The Impacts of Petty and Grand Corruption on Public Service Motivation: Unintended Consequences of Ethical Leadership in Corrupt Contexts

Past research indicates that individuals with high public service motivation (PSM) display lower tendencies toward corruption. However, research has not investigated whether perceptions of corruption can erode PSM. This study aims to bridge this research gap by drawing upon expectancy violations theory (EVT) to assess the effects of petty and grand corruption on PSM. This study further postulates that ethical leadership may, quite paradoxically, intensify the undesirable effects of corruption. Using survey data from 4,998 employees across 69 central agencies in Thailand, the findings indicate that both petty and grand corruption significantly reduce PSM. Cross-level interaction analysis further reveals that while ethical leadership has a strong positive influence on PSM, it intensifies the negative impacts of both forms of corruption. These results suggest that ethical leaders who fail to confront corruption risk being perceived as hypocritical, thereby undermining their moral authority and limiting their ability to generate full organizational benefits.