ABSTRACT
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN PERCEIVED INJUSTICE and action is not as direct as one would be tempted to think. Although most people vehemently denounce injustices and illegitimate inequalities, collective action often seems to pale in the face of the wrongs a subject has experienced, and the anger and indignation he takes away from the experience. It is not enough to be appalled by injustice to take action; what’s more, it seems that those who do mobilize are not necessarily more sensitive to injustice than those who don’t. The fi rst to act are those who can, and their motives are often only very indirectly linked to injustices experienced at work. In our questionnaire survey, the “injustice score” we computed for nonunionized employees is only slightly lower than the score for unionized staff, and just barely below the fi gure for those who go on strike.1 Why do we fi nd this disconnect between perceived injustice and action?
