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Husted, B. W. and R. Folger (2004). 'Fairness and Transaction Costs: The Contribution of Organizational Justice Theory to an Integrative Model of Economic Organization'. Organization Science 15(6): 719.
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This article begins to integrate 2 fields that have, until now, remained largely independent of one another: organizational justice and transaction-cost economics. A model is developed of transaction costs based on a more complete description of human psychology as it operates in exchange relationships. It is argued that transaction costs are often due to the difficulty of evaluating the fairness of a specific exchange of goods and services. Besides asset specificity and the metering problem, which are treated in the transaction-cost economics literature, the organizational justice literature is especially relevant. The paper examines some of the ways that the organizational justice literature complements transaction-cost economics. A model is developed of economic organization in which transaction costs are related to the perception of fairness in economic exchange. It is suggested that the transaction-cost calculus is affected by the perception of fairness in the exchange.