The Role of Political Affiliation in Employment Decisions: A Model and Research Agenda

Organizational researchers have studied how individuals identify with groups and organizations and how this affiliation influences behavior for decades (e.g., Tajfel, 1982). Interestingly, investigation into political affiliation and political affiliation similarity in the organizational sciences is extremely rare. This is striking, given the deep political divides that exist between groups of individuals described in the political science literature. We draw from theories based on similarity, organizational identification, and person-environment fit, as well as theoretical notions related to individuating information, to develop a model, the political affiliation model (PAM), which describes the implications of political affiliation and political similarity for employment decisions. We set forth a number of propositions based on PAM, to spur future research in the organizational sciences for a timely topic which has received little attention.