This note examines the relationship between affirmative action (AA) program perceptions and women’s self-ascribed capacity and desire to become leaders. We propose that women who believe that their organization implements a program of preferential selection toward women will experience negative psychological effects leading to lowered self-expectations for leadership, but that this effect will be moderated by their justice perceptions of AA programs. We test this proposition empirically for the first time with a Latin American female sample. Among Brazilian women managers, desire but not self-ascribed capacity to lead was reduced when they believed an AA policy was in place. Both desire’s and capacity’s relationships with belief in an AA policy were moderated by justice perceptions.
