Diversity for Tokenism? Moderating Effect of Fairness on Token-Gender and Workplace Discrimination

Abstract

Based on tokenism theory, this study investigates how employees’ experience of workplace discrimination differs in settings of employee gender status in specific gender dominated or gender diversified jobs. We also examine whether the effect of the employee gender status such as minority or diversity status (e.g., minority status: female employee in male-dominated jobs) on workplace discrimination is influenced by organizational fairness. Using a dataset of 23,474 employees, we find that female employees who work in a male-dominated (minority status) and gender-diversified (neutral status) jobs have greater experiences for workplace discrimination, while male employees who work in the female-dominated jobs tend to have less workplace discrimination. In addition, our findings show that female employees who work in male-dominated jobs have lower workplace discrimination when they work in organizations with greater fairness. Our study contributes to literature on gender diversity and gender minority by demonstrating tokenism of gender diversity and the role of organizational fairness.