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Working While Liberal/Conservative: A Review of Political Ideology in Organizations
Abstract
Political polarization has increased significantly in society over the past decade, and whether intended or not, employees at all levels bring their political ideologies into organizations. We posit that political ideology is unique and warrants the attention of organizational scholars. We begin by integrating literature from political science and political psychology to review the various conceptualizations of political ideology as representing values, identity, and political affiliation. Next, we review the literature of political ideology in organizational sciences which has examined political ideology through a values-based lens,understanding it to be a source of motivated reasoning that influences strategic decisions. We then review a smaller subset of literature that has examined political ideology through an identity-based lens, exploring its influence on social dynamics including stereotyping, diversity in teams, and person-organization fit. Finally, we chart a course for future research on political ideology, focusing on (1) conceptual expansions, (2) contextual determinants, (3) diversity, (4) cross-level alignment, and (5) the acknowledgment of possible researcher bias.
... Second, parties' ideological standpoints often depend on the topic and not on ideological blocs (Linhart & Shikano, 2009;Urban Pappi & Seher, 2009). Third, people's political affiliation is less clear because voting behavior is sometimes inconsistent with political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020): For instance, people might not vote according to their party affiliation but according to which coalition they prefer. Therefore, we propose that, in multiparty systems, the values-based perspective of political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020) is more relevant. ...
... Third, people's political affiliation is less clear because voting behavior is sometimes inconsistent with political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020): For instance, people might not vote according to their party affiliation but according to which coalition they prefer. Therefore, we propose that, in multiparty systems, the values-based perspective of political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020) is more relevant. Accordingly, political similarity should be measured via a conceptually aligned measure, namely perceived political value similarity (PVS). ...
... Importantly, at the same time, we also discovered that in multiparty contexts the PAM's key variable is better conceptualized as a deep-level similarity in political values than mere affiliation with the applicant's preferred party: In Germany, only PVS had a significant effect, whereas CPA had not. This shows that, in multiparty systems, the PAM needs to be refined from the twoparty systems' behavioral lens to a values-based lens of political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020). ...
Recruiters increasingly cybervet job applicants by checking their social media profiles. Theory (i.e., the political affiliation model, PAM) and research show that during cybervetting, recruiters are exposed to job-unrelated information such as political affiliation, which might trigger similarity-attraction effects and bias hireability judgments. However, as the PAM was developed in a more polarized two-party political system, it is pivotal to test and refine the PAM in a multiparty context. Therefore, we asked working professionals from the United States (two-party context, N = 266) and Germany (multiparty context, N = 747) to rate an applicant's hireability after cybervetting a LinkedIn profile that was manipulated in a between-subjects design (party affiliation by individuating information). Key tenets of the PAM could be transferred to multiparty contexts: The political similarity-attraction effect predicted hireability judgments beyond job-related individuating information, especially regarding organizational citizenship behavior. In addition, in a multiparty context, these biasing effects of political similarity and liking were not attenuated. Yet, there were also differences: In a multiparty context, political similarity had to be operationalized in terms of political value similarity and recruiters' political interest emerged as a significant moderator of the effects. So, this study refines the PAM by showing in multiparty contexts the importance of (a) a values-based perspective (instead of a behavioral political affiliation perspective) and (b) political interest (instead of identification). Accordingly, we provide a more nuanced understanding of when political affiliation similarity contributes to perceived overall similarity in affecting liking and hireability judgments in cybervetting. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).
... While CEO ideology may embody many facets, we focus on the liberalism-conservatism axis, one of the most parsimonious and robust manifestations of ideology, validated by abundant research in political science and political psychology (e.g., Bonica, Chilton, Goldin, Rozema, & Sen, 2017;Swigart, Anantharaman, Williamson, & Grandey, 2020). In this literature, liberals are characterized by openness to change, while conservatives espouse a lower degree of openness to change (Jost, Nosek, & Gosling, 2008). ...
... According to the online Oxford dictionary, ideology refers to "a system of ideas and ideals, especially one which forms the basis of economic or political theory." Regarding the specific notion of political ideology, while it has held multiple meanings throughout history, we subscribe to the 'culturalist' or value-based view defining political ideology as a "stable individual difference, or a 'predisposition' such that the beliefs are deeply held and likely to remain consistent throughout the life course" (Swigart et al., 2020(Swigart et al., : 1065. ...
... In organizational research, several studies have demonstrated that the political leaning of top leaders is likely to influence strategic outcomes, as managers rely on their "schema of related values" when making decisions (Swigart et al., 2020(Swigart et al., : 1065, especially under conditions of ambiguity, uncertainty and with limited information (Hambrick, 2007;Mees-Buss & Welch, 2019). From an empirical standpoint, CEO ideology has been linked to outcomes such as non-market and market strategies (e.g., corporate social responsibility, mergers and acquisitions, entrepreneurship) (e.g., Chin et al., 2021;Di Giuli & Kostovetsky, 2014;Elnahas & Kim, 2017). ...
... Notably, there is an increasing amount of empirical and anecdotal evidence that societal politics and political issues have become more prevalent in the workplace (Hersh, 2022;Society for Human Resource Management, 2022;Swigart et al., 2020;Telford, 2022). As organisational members bring their individual political views and preferences into organisations, the types of discourse and rhetoric that previously may have been uniquely relevant in the political domain have become an active part of organisational life and therefore have the potential to influence individuals' perceptions and behaviour in the workplace. ...
... voter perceptions in an election), political differences may not be commonly thought about as a factor that would affect individuals in the workplace. However, even though organisations tend to make a conscious effort to keep societal politics and political activities out of the workplace (Society for Human Resource Management, 2016), in a politically polarising environment, it has become much more difficult for organisations to stay isolated from political issues and to keep employees' political differences out of their interpersonal communication (Peterson et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). This new phenomenon is not only an important issue for organisations to manage, but because research involving "political ideology in organisations is a relatively new topic" (Swigart et al., 2020(Swigart et al., , p. 1064, it is crucial to understand how differences in political ideology may affect individuals' perceptions, decisions and behaviour in the workplace, including their social status perceptions. ...
... However, even though organisations tend to make a conscious effort to keep societal politics and political activities out of the workplace (Society for Human Resource Management, 2016), in a politically polarising environment, it has become much more difficult for organisations to stay isolated from political issues and to keep employees' political differences out of their interpersonal communication (Peterson et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). This new phenomenon is not only an important issue for organisations to manage, but because research involving "political ideology in organisations is a relatively new topic" (Swigart et al., 2020(Swigart et al., , p. 1064, it is crucial to understand how differences in political ideology may affect individuals' perceptions, decisions and behaviour in the workplace, including their social status perceptions. ...
Purpose
Drawing on research in the social psychology and political science literatures, this research aims to examine how political moderates perceive, and are perceived by, their co-workers with differing political ideologies in an organisational context, with a focus on the perceptions of social status.
Design/methodology/approach
To test the hypotheses regarding the social status perceptions of and by political moderates in the workplace, the authors conducted an online experiment in which working adults read a hypothetical workplace scenario and then assessed the social status of a co-worker based on the political ideology of that co-worker.
Findings
The results largely supported the two hypothesised asymmetries of social perceptions of and by political moderates in an organisational context. Specifically, political moderates were perceived to have higher social status by their moderate and conservative co-workers than by their liberal co-workers. In addition, political moderates perceived moderate co-workers to have higher social status than conservative ones.
Originality/value
This research investigates the influence of political ideology on social status perceptions in organisations by focusing on the previously underexamined political moderates. The findings illustrate the importance of political moderates, who tend to espouse a moderate level of resistance to social change, in the process of developing a functional hierarchy and balancing change and stability in organisations.
... In the entrepreneurial context, political ideology might also shape VC investment decisions in mitigating uncertainty associated with young ventures (De Clercq, Fried, Lehtonen, & Sapienza, 2006;Swigart, Anantharaman, Williamson, & Grandey, 2020). ...
... Among the limited research that has considered investor characteristics, Matusik et al. (2008) highlight that investors' personal value systems, specifically process values, can affect how they judge venture quality. In this regard, a potentially influential dimension of investors' personal value about which we have little understanding is the one emanating from their political ideology (Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... We conceptualize political ideology as representing both a set of values and identities that translate into specific patterns of judgments and behaviors (Jost, 2006). Characterizing political ideology along a liberal/conservative spectrum, we suggest that the different value orientations of conservatives and liberals translate into a lower tolerance to uncertainty for the former compared with the latter (Jost, Nosek, & Gosling, 2008;Swigart et al., 2020). Building on this premise, we first propose that higher VC investor conservatism may result in fewer investment rounds received by a venture. ...
This dissertation examines entrepreneurial resource mobilization of cleantech startups related to political ideology and product digitization. It comprises three studies: (1) a quantitative analysis of the effect of VC investors’ political ideology on investment decision-making, (2) a quantitative analysis of the effect of startups’ product digitization on venture growth, and (3) a qualitative examination of entrepreneurial resource mobilization of non-digital, hybrid, and digital startups.
... Other research suggests that liberal and conservative views generate different dispositions toward traditional and new ideologies and practices (Hirsh et al., 2010). Those with liberal views have a more positive perception of change and a better disposition toward social change initiatives, while those with conservative views feel more strongly about traditions, individualism, and norms (Swigart et al., 2020). Previous research affirms a potential relationship exists between political views, attitudes, and behaviors. ...
... Studies that focused on organizational attraction have found a direct relationship between a company's position, specifically its legal and ethical aspects, and candidates' attraction (Zhang and Gowan, 2012), which is influenced by their liberal or conservative values (Swigart et al., 2020). Similarly, hospitality research has revealed that different factors may mediate and moderate CSR outcomes including employee factors of motivation, trust, organizational identification, organizational characteristics, and policies (Kaur et al., 2022). ...
... For instance, Gully et al. (2013) found the relationship between social and environmental responsibility messages and P-O fit to be enhanced when individuals had a high desire to have a significant impact through work. Considering how individuals that align with more liberal values are commonly found to have a better disposition toward social change initiatives (Swigart et al., 2020), we predict the following: ...
Organizations strive to communicate the right content to stakeholders in today's polarized world. This study explored the relationship between socially controversial corporate social responsibility (CCSR) and organizational attraction in the hospitality industry under the boundary conditions of liberal values. Specifically, we examined how liberal values moderated the relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction. We also discussed how liberal values moderated the indirect relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction through the effects of person-organization fit, anticipated organizational support, and anticipated pride from membership. A between-subjects online experiment showed that liberal values are a significant boundary condition in almost all relationships, besides the direct relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction and through the indirect effect of anticipated pride from membership. These results provide critical theoretical and practical implications for understanding CCSR communication in hospitality recruitment.
