Who Is to Blame? A Network Perspective on Workplace Injustice

Abstract

ABSTRACT Organizational justice research typically assumes that accountability for injustices is localized to the direct offender. Yet growing evidence suggests that blame can extend to indirect actors, calling into question such a narrowed view of injustice. By integrating fairness and power‐dependence theories, we develop a model of blame‐shifting to explain how victims can hold both coworkers (direct offenders) and supervisors (indirect offenders) accountable when coworker offenses arise. Across two studies, we theorize and test the mechanisms through which blame migrates from a direct offender to a background actor, highlighting the importance of power‐based network considerations for workplace injustices. In Study 1, event‐based data demonstrate that coworker injustice predicts supervisor injustice through the sequential mediation of coworker and supervisor blame. Study 2 constructively replicates this effect and tests boundary conditions involving formal (delegation‐based, vertical) and informal (status‐based, horizontal) power asymmetries. Results indicate that perceived intermediary delegation (PID)—the degree to which victims view coworkers as agents acting under supervisory authority—strengthens the blame migrating effect when victims concurrently hold lower relative statuses with their supervisors than their offending coworkers. Together, these findings suggest that accountability judgments arise within power‐laden networks rather than in isolated dyads. Such a network perspective offers a deeper understanding of accountability judgments thereby advancing justice theory and practice.