Experiences of women victims of sexual harassment working in public institutions

Abstract

Gender implies different dimensions of the life of women and men, and is submerged in the relationships of people, in their ways of thinking and acting. In this order, the gender relations are crossed by the social representations of a patriarchal vision. In this scheme, historically the woman has been represented as the weak and vulnerable gender and from this, subject of abuses from this patriarchal order. From this view, this qualitative research aimed to know the experiences of women who suffered sexual harassment in the public sector, considering that sexual harassment is a type of sexual violence that implies any action that subjects women to maintain “sexualized, physical or verbal contact, or to participate in it through the use of force, intimidation, coercion or blackmail”. The research was based on 7 deep interviews with women who have been victims of sexual harassment in public institutions. This study showed that work conditions were marked by a context of inequality towards women in the studied population, the existence of abuse of power as a tool for sexual harassment was evidenced as well as the conditions of vulnerability of the women by her condition of being subordinated. Another fact showed by this study was the lack of an explicit public policy that tends to address these cases, safeguarding the labor rights of the victims of sexual harassment.