Consensus is forming internationally
that tackling sexual harassment requires
leadership and organisation-wide
approaches to break the culture of silence
and drive cultural change.
Australia is part of the new Group of
Friends to Eliminate Sexual Harassment,
which was set up to share national,
regional and international good practices
between UN Member States.120
Internationally, there have been a range
of recent initiatives not only to break
the silence on sexual harassment, but
also to take proactive steps to stop it.
For example, the UN has acknowledged
unequal power relations, abuse of power
and gender bias as factors that underlie
sexual harassment.114
Although the issue of sexual harassment
is not new, best practices to reduce sexual
harassment are still in development.
The ILO and UN Women have compiled
lessons on addressing violence and
harassment in the world of work,
arguing for a ‘transformative’ approach
to sexual harassment that tackles the
gender equalities and discrimination that
underpin it.121
In response to accounts of sexual
exploitation, abuse and harassment by
UN personnel, the UN Secretary General
launched a set of system-wide initiatives—
including structural, legal and operational
measures to drive change across the UN
system—and called on States to pursue a
range of common goals.115 These included
upholding international obligations
to ensure accountability, holding
perpetrators to account and ensuring
effective remedies for victims.116 Further,
UN agencies have noted the importance of
collective action by employers, civil society,
governments and workers, and the need
to provide opportunities for victims’ voices
to be heard.117
Australia has committed to the UN
Secretary General’s initiatives and joined
other global leaders in the UN’s Circle
of Leadership.118 It also signed the UN
Voluntary Compact, signalling high-level
political commitment to prevent sexual
exploitation and abuse in UN operations,
and contributed to a Trust Fund in support
of victims of sexual exploitation and
abuse.119
One of the most recent and
comprehensive was the ILO and UN
Women Handbook: Addressing violence and
harassment against women in the world of
work, which recognises that such violence
and harassment is a serious violation of
women’s human rights and a major barrier
to achieving equality of opportunity and
access to decent and dignified work.122
In addition, a 2019 UN Women publication
offering guidance for policy makers
and employers on eliminating sexual
harassment at work, emphasised:
The task is not to protect an
organisation by denying or minimising
what is happening but to end sexual
harassment by changing behaviour
and culture: that is, ending skewed and
rigid power distributions.123
Respect@Work: National Inquiry into Sexual Harassment in Australian Workplaces • 2020 • 83