To enhance the understanding of leadership influences on employee voice behavior, this study
focused on traditional Chinese leadership (i.e., authoritarian leadership). We proposed that
supervisor authoritarian leadership negatively affects employee voice behavior and manager
authoritarian leadership has a cascading effect on such behavior through supervisor authoritarian
leadership. Furthermore, these effects were either amplified or attenuated under different
conditions (i.e., leader identification and power distance orientation). A cross-level investigation
of voice behavior within 52 groups of employees from multiple Chinese companies in Beijing was
conducted. The results showed that supervisor authoritarian leadership negatively affected
employee voice behavior and mediated the negative relationship between manager authoritarian
leadership and employee voice behavior. Leader identification moderated the indirect negative
effect of manager authoritarian leadership on employee voice behavior via supervisor
authoritarian leadership, while power distance orientation moderated the direct negative effect
of supervisor authoritarian leadership on employee voice behavior.