Organizational protection for whistleblowers: a cross-national study

ABSTRACT

Whistleblowing is recognized as an effective means to mitigate organizational corruption. However, there is little empirical research that broadens our understanding of organizational strategies that enhance perceived organizational protection for whistleblowers. We aim to fill this gap in the literature by empirically examining a multi-pronged approach to improve this organizational outcome in diverse countries and contexts. A multi-dimensional theoretical framework utilized in this study emphasizes the role of an ethics-oriented climate; ethical leadership behaviours; structural provisions for ethics management, and an awareness of whistleblower protection laws in enhancing perceived organizational protection for whistleblowers.

KEYWORDS:

• Whistleblower protection
• ethics training
• ethics code
• ethics-oriented climate
• ethical leadership
• cross-national study

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge and thank the reviewers for their valuable and constructive comments and feedback.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. For a detailed discussion of survey methods please refer to Berman (2013).

2. The measure is based on Victor and Cullen (1988) construct of ethical climate.

3. The measure is based on existing definitions and construct of ethical leadership (Brown, Treviño, and Harrison 2005; Brown and Treviño 2006).

4. The outcome variable is a categorical Likert scale, allowed to take values between 1 and 7. We examined the range for predicted values of the outcome variable, that is, ‘y^’ for the following regression model (model 1):

$\begin{array}{rl}& Y_{(Whistlebloweprotection)}=\beta 1_{(Intercept)}+\beta 2_{(\mathrm{E}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{h}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{s}-\mathrm{o}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{l}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{m}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{e})}+\\ & \beta 3_{(\mathrm{A}\mathrm{w}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{f}\mathrm{w}\mathrm{h}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{l}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{b}\mathrm{l}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{w}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{l}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{w})}+\beta 4_{(Ethicalleadership)}+\beta 5_{(\mathrm{M}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{y}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{h}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{g})}+\\ & \beta 6_{(\mathrm{C}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{f}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{h}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{f}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{u}\mathrm{c}\mathrm{t})}+\beta 7_{(\mathrm{S}\mathrm{u}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{v}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{y}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{l}\mathrm{e})}+\beta 8_{(\mathrm{Y}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{r}\mathrm{g}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{z}\mathrm{a}\mathrm{t}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{n})}+\\ & \beta 9_{(\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{d}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{r})}\end{array}$

The predicted values for outcome variable $Y{}_{\left(Whistleblowerprotection\right)}$ for ‘model 1’ ranged from a minimum value of 2.198 to a maximum value of 5.636, had a mean of 4.40, and a standard deviation of 0.590. The model included data for all four countries and settings in Asia-Pacific, and the number of observations were 2,276. Because the predicted values of outcome variable for ‘model 1’ were within the range of 1–7, we used linear regression analysis to test our study hypotheses.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rashmi Chordiya

Rashmi Chordiya is an assistant professor at the Institute of Public Service at Seattle University. Her research is focused in the areas of international and cross-national comparative public management, and social equity, diversity, and inclusion. Her work is published in Review of Public Personnel Administration, The American Review of Public Administration, Public Management Review, and Public Administration. In past, she has worked in India with a demonstrated history of facilitating collaborative partnerships among the government, nonprofits, and private sector organizations, for social development through corporate social responsibility.

Meghna Sabharwal

Meghna Sabharwal is an associate professor and program head in the public and nonprofit management programme at the University of Texas at Dallas. Her research interests are focused on public human resources management, specifically workforce diversity, job performance, job satisfaction, and high-skilled migration. She is widely published in public administration journals, and is the winner of three best paper awards. She also has two book publications: Public Personnel Administration (6th Ed.) and Public Administration in South Asia: India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.

Jeannine E. Relly

Jeannine E. Relly, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the School of Journalism at The University of Arizona with a courtesy appointment with the School of Government and Public Policy. She is an affiliated faculty member with the Center for Latin American Studies, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies and the Center for Digital Society & Data Studies. Her research includes several cross-national studies focused on public corruption and government information policy and case study work focused on retribution against whistleblowers.

Evan M. Berman

Evan M. Berman is professor of Public Management at Victoria University of Wellington (New Zealand). He has published widely in leading journals of the discipline and has received major awards such as the Fred Riggs Award for lifetime achievement in comparative and international administration presented by the American Society for Public Administration. In addition to scholarship in international public administration, he is also known for work in public sector HRM and public performance.