... This cognitive, social, and behavioral construct is rooted in values (i.e., what I believe), identity (i.e., who I am), and partisan affiliation (i. e., whom I vote for) (Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... We measure founders' political ideology using voter registration records. Extant literature in political science and psychology leverages party affiliation (e.g., party registration, voting, donating, campaigning) as a proxy for underlying political ideology (Gerber et al., 2010;Goren et al., 2009;Swigart et al., 2020) and suggests that partisan political affiliations are highly stable over time (Hart et al., 2020). Although political contributions are often used to measure ideology of top management teams and boards of directors in established organizations, only contributions of over $200 are recorded by the Federal Electoral Commission-such that "everyday" founders may not be well captured therein. ...
... SIT affirms that founders bring not only their self-identity to bear in the venture creation process but also their identity in relation to groups and collectives (Fauchart and Gruber, 2011). Interestingly, although political ideology is often conceptualized as a social identity in adjacent fields (Huddy and Bankert, 2017) and some organizational research (Swigart et al., 2020), this work has seen little crossfertilization with the SIT-social entrepreneurship literature (Hertel et al., 2019;Nason et al., 2018). How does social venture founders' identification with a political worldview relate to other identities like gender, religion, or disability-or to entrepreneurshipspecific identities (Fauchart and Gruber, 2011)? ...
Although organizational mission is central to social venturing, little is known about the nature and origins of social ventures' missions. In particular, the field lacks a framework for understanding the moral content of nascent ventures' “prosocial” missions that rely on quite different—and potentially conflicting—moral values. We engage in an exploratory study, drawing on moral foundations theory and upper echelons theory to develop framing questions related to the moral discourse in social venture missions and the role of founders' political ideology in relation to this moral discourse. We construct a novel dataset using computer-aided text analysis on the mission statements of over 50,000 nascent nonprofit ventures in the United States, supplemented by voter registration data from 17 states and Washington, D.C. Our findings reveal rich nuance in the moral discourse found in organizations' mission statements. Furthermore, founding teams' political ideologies are strongly associated with the moral discourse in their social ventures' stated missions—and in ways that differ intriguingly from findings in moral psychology at the individual level. We draw on these new insights to develop a roadmap for future research on organizational mission in relation to social venturing, moral markets, mission drift, and political ideology.
... One specific way in which political ideologies manifest is through classifications that characterize political positions in relation to one another (e.g., the spectrum of liberalism to conservativism), often referred to as "political orientations" (Heywood, 2017). Research has suggested that political orientations can play an important role in the work and employment context (Johnson & Roberto, 2018;Roth et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). For example, research has shown that a greater misfit between applicants' political orientation and the political orientation held by organizational decision-makers is associated with a lower likelihood of hireability decisions (Roth et al., 2020). ...
... In contrast, potential effects of misfit between the dominant political orientation that characterizes an entire industry, profession, or occupational field and the personal political orientations of people working in this industry, profession, or field are currently not wellunderstood (Swigart et al., 2020). This is unfortunate, given that such person-occupation political orientation misfit may also lead to detrimental employee and work outcomes, such as reduced occupational identification (i.e., a cognitive-affective construct that represents a person's perception of oneness and feeling of belongingness to an occupational field; Becker & Carper, 1956;Witt, 1993; see also Ashforth & Mael, 1989). ...
... Political orientations, as reflections of political ideologies, represents certain deeply-held beliefs, attitudes, and values about the ideal structure of society and how it should be achieved (Erikson & Tedin, 2003;Jost et al., 2009). These beliefs and values are typically assessed using a unidimensional continuum ranging from left-wing (or liberal, socialist, communist) political orientation to right-wing (or conservative, neoliberal) political orientation (Johnson & Roberto, 2018;Jost, 2006;Swigart et al., 2020). While the neoliberal orientation has a complex relationship with traditional political ideologies on the left-right continuum, its economic program (which is the focus of the current study) is clearly conservative and antisocialist/communist (i.e., left-wing) and, thus, modern neoliberalism is firmly situated on the right-wing side of the political continuum (Bettache & Chiu, 2019;Davidson & Saull, 2017). ...
Researchers and practitioners have become increasingly interested in the role of political orientation in the workplace. Importantly, people do not always agree with other members of their profession when it comes to politics. However, the effects of such person-occupation political orientation misfit on people’s work-related attitudes remain unclear. According to the social identity perspective, person-occupation political orientation misfit is likely to lead to the experience of identity threat which, in turn, should negatively impact people’s occupational identification. To address this idea empirically, the goal of this study was to examine the influence of different political depictions of the field of industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology (i.e., as generally neoliberal, left-wing, pluralistic, or neutral) on I-O psychologists’ occupational identification, depending on their personal political orientation (i.e., more or less liberal vs. conservative). Specifically, we hypothesized that experiencing person-occupation political orientation misfit would reduce occupational identification. Results of an experiment (n = 800 I-O psychology academics and practitioners) provided some support for this hypothesis, suggesting specifically that person-occupation political orientation misfit might alienate people with a more conservative political orientation from their occupation.
... Specifically, referencing previous SITL research in the US political context, we considered bipartisanship as an indicator of inter-subgroup relations in the United States (Alabastro et al., 2013;Hohman et al., 2010;Rast et al., 2015). From a value-based perspective, partisans subscribe to one party versus another based on alignments of values and beliefs with the party (Swigart et al., 2020). Broad distinctions between conservatives and liberals (roughly corresponds to the Republican and the Democratic party, respectively) includes one's belief in a) social change versus tradition, b) equality versus hierarchy, and c) emphasis on contextual factors versus personal agency (Jost et al., 2009;Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... From a value-based perspective, partisans subscribe to one party versus another based on alignments of values and beliefs with the party (Swigart et al., 2020). Broad distinctions between conservatives and liberals (roughly corresponds to the Republican and the Democratic party, respectively) includes one's belief in a) social change versus tradition, b) equality versus hierarchy, and c) emphasis on contextual factors versus personal agency (Jost et al., 2009;Swigart et al., 2020). Conservatives, compared to liberals, also tend to prioritize individual freedom over collective egalitarian goals or government interventions (Jost, 2017). ...
... Through this lens, partisanship is partly viewed as symbolic labels (Devine, 2015;Malka & Lelkes, 2010). In other words, partisans' cognition, attitudes, and behaviors are driven by not only their values and beliefs but also their social identification (Swigart et al., 2020). We adopt this view of social group identification as political affiliation in the current studies. ...
Operationalizing social group identification as political partisanship, we examine followers’ (i.e., US residents’) affective experiences and behavioral responses during the initial COVID‐19 outbreak in the United States (March to May 2020). In Study 1, we conducted content analyses on major news outlets’ coverage of COVID‐19 (N = 4319) to examine media polarization and how it plays a role in shaping followers’ perceptions of the pandemic and leadership. News outlets trusted by Republicans portrayed US President Donald Trump as more effective, conveyed a stronger sense of certainty with less negative affective tone, and had a lower emphasis on COVID‐19 prevention compared to outlets trusted by Democrats. We then conducted a field survey study (Study 2; N = 214) and found that Republicans perceived Trump as more effective, experienced higher positive affect, and engaged in less COVID‐19 preventive behavior compared to Democrats. Using a longitudinal survey design in Study 3 (N = 251), we examined how emotional responses evolved in parallel with the pandemic and found further support for Study 2 findings. Collectively, our findings provide insight into the process of leadership from a social identity perspective during times of crisis, illustrating how social identity can inhibit mobilization of united efforts. The findings have implications for leadership of subgroup divides in different organizational and crisis contexts.
... The mega-threat of racism has often been politicized; for example, the anti-racist Black Lives Matter campaign has been met with reactionary Blue Lives Matter and All Lives Matter movements. Organizations, therefore, may not want to comment on such social and societal issues, given beliefs that work and politics should not mix (Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... It is noteworthy that how statements may be used to address potential pain points in an Democratic (vs. Republican), the organization is dominated by the employees possessing the corresponding political ideology, which thus forms the organizational political orientation (Gupta et al., 2017;Gupta & Briscoe, 2020;Swigart et al., 2020). Per our findings, pro-Democrat companies were more likely to acknowledge Black community and avoid general DEI terms in their diversity statements, thereby specifically naming their support for minoritized individuals. ...
... However, this trend is reversed in pro-Republican organizations. The literature on political ideology suggests that organizations higher in liberalism are more likely to notice and emphasize contextual factors compared to those higher in conservatism (Swigart et al., 2020), particularly in the case of sensing injustice. For example, companies with liberal CEOs and members are more likely to enact and promote corporate social responsibility initiatives (Chin et al., 2013;Gupta et al., 2017Gupta et al., , 2018, which are actions that further the social good (McWilliams & Siegel, 2001) such as combating racism. ...
Following the deaths of many Black Americans in spring 2020, public consciousness rose around the societal mega-threat of racism. In response, many organizations released public statements to condemn racism and affirm their stance on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). However, little is known about the specific thematic contents covered in such diversity statements and their implications on important organizational outcomes. Taking both inductive and deductive approaches, we conducted two studies to advance our understanding in this area. Study 1 employed structural topic modeling (STM)—an advanced unsupervised machine-learning text-mining technique—and comprehensively analyzed the latent semantic topics underlying the diversity statements publicly released by Fortune 1000 companies in late May and early June 2020. The results uncovered six underlying latent semantic topics: (1) general DEI terms, (2) supporting Black community, (3) acknowledging Black community, (4) committing to diversifying the workforce, (5) miscellaneous words, and (6) titles and companies. Furthermore, drawing from the identity-blindness and identity-consciousness theoretical frameworks and leveraging millions of data points of employees’ DEI ratings retrieved from Glassdoor.com, Study 2 further tested and supported hypotheses that companies were more positively rated by their employees on organizational diversity and inclusion if they (1) released (vs. did not release) diversity statements and (2) emphasized identity-conscious (vs. identity-blind) topics in their diversity statements. Our findings shed light on important theoretical implications for the current research and offer practical recommendations for organizational scientists and practitioners in diversity management.
