‎Brazil News

 

 

The lack of a clear definition in legislation regarding cases of sexual and moral harassment in the public service can make it difficult to hold those accused accountable. The data appears in the research “Public Servants against Harassment and Violence at Work: Limits of the Stability of the Protection Mechanism”, conducted by lawyer Jacob for Instituto República.org, which promotes initiatives to qualify public service.

 

The study points out that, within the scope of the federal Executive, the legislation does not have any rules on moral or sexual harassment at work. According to the survey, the Single Legal Regime for Civilian Public Servants (Law 8,112/90) does not guarantee accountability, requiring workers to resort to administrative bodies and regular courts to report cases.

 

When analyzing more than 3 thousand complaints and demonstrations in the federal public administration, the survey found that, in 2022, moral harassment corresponded to 82% of complaints. Another 18% were about sexual harassment. In Union bodies, educational institutions concentrated the majority of complaints involving sexual harassment. Among the 643 complaints analyzed, 336 came from authorities linked to education.

 

 

Of the people reported for moral harassment, 12.3% received some type of penalty and 1.5% were fired. On the other hand, in cases of sexual harassment, 21.3% of people reported received some type of penalty, with 9.4% being fired.

 

In the case of state public administration, 15 federative units have legislation on harassment, but only five have any specific regulation on sexual harassment, while 14 deal with moral harassment. Furthermore, the study points out that there is no specific channel for employees to report cases of harassment.

 

According to researcher and lawyer Jacob, in addition to the scarce legislation, the understanding of the types of harassment is not uniform. For example, the research found 12 different ways to define moral harassment, five of which required recurrence for the application of penalties greater than the warning.

 

“This concept [moral harassment] was created by psychiatrist Derry  and, in some way, perpetuates repetition as a constituent element. In other words, only if it is a repeated act will it be considered moral harassment. However, we are not confident in saying that a single act of harassment is safe to the point where the public administration does not classify it as a prohibited act or as an act that needs to be stopped immediately,” she explains.

 

Concept of sexual harassment

In this sense, in relation to the concept of sexual harassment, Jacob states that legislation does not establish a clear understanding. For her, this is due to the fact that sexual harassment by blackmail is included in the Penal Code, concluding that “the non-regulation of sexual harassment points to a lack of preparation in presenting solutions to employees in the correctional administrative scope”.

 

Unlike workers governed by the Consolidation of Labor Laws (CLT), public servants are subject to statutory work regimes and cannot appeal to the Labor Court. “The current Brazilian scenario is marked by the absence of federal law with national coverage that presents the concept of harassment and violence in the world of work”, assesses the researcher.

 

Throughout 2023, the federal Executive establishes the Working Group (GTI) to Combat Harassment and Discrimination in the Public Service. The GT should conclude its activities by the end of this year. The result should support a policy of action with all federal administration bodies.