Organizational Justice: Typology, Antecedents and Consequences: History
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Contributor:
Jennifer Wiseman
,
Amelia Stillwell

Organizational Justice is an individual’s perception that events, actions, or decisions within an organization adhere to a standard of fairness. Justice researchers have categorized justice into four types, differentiated by how fairness is evaluated by employees: distributive, procedural, interpersonal, and informational justice. Organizational justice perceptions have consequences for the employee and the organization: increasing job satisfaction, commitment, and trust; and decreasing turnover, counterproductive work behaviors, and even workplace violence. Contemporary organizational justice research seeks to understand how to restore justice after an injustice has occurred. 

  • organizational justice
  • distributive justice
  • procedural justice
  • interactional justice
  • interpersonal justice
  • informational justice
  • deontic justice
  • fairness
  • restorative justice
Justice, as it is broadly defined, is present when a person evaluates something as fair or unfair [1]. Organizational Justice is an individual’s perception that events, actions, or decisions within an organization adhere to a standard of fairness [2]. Critically, organizational justice is a subjective perception, evaluated by the employee, the manager/supervisor, and others in the workplace (i.e., third party observers). Researchers refer to such perceptions and evaluations as justice judgements [3]; observers form justice judgements using the information and cues they observe in the organization, together with their emotional responses to these events [2]. Justice researchers have categorized justice into four types, which are differentiated by how fairness is evaluated by employees: distributive, procedural, interpersonal, and informational justice [1]. These justice judgements link to employee affect, attitudes, and behavior [4], and aggregate to impact both team- and organization-level outcomes [5]. Unlike moral concerns, fairness considerations tend to be ubiquitous across cultures, and the four key types of justice generally hold cross-culturally [6]. As such, organizational justice is an important consideration for organizations and their stakeholders [7].
It may seem obvious that employees care about justice, but research underscores that justice perceptions are more than short-term, self-interested concerns. Rather, justice perceptions reflect a long-term concern for both the self and others [7][8][9]. As humans, the desire to be accepted by important others drives us to act in ways that prompt reciprocal acts of fairness [10]. Concern for reciprocity is future focused. Employees consider long-term benefits when they evaluate how an organization treats them, with a desire to reduce future uncertainty by evaluating justice events in the present. Observing (in)justice toward others offers information about how employees themselves can expect to be treated within the organization. Moreover, when employees witness injustice directed at others, they may have negative emotional and cognitive responses and may retaliate against the organization or responsible party [11].
Organizations and managers also care about justice, as its impact goes far beyond the individual employee. Whether or not they were the target, witnessing injustice at work makes employees more likely to act in retribution, even at personal cost [9][11][12][13]. When employees agree that the workplace is not just (low justice climate), absenteeism is higher and performance is lower [14][15]. By contrast, employees who perceive workplace justice express greater trust in and commitment to the organization, are more likely to adhere to company policies, and exhibit greater conscientiousness and job effectiveness [7][9][16]. Overall, workplaces that are perceived to be just are viewed as more legitimate organizations [17].
Employee identities, personalities, and values can influence their justice judgements (e.g., [18][19]). For example, Lee and Farh [20] show that women may be more attentive to distributive justice around salary given the history of gendered pay inequity between men and women. Individual differences among managers, such as empathy, personality traits, moral motives, and workload, can also influence employee justice perceptions [21][22]. Mayer and colleagues [23] found employees supervised by neurotic managers tend to have lower perceptions of procedural, interpersonal, and informational justice climate. When researchers measured the daily workload of managers, they observed that managers with higher workloads were less likely to prioritize acting justly over other responsibilities [24]. Encouragingly, when managers included justice tasks on lists of daily duties, they showed greater adherence to justice rules.