... explanation for social and economic disparity (Graham et al., 2012;Swigart et al., 2020). With the recent Presidential election and the increasingly politically charged debate during the pandemic, the divide between people who identify themselves as Democrats and Republicans has become deeper and more apparent than ever before (Milligan, 2019;Rutenberg, 2020). ...
... However, organizational researchers, leaders, and employees alike, have been acting like they do not see the elephant (or the donkey) in the room. This oversight has been recently noted by scholars and has inspired calls for more research on the role of political affiliation in the workplace (Johnson & Roberto, 2018;Roth et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). Of the research that has been conducted on this topic, the majority has focused on the effects of political ideologies on strategic decision making (e.g., resource allocation decisions, corporate strategy and governance decisions, financial investment decisions, Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... This oversight has been recently noted by scholars and has inspired calls for more research on the role of political affiliation in the workplace (Johnson & Roberto, 2018;Roth et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). Of the research that has been conducted on this topic, the majority has focused on the effects of political ideologies on strategic decision making (e.g., resource allocation decisions, corporate strategy and governance decisions, financial investment decisions, Swigart et al., 2020). Far less research has been conducted on the implications of political affiliation on social dynamics and experiences in the workplace. ...
Political affiliation is an important demographic variable that has been relatively neglected in the organizational literature. At present, it is unclear how political dissimilarity between employees and their coworkers affects employees’ attitudes and experiences, and whether traditional theories are applicable to this unique form of diversity. Based on time-lagged data from a sample of working Americans (N = 360), we found that lone affiliates (employees who work with coworkers who do not share the same political affiliation) experienced lower levels of positive attitudes than majority affiliates (employees who work with coworkers who do share the same political affiliation). Specifically, in Republican majority organizations, Democrats had lower job satisfaction and affective commitment compared to Republicans. This difference was not found in Democrat majority organizations. Interestingly, these trends were not found for negative experiences, such as incivility from coworkers and depletion. Unaffiliated employees had a unique set of attitudes and experiences in that they suffered the most in organizations with no clear affiliation. Theoretical and practical implications, limitations, and future directions are also discussed.
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... We contribute to this research by illuminating how the effect of CEO political ideology on the market entry mode choice can be mitigated by a more vigilant board. Further, our theoretical insights and empirical findings also contribute to the broader literature by providing an important theoretical and practical understanding of how political biases may be mitigated in organizations (Swigart, Anantharaman, Williamson, & Grandey, 2020). ...
... Supporting the premise of upper echelons theory, scholars find that firm strategic choices relate to many CEO characteristics and, recently, introduced political ideology as one such characteristic (e.g., Chin et al., 2013;Christensen et al., 2015;Gupta, Nadkarni, & Mariam, 2019;Semadeni et al., 2022). An individual's political ideology is associated with a set of beliefs about the proper order of society and how it can be achieved (Erikson & Tedin, 2003;Jost, 2006) and is typically conceptualized on a conservative-liberal spectrum as this conceptualization has been the ''single most useful and parsimonious way to classify political ideology for more than 200 years'' (Park, Boeker, & Gomulya, 2020: 120;Swigart et al., 2020). Political psychology research notes that conservative and liberal individuals differ in a variety of fundamental values. ...
Drawing on upper echelons theory and political science research, we investigate how CEO political ideology influences a firm's choice between international alliances and international acquisitions as an entry mode into foreign markets. Due to their ideological differences, we find that firms led by more liberal CEOs are more likely to use international alliances when entering a foreign market while firms led by more conservative CEOs are more likely to use international acquisitions as an entry mode choice. We also examine how these political preferences of CEOs can be mitigated by more vigilant boards. We find that the effect of CEO political ideology on the choice between international alliances and international acquisitions is mitigated by greater board independence and greater independent director shareholdings in the firm. However, contrary to our expectations, we find that separating the CEO and board chair positions has no effect on this relationship, suggesting that CEOs' political preferences shape such choices regardless of whether CEOs are also the chair of the board. In general, our findings indicate the importance of CEO political values as a predictor of a firm's approach to foreign market entry strategies.
... Moreover, and in line with a burgeoning literature on its influence in organizational life (e.g., Roth et al., 2021;Swigart et al., 2020;Wade et al., 2020), we expect an employee's political orientation to explain unique variance in attitudinal, emotional, and behavioral responses to ARPs beyond racial differences aligned with self-interest (Konrad & Hartman, 2001), a social dominance orientation often presumed to cause political and racially tinged beliefs and actions (SDO: Kteily, Sidanius, & Levin, 2011), and the individualizing or binding moral foundations thought to underlie partisan identification and expression (Graham et al., 2009, Haidt, 2012. We experimentally tested these ideas in two broad samples. ...
... Our findings correspond to evidence emerging about the potency of political orientation at work. Despite its 'taboo' nature in workplace exchanges (e.g., Maxfield et al., 2016), political affiliation is a construct with rising importance to the experience and operation of organizations (e.g., Bermiss & McDonald, 2018;Roth et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). It appears that partisanship may override principles in meaningful but yet unexplored ways. ...
... Considering this action-oriented nature of ideology, organizational ideology can be defined as "prevailing beliefs among organizational members about how the social world operates, including convictions about what outcomes are desirable and how they should be achieved" by shaping organizational norms, policies, values, practices etc. (Gupta et al., 2017(Gupta et al., , p. 1020Simons & Ingram, 1997). The ideological stances of organizations-such as conservative versus liberal-affect whether CSR is important for the company (Chin et al., 2013;Gupta et al., 2018;Hafenbrädl & Waeger, 2017;Jiang et al., 2018), how a CSR strategy is formulated (Swigart et al., 2020), which stakeholder group (Swigart et al., 2020;Tetlock, 2000) and which component/s of CSR are prioritized (Gupta et al., 2017;Jiang et al., 2018). ...
... Considering this action-oriented nature of ideology, organizational ideology can be defined as "prevailing beliefs among organizational members about how the social world operates, including convictions about what outcomes are desirable and how they should be achieved" by shaping organizational norms, policies, values, practices etc. (Gupta et al., 2017(Gupta et al., , p. 1020Simons & Ingram, 1997). The ideological stances of organizations-such as conservative versus liberal-affect whether CSR is important for the company (Chin et al., 2013;Gupta et al., 2018;Hafenbrädl & Waeger, 2017;Jiang et al., 2018), how a CSR strategy is formulated (Swigart et al., 2020), which stakeholder group (Swigart et al., 2020;Tetlock, 2000) and which component/s of CSR are prioritized (Gupta et al., 2017;Jiang et al., 2018). ...
Despite the impact of ideologies on corporate social responsibility (CSR), little is known whether the authenticity of CSR can be assessed in the face of ideological tensions. Following cognitive dissonance and attribution theories, this study investigates the impact of CSR authenticity, which is conceptualized as a function of (1) the ideological fit between company and its CSR initiative and (2) the perceived motive of an ideologically distinct initiative, on organizational attractiveness. Findings of a survey on 253 respondents reveal that while both dimensions of CSR authenticity affect organizational attractiveness, the fit between company and its CSR has a higher effect than does the social motive of CSR. Moreover, positive attitudes toward the CSR initiative as well as the company itself both mediate these relationships. The study shows taking an ideological perspective in authenticity is a relevant approach to understand CSR in the politically polarized contexts of most countries.
... These studies almost exclusively conceptualize PEM as a crosslevels work values construct (i.e. the misalignment of individual and organization values). Hence, in quantitative empirical studies, PEM is almost always studied in perceived PO value congruence terms even though there are competing ideas saying there are forms of PEM related to differences between people (Bermiss and McDonald, 2018;Billsberry et al., 2022;Cooper-Thomas and Wright, 2013;Swigart et al., 2020), deficiencies within the self Scott, 2006) or a myriad of other factors not related to an individual's interaction with an organizational level factor. PEM is formally defined as an employee's personal construction of their own sense of misfit (Edwards, 2008;Edwards and Billsberry, 2010;Follmer et al., 2018;Kristof-Brown and Billsberry, 2013). ...
... Misfit arises as an emotional response to behaviors that isolate the employee at work to the extent that they feel disconnected and/or separated from other colleagues. This is a self-defining and selfreferential construct (Costas and Fleming, 2009;Swigart et al., 2020). Someone who has misfit as part of their personal identity would say things like, "I am a misfit." ...
Purpose
The purpose of this review is to argue that the way that perceived employee misfit (PEM) has been measured in quantitative studies does not capture the construct identified in qualitative studies.
Design/methodology/approach
Through reverse citation analysis, this study reveals how low levels of value congruence became the currency of PEM in quantitative studies.
Findings
This study finds that in the absence of alternatives, researchers have taken low scores of value congruence as a measure of misfit. However, there is limited evidence to show that PEM relates to values, supplementary conceptualization or interactions with the organization (rather than interactions with other employees, tasks, etc.). In addition, the most commonly used instruments measure degrees of similarity, not disparity, making the interpretation of PEM-related data unclear. Combined, these factors raise construct validity concerns about most quantitative studies of PEM.
Research limitations/implications
Given the upsurge of interest in PEM, there is an urgent need for greater clarification on the nature of the construct. From the analysis, this study identifies two key dimensions of studying PEM that create four distinctly different ways of conceptualizing the construct.
Originality/value
This study highlights a series of major methodological weaknesses in the study of PEM and reveal that almost all published quantitative studies of PEM are actually studying something else; something whose nature is very unclear.
... political affiliation (Bermiss & McDonald, 2018;Swigart et al., 2020) are two impactful aspects of diversity for organisations to consider. Yet a review of the research on generational differences in the workplace notes the majority of studies fail to consider that generational identity groups are a product of cultural conditions and changes (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). ...
... Yet a review of the research on generational differences in the workplace notes the majority of studies fail to consider that generational identity groups are a product of cultural conditions and changes (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). Similarly, a review of political ideology in organisations calls for its consideration as an aspect of identity based workplace diversity (Swigart et al., 2020). Viewed through the conceptual logic that we offer and the urgings of Ang et al. (2020), future research should examine the potential beneficial effects of cultural intelligence in these type of social identity contexts. ...
Drawing from upper echelons theory, this study examines Chief Human Resource Officers (CHROs) level of cultural intelligence as a predictor of diversity management practices established during their tenure. We model cultural intelligence (CQ) as an individual difference that combines with functional expertise to bolster attention to diversity management. CHRO cultural intelligence is further posited to have an indirect effect on the establishment of diversity management practices through CHRO propensity for transformational leadership behaviours, in this case directed towards other TMT members to garner support for diversity management practices. We test arguments with primary and secondary data from a sample of 193 CHROs and their institutions. Findings address the call to analyse functional TMT roles and factors that impact their effectiveness, and speak to the continued evolution of CQ as a research construct. We conclude with research and practical implications at a time of heightened attention to diversity.
