| To attempt to understand why employees engage in unethical behavior within their organizations, I investigated the relationship between accountability, organizational justice, and unethical behavior in two studies. Contrary to research that organizational justice is negatively related to unethical behavior that has the potential to harm organizations (e.g., Greenberg, 1990), I predicted, based on social exchange theory (e.g., Blau, 1964), that organizational justice would be positively related with unethical behavior that has the potential to benefit organizations. Consistent with the accountability (e.g., Brief, Dukerich, & Doran, 1991) and obedience (Milgrim, 1974) literatures, it was hypothesized that accountability would be positively related with unethical behavior. Finally, I predicted that accountability and organizational justice would interact to determine unethical behavior such that the relationship between organizational justice and unethical behavior is stronger when accountability is lower. It was found that interactional justice and accountability, for one dependent variable in a laboratory study, both were positively related to unethical behavior. On the whole, however, limited support was found for these hypotheses in a laboratory and a field study. Possible explanations for the lack of significant effects and the implications of these results are discussed. |
