Although research has examined the relationship between employees’ justice perceptions of authorities and their subsequent attitudes and behaviors, inadequate efforts have been taken to integrate leadership theories and justice research. Using data from China, this dissertation simultaneously examines how supervisor-focused procedural, distributive, interpersonal, and informational justice perceptions affect the effectiveness of transformational leadership, transactional leadership, and paternalistic leadership. In addition, due to the profound socio-economic changes in the past few decades in China, Chinese employees’ values have become more diverse and may affect the effectiveness of different leadership styles. Thus, this dissertation also examines how the Chinese cultural values of traditionality and modernity moderate the relationships between the three leadership approaches and supervisor-focused justice perceptions.
The results of this study reveal that when the three leadership approaches are juxtaposed, they display differential total effect on in-role performance and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB). Transactional leadership has a weak positive total effect on in-role performance while transformational leadership shows a strong positive total effect on OCB but not on in-role performance. However, paternalistic leadership does not display any significant total effect on the performance variables. This study also suggests that the three leadership approaches have differential impacts on the followers’ justice perceptions. Transformational leadership is the most influential antecedent of all four dimensions of supervisor-focused justice perceptions whereas paternalistic leadership only positively influences supervisor-focused informational justice. Transactional leadership has no significant effect on supervisor-focused justice perceptions when transformational leadership and paternalistic leadership are controlled for. The findings also indicate that not all supervisor-focused justice dimensions are instrumental for the leadership approaches to affect the followers’ in-role and extra-role performance. Supervisor-focused procedural justice and supervisor-focused interpersonal justice mediate the effect of transformational leadership on the followers’ performance. Justice perceptions do not mediate transactional leadership and paternalistic leadership’s effect on the followers’ performance when the three leadership styles are examined together. Furthermore, Chinese employees’ value of traditionality is found to moderate the relationship between transformational leadership and supervisor-focused informational justice and that between transformational leadership and supervisor-focused procedural justice. However, Chinese employees’ value of modernity does not moderate the leadership-justice relationships.
By comprehensively examining multiple leadership approaches, multiple leader-focused justice perceptions and the followers’ values, this study is able to provide answers to some of the important leadership questions in the unique Chinese setting. The current study tests the effect of each of the three leadership approaches on the followers’ performance when the other two leadership approaches are controlled for. It also examines the efficacy of the different dimensions of supervisor-focused justice perceptions in mediating the effect of different leadership approaches on the followers’ performance. Furthermore, this study provides empirical evidence on how followers with different levels of certain values respond differently to transformational leadership.