... Our study responds to the call for research on developing and testing contextual conditions that make individuals' political views salient to organizations. We contribute to the literature by considering when and for whom political ideology tends to be activated-or dormant-to understand when it is more likely to impact organizational decisions (Swigart et al., 2020). ...
... By referring to the contextual determinants of political ideology in organizations (Swigart et al., 2020), our work reveals the role that politically charged events, such as elections, play in making political ideology more salient within organizations and highlights the dynamic relationship between political ideology and organizational outcomes over time. Importantly, therefore, we draw attention to the interaction of a founder's political ideology with the societal political environment. ...
... Liberals also tend to see immigrants as contributing to their country's economy. There are also differences between conservatives and liberals in terms of their views on diversity, equity, and inclusion [59,60]. ...
Fake news has led to a polarized society as evidenced by diametrically opposed perceptions of and reactions to global events such as the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and presidential campaigns. Popular press has linked individuals’ political beliefs and cultural values to the extent to which they believe in false content shared on social networking sites (SNS). However, sweeping generalizations run the risk of helping exacerbate divisiveness in already polarized societies. This study examines the effects of individuals’ political beliefs and espoused cultural values on fake news believability using a repeated-measures design (that exposes individuals to a variety of fake news scenarios). Results from online questionnaire-based survey data collected from participants in the US and India help confirm that conservative individuals tend to exhibit increasing fake news believability and show that collectivists tend to do the same. This study advances knowledge on characteristics that make individuals more susceptible to lending credence to fake news. In addition, this study explores the influence exerted by control variables (i.e., age, sex, and Internet usage). Findings are used to provide implications for theory as well as actionable insights.
... However, the core of any behavioral change at the societal level is based on individual consumers' personal values, beliefs, and political orientations. For example, there is a rich body of literature about the effect of political ideology and personal values on behavior [10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. In this context, Soderbaum [17] argues that the traditional "economic man" model needs to be modified to incorporate roles people play as citizens, with their political orientations serving as guiding principles driving values and behavior. ...
Previous research reports inconsistency in the relationship between political identity and orientations toward green consumption, and there is little information on the change mechanism(s) that link(s) political orientations and sustainable consumption behavior. In this study, we examine the mediating role of green values and beliefs about sustainability with respect to the relationship between a person’s political identity and personal values and his or her sustainable consumption behavior. Using structural equation modeling, the model was tested using data from an online survey of 179 adults. Results suggest that the effects of political identity and personal values on sustainable consumption behavior are mediated by green values and specific beliefs about sustainability, with conservatives being the least likely to adopt sustainable consumption habits. The findings also suggest that public policy makers attempting to persuade conservatives to adopt sustainable consumer behaviors may face an uphill task because deep-rooted values of conservatives might prevent them from accepting such messages in the belief formation stage. Implications of these findings for theory development and social scientists are also discussed.
... The United States has become so politically divided that "both Republicans and Democrats increasingly dislike, even loathe, their opponents" (Iyengar et al., 2012). To the extent that leaders of an organization support a political view, outgroup members are apt to be penalized (Bermiss and McDonald, 2018;Roth et al., 2017;Swigart et al., 2020). Thus, an employee requesting abortion healthcare may be seen as indicating a stance on a political issue (regardless of their actual political affiliation) from an anti-abortion manager, who may impose some form of sanction. ...
Purpose
The authors discuss the implications of the recent United States Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson and its impact on employees and employers. Although several employers issued public statements regarding the provision of abortion-related benefits, the authors highlight some of the obstacles to their implementation.
Design/methodology/approach
With a focus on employee wellbeing, the authors discuss the obstacles in implementing abortion care benefits.
Findings
While it is encouraging to see many organizations make public statements in support of abortion rights, the authors temper their enthusiam with questions about practicality.
Research limitations/implications
Based on the research on hidden stigmas and the job demands-resources model, the authors argue that employees who need to use abortion-related benefits may be unlikely to seek them.
Practical implications
The authors highlight some unanswered questions relating to the requesting and granting of abortion healthcare benefits.
Social implications
The Dobbs decision takes away rights. While the authors applaud organizations’ efforts to restore them, facilitating access to an abortion in other states is quite complicated.
Originality/value
Although abortions are very common, very little organizational research has addressed the topic. In light of the Dobbs v. Jackson decision, the paper raises some timely questions about employer-sponsored abortion healthcare.
... Extant research emphasizes differences in firms' capabilities and global operational experience to account for inter-firm variation in NMS across political and institutional contexts Blake, 2018, 2021;Cuervo-Cazurra and Genc, 2008;Holburn and Zelner, 2010). Our account of firms' varying estimates of regime fragility bridges this scholarship with the increasing recognition in the literature that firms can have an ideological orientation (Gupta and Briscoe, 2020;Swigart et al., 2020). ...
Although recognized as a defining feature of the current political era, populism and its implications for nonmarket strategy remain undertheorized. We offer a framework that (a) conceptualizes populism and its progression over time; (b) outlines the risks populism generates for firms; and (c) theorizes effective nonmarket strategies under populism. Our framework anchors the political risk profile of populism in three interdependent elements: anti‐establishment ideology, de‐institutionalization, and short‐term policy bias. These elements jointly shape the policymaking dynamics and institutional risks for firms under populism. Our analysis shows how firms can calibrate two nonmarket strategies – political ties and corporate social responsibility – to mitigate populism‐related risks. We specify how particular configurations of political ties and CSR activities, aimed at the populist leadership, bureaucrats, political opposition, and societal stakeholders, minimize risk under populism. Further, we theorize how the effectiveness of specific attributes of political ties and CSR – namely their relative covertness (more vs. less concealed) and their relative focus (narrowly vs. widely targeted) – varies as a function of firm type (insiders vs. outsiders) and the probability of populist regime collapse. Finally, we address how motivated reasoning may bias firms’ assessments of regime fragility and resulting strategy choices.
... Fourth, the discussion on the potential health-benefits of religion has been muddied by concerns about researcher interests and biases. That is, it has been argued that scholars of religion might be biased by their own (religious) beliefs (Ladd & Messick, 2016;Swigart et al., 2020;Wulff, 1998) or by the fact that a substantial amount of research in the science of religion is funded by religiously-oriented organizations such as the John Templeton Foundation (Bains, 2011;Wiebe, 2009). 1 Inviting independent analysts from various backgrounds including but not restricted to religious studies attenuates this potential concern. Moreover, in addition to quantifying variability, with a sufficiently large number of analysis teams one can also investigate factors that might explain observed variability, such as those related to theoretical or methodological expertize and prior beliefs (Aczel et al., 2021). 2 In addition to the theoretical rationale for using a many-analysts approach to answer the research questions at hand, we also consider the current dataset particularly appropriate for such an approach. ...
The relation between religiosity and well-being is one of the most researched topics in the psychology of religion, yet the directionality and robustness of the effect remains debated. Here, we adopted a many-analysts approach to assess the robustness of this relation based on a new cross-cultural dataset (N = 10, 535 participants from 24 countries). We recruited 120 analysis teams to investigate (1) whether religious people self-report higher well-being, and (2) whether the relation between religiosity and self-reported well-being depends on perceived cultural norms of religion (i.e., whether it is considered
normal and desirable to be religious in a given country). In a two-stage
procedure, the teams first created an analysis plan and then executed their planned analysis on the data. For the first research question, all but 3 teams reported positive effect sizes with credible/confidence intervals excluding zero (median reported b = 0.120). For the second research question, this was the case for 65% of the teams (median reported b = 0.039). While most teams applied (multilevel) linear regression models, there was considerable variability in the choice of items used to construct the independent variables, the dependent variable, and the included covariates.
... It is important to note that a respondent could report high (or low) affiliation with both parties simultaneously. This measurement approach aligns with the notion that political orientation (and thus affiliation with a political party) is not binary but instead a continuum (Swigart et al. 2020). To test this assertion, the political orientation variable was recoded so that someone who reported always affiliating with the Republican Party was coded 3 and someone who always reported affiliating with the Democratic Party was coded −3. ...
The purpose of this paper is to present findings from research that was undertaken to answer the following questions. First, to what extent is political orientation associated with financial risk tolerance, and second, to what degree is political orientation predictive of changes in risk tolerance across periods? Using panel collected before and after the 2020 U.S. presidential election, it was determined that the strength of affiliation with the Republican and Democratic Parties was descriptive of cross-sectional financial risk tolerance. Republicans were found to exhibit greater risk tolerance compared with Democrats. Across periods, the risk tolerance of Republicans was less stable, whereas the financial risk tolerance of Democrats was more stable. A significant decrease in risk tolerance was observed for those affiliating as a Republican pre-election to post-election. When political orientation was measured on a scale, the decrease in risk tolerance across periods for Republicans was significant. The risk tolerance of those affiliating as a Democrat increased across the periods but at a lower rate than in the drop in scores among Republicans. When viewed across the variables of interest in this study, political orientation was found to be an important descriptor of FRT.
... With this review, we provide a springboard for focusing on problematic manifestations of identification at work and beyond: indeed, social events are often reflected in interactions within organizations and organizations are becoming more active participants in these movements. Recent reviews of particular nonwork identities in the context of work, such as religious identity (Héliot, Gleibs, Coyle, Rousseau, & Rojon, 2020) and political identity (Swigart, Anantharaman, Williamson, & Grandey, 2020), reflect this important development. By exploring the dark side of identification, our review draws attention to how identification processes can ignite, or complicate the tackling of, current grand challenges (George, Howard-Grenville, Joshi, & Tihanyi, 2016). ...
... A key dimension in which institutional investor activists differ is their political ideology (Kim et al. 2020). The political ideology of other governance actors such as executives and board members has been shown to shape their choices, decisions, and behavior (e.g., Gupta and Wowak 2017, McDonnell and Cobb 2020, Park et al. 2020, with profound differences between liberals and conservatives (Jost 2006, Briscoe et al. 2014, Swigart et al 2020, especially with regard to stakeholder-related issues (e.g., Chin et al. 2013, Gupta andBriscoe, 2020). Despite their common focus on a financial motive, liberal and conservative institutional investor activists are likely to differ in their attention to stakeholders. ...
