In the age of social media and accountability, comes the importance of one major factor that affects the decisions behind individuals that are seeking new employment. People are now interested in the research behind how inclusive and diverse a certain company is and whether it would be a place where one could feel like part of a social identity that is relating to their personal identity. So what is personal and social identity? Personal identity is based on your inherent identifying factors such as age, sex, gender, race, and experience (Gruman, 2017). While personal identity feeds into social identity, there are still rather different. Social identity is the coming together of those personal identities amongst a group of similar interests and similar emotional investment.
One of the best ways to approach this concept is to look at LGBT groups in society. They are all centered around the personal identity of sex, gender, and orientation (PSU, 2019). While LGBT groups have been around for a while now, it’s important to remember how much influence such social identities will have on politics. This group is estimated to have around 12 million people and thus is a hot topic in politics.
While companies have shifted a lot of focus on promoting a sense of diversity and inclusion in the workplace, there are inevitable changes that come with politics. While the leadership of President Obama lead us to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2010, it was quickly reversed under the leadership of President Trump (Zugelder, M., & Champagne, P., 2018). Trump enacted a controversial order to promote free speech and religion by allowing businesses to discriminate against individuals that identify with the LGBT group (2018). This discrimination was targetting the category membership of those that go against conventional norms and thus are seen as the out-group rather than the in-group of society.
One could argue that the reason why politics are so effective in influencing others is through the idea that they might be a part of social dominance theory. In which republicans can be seen as individuals that maintain specific group hierarchies and will do anything to maintain that hierarchy and status within society. There are three additional parts to these groups, age, sex, and arbitrary set (PSU, 2019). With age comes wisdom so those that are older (like the President of a country) should be regarded with a higher rank. Next, we focus on sex. Sex is the biological mark of being male or female, and as expected, those that are male will be at a higher rank, as well. If we were to look at how many CEOs of companies are actually female-identifying, the numbers would be really slim. Finally, arbitrary set focuses on the set beliefs around the world. This can be connected to the belief system that is typically seen from the Republican Party. These beliefs are conservative and set in their ways and thus will fight against change and the non-conformity.
Gruman, J. A., Schneider, F. W., & Coutts, L. (2017). Applied social psychology: understanding and addressing social and practical problems. Los Angeles ; London ; New Dehli ; Singapore ; Washington DC ; Melbourne: SAGE.
Pennsylvania State University (2019). PSYCH 424, Section 001: Applied Soc Psy. Lesson 6: Intergroup Relations/Diversity. Retrieved from https://psu.instructure.com/courses/2008549/modules/items/27030730
Zugelder, M., & Champagne, P. (2018). A Management Approach to LGBT Employment: Diversity, Inclusion and Respect. Journal of Business Diversity, 18(1). https://doi.org/10.33423/jbd.v18i1.517
The Social Dominance Theory is an excellent theory to attach to anyone in “higher power” in our country, like the government or those that are in the 1% bracket for income. Those in executive positions make decisions that are supposed to reflect the good intentions placed upon their people and to take their livelihoods into their best considerations. However, this is not always necessarily the case. As you mentioned in your article, Trump has done numerous actions against the LGBTQ+ community that are deemed unforgivable – transgender individuals are banned from entering the military, discrimination can be placed against LGBTQ+ individuals looking for employment, and even some in the community can be rejected by doctors due to their “beliefs”, which goes against everything doctors swore to provide the public when they were introduced into practice.
Diversity is incredibly important in the workforce because it demonstrates capabilities from different types of people. It retrospect, it broadens horizons and uses their multifaceted experiences to create a better environment for everyone. This action can be used to dominant those higher in the social ladders. For example, diverse individuals that come together to form a close knit community (LGBTQ+) can change the course of discriminatory actions (like Trump’s). It is what makes America great – a melting pot of combined differences that ultimately seek the greater good for all. Interesting blog entry!
Gruman, J. A., Schneider, F. W., & Coutts, L. (2017). Applied social psychology: understanding and addressing social and practical problems. Los Angeles ; London ; New Dehli ; Singapore ; Washington DC ; Melbourne: SAGE.