Political ideology as organizational positioning: Polarized identities, voice, and unequal inclusion at work

This study examines how political and ideological identities are carried into organizations and become consequential at work. Drawing on a comparative qualitative study of 38 interviews across four organizational settings in Türkiye, it suggests that workplace polarization is not a uniform spillover from society but a conditional, organizationally mediated process. We propose that it operates through three interrelated mechanisms: boundary filtering, which structures who enters and remains; asymmetrical identity expressibility, which conditions whose identities can be voiced without cost; and threatened contact, through which interaction across difference becomes shaped by avoidance and anticipated sanction. These mechanisms condition one another and shape belonging, fairness, and the unequal distribution of voice at work.