Although prior research on shareholder activism has highlighted how such activism can economically benefit the shareholders of targeted firms, recent studies also suggest that shareholder activism can economically disadvantage nonshareholder stakeholders, notably employees. Our study extends this research by exploring whether shareholder activism by institutional investors (i.e., institutional investor activism) can adversely affect employee health and safety through increased workplace injury and illness. Furthermore, deviating from the assumption that financially motivated institutional investor activists are homogeneous in their goals and preferences, we investigate whether the influence of institutional investor activism on employee health and safety hinges on the political ideology of the shareholder activist and of the board of the targeted firm. Using establishment-level data, we find that institutional investor activism adversely influences workplace injury and illness at targeted firms and that this influence is stronger for nonliberal shareholder activists and for firms with a nonliberal board. Our study contributes to shareholder activism research by highlighting how the political ideology of shareholder activists and boards affects the impact of shareholder activism on stakeholders and how shareholder activism can adversely affect the health and safety of employees. Furthermore, our paper also contributes to research on workplace safety and the management of employee relations and human capital resources by highlighting the detrimental effect of a firm’s ownership by investor activists on its employees and how the board’s political ideology may enable a firm to reduce this risk.
Supplemental Material: The online appendices are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.1542 .
Purpose
This study aims to investigate how employee perspectives on the role of business, specifically capitalist beliefs, affect the corporate social responsibility (CSR)–reputation–employee behavior relationship.
Design/methodology/approach
A conceptual model was developed, and to test the model empirically, survey data were collected over two phases from 192 working professionals. Data were analyzed in SAS using Hayes’s PROCESS approach.
Findings
Results of this study reveal that the positive employee outcomes (i.e. affective commitment and reduced turnover intentions), resulting from CSR, through perceived employer reputation (i.e. an employee’s perception of how others view their firm), are diminished when employees have strong capitalist beliefs.
Research limitations/implications
Building on the signaling and person–organization fit literatures, this study highlights the theoretical and managerial importance of recognizing employees’ ideological differences as well as the value of considering employee perceptions of reputation. Although many stakeholders value social responsibility, not all do, and a firm’s intended outcomes will vary depending on employees’ beliefs.
Originality/value
This study demonstrates that CSR not only affects institutional-level corporate reputation, as previously studied, but also affects employees’ behaviors through “perceived employer reputation”, or employee beliefs about how other stakeholders perceive the firm. Moreover, this study highlights the importance of understanding employee differences, including ideological differences, prior to engaging in certain types of CSR.
The tech industry profoundly impacts our lives and has gained great economic and political influence. Yet, we know little about the people inside tech firms, whose actions and decisions shape technological progress and its impact on society. What is of particular relevance is their opinions and beliefs about the proper order of society and the societal role of tech firms – that is to say, their political ideologies. The few existing studies on this topic mainly concentrate on tech leaders. Our study shifts attention to the workers who develop the technology. Numerous works highlight their influence on the affordances of technology and decisions taken by their firms. Our quantitative analysis of campaign contributions shows that American tech workers exhibit a unique combination of left-wing (liberal) and anti-establishment attitudes. Moreover, we expose a substantial ideological divide between tech workers and their leaders. We discuss these findings in relation to the development of new technologies, employee activism, and tech workers as a distinct class fraction.
This study investigates the association between a CEO's political ideology and Corporate Environmental Performance. Although previous research has established a strong association between a CEO's political ideology and overall performance on Corporate Social Responsibility, little research has examined how it relates to a firm's environmental impact. Utilizing data on CEO political donations, this study shows that a CEO's liberalism generally has a positive effect on a firm's environmental performance. However, this relationship can be influenced by the political conservatism of the board of directors. Furthermore, liberal CEOs are inclined to prioritize environmental strength and minimize environmental concerns. This research provides insight into the intricate dynamics of how a CEO's political ideology, as well as that of the board of directors, can influence a firm's environmental performance.
Trust has long been recognized as an important component of marketing systems. However, while macromarketing researchers argue that a lack of trust in business can impact other components of marketing systems, very few empirical studies in marketing investigate the determinants or outcomes associated with this type of trust. Accordingly, we begin with the premise that trust in major corporations is a critical, micro-level attitude that affects the performance of a marketing system. Then, we investigate the factors that influence trust in major corporations by analyzing how perceptions of government involvement in business, political ideology, and other attitudinal and demographic variables affect trust. Using hierarchical linear modeling, we find that trust has a curvilinear relationship with perceptions of free-market competition, in which too much trust, or too little, leads to negative perceptions - trust plays a critical mediating role in constructing beliefs about free markets. Additionally, we show that macroeconomic variables influence the first stage of attitude formation toward major corporations, with gross domestic product (GDP) per capita and foreign direct investment (FDI) acting as moderators in our analysis. Overall, the multi-level moderated-mediation model used in this research embodies a true systems approach to the analysis of marketing systems by demonstrating how the economic outcomes of marketing systems (e.g., GDP and FDI) can also have feedback effects on participants within a marketing system.
Organizations strive to communicate the right content to stakeholders in today's polarized world. This study explored the relationship between socially controversial corporate social responsibility (CCSR) and organizational attraction in the hospitality industry under the boundary conditions of liberal values. Specifically, we examined how liberal values moderated the relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction. We also discussed how liberal values moderated the indirect relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction through the effects of person-organization fit, anticipated organizational support, and anticipated pride from membership. A between-subjects online experiment showed that liberal values are a significant boundary condition in almost all relationships, besides the direct relationship between CCSR and organizational attraction and through the indirect effect of anticipated pride from membership. These results provide critical theoretical and practical implications for understanding CCSR communication in hospitality recruitment.
How does CEO political ideology influence the pay disparity between a CEO and typical firm employees? Drawing on the upper echelons theory, we postulate that politically liberal CEOs are more inclined to address within‐firm vertical pay disparity versus conservative or neutral CEOs, because liberals attend more closely to potential inequality issues and are more open to social changes. We furthermore contend that the effect of CEO political ideology varies across certain contextual factors. Results based on a sample of United States public firms support our arguments. Our study contributes to the literature on income inequality by highlighting CEO political ideology as a crucial determinant and investigating the boundary conditions.
Small teams’ decisions play a major role in shaping business and society. As political differences permeate our lives, their influence is increasingly being felt throughout organizations. Yet, little is known about how executives’ political differences influence the Top Management Team’s decision-making processes. We integrate literatures on executive diversity, political polarization, and small teams to develop a new construct, Top Management Team political polarization, and examine how this team characteristic influences two critical parts of the strategic decision-making process: comprehensiveness and speed. We also propose behavioral integration reduces polarization’s drawbacks, offering improvements to decision-making processes in these polarizing times.
This foundational text was one of the first books to integrate work from moral philosophy, developmental/moral psychology, applied psychology, political and social economy, and political science, as well as business scholarship. Twenty years on, this third edition utilizes ideas from the first two to provide readers with a practical model for ethical decision making and includes examples from I-O research and practice, as well as current business events. The book incorporates diverse perspectives into a "framework for taking moral action" based on learning points from each chapter. Examples and references have been updated throughout, and sections on moral psychology, economic justice, the "replicability crisis," and open science have been expanded and the "radical behavioral challenge" to ethical decision-making is critiqued. In fifteen clearly structured and theory-based chapters, the author also presents a variety of ethical incidents reported by practicing I-O psychologists. This is the ideal resource for Ethics and I-O courses at the graduate and doctoral level. Academics in Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management will also benefit from this book, as well as anyone interested in Ethics in Psychology and Business.
Increasing demographic diversity is undoubtedly important and can aid in debiasing decision makers. Yet, the promises of demographic diversity are not always realized due to social integration problems. We consider why and for whom differences combined with homogeneity make a difference for groups in terms of integratively complex thinking and ideological decision making. Although research has shown that decision makers often rely on political biases, that work has not addressed when and why decision-making groups are able to overcome these biases—a pervasive concern in today’s politically polarized social milieu. Drawing on the common in-group identity model and research on integrative complexity, we theorize that demographic diversity ultimately yields less ideological decision making because it prompts integrative complexity; however, demographic diversity only accrues this benefit in the presence of ideological homogeneity. We also reason that the relationship between integrative complexity and reduced ideological decision making emerges for more conservative (versus more liberal) groups. We find support for our expectations using a natural experiment of judges on the U.S. Courts of Appeals. Supplemental analyses indicate that working within a demographically diverse and ideologically homogeneous group also positively predicts integrative complexity in future decision-making groups. Finally, we find that demographic and ideological diversity can substitute for one another, but no additional integrative complexity benefits accrue when both are present. We discuss implications of this research in light of the ongoing conversation about the value of diversity and today’s polarized political climate.
Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2022.1647 .
The relation between religiosity and well-being is one of the most researched topics in the psychology of religion, yet the directionality and robustness of the effect remains debated. Here, we adopted a many-analysts approach to assess the robustness of this relation based on a new cross-cultural dataset (N=10,535 participants from 24 countries). We recruited 120 analysis teams to investigate (1) whether religious people self-report higher well-being, and (2) whether the relation between religiosity and self-reported well-being depends on perceived cultural norms of religion (i.e., whether it is considered normal and desirable to be religious in a given country). In a two-stage procedure, the teams first created an analysis plan and then executed their planned analysis on the data. For the first research question, all but 3 teams reported positive effect sizes with credible/confidence intervals excluding zero (median reported β=0.120). For the second research question, this was the case for 65% of the teams (median reported β=0.039). While most teams applied (multilevel) linear regression models, there was considerable variability in the choice of items used to construct the independent variables, the dependent variable, and the included covariates.
Pressure from stakeholders has resulted in increased board gender diversity. Such diversity, however, goes against the well-accepted concept of demographic homophily. In addition, other studies find that increased board gender diversity may not unequivocally lead to better firm decisions, which does not sit well with the assumption that demographic minorities bring diverse information/ideas to the board. This study advances an explanation for these inconsistencies in the literature by integrating symbolic management and recategorization theories to assert that boards outwardly conform to greater gender diversity, whilst choosing to reinforce value homophily by recategorizing female new directors based on shared political ideology. We test our hypotheses on a sample of 13,483 new director appointments in 2,473 US firms using fractional regression analysis. The findings show that the appointment of a new female director strengthens the association between the board's and the new director's political ideology. In addition, this relationship is strengthened when there is a female CEO, or when the new female director has a less similar demographic background. Moreover, supplemental analysis considering ethnic minority new director appointments shows similar results. The study makes important contributions toward the literatures on female new director selection, recategorization and political ideology. We shed light on why research is ambivalent regarding the benefits of gender diversity since findings show that boards compensate for gender diversity by becoming more homogeneous on political ideology, a value dimension that influences board decisions.
