ABSTRACT

Organizational politics, defined as “social influence attempts directed at those who can provide rewards that will help promote or protect the self-interests of the actor” (Kacmar & Carlson, 1997, p. 657) is a reality of organizational life. Not surprisingly, a large research industry has developed on the existence, antecedents, and consequences of organizational politics (see Ferris, Adams, Kolodinsky, Hochwarter, & Ammeter, 2002; Ferris, Hochwarter, Douglas, Blass, Kolodinsky, & Treadway, 2002 for reviews). Like most organizational phenomena, organizational politics is context dependent. Specifically, the organizational context is a determinant of the degree of politics within organizations as well as a boundary condition for outcomes of organizational politics (e.g., Ferris, Adams, et al., 2002; Andrews, Kacmar, & Harris, 2009). As such, accounting for contextual contingencies is critical for fully understanding the nature and consequences of organizational politics.