Understanding the Impact of Organizational Cronyism and Nepotism on the Organization's Social Capital: Explaining the Mediating Role of Perceived Organizational Justice (Case study: Governmental organizations of Lorestan province)

Document Type : Research/Original/Regular

Authors

1 Faculty of Management, Lorestan university, Korramabad, Iran

2 Department of Management, Lorestan University, Khorramabad, Iran

Abstract

Today, one of the issues and dilemmas that governmental organizations are caught in is nepotism, ethnocentrism and cronyism. In organizations affected by such problems, the reduction of organizational trust, the weakening of cooperation between employees and managers, and the reduction of the motivation of human resources cause irreparable injuries and damages to the organization. Therefore, the present study was conducted with the aim of investigating the effect of organizational cronyism and nepotism on social capital, with the mediating role of perceived organizational justice in government organizations of Lorestan province. This research is applied in terms of purpose and descriptive survey in terms of data collection. The statistical population of the research was formed by the employees of the governmental organizations in Lorestan province. Considering the size of the limited and specific statistical population, the Cochran sample calculation formula was used, and based on that, the sample size at the confidence level of 0.95 was determined to be 384 people. The members of the sample were selected using the available sampling method. The data collection tool in this research is a standard questionnaire, the validity of which was confirmed using the content validity method and the reliability was assessed using  Cronbach's alpha method. To investigate and test the research hypotheses, structural equation modeling approach and Smart PLS2 and SPSS software were used. The research results show that organizational cronyism and nepotism have a significant and negative effect on social capital. Additionally, the results indicate that perceived organizational justice plays a mediating role in the effect of organizational cronyism and nepotism on social capital. Therefore, as a general conclusion, it can be stated that in governmental organizations, when cronyism along with nepotism prevails, social capital in the organization will weaken and decline through perceived organizational justice.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

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Social Capital Management
Volume 12, Issue 1
April 2025
Pages 17-38

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