The Corporate Samaritan: Advancing Understanding of the Role of Deontic Motive in Justice Enactment

Although the literature on organizational justice enactment is becoming richer, our understanding of the role of the deontic justice motive remains limited. In this article, we review and discuss theoretical approaches to and evidence of the deontic justice motive and deontic justice enactment. While the prevalent understanding of deontic justice enactment focuses on compliance, we argue that this conceptualization is insufficient to explain behaviors that go beyond the call of duty. We thus consider two further forms of deontic behavior: humanistic and supererogatory behavior. Drawing on the concepts of situation strength and person strength, we further argue that the reduced variance in behavior across morally challenging situations makes deontic justice enactment visible. We thus observe deontic justice enactment when an actor's deontic justice motive collides with strong situational cues or constraints that guide the actor to behave differently. We formulate propositions and develop a theoretical model that links the deontic justice motive to moral maturation and deontic justice enactment.

Automated summary

Although there is a growing body of literature on organizational justice enactment, our understanding of the deontic justice motive is limited. In this article, we review theoretical approaches and evidence of the deontic justice motive and argue that the prevalent understanding of deontic justice enactment is insufficient. We propose two additional forms of deontic behavior and suggest that the reduced variance in behavior across morally challenging situations makes deontic justice enactment visible.