Slur to Its Egalitarian Image : Sweden Decries Sex Harassment on Job

Sweden, famous for its successful promotion of equality between the sexes, has unearthed and declared war on an apparent slur to its egalitarian image--sexual harassment of women in offices and factories.

Equality Minister Ingela Thalen recently published a study stating that sexual harassment at work is a huge problem that lingers as much in Sweden as in countries where women are still fighting for basic rights.

“It affects hundreds of thousands of women on the Swedish labor market,” said Equality Ombudsman Inga-Britt Tornell, ministry overseer of Sweden’s extensive equality programs and author of the study “Sexual Harassment of Women at Work.”

In the report, 17% of about 2,000 women surveyed said they had put up with obscene language, sexual innuendoes, groping, lewd suggestions and outright rape attempts in the workplace.

80% of Women Employed

Tornell proposed a government-, employer- and union-backed program and new legislation to take sex off the shop floor and end the reign of the office lecher.

The Social Democratic government is committed to wiping out all forms of male dominance and is proud of Sweden’s 80% employment rate among women.

A growing number of Swedish men share domestic duties with their working wives, and one father in five takes up to a year’s parental leave from work at government expense to look after babies while wives go on working.

But Tornell said that despite these achievements, Swedish men were still just as prone to sexually harass female colleagues as were men in the United States and other countries where the problem had been surveyed.

About 30% of the Swedish survey’s victims either resigned, took leave of absence or sick leave, or asked for a transfer. Six were fired. Many suffered headaches, insomnia or depression, and eight at some stage contemplated suicide.

Many victims claimed that they were overlooked for promotion and raises, and sometimes demoted, as punishment for rejecting sexual advances.

“Sexual harassment is used by men as an instrument of power to hold women down or to keep them out of male-dominated jobs,” Tornell said.

Many women kept silent about it for fear of ridicule, slander and negative career repercussions, Tornell said, while men often reacted with the old joke, “I wish someone at my office would harass me.”

She called for an amendment defining and banning sexual harassment to be included in Sweden’s equal rights legislation, a workplace information campaign, local surveys, ombudsmen to deal with the problem and more research.

“Employers and unions must realize that sexual harassment is a personnel issue, not a personal issue,” Tornell said.

But she said change would not come easily. “History shows that maids were sexually exploited by squires,” she said. “And women in factories were forced to let owners, managers and foremen have their wicked way.”

Cases cited in her study, showing modern expressions of the old problem, included:

A waitress who was fired after fighting off an employer who tried to kiss her,

A social worker who was urged to resign after complaining about a colleague who patted her behind and suggested sex in a vacant office,

A dental nurse who took prolonged sick leave to escape a dentist’s habit of entering her changing room unannounced to make amorous advances.

The report was blasted by some critics as discriminatory because it singled out men as the sole culprits.

‘Taboo Subject’

“Women sometimes harass men, but that is apparently a taboo subject,” complained Heinz Leymann, assistant professor of the government Institute of Working Environment.

He mentioned a case of an 18-year-old production line worker who committed suicide after a mob of older women colleagues pushed him into a corner, pulled down his trousers and taunted him.

Some critics believed that the report exaggerated the problem.

One female car mechanic quoted in the study advised women not to be too sensitive about blue language and sexual innuendoes.

“Pornographic pictures are posted on the garage walls, and the blokes tease me about my small breasts,” she said. “But there is no offense intended. Men will be men. It doesn’t bother me.”