Speaking up, acting out: The moral licensing dynamics linking ethical voice to unethical behavior

Abstract Drawing on moral licensing theory, this study challenges the dominant assumption that ethical voice has uniformly positive effects. It argues that engaging in ethical voice triggers moral credits, which subsequently increase employees' propensity to engage in unethical behavior. Integrating the person–situation interactionist perspective, this study further theorizes that this licensing process depends on two boundary conditions: supervisor gratitude expression following ethical voice and employees' felt accountability. Using multiwave, multisource data from employees across diverse industries in Taiwan, results show that moral credits mediated the relationship between ethical voice and unethical behavior. This indirect effect was strongest when employees received higher (vs. lower) supervisor gratitude expression and experienced lower (vs. higher) felt accountability. These findings reveal that ethical voice, despite its moral intent, can paradoxically facilitate unethical behavior under certain contextual and personal conditions. The study offers a more balanced and theoretically grounded understanding of ethical voice, identifying a novel, high‐risk antecedent of moral licensing with important implications for organizational ethics management.