ustice is a universal concept that touches all areas of life, including commercial exchanges.
Humans, unlike other species, have a sense of morality (Cropanzano et al., 2011). Justice is
typically defined as a moral property of some event or action (e.g., Bagger et al., 2006). Simply
put, something is fair when a person believes it to be fair. In other words, perceived fairness lies
in the eyes of the beholder and consequently the same event can be perceived as fair or unfair
depending on the individual. In this chapter we use the terms fairness and justice interchangeably.
The goal of the present chapter is to review marketing and consumer behavior literature related
to justice and to provide some avenues for future research.
The chapter is organized as follows: first we discuss the dimensions of the fairness construct.
We then discuss fairness in the context of service recovery efforts. Third, we discuss the social
impact of justice in terms of relationship norms and third-party justice.We then explore different
pricing strategies and their impact on perceived fairness. We end with a discussion on the role
of culture in shaping consumers’ fairness perceptions.