Analysis of the University sexual and gender based harrasment protocols in Spain: situation diagnosis in higher education

Resumen

In recent years, numerous international research groups have shown an increasing interest in sexual harassment as a manifestation of what we know as gender violence according to the Istanbul Convention (2011). This has fostered, among other issues, the raise of awareness of society and the manifest rejection of it. Proof of this is, among others, the #Metoo movement that is putting a face to the many victims - hitherto silent or silenced - and to the executioners of practices as reprehensible even despicable.Although at the international level it has been incorporated into university regulations as a protocol for its detection, prevention and eradication, in Spain the times have been different. Despite the mandatory existence of a protocol against sexual harassment in Public Administrations and Public Organizations since 2011, a year later only three Universities included it in its regulations. Until today, 8 years later, according to some studies, we still find some Higher Education institutions - out of the 50 public ones found in Spain - that do not have these instruments to fight against sexual harassment and / or for reasons of sex on their campuses. Neither, they count with the Equality Units that are included in the last amendment of the Universities Law as guarantors of equality. Some of these protocols are very comprehensive, facilitate the recognition and management of these conflicts, while others are relatively new, and have gaps in many respects. In some cases, a modification and renewal is already being worked on to expand the concepts collected, and in others, it has only begun to work after its late approval. Therefore, the objective of this research work is none other than to respond to the growing concern that we as a society have been expressing about an act so deplorable that it undermines coexistence, harmony in higher education centres, and whose negative effects fall on society as a whole. The university, in its service to the community in which it is framed and to the society, with which it lives, has a role in educating and correcting comportment in terms of bad practices and unethical behaviour. Thus, this research, which is part of a larger project, presents a diagnosis of the situation of university protocols in Spain against sexual and gender based harassment.The methodology used is a content analysis with the Nvivo program of around 50 protocols currently in force at Spanish public universities. Relevant results are obtained on the groups that are taken into consideration in said protocols, the types of harassment that are included, the existence of mediation processes, the sanctioning power or only deterrence thereof, the existence of processes of dissemination and awareness, the age of these and whether they have undergone modifications since they were written or not. Finally, these results are compared with some outstanding protocols at the international level. The research concludes with the recommendations and indications so that any higher education institution can elaborate a protocol that responds to the needs of the university community as a whole in an effective way.