The militarized workplace: How organizational culture perpetuates gender inequality in Korea

Abstract

This study advances our understandings of gender inequality in organizations by examining the experiences of young women who leave their jobs even in the absence of family responsibilities. Based on 29 in‐depth interviews with young women who left full‐time employment at large Korean firms early in their careers, complemented by interviews with 16 men who also resigned from these companies, I find that women's experiences and decisions to quit are critically shaped by what I term militarized workplace culture and practices. The militarized workplace is a work organization where core military values and mechanisms have been integrated and are reproduced to such an extent that organizational culture is saturated with military discipline. Within the militarized workplace, rigid hierarchies and male‐only informal networks marginalize and exclude women, and norms of overwork and complete availability undermine women's aspirations of long‐term employment. By demonstrating the roles that male conscription and the military play in shaping organizational culture and its gendered outcomes, these findings provide insight into how external institutions operate as a source of gender inequality at the organizational level.