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Sexual harassment, defined as unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, or other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature, (EEOC, n.d.-a) has long been a significant problem in the USA and various countries around the world (e.g. Handy, 2006; Kauppinen and Patoluoto, 2005; McDonald and Charlesworth, 2013; Merkin, 2008; Timmerman and Bajema, 1999). In the book Sexual Harassment: Women’s Hidden Occupational Hazard, Evans (1978) reported on a “Speak out on sexual harassment” event organized in 1975 by Working Women United, a group of grassroots activists (see Baker, 2008). Evans described sexual harassment as a serious barrier to equality and emphasized the need for effective legislation. In the foreword to legal scholar Catherine MacKinnon’s ground-breaking book on sexual harassment, legal theorist Thomas Emerson also pointed out that “sexual harassment of working women has been one of the most pervasive but carefully ignored features of our national life” (Emerson, in MacKinnon, 1979, p. vii). Emerson, a Yale law professor and practicing attorney, proposed that the law may “start to do something” about sexual harassment. Indeed, progress was made in 1980 when the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission released “Guidelines on Sexual Harassment” (EEOC, 1995). These guidelines identified sexual harassment as being a form of sex discrimination, as MacKinnon had pointed out, already illegal under the 16-year old Civil Rights Act of 1964.
After MacKinnon’s book conceptualizing sexual harassment as a form of illegal sex discrimination and the EEOC Guidelines were released, interest in sexual harassment and greater acknowledgment of its destructive consequences increased tremendously. However, despite legislation and a bounty of research, sexual harassment remains an ongoing societal issue, particularly for working women (McDonald, 2012). Men comprise about 16 percent of those who file harassment complaints with the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, suggesting the overwhelming majority of targets are women (EEOC, n.d.-b). Women are harassed at work, at school, in places of worship and by men they encounter in their daily lives (e.g. street harassment). Although most harassment targets do not sue, 7,609 sexual harassment charges were filed with the EEOC in 2018, a 13.6 percent increase from 2017 (EEOC, n.d.-b). This figure does not include charges filed with state and local Fair Employment Agencies, which are historically nearly 50 percent of the...