Sexual harassment is as old as the hills but still needs to be identified

Organisations and workplaces are often infused with gender, sexuality and violation - unspoken forces often kept invisible and barely known.

A recent book seeks to make visible these invisible forces and render the less known more fully known. Gender, Sexuality and Violence in Organizations: the Unspoken Forces of Organization Violations, by Jeff Hearn and Wendy Parkin - published by Sage Publications (www.sagepub.co.uk) £17.99 sterling - is not bedtime reading. But it's a fascinating read for anyone interested in sexual harassment, bullying and physical violence in organisations, or its notion of "organisational sexuality".

The recognition of sexuality as a central feature of organisations is relatively recent but sexual harassment is not new. Before the 1970s it was taken for granted, unnoticed, ignored or defined in other ways. That there is nothing new under the sun is clear from the authors' review of historical material.

A debate raged in early 19th century Britain about the dangers of sexuality, occasioned by women's presence in factories. In 1864, some three years after women were first admitted to work in the US Treasury Department, a congressional committee was set up to investigate reports of sexual harassment and advances made by male supervisors on female staff.

In 1872, Britain's post office introduced women employees, where they worked in the same room as men. Although considered a "hazardous experiment", in a report by a senior official that year women were deemed to have "raised the tone" of the male workers, confining men to "a decency of conversation and demeanour which is not always to be found where men alone are employed".

Women working in mines horrified 19th century British commissioners, not for health and safety reasons but because of their state of undress and the likelihood that it would lead to "immoral practices". Parliamentary papers for 1842 show that in many coal pits, men worked "in a state of perfect nakedness", assisted "by females of all ages, from girls of six years old to women of 21, these females themselves being quite naked from the waist down".

In 1891, a report of a committee of inquiry of local churchmen into a Lancashire weaving mill found that one Houghton Greenwood, rumoured to be "a very odious character" could not be charged with "actual adultery". Rather the Weavers Committee accused him of "language and conduct tending to immorality". He was found guilty of "making immoral proposals to a married woman" and "of using indecent language to other females".

The report found "with the deepest regret" that the offences of which he was guilty "are not uncommon among men who have the oversight of the female operatives in other mills". It implored employers to recognise their duty to the well-being and happiness of "those under their charge as well as to their own credit to make the moral conduct of their workforce a subject of nearer concern and of greater importance".

Hearn and Parkin argue that sexual harassment, bullying and physical violence do not "just happen". They further suggest that awareness of the use of the language of "sex" and "conquest" in business, such as talk of "penetrating" markets can help recognise harassment and sexual harassment.

They define work-related violence as including physical violence (e.g., assault, robbery), harassment (e.g., sexual, racial) and bullying (e.g., isolation, slander, gestures, sneering). Behaviours they consider harassment include touching, pinching, leering, whistling, suggestive gestures, physical sexual advances and assault. They include insults, derogatory jokes, threatening or obscene language, verbal sexual advances and offensive materials such as pornography or graffiti.

They stress that the person harassed can feel ashamed, humiliated, lose confidence, become physically or mentally ill and give up their job.

Appalling instances of sexual harassment in business are presented. For instance, a US law firm was ordered to pay more than $7 million to a woman who had been employed for only two months because a male in the firm would grab her breasts. The firm had known about this but not acted.

In another instance cited, 17 former women employees were awarded substantial damages when an area through which they had to pass several times a day was staffed by male brokers who subjected the women to a daily torrent of verbal sexual harassment.

The book includes useful figures and tables, such as one that looks at "enabling, motivating and triggering factors in the work environment explaining workplace bullying". Triggering factors include downsizing, increased internal competition and stress. Motivating factors include "very high or low performing colleagues", while enabling factors include a strained atmosphere and insufficient time for conflict resolution.

jmarms@irish-times.ie