This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/encyclopedia2030086

References

  1. Cropanzano, R.; Ambrose, M. Organizational justice: Where we have been and where we are going. In The Oxford Handbook of Justice in the Workplace; Cropanzano, R., Ambrose, M., Eds.; Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2015; pp. 3–14.
  2. Colquitt, J.A.; Zipay, K.P. Justice, fairness, and employee reactions. Annu. Rev. Organ. Psychol. Organ. Behav. 2015, 2, 75–99.
  3. Tyler, T.R. Social justice: Outcome and procedure. Int. J. Psychol. 2000, 35, 117–125.
  4. Hollensbe, E.C.; Khazanchi, S.; Masterson, S.S. How do I assess if my supervisor and organization are fair? Identifying the rules underlying entity-based justice perceptions. Acad. Manag. J. 2008, 51, 1099–1116.
  5. Simons, T.; Roberson, Q. Why managers should care about fairness: The effects of aggregate justice perceptions on organizational outcomes. J. Appl. Psychol. 2003, 88, 432.
  6. James, K. Culture and organizational justice: State of the literature and suggestions for future directions. In The Oxford Handbook of Justice in the Workplace; Cropanzano, R., Ambrose, M., Eds.; Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2015; pp. 273–290.
  7. Cohen-Charash, Y.; Spector, P.E. The role of justice in organizations: A meta-analysis. Organ. Behav. Hum. Decis. Processes 2001, 86, 278–321.
  8. Skitka, L.J.; Winquist, J.; Hutchinson, S. Are outcome fairness and outcome favorability distinguishable psychological constructs? A meta-analytic review. Soc. Justice Res. 2003, 16, 309–341.
  9. Cropanzano, R.; Bowen, D.E.; Gilliland, S.W. The management of organizational justice. Acad. Manag. Perspect. 2007, 21, 34–48.
  10. Blader, S.L.; Tyler, T.R. Relational Models of Procedural Justice. In The Oxford Handbook of Justice in the Workplace; Cropanzano, R., Ambrose, M., Eds.; Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2015; pp. 351–370.
  11. Ellard, J.; Skarlicki, D. A third-party observer’s reactions to employee mistreatment: Motivational and cognitive processes in deservingness assessments. Emerg. Perspect. Manag. Organ. Justice 2002, 2, 133–158.
  12. Bies, R.J.; Tripp, T.M. Hot flashes, open wounds: Injustice and the tyranny of its emotions. Emerg. Perspect. Manag. Organ. Justice 2002, 203224.
  13. Rupp, D.E.; Spencer, S. When customers lash out: The effects of customer interactional injustice on emotional labor and the mediating role of discrete emotions. J. Appl. Psychol. 2006, 91, 971.
  14. Li, A.; Cropanzano, R.S.; Molina, A. Fairness at the unit level: Justice climate, justice climate strength, and peer justice. In The Oxford Handbook of Justice in the Workplace; Cropanzano, R., Ambrose, M., Eds.; Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK, 2015.
  15. Li, A.; Cropanzano, R.; Bagger, J. Justice climate and peer justice climate: A closer look. Small Group Res. 2013, 44, 563–592.
  16. Colquitt, J.A.; Conlon, D.E.; Wesson, M.J.; Porter, C.O.; Ng, K.Y. Justice at the millennium: A meta-analytic review of 25 years of organizational justice research. J. Appl. Psychol. 2001, 86, 425.
  17. Lind, E.A. The study of justice in social psychology and related fields. In Social Psychology and Justice; Lind, E., Ed.; Routledge: New York, NY, USA, 2019; pp. 1–20.
  18. Huang, J.L.; Cropanzano, R.; Li, A.; Shao, P.; Zhang, X.-A.; Li, Y. Employee conscientiousness, agreeableness, and supervisor justice rule compliance: A three-study investigation. J. Appl. Psychol. 2017, 102, 1564.
  19. Koopman, J.; Matta, F.K.; Scott, B.A.; Conlon, D.E. Ingratiation and popularity as antecedents of justice: A social exchange and social capital perspective. Organ. Behav. Hum. Decis. Processes 2015, 131, 132–148.
  20. Lee, C.; Farh, J.L. The effects of gender in organizational justice perception. J. Organ. Behav. Int. J. Ind. Occup. Organ. Psychol. Behav. 1999, 20, 133–143.
  21. Patient, D.L.; Skarlicki, D.P. Increasing interpersonal and informational justice when communicating negative news: The role of the manager’s empathic concern and moral development. J. Manag. 2010, 36, 555–578.
  22. Scott, B.A.; Colquitt, J.A.; Paddock, E.L. An actor-focused model of justice rule adherence and violation: The role of managerial motives and discretion. J. Appl. Psychol. 2009, 94, 756–769.
  23. Mayer, D.; Nishii, L.; Schneider, B.; Goldstein, H. The precursors and products of justice climates: Group leader antecedents and employee attitudinal consequences. Pers. Psychol. 2007, 60, 929–963.
  24. Sherf, E.N.; Venkataramani, V.; Gajendran, R.S. Too busy to be fair? The effect of workload and rewards on managers’ justice rule adherence. Acad. Manag. J. 2019, 62, 469–502.
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