Moag (1986) and Bies (1987) with the concept of interactional justice. According to Bies, decision makers know that they might be held accountable for aversive events. Thus, they devise explanations that they hope will allow them to avoid retaliation from the person who feels unfairly treated. Interactional justice research is especially important for our purposes here because it explicitly notes that authority figures (and, more generally, anyone whose conduct has implications for others' welfare) often risk being blamed. The model goes on to describe tactics by which decision makers avoid being held accountable (for recent reviews see Bies, this volume; Bobocel, McCline, & Folger, 1997). Consequently, Bies (1987) emphasized the role of accountability, although he did not describe the process by which it occurs.

This brief review suggests that although the construct of accountability is ubiquitous, no justice theories have explicitly emphasized the process by which accountability judgments are made. In the following section, we try to plug that gap by introducing and explicating a model of accountability called fairness theory. Fairness theory focuses on the implications of accountability for fairness judgments. Briefly previewed, fairness theory maintains that accountability has three interrelated components. One component is the existence of an unfavorable condition (a negative state of events, relative to a given frame of reference). In other words, there must be something of an aversive nature for which someone might be held accountable. Second, the event must be due to the volitional, discretionary actions of the target person whose accountability is assessed. An individual who had no feasible alternatives, for example, is ordinarily not held accountable. Third, those harmful actions (responsible for the negative conditions) must violate some ethical principle of interpersonal conduct-a normative standard of justice. People ordinarily do not, for example, consider a dentist unfair who bears responsibililty for painful conditions caused by a tooth extraction. Though the treatment may hurt in the short run, the dentist has behaved in an ethically fair manner and therefore is not accountable for a charge of injustice.

The following pages describe the model in two parts. The first lays out the three elements of fairness theory. The second part integrates fairness theory with previous justice research.

The Three Elements of Fairness Theory

Imagine arriving at work one morning. Unexpectedly and without cause, your supervisor approaches you with a specimen jar in hand. She orders you to go to the bathroom and, while accompanied by an observer, to provide a urine sample for a random drug test. There is a good chance that you might feel a sense of uneasiness (Konovsky & Cropanzano, 1993), but do you hold your supervisor accountable for having treated you unfairly?

Figure 1.1 shows the three elements of fairness theory: (a) an injurious condition or state of affairs (circumstances considered disadvantageous), (b) attributable to someone's discretionary conduct that (c) violates an applicable moral tenet. For example, many people would have negative thoughts about a random drug test, especially one performed in an invasive fashion. When such events are experienced in that aversive fashion, the first element of accountability is in place. On the other hand, had the organization been less punitive, more supportive, and more respectful of employee privacy, then the test might have seemed less aversive (Cropanzano & Konovsky, 1995), and there would have been less reason to consider assigning blame.

Now consider the second element. Although your supervisor handed you the urine-specimen jar, she might not be the person whom you blame. Perhaps you suspect that she had no choice because the order came from her superiors. If your supervisor was forced to administer the test, then you might not hold her accountable.

Finally, note the relevance of normative precepts as a third element of accountability. When the supervisor is held responsible for her conduct, such a behavior may or may not be a violation of prevailing ethical norms. Certainly, violating the privacy of a well-performing employee might seem morally questionable or problematic to at least some people. There might be a justification for that action, however, that would make it morally legitimate. Perhaps there have been serious safety problems in your company. Your supervisor, though perhaps a tad zealous, is motivated by a concern for others' well-being. Hence, though your supervisor may well be accountable for an odious incident, she may not be accountable for an unfair incident.

This example illustrates our three conditions of accountability, which we have modeled after what Schlenker (1997; Schlenker, Britt, Pennington, Murphy, & Doherty 1994) has called the "triangle" nodes of responsibility: (a) injury, (b) discretionary conduct, and (c) moral transgression. More important, it illustrates the interplay among the three (also following Schlenker's emphasis on links among those nodes): For a person to be held accountable for an injustice, that person must harm another person by behaving in a way that violates some ethical principle of social conduct. The fully interconnected chain linking these elements needs to be maintained. If the chain is broken in any place, then a social injustice has not occurred. In effect, an individual composes a sense of accountability from these three judgments-injury, conduct, and standards are the constituent elements from which blame is built.

In the next section we discuss the nature of these three judgments. We argue that all three involve a prototypical form of contrastive thinking. In discussing how that contrastive mode of thought operates, we draw from the most comprehensive descriptions available, as found in the psychological literature on counterfactuals and related topics, such as the simulation heuristic (Kahneman & Tversky, 1982) and norm theory (Kahneman & Miller, 1986).

When we use the term counterfactual, we mean exactly what we say. Counterfactual thinking is "contrary to the facts," as Roese (1997, p. 133) aptly puts it. The point of departure for counterfactual thinking could be any event that someone experiences. If the event is important or at least salient, the person will try to make sense out of it. The person attempts to ascribe some meaning to the occurrence. Meaning is not intrinsic to an event. It is something assigned to an incident by a human observer or observers. In other words, meaning is added during or after the fact. What people add is their own thoughts, interpretations, perceptions, and ideas. In a word, they add their imagination. Among other things, they assess what the nature of the experience would have been like if the event had not occurred or had unfolded differently (Roese & Olson, 1995).

