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The literary texts Lee examines in “Chapter Two” involve scenarios in which hidalgos are threatened by lowborn passers determined to do them harm, and ultimately arrive to the felicitous conclusion that the established nobility prevails. These fictional narratives and dramas of lowborn passers allow the target reader or audience member to peek into the otherwise mysterious lives of these imagined impostors and proffer the false sense that s/he has an insight on the well-shielded secrets of their deceptive performances. Lee focuses on authors Alonso Jerónimo de Salas Barbadillo’s El caballero puntual, Diego de Hermosilla’s Diálogo de la vida de los pajes de palacio, Lope de Vega’s El caballero de milagro, Quevedo’s Historia de la vida del buscón llamado don Pablos, Alonso de Castillo Solórzano’s Teresa de Manzanares, and Vicente Espinel’s Relaciones de la vida del escudero Marcos de Obregón. She ends her discussion of social anxiety with an interpretation of the hidalgo hero in Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quijote as a figure who initially incarnates the anxiety of sameness and eventually conquers it.

This chapter reviews the degree to which Yury Olesha was familiar with James Joyce based on his own statements and the general availability of Joyce's work in Russia. It enumerates and analyzes the similarities between Envy and Ulysses at various important levels including character, plot, and theme. The chapter focuses on Olesha's use of Ulysses as both a subtext and a counterdiscourse throughout his short novel Envy (Zavist, 1927). Supplemented by archival research, it serves in part to demonstrate that Joyce's impact on Russian writers began early, just a few years after the publication of Ulysses in 1922. Despite his complex and seemingly contradictory attitude toward Joyce, Olesha inscribed several direct parallels and inversions of various elements from Joyce's novel into Envy in order to counter the idea that the gifted, creative artist may rewrite his past by selecting a literary forefather. Stephen Dedalus's project, Olesha intimates, was simply not possible under the Soviet system. While Olesha valued Joyce's project, which aligned with his respect for individualism and Western art, this chapter argues that Envy is as a counterresponse to many of Ulysses's basic modernist premises.

While envy research has grown rapidly, there is currently no generally accepted definition of envy. The authors of this chapter discuss this ambiguity and suggest a solution that aims to unify the field and promote knowledge about envy. They begin with a historical and cross-disciplinary review of the nature of envy as a desirable (leading to constructive outcomes) and/or undesirable (leading to destructive outcomes) emotion. They then focus on the current popular differentiation between two types of envy – “benign” and “malicious.” The negative ramifications of studying two types of envy are discussed. The authors propose researchers examine envy as a unitary construct that is neither malicious nor benign, and provide a definition of envy that separates the emotion from its hypothesized causes and outcomes. They conclude with a discussion of the promising future of envy research and how a clear, judgement-free definition will help this research progress.

Some studies indicate that individual performance appraisal systems can be harmful to organizations. Criticisms of these systems should in theory lead to the decline of their use. Quite the opposite happens. A key question is therefore to understand why, paradoxically, despite the harmful effects of the evaluation systems and the complaints they generate, most people are favorable to their development. In this chapter, we will make the case that envy is one trigger that explains the growing demand for individual performance appraisal. Evaluation systems may therefore be regarded as a very interesting social phenomenon: partly motivated by envy, a taboo and unavowable emotion, they cannot be justified as such; hence, their development is in general supported by noble and rational statements such as the quest for fairness or transparency. This chapter proposes to look with new eyes into the link between envy and contemporary evaluation systems.

This chapter employs psychoanalytic tools and concepts to trace the vicissitudes of envy as it occurs in groups and organizations, offering some social and organizational illustrations. From a psychoanalytic point of view, attempts to minimize or eliminate envy through social engineering and modifications, which may feed ideological causes and political strivings, are doomed to failure. A major unavoidable component of envy stems from the indispensable intergenerational conflicts, which in turn are projected into social and organizational structures; other manifestations are limited to the individual’s difficulties in coping with it. The most dangerous aspect of envy in groups occurs when, through the dynamics of idealization and denigration, “the other” becomes the representative of all that is wanted and desired, which was projected into him, and he in turn is resented and hated. It is this last that we must mostly be on guard against.

This chapter addresses two areas of research—envy and organizational justice—that have developed along largely separate lines in different disciplines, despite their substantial conceptual overlap. We address how models of organizational justice and envy can inform one another and in the process hopefully lead to improved understanding of both phenomena. Drawing on the concepts of distributive justice, procedural justice, counterfactual thinking, and equity theory, we address how organizational justice research can inform the study of envy. Rather than focusing on “emotions as categories,” we adopt the approach of appraisal theorists who view emotions as existing along a continuum. In so doing, we can creatively explore the distinctions and similarities in these two experiences and hopefully, at the end of the day, improve our understanding of both.

Envy is common, not merely within large groups (or organizations), but also in small ones. This chapter discusses the nature of envy in the small group of romantic relationships. Envy is concerned with our undeserved inferiority; hence, the issues of inequity and inequality are central in it. Romantic love—the ideal characterization of which includes disinterested care for the other—seems to be incompatible with the presence of envy, which involves a negative attitude toward the good fortune of the other. Nevertheless, the presence of the inequality and the inequity concerns in close relationships in general, and in romantic relationships in particular, may generate envy. Since envy is typically a neighborhood emotion, it is more central and painful in small romantic groups than in big organizations. The chapter concludes by examining ways of reducing envy in romantic relationships and in larger organizations.

In organizations, envy has complex social and emotional consequences for persons who are the targets of envy. This chapter presents theoretical frameworks that characterize those consequences and reviews recent research. From the perspective of the envied person, envy can be beneficial by confirming others’ recognition of one’s accomplishments and status, and can increase self-confidence, self-affirmation, and pride. But being the target of envy can have costs as well. It can disrupt relationships and create unhappiness in others that the envied person cares about. It can also lead to hostility and uncooperative behavior. The targets of envy therefore often adopt strategies to avoid or reduce envy in others. Being the target of envy can be characterized as an ambivalent experience that presents a mix of positive and negative emotions.

This chapter draws upon varied sources to suggest ideas and strategies that may be helpful for orienting managers and practitioners in mitigating some of the negative effects of envy. In the first part, we review the literature on coping with workplace envy, focusing on social blame, social comparison, equity issues, and emotional intelligence. The second part focuses on containing envy, the challenges of transforming and treating envy, and how to confront envy in team contexts; special attention is given to reward and recognition where envy has both positive and negative aspects. The third part illustrates some strategies to reduce envy’s damage in the workplace from the perspective of appropriate selection processes, from understanding the toxic nature of environments that promote envy, and from a review of ways that employees can cope with envy.