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This paper aims to focus on one of the most frequently cited problems with respect to the performance management process: the prevalence of performance appraisal distortion.

Through semi‐structured interviews with managers, this paper attempts to answer the following question: Which factors influence managers' motivation to distort the performance evaluation ratings of their subordinates?

This paper offers three main contributions or implications. First, from a methodological point of view, using a qualitative research design to investigate the appraisal of subordinates' performance is useful because it allows us to reduce the gap between research and practice. Second, this study shows that researchers must embrace or integrate various theoretical perspectives (rational, affective, political, strategic, cultural, justice, and symbolic), given that managers' motivation to evaluate subordinate performance cannot be analyzed outside of the social context. Third, from a practical point of view, managers' motivation to evaluate subordinate performance is less about the technique used and more about leadership support, execution, and overall performance culture.

To date, prior research has focused on improving performance appraisal accuracy through experimental research design by emphasizing rating criteria, rater errors, rater training, and the various rating methods. Despite extensive research, very little progress has been made toward improving rater accuracy.

Fair trade has made paying producers in poorer countries a “just” price one of its central aims, with the issue constantly in its public communiqués, from the print media to social networking sites. As most research has looked at fair trade in the South, where small producers and craft makers live, discussions of the fair price have centered on whether the wholesale prices paid to them are alleviating poverty. However, circumscribing the issue of the fair price only to its impact in the South impedes our understanding of how fair trade operates in the North, on which the system relies for its existence. Looking at fair trade from a Northern perspective, this paper sees the fair price as a partial illustration of the social processes that characterize reflexive modernity, particularly the ethical dilemmas that surround the composition of prices. But rather than focusing exclusively on activist discourse, the paper uses practice theory to build a more nuanced picture of the diverse beliefs and behaviors that the fair price is entangled with. Drawing on ethnography with people who consume and sell fair trade in the Italian city of Palermo, the paper shows how understanding what a fair price is appears to be an enigma that conceals different aspects of the fair trade network. Specifically, it reveals that the fair price is not a single but a double entity, comprising the wholesale price paid to producers, where “political” emphasis usually lies, and the fair retail price, an entity discussed far less often.

The purpose of this paper is to question the status of trade unions on corporate social responsibility (CSR) today in the European Union (EU). How do they go from being social partners to a full‐fledged stakeholder status? The paper examines this question both from the point of view of stakeholder theory and from a field study in three different European countries.

The methodology is qualitative, i.e. based on a series of face‐to‐face interviews conducted in three different European countries (France, Germany, the UK) with different stakeholders, union representatives, non‐governmental organizations, experts, employers' associations.

The main findings are: inadequacy between stakeholder theory and the reality of European trade unionism and the CSR debate; trade unions are not “natural” stakeholders, rather “stake‐seekers”; the national business approach is relevant, in that national differences account for major differences among the three countries studied; and the European and global implications of trade unions into CSR help them gain full stakeholder status.

The sample is a bit limited; it would be interesting to enlarge the scope of European countries. Also, it would also be relevant to interview shop‐floor members to analyze the gap between union officials and rank and file members.

This paper can help unions consider CSR in a better way, so as to integrate CSR issues into their agenda.

The status of trade unions in the CSR debate has largely been overlooked, whereas their role in European countries is quite important.

There has been very little previous research on trade unions and CSR. The cross‐cultural dimension of this research and the EU dimension add value to the paper.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the relationship between language, thinking and society for explaining the degree of visibility of the French organizational studies (OS) production.

This paper proposes a sociological analysis based on Bourdieu field to understand the variation of reception the French OS production have had among the Anglo-Saxon field. The paper aims to underline some key elements, which can explain the differences of reception experienced by the French OS scientists. The paper opted for a general review using historical data; reviews of OS literature; and Google scholar, Web of Science and major OS Journal data.

The paper provides some evidence about how the degree of visibility of the French OS production is related to translation, cognitive and social resonance, producer place in the scientific network and relationship between the fields. It suggests that the degree of visibility is the result of a complex set of socio-cognitive schemes, social issues raised by the scholar and the place occupied by the researcher in the field.

The paper brings interesting ideas concerning the international development of the OS field, the degree of visibility of diverse contributions coming from non-English speaking researchers, notably the French ones, and how the dialogue between different linguistic and social universes can be ameliorated.