In this paper we first of all summarize and rationalize current typologies of organizational forms, arranging available classifications in a hierarchy of increasing generality. The ensuing structure parallels the classification of living beings into classes of increasing generality such as species, genus, family, order, and so on. Subsequently, we analyze the structure of communications that favored the diffusion of each organizational form. We isolate a few stylized communication structures, pointing to the presence of several sources endowed with global connections as the most efficient diffusion mode. The empirical research that is being carried out on single organizations is close to observing their T-patterns, whereas nothing comparable is in sight for organizational forms as yet. However, at least in some cases, we dare to formulate tentative hypotheses on certain features that the ensuing T-patterns-of-patterns might exhibit.
CSR is playing an essential role in the development of enterprises, although scholars and society recognize the usefulness of CSR, and the specific factors which will influence CSR are still in discussion, how to apply CSR has not the conclusion. This paper uses the bibliometric method to analyse the comprehensive view of research and summarises CSR influence factors from corporate governance. Additionally, the knowledge frame from the theoretical perspective with the Ability, Motivations and Opportunities (AMO) model is sorted out. This bibliometrics summarizes previous studies and sorts out the knowledge framework, avoiding the repetition of future studies and providing enterprises with ideas for CSR implementation. Besides, this paper also points out the future development direction of CSR research.
Purpose
As China's only ruling party, will the Communist Party influence corporate decisions? The purpose of this paper is to examine whether and how the political ideology of CEOs affects the environmental responsibility of Chinese family firms and its effects on Corporate Environmental Responsibility (CER), in addition to a cohesive set of corporate governance contingency factors.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses a series of the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression estimates and two-stage approach to examine four main hypotheses, based on 7,824 observations corresponding to 1,919 family firms in China from 2004 to 2015.
Findings
The study's findings show that CEOs imprinted with communist ideology are significantly positively related to CER in family firms, that the moderating role of ownership concentration is not significant, that board independence positively moderates the focal relationship and that CEO duality negatively moderates this relationship.
Originality/value
The paper expands the research of CEOs' political ideology to the ecological context, which are of significance to both theory and practice.
Talking about politics with others or voicing your political views in public is a commonplace aspect of everyday life. In particular, after the U.S. presidential election in 2020, media sources highlighted the detrimental effects of political conversation at work on employee well-being and morale. Nevertheless, little academic research has sought to examine political interactions at work and their effects on employees' well-being and work outcomes. Integrating the concept of self-regulation with the coping model of stress, in this study we examine the costs of political conversations initiated by either supervisors or coworkers for employees' helping and withdrawal behaviors. We used an experience sampling method to collect two weekly surveys from 166 full-time workers from South Korea for 6 weeks (n = 823). Our multilevel path analysis found that during weeks when employees had more political conversations at work, they had higher levels of resource depletion, which in turn was linked to fewer helping behaviors and more withdrawal behaviors. Importantly, individuals' geographic region and political identity management (i.e., their preferences for openly talking about their political identity) moderated the indirect effects of political conversations on behavioral outcomes via increased resource depletion.
Purpose
This study explores the framing of messages delivered by 105 Fortune 500 companies across 21 sectors in June 2020 in response to three social justice issues that took prominence that month in the United States: racial inequity, immigration laws and LGBTQ rights.
Design/methodology/approach
Researchers compiled a list of the top five companies in each sector on the 2020 Fortune 500 list, with a resulting list of N = 21 sectors and N = 105 companies. A database of corporate statements was compiled along with a comprehensive list of recurring themes. Quantitative framing analysis was used to examine each corporate statement.
Findings
Seventy percent of the companies examined made statements about the issue of racial injustice, 58% about LGBTQ issues and only 6% about immigration policy. Coders identified the most frequent message type coded on each social justice issue: racial inequity –“Working Together”; immigration policy – “Celebration”; LGBTQ rights – “Celebration.”
Research limitations/implications
This study relied on a quantitative analysis of themes, but it did not analyze the specific language or media used. Further examination of rhetorical choices could uncover additional meanings in the messages.
Practical implications
Companies are increasingly called upon to speak out on controversial issues. This can be challenging for communicators who are deciding how to respond. This study sheds light on the common frames used in corporate statements.
Originality/value
No studies to date have adopted a content analysis approach to assess the content of corporate activist statements. Examining the messages is important because, as more companies become increasingly vocal about social issues, stakeholders utilize this information to judge the sincerity of both the company and the message.
This study aims to develop a contextualized perspective for understanding the variation in the persistence of founders’ ideological imprints across different periods. We argue for the time-varying influence of political circumstances on ideological imprinting to grasp the consequences of multiple different imprints. Employing a multiple-case study research design that relies heavily on archival data, we explored the political contextual sources of variation in political cartoons of Turkish humor magazines from 1972 to 2015. Our findings show that the variation in the persistence of ideological imprints is related to political changes that result in (in)congruence between the founder’s political ideology and the ideology of the governing party, the type of political ideology that the founder represents, and change within the party ideology over time. By revealing how political contexts surrounding imprints lead to persistence, we contribute to imprinting theory and the organizational implications of political ideologies in non-Western contexts.
This study contributes to the growing literature on organizational political ideology by positing that acquiring firms choose targets with similar organizational political ideology in their effort to retain employees post-merger. Using a sample of M&A announcements in the US from 1996-2014, we find a positive relationship between the similarity of political ideologies of the merging organizations and the likelihood of M&A announcement. In addition, we find that our main relationship is stronger the more homogeneous the organizational political ideology of the acquirer, and the more the human capital intensity of the merging firms. In addition, we find support for the proposed mechanism that drives the main relationship. We thus introduce the concept of organizational political ideology into the debate over the influence of organizational values in M&As, and we extend the theoretical application of political ideology to settings with inter-organizational partnerships.
The Business Roundtable, a large group of top CEOs, recently issued a statement defining the purpose of the corporation in stakeholder terms, a direct and intended reversal from an earlier statement that defined the duty of directors as serving the interests of stockholders. In this editorial, we briefly describe the major twists and turns in the stockholders-versus-stakeholders debate that make this statement so significant to management theory and practice. We then describe the implications of the statement for scholars and practicing managers. We end with a description of three specific research topics that require more research in light of this statement: firm boundaries, the nature of value creation systems, and theory regarding the destruction of stakeholder value.
This paper argues that organizations tend to be more “open” or “closed” as a function of their members’ political ideologies and that this variation can help explain firms’ responses to social activism. Integrating research on social activism with political psychology, we propose that when firms experience activists’ protests, a liberal-leaning firm will be more likely to concede to activists’ demands than its conservative-leaning counterpart, because its decision makers will more readily accept the interconnectedness of the firm’s activities with the activists’ claims. Building on this core concept, we examine how factors that increase the salience of an organization’s ideology also amplify its effect on responses to protests. Based on a longitudinal sample of 558 protest events directed against Fortune 500 firms from 2001 to 2015, our results support the notion that liberal-leaning firms concede more to activism, an effect that exists after accounting for the ideological valence of the protest issues. When an organization’s members are more proximate to the corporate headquarters, this effect of its ideology is heightened. The same is true when the firm’s ideology is incongruent with that of its local community or its industry. These findings inform research on the organizational implications of political ideologies, as well as on social movements, institutional complexity, and non-market strategy.
This article validates donation-based measures of ideology against a rich battery of policy items from the Congressional Campaign Election Study. Donation-based measures are powerful predictors of policy preferences for a wide range of issues and successfully discriminate between donors from the same party. The overall predictive accuracy and relative improvement over party are comparable to what is achieved by scaling roll call votes in legislatures. The results add to an existing body of evidence on the internal validity and reliability of donation-based measures. They also resolve a standing debate in the literature over whether political donations are a valid indicator of donors’ policy preferences. © 2018 by the Southern Political Science Association. All rights reserved.
Moral foundations theory suggests that relative to liberals, conservatives care more about values that are believed to bind group members together: loyalty/betrayal, authority/subversion, and purity/degradation. In contrast, we propose that individuals who are deeply aligned (“fused”) with their group should display elevated commitment to group‐oriented moral values, regardless of their political orientation. The results of three studies supported this hypothesis. The tendency for conservatives to endorse the binding foundations more than liberals only emerged among weakly and moderately fused Americans. In fact, liberals strongly fused with the United States endorsed “binding” foundations more than average conservatives and to the same extent as strongly fused conservatives. These results indicate that to fully understand moral prerogatives, one must consider the nature of the connections people form to the group, as well as their political orientation.
On political questions, many people prefer to consult and learn from those whose political views are similar to their own, thus creating a risk of echo chambers or information cocoons. We test whether the tendency to prefer knowledge from the politically like-minded generalizes to domains that have nothing to do with politics, even when evidence indicates that politically like-minded people are less skilled in those domains than people with dissimilar political views. Participants had multiple opportunities to learn about others’ (1) political opinions and (2) ability to categorize geometric shapes. They then decided to whom to turn for advice when solving an incentivized shape categorization task. We find that participants falsely concluded that politically like-minded others were better at categorizing shapes and thus chose to hear from them. Participants were also more influenced by politically like-minded others, even when they had good reason not to be. These results replicate in two independent samples. The findings demonstrate that knowing about others’ political views interferes with the ability to learn about their competency in unrelated tasks, leading to suboptimal information-seeking decisions and errors in judgement. Our findings have implications for political polarization and social learning in the midst of political divisions.
Despite the wide use of groups in organizations, research on individuals’ experiences of fit in their work groups has lagged due to lack of conceptual clarity of Person‐Group (PG) fit and inconsistent measurement. To rectify these issues, we present an integrative definition of PG fit, which incorporates social‐ and task‐related elements of group work, as well as supplementary and complementary conceptualizations of fit. Using this definition, we develop the Multidimensional Perceived Person‐Group Fit (MPPGF) scale, and validate it through five phases, across six samples. In Phase 1, we identified dimensions and generated items using a mix of deductive and inductive approaches. In Phase 2, we validated items yielding seven dimensions (value congruence, shared interests, perceived demographic similarity, needs‐supplies match, goal similarity, common workstyle, and complementary attributes). In Phase 3, we examined how the dimensions combine to form an aggregate (formative) PG fit construct. The MPPGF scale showed convergent and discriminant validity with relevant constructs in Phase 4. In Phase 5, the MPPGF exhibited criterion‐related and incremental validity with attitudes and performance beyond existing PG fit scales. Finally, we report dimension‐specific results, demonstrating that MPPGF could be used to study questions regarding overall PG fit perceptions, as well as more narrow dimension‐specific questions.