When people contemplate an actual event, they often mentally alter certain parameters or change certain facts for a contrastive perspective that acts as a frame of reference. These changed elements are "counterfactual" because, as just mentioned, they run counter to the actual event. The use of counterfactuals creates new, alternative scenarios, and these alternatives provide a frame of reference. In short, people place what "is" side by side with "what might have been." This juxtaposition is the essence of counterfactual thinking (Roese, 1997).

In fairness theory, counterfactual thinking has wide utility. Each of the three central judgments in fairness theory is decided by comparing reality with the corresponding aspect of a counterfactual scenario. From the point of view of cognitive processing, it matters relatively little which of the judgments is being made. Counterfactual thinking is implicated whether we are attempting to understand states, behaviors, or principles. From the point of view of establishing human meaning, on the other hand, each judgment is quite different. First, an aversive state involves implicit comparison with a more beneficial state. This entails a question about what an alternatively experienced state would have felt like if a different type of event or situation had occurred-one with more positive implications for well-being than those that were actually encountered. Second, discretionary conduct refers to another person's choices among feasible alternatives. Hence, the contrast between what another person actually did and an alternative course of action involves the behaviors that could have transpired. Third, judging another's discretionary conduct by moral principles implies the contrast between what was done and what should have been done. Would, Could, and Should (henceforth capitalized) are the essential elements of accountability.

Would Perceptions: Counterfactual Thinking and Injury (Reduced or Threatened Welfare)

When one has been threatened with a great injustice, one accepts a smaller as a favor. -Mrs. Thomas Carlyle

It is easiest to describe fairness theory by beginning with consequences as implications for well-being. What do people mean when they say that they have been injured or harmed? To answer these question, we need to introduce the idea of states of being. A state is a condition of existence. For example, wealth and poverty refer to economic states, whereas feelings such as contentment and emotional exhaustion are psychological states. Health is a physical state, and the quality of being respected is a social state. When a person has been injured, some state of being has been worsened or made problematic, even if only as a threatened prospect that jeopardizes future welfare. Malevolent intentions by an antagonist who constitutes a threat to someone's well-being therefore constitute injurious consequences for that person as we use the term injury.

Consider, for example, a female employee who submits to a blood test as part of a routine company physical. Unbeknown to the individual, the firm uses the sample for genetic screening, drug screening, and a host of other medical tests (see Stone & Stone, 1990, for an excellent discussion of this and similar issues). Subsequently, the employee is terminated because her genetic tests suggest that she might be prone to some costly illness. How might her state of being be affected? Her economic state is likely to worsen due to the loss of pay. Unemployment is apt to batter her social status as well. Finally, if she becomes ill and cannot draw on company benefits for health care, then her physical state might deteriorate. Clearly, the employee will see the testing and firing as an injurious event. Harm is defined as damage to some state of being, although often justice researchers tend to focus on economic, psychological, and socal states.

Determining Whether Injury Has Occurred

The counterfactual contrast between well-being and injuries such as pain or financial loss seems fairly straightforward in principle, but in fact judgments of injury can be more problematic than they first appear. People are sometimes uncertain whether they have been harmed. This is because it takes a ruler to measure something. To gauge injury, this "ruler" incorporates a referent standard as a point of comparison (Folger, 1984; Folger & Kass, in press; Kulik & Ambrose, 1992). By referring to a referent standard as a ruler, we intend to connote variations in magnitude rather than absolute "yes/no" categories. People can feel a little disadvantaged or quite a lot. In this way, the referent standard acts as a ruler. Generally speaking, a very serious event is one with a large discrepancy between the actual event and the well-being standard. A less serious event has a smaller discrepancy. In any case, it is the rift between a consequence and a comparison point that determines the extent of felt injury.

Harder (1992), for example, documented that pay inequity exists even among highly paid major-league baseball players. Though all of these individuals are far better compensated than the average American, there is still a good deal of variability in their earnings, and, additionally, players do not always get what they want in salary negotiations. From their standpoint, some players see themselves as doing better than their peers. It should be emphasized that this finding is not limited to the unique sample of professional athletes. In fact, considerable evidence suggests that standards of comparison are important in decisions of pay satisfaction (e.g., Cowherd & Levine, 1992; Summers & Hendrix, 1991; Sweeney, McFarlin, & Inderrieden 1990).

An especially intriguing example was discussed by Martin (1981). Martin pondered the circumstances of women working in management. It has been well-documented that women in management earn less than men of similar experience and tenure (Brett & Stroh, 1997; Lyness & Tompson, 1997). However, women managers also earn more than most other female workers, who tend to be overrepresented among lower-paying jobs (Peterson, 1994). This presents female managers with a question: To what extent have they been "injured" by their pay? As Martin observed, if they compare themselves with male managers, then they have been hurt. If they compare themselves with the typical female worker, then they are doing reasonably well. For this reason, some women may be slow to claim discrimination, even when they are clearly not being compensated equitably (for a fuller discussion of this and related phenomena, see Crosby, 1984; Martin, 1986). Parenthetically, we should note the obvious: Federal law requires that women be paid relative to men in their job class and with similar competence, not based upon their gender. The managers considered by Martin, therefore, were in fact being discriminated against.

(Continues...)

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Edition details

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Publication date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804741328
• ISBN 13: 9780804741323
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304
• Editor: Greenberg Jerald