Equal Opportunities Work - Theories about Practice

analysis of sexual harassment to use the gender perspective at the structural level
in the form of a perspective relating to sex/gender and power.
This reveals a structural imbalance between the sexes in an organization.
The organization is run by men and is shaped on the basis of their needs.
Sexual harassment is one of the mechanisms underpinning the maintenance of
this male supremacy, and is an example of what happens when the freedom of
maneuver of the underrepresented sex is reduced and controlled. What we are
now discussing is sex/gender at the structural level, although there are, of
course, individual women and men whose actions will not correspond to this
description.
Human identity is extremely complex. We are corporeal beings,
autonomous agents, social, communicators, etc.36 When we relate gender to
our identity, we must examine the relationship between sex/gender and each of
these aspects. And they must be examined both individually and in their
interrelations. For instance, regarding the relationship between gender and
socialization gives rise to other analytical problems than examining the
relationship between gender and autonomy. In addition, we must distinguish
between gender in the structural sense and gender as one aspect of human
identity.
Above, we have discussed power at the structural level, for instance power
in its capacity as the influence of the organization on its members when it
comes to jargon or the social atmosphere. Sexual harassment is often, in fact,
part of that jargon or atmosphere.
Moving on to examine sex/gender as one aspect of our identity at the level
of the individual psyche, the discussion of power shifts to a different level.
Here, what is at issue is how we experience power, i.e. power as apprehended
"from inside". This may be referred to as power in the phenomenological
sense, power as perceived through our experience. Let us now link power in
the phenomenological sense to sexual harassment. How is this form of exercise
of power experienced
"from inside"?
Naturally, a person subjected to sexual harassment may react in any number
of different ways, and there are risks associated with generalizing. However, it
is not unusual for the situation to be experienced as uncertain and vague, in
spite of the belief that we "know" what things are like for the underrepresented
sex in an organization characterized by inequality. A person subjected to
harassment often loses his or her footing and becomes confused. He or she
36 See Mark, Eva., Siiitvbilder och jagkonstitution,Acta Philosophica Gothoburgensia, no.7, 1998. ("Selfimages
and Ego Constitution")
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