The Psychosocial Impacts of Whistleblower Retaliation

This book analyzes the harms related to whistleblower retaliation, its psychosocial impacts on employees, and the institutional dysfunction it creates and perpetuates. Stigma and biases against whistleblowers interfere with their ability to make protected disclosures when harm to others is at stake. Retaliatory toxic tactics create an atmosphere and corporate culture that embodies fear and encourages bystander behavior. In this book, the authors explore psychosocial impacts across domains that include financial, legal, social, physical, and emotional well-being. Ten of the 14 chapters specifically examine the toxic tactics of retaliation: gaslighting, mobbing, marginalizing, shunning, devaluing, double-binding, career blocking, counter-accusing, bullying, and doxxing. These toxic tactics are the building blocks of workplace traumatic stress (WTS) and can lead to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, substance abuse, and suicide. WTS is a term that differentiates between