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We investigate the dispositional sources of managerial discretion by theorizing that CEOs' personality traits affect the extent to which their firms' strategies reflect their preferences. In a longitudinal study of Fortune 500 firms, we examine the moderating influence of two personality traits-narcissism and extraversion-on the relationship between CEOs' liberal-or conservative-leaning political ideologies and two firm strategies: corporate social responsibility (CSR) and workforce downsizing. We anticipate and confirm that liberal-leaning CEOs are more likely than others to enact CSR practices, and conservative-leaning CEOs are more likely than others to engage in downsizing. We find that extraversion strengthens these effects: it increases liberal CEOs' use of CSR and conservative CEOs' use of downsizing. Narcissism likewise strengthens the effect of CEO liberalism on CSR, but it does not significantly moderate the effect of CEO conservatism on downsizing. In a supplementary study using primary data from working professionals, we further explore the distinct mechanisms associated with these two personality traits. We find that narcissism relates strongly to individuals' inflated perception of their discretion, whereas extraversion relates to their ability to sell an issue to others. Our study furthers research on managerial discretion by providing nuanced theory and evidence on innate sources of CEOs' influence, and it enhances research on CEOs' political ideology by spotlighting the dispositional boundary conditions of its effects on firms' strategies.
This paper evaluates the state of contact hypothesis research from a policy perspective. Building on Pettigrew and Tropp's (2006) influential meta-analysis, we assemble all intergroup contact studies that feature random assignment and delayed outcome measures, of which there are 27 in total, nearly two-thirds of which were published following the original review. We find the evidence from this updated dataset to be consistent with Pettigrew and Tropp's (2006) conclusion that contact “typically reduces prejudice.” At the same time, our meta-analysis suggests that contact's effects vary, with interventions directed at ethnic or racial prejudice generating substantially weaker effects. Moreover, our inventory of relevant studies reveals important gaps, most notably the absence of studies addressing adults' racial or ethnic prejudices, an important limitation for both theory and policy. We also call attention to the lack of research that systematically investigates the scope conditions suggested by Allport (1954) under which contact is most influential. We conclude that these gaps in contact research must be addressed empirically before this hypothesis can reliably guide policy.
We examine how two dimensions of CEOs’ political ideologies – social and economic – each influences top management team (TMT) decision-making processes and in turn corporate entrepreneurship. We theorize that CEOs’ social liberalism influences the amount and types of information used during TMT decision-making processes, while CEOs’ fiscal liberalism influences the degree of cooperation occurred during TMT decision-making processes. We also hypothesize that these two ideology dimensions influence corporate entrepreneurship through TMT decision-making processes. We test our theory with a sample of 141 small and medium-sized Iranian firms. We find that TMTs with socially liberal CEOs tend to go through more extensive information search processes, which in turn is negatively related to corporate entrepreneurship, and that TMTs with fiscally liberal CEOs tend to go through more cooperative processes, which in turn is positively related to corporate entrepreneurship. This study re-conceptualizes executive political ideology by disentangling the distinct effects of social and economic dimensions of ideology and yields new theoretical insights on the implications of executive political ideologies for firm strategies and outcomes. In addition, through explicit examination of the mediating mechanisms, this study develops more precise theoretical explanations of how CEO political ideologies affect strategic behaviors.
Both liberals and conservatives accuse their political opponents of partisan bias, but is there empirical evidence that one side of the political aisle is indeed more biased than the other? To address this question, we meta-analyzed the results of 51 experimental studies, involving over 18,000 participants, that examined one form of partisan bias—the tendency to evaluate otherwise identical information more favorably when it supports one’s political beliefs or allegiances than when it challenges those beliefs or allegiances. Two hypotheses based on previous literature were tested: an asymmetry hypothesis (predicting greater partisan bias in conservatives than in liberals) and a symmetry hypothesis (predicting equal levels of partisan bias in liberals and conservatives). Mean overall partisan bias was robust (r = .245), and there was strong support for the symmetry hypothesis: Liberals (r = .235) and conservatives (r = .255) showed no difference in mean levels of bias across studies. Moderator analyses reveal this pattern to be consistent across a number of different methodological variations and political topics. Implications of the current findings for the ongoing ideological symmetry debate and the role of partisan bias in scientific discourse and political conflict are discussed.
What comes to mind when people think about rank-and-file party supporters? What stereotypes do people hold regarding ordinary partisans, and are these views politically consequential? We utilize open-ended survey items and structural topic modeling to document stereotypes about rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans. Many subjects report stereotypes consistent with the parties’ actual composition, but individual differences in political knowledge, interest, and partisan affiliation predict their specific content. Respondents varied in their tendency to characterize partisans in terms of group memberships, issue preferences, or individual traits, lending support to both ideological and identity-based conceptions of partisanship. Most importantly, we show that partisan stereotype content is politically significant: individuals who think of partisans in a predominantly trait-based manner—that is, in a way consistent with partisanship as a social identity—display dramatically higher levels of both affective and ideological polarization.
This investigation examined predictors of changes over time in subjective well-being (SWB) after the 2016 United States presidential election. Two indicators of SWB—general happiness and life satisfaction—were assessed three weeks before the election, the week of the election, three weeks later, and six months later. Partisanship predicted both indicators of SWB, with Trump supporters experiencing improved SWB after the election, Clinton supporters experiencing worsened SWB after the election, and those who viewed both candidates as bad also experiencing worsened SWB after the election. The impact of the election on SWB decreased over time, with all participants returning to baseline life satisfaction six months after the election. Trump supporters and those who viewed both candidates as bad for the country also returned to baseline general happiness six months after the election. Clinton supporters, in contrast, remained below baseline levels of general happiness six months after the election. Moral and political values, and exposure to media inconsistent with those values, predicted lasting change in subjective well-being. National events can affect how people perceive the overall quality of their lives and these effects are exacerbated when moral and political values are involved.
This review addresses the three basic principles of person–environment fit theory: (a) The person and the environment together predict human behavior better than each of them does separately; (b) outcomes are most optimal when personal attributes (e.g., needs, values) and environmental attributes (e.g., supplies, values) are compatible, irrespective of whether these attributes are rated as low, medium, or high; and (c) the direction of misfit between the person and the environment does not matter. My review of person–job and person–organization fit research that used polynomial regression to establish fit effects provides mixed support for the explanatory power of fit. Individuals report most optimal outcomes when there is fit on attributes they rate as highest, and they report lowest outcomes when the environment offers less than they need or desire. Linking these findings to individuals' abilities and opportunities to adapt, I reconsider fit theory and outline options for future research and practice.
Although past research suggests authoritarianism may be a uniquely right-wing phenomenon, the present two studies tested the hypothesis that authoritarianism exists in both right-wing and left-wing contexts in essentially equal degrees. Across two studies, university (n = 475) and Mechanical Turk (n = 298) participants completed either the RWA (right-wing authoritarianism) scale or a newly developed (and parallel) LWA (left-wing authoritarianism) scale. Participants further completed measurements of ideology and three domain-specific scales: prejudice, dogmatism, and attitude strength. Findings from both studies lend support to an authoritarianism symmetry hypothesis: Significant positive correlations emerged between LWA and measurements of liberalism, prejudice, dogmatism, and attitude strength. These results largely paralleled those correlating RWA with identical conservative-focused measurements, and an overall effect-size measurement showed LWA was similarly related to those constructs (compared to RWA) in both Study 1 and Study 2. Taken together, these studies provide evidence that LWA may be a viable construct in ordinary U.S. samples.
As political polarization in the United States continues to rise, the question of whether polarized individuals can fruitfully cooperate becomes pressing. Although diversity of individual perspectives typically leads to superior team performance on complex tasks, strong political perspectives have been associated with conflict, misinformation and a reluctance to engage with people and perspectives beyond one's echo chamber. It is unclear whether self-selected teams of politically diverse individuals will create higher or lower quality outcomes. In this paper, we explore the effect of team political composition on performance through analysis of millions of edits to Wikipedia's Political, Social Issues, and Science articles. We measure editors' political alignments by their contributions to conservative versus liberal articles. A survey of editors validates that those who primarily edit liberal articles identify more strongly with the Democratic party and those who edit conservative ones with the Republican party. Our analysis then reveals that polarized teams---those consisting of a balanced set of politically diverse editors---create articles of higher quality than politically homogeneous teams. The effect appears most strongly in Wikipedia's Political articles, but is also observed in Social Issues and even Science articles. Analysis of article "talk pages" reveals that politically polarized teams engage in longer, more constructive, competitive, and substantively focused but linguistically diverse debates than political moderates. More intense use of Wikipedia policies by politically diverse teams suggests institutional design principles to help unleash the power of politically polarized teams.
We develop a new explanation for why some organizations are relatively evenhanded, while others are more disparate, in allocating resources to subunits. Recognizing the central role of chief executive officers (CEOs) in resource allocation, we argue that CEOs’ personal values regarding egalitarianism, as manifested in their political ideologies, will lead to different allocation styles. Liberal CEOs will favor evenhandedness, while conservatives will tolerate greater disparities. Placing this primary expectation in a social context, we then argue that the effects of a CEO’s values are amplified when aligned with the prevailing ideology among organizational members, and conversely are muted when misaligned. Then, examining how instrumental incentives moderate the enactment of CEO values, we envision motivated cognition as a potent psychological process, which leads CEOs to “double down” on their personal values when they have more to gain or lose (when pay is more equity-based or the CEO has larger shareholdings). Finally, we consider the implications of our values-based framework for firm performance, arguing that evenhanded allocations are beneficial when organizational ideology is liberal, but harmful when the organization leans conservative. We test our ideas on a sample of multibusiness firms, using personal political donations to capture ideologies. We find considerable support for our hypotheses.
The distinction between a person’s ideological identity and their issue positions has come more clearly into focus in recent research. Scholars have pointed out a significant difference between identity-based and issue-based ideology in the American electorate. However, the affective and social effects of these separate elements of ideology have not been sufficiently explored. Drawing on a national sample collected by SSI and data from the 2016 ANES, this article finds that the identity-based elements of ideology are capable of driving heightened levels of affective polarization against outgroup ideologues, even at low levels of policy attitude extremity or constraint. These findings demonstrate how Americans can use ideological terms to disparage political opponents without necessarily holding constrained sets of policy attitudes.
Recent research in political science, along with theory in applied psychology, has suggested that political affiliation may be associated with substantial levels of affect and, thus, might influence employment decision-makers. We designed 2 experiments using social media screening tasks to examine the effects of political affiliation similarity on ratings of hireability. Our findings in both studies suggest that the identification (capturing positive affect) and disidentification (capturing negative affect) of a decision-maker with a job applicant's political affiliation were important variables that influenced perceived similarity. Consistent with the similarity-attraction paradigm, perceived similarity was related to liking and, in turn, liking was related to expected levels of applicant task and organizational citizenship behavior performance. Further, in both studies, political affiliation related variables influenced hireability decisions over and above job-relevant individuating information. Future research should continue to examine political affiliation similarity, particularly in light of its frequent availability to decision-makers (e.g., via social media websites). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
An emerging literature in psychology and political science has identified political identity as an important driver of political decisions. However, less is known about how a person's political identity is incorporated into their broader self-concept and why it influences some people more than others. We examined the role of political identity in representations of the self-concept as one determinant of people's political behaviors. We tested the predictions of a recent theoretical account of self-concept representation that, inspired by work on conceptual representation, emphasizes the role of causal beliefs. This account predicts that people who believe that their political identity is causally central (linked to many other features of the self-concept) will be more likely to engage in behaviors consistent with their political identity than those who believe that the same aspect is causally peripheral (linked to fewer other features). Consistent with these predictions, in a study run when political identity was particularly salient—during the 2016 U.S. Presidential election—we found that U.S. voters who believed their political party identity was more causally central (vs. those who believe it was causally peripheral) were more likely to vote for their political party's candidate. Further, in two studies, we found that U.K. residents who believed that their English or British national identity was more causally central were more likely to support the U.K. leaving the European Union (Brexit) than those who believed the same identities were more causally peripheral.
The implicit association test (IAT) is one of several measures of implicit attitudes, but it has attracted especially intense criticism. Some methodological objections are valid, but they are damning only if one accepts false analogies between the IAT and measures of intellectual aptitude, clinical diagnosis, or physical height. Other objections are predicated on misconceptions of the nature of attitudes (which are context-sensitive and reflect personal and cultural forces) or the naive assumption that people cannot be biased against their own group. Other criticisms are ideological, pertaining to questions of moral and political value, such as whether it is good to have fewer pro-White/anti-Black implicit attitudes and to provide respondents with feedback about their implicit attitudes. Implicit-attitude measures have been extremely useful in predicting voting and other political behavior. An indirect, unobtrusive, context-sensitive measure of attitudes is far more useful to social and political psychologists than an IQ test or clinical “diagnosis” would be, insofar as it reflects a dynamic Lewinian conception of the “person in the situation”.
The current research examines how political identity shapes preferences for objects and messages that highlight either equality or hierarchy. We find that liberals show a greater preference for an object associated with less as opposed to more hierarchy, whereas conservatives do not exhibit such a preference (Study 1). We also find that liberals are more persuaded by persuasive appeals that endorse equality rather than hierarchy, whereas conservatives are less sensitive to this distinction (Study 2). Finally, we identify the moderating role of political identity salience: When one’s political identity is made salient, liberals show an increased preference for messages highlighting equality, whereas conservatives become more persuaded by messages highlighting hierarchy (Study 3).
The well documented academic-practice gap has frequently been viewed as a problem to be solved via evidence-based management. Evidence-based management focuses heavily on aggregating and evaluating research evidence to address practical questions via meta-analysis and other forms of systematic review, as well as educating managers and management students on how to differentiate strong from weak research methods. The assumption has been that if researchers produce stronger research findings and disseminate them in manager- and student-accessible venues, the results will be believed and implemented if appropriate to the context. However, these strategies alone are woefully insufficient, as a growing body of evidence suggests that even when individuals are aware of research findings supported by a vast majority of studies, they often choose not to believe them. Sources of this disbelief include growing public distrust of academics, scientific research, and professional expertise in general, as well as negative emotional reactions to specific research findings that threaten people’s cherished beliefs, self-image, self-interest, or social identity. This editorial takes an interdisciplinary approach to explain why people might not believe management research findings and offers strategies for increasing public trust of academics and reducing resistance to self-threatening research findings.
We investigated the dynamics of identity fusion and prosocial behavior within political groups in the four weeks preceding and following the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. The primary questions were whether a negative event (losing) would lead to a more pronounced increase in identity fusion, and whether identity fusion would predict prosocial giving. We found that while fusion gradually increased in the run-up to the election, there was no significant increase after the event for supporters of either party. We also found that identity fusion robustly predicted prosocial ingroup giving, especially before the election, and even when accounting for self-reported identification and previous political commitment behaviors. Implications for theories of identity fusion are discussed.
While research in employee identities continues to garner increased attention, political attitudes and their related behaviors have been largely overlooked. Considering the currently charged political climate in the United States and other areas of the world, we sought to examine how political identities affect the determination to the hire candidates and how willing potential coworkers would be to work with candidates. Guided by social identity theory, through a series of exploratory studies we find support for several tenants of the theory including both a similarity bias for candidates who hold similar political identities as well as reversals of ingroup favoritism in order to avoid the loss of reputation potentially caused from low-quality, politically similar candidates when a more salient social identity is present. Additionally, we find noticeable differences in the effects of political identity and their congruence with those of the raters depending on job position (i.e., HR professional or prospective coworker) as well as participation in other common identities (e.g., employees of all ages or those in a specific age-based peer group). Taken together, our results shed important light on the influence of political identities in organizations and provide fecund opportunities for future consideration.
https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/AMBPP.2018.14563abstract
Partisanship continues to divide Americans. Using data from the American National Election Study, as well as implicit attitude tests, we argue that Americans’ partisan identity has become highly salient. Partisans have become more negative towards the opposing party on both explicit and implicit measures, and these biases spill over into their everyday decisions. Partisanship has become one of Americans’ most salient social identities.
Underscored by perceived moral truths and at times punctuated by hypocrisy, political ideology is a deeply held conviction for many individuals, affecting their behavior. In an organizational setting, conflicting political ideologies may lead to a number of undesirable outcomes. This Incubator calls for further study into this important individual trait.
Partisanship often colors how citizens perceive real‐world conditions. For example, an oft‐documented finding is that citizens tend to view the state of the national economy more positively if their party holds office. These partisan perceptual gaps are usually taken as a result of citizens' own motivated reasoning to defend their party identity. However, little is known about the extent to which perceptual gaps are shaped by one of the most important forces in politics: partisan elites. With two studies focusing on perceptions of the economy—a quasi‐experimental panel study and a randomized experiment—we show how partisan perceptual differences are substantially affected by messages coming from party elites. These findings imply that partisan elites are more influential on, and more responsible for, partisan perceptual differences than previous studies have revealed.
Though organizations are increasingly active participants in the political realm, little research has investigated how an organization’s heightened focus on political ideology impacts employees. We address this gap by exploring how an individual’s political ideological misfit with an organization’s prevailing ideology impacts departure. By tracking the movements of over 40,000 investment professionals in the U.S. private equity industry over 10 years, we investigate the consequences of the ideological misfit that arises when individuals’ political ideologies diverge substantially from the prevailing ideology of their firms. We hypothesize that ideological misfit increases the likelihood of departure, though the effects vary with liberal or conservative ideological orientation. Polynomial regression analyses reveal that the fit relationship between individual and organizational political ideology deviates from the idealized congruence relationship that underlies prevailing theory. Specifically, we find that departure is more likely for employees experiencing conservative misfit (a personal ideology more conservative than the firm’s) versus liberal misfit (a personal ideology more liberal than the firm’s). Conservatives are more likely to depart than liberals regardless of fit, and departing misfits tend to join new organizations that are closer to their own ideology.
“Social sorting” is a concept used by Mason (2016) to explain the process by which individuals' social identities grow increasingly aligned with a partisan identity, reducing social cross-pressures on political behavior. Roccas and Brewer (2002) have found that individuals who feel fewer cross-pressures more strongly identify with their ingroups and are less tolerant of outgroups. Accordingly, we create “objective” and “subjective” measures of social sorting to help identify the mechanism by which individual partisans connect social sorting to partisanship in the CCES and a nonprobability Internet sample. As racial, religious, and ideological identities have cumulatively moved into greater alignment with Democratic and Republican identities in recent decades, American partisans have grown increasingly identified with their parties due to the psychological effects of identity alignment captured in objective and subjective sorting mechanisms. However, we find that this effect is more powerful among Republicans than among Democrats, due to the general social homogeneity of the Republican party. Contrary to the assessments of modern political punditry, Republicans are more susceptible to identity-based politics.
Women in the United States are making historic progress in business leadership, with research linking women's leadership representation to positive outcomes. However, men still dominate US leadership, raising several key questions. Is the United States closing the leadership gender gap? What organizational barriers perpetuate the gap? What facilitates women's leadership? We synthesized and extended US literature to develop a multilevel organizational model of Barriers And Facilitators of Female Leader Empowerment, called the “BAFFLE” Female Leadership Model to highlight the baffling complexities and limited success in solving the US leadership gender gap. The review found that literature narrowly focuses on barriers and offers limited insights about how to facilitate female leader empowerment while simultaneously addressing systemic, entrenched organizational barriers. We also used the World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Gender Gap Index to provide global perspective on the US leadership gender gap. Finally, we summarize findings and implications for practice and scholarship.
Scholars have consistently shown that social identities can shape political attitudes and behaviors; this article explores the reverse relationship. Are partisan identities ever strong enough to influence involvement with a politically relevant social group? Looking at an identity that has become an increasingly strong predictor of partisanship and vote choice, religion, the article develops and tests a theory that politics can affect partisans’ levels of religiosity at a certain time in their lives. An experiment and two panel studies show that when people are in the process of raising children—a time that encourages many to make decisions associated with their religious identities—their partisanship may influence these religious choices. The findings highlight politics’ role in shaping key aspects of partisans’ social identities and, ultimately, the religious makeup of the United States.
