Determinants of Organizational Commitment for Public Administration Employees: A Theoretical Model with an International Perspective

The current economic and social recession is taking its toll on public sector organizations, which suffer continuous budget restrictions and restrict service provision. Public employees are directly affected by such circumstances, worsening their working conditions and decreasing their satisfaction and engagement levels, which in turn will affect their performance and their organizational behaviour. Indeed, there is a need for public organizations to make more with less, and public employees have to endure facing the increasing demands of their citizen-customers with reduced resources, which will have an effect on the way they relate to their job (employee engagement) and their motivation and satisfaction levels at work. This paper presents a comprehensive review of the literature on the role of job engagement and job satisfaction as determinants of organizational commitment for local administration employees. Our research contribution is the development of a model in which the most relevant variables are put in value from a theoretical point of view, trying to establish the direct and indirect relationships that they might have over public employees’ behaviour. The model takes into account the mediation effect of cultural values, since different country cultures result in different work environments.