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The professor of Renmin University was dealt with quickly, where is the prevention and control of sexual harassment in colleges and universities?

The professor of Renmin University was dealt with quickly, where is the prevention and control of sexual harassment in colleges and universities?

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The professor of Renmin University was dealt with quickly, where is the prevention and control of sexual harassment in colleges and universities?

Source: Intellectuals Author: Yan Shengnan

The professor of Renmin University was dealt with quickly, where is the prevention and control of sexual harassment in colleges and universities?

Source: Freepik

Guide

Another incident of sexual harassment in colleges and universities was revealed on social media. On the evening of July 21, a doctoral student at the School of Liberal Arts of Chinese University reported that his supervisor Wang Guiyuan had sexually harassed and forcibly molested him, and provided recorded evidence and relevant chat records. Only one day later, the National People's Congress issued a circular, the report was true, and Wang Guiyuan was expelled from the party and dismissed. This was seen as the highest punishment that the school could give, and at the same time, the relevant clues were handed over to the public security organs. On the one hand, long-overdue justice has finally been served, and on the other hand, since 2018, a series of sexual harassment incidents in colleges and universities have emerged in cyberspace, and in the past six years, we have still not established a real mechanism for preventing sexual harassment in colleges and universities, from prevention, training and publicity, feedback and investigation, handling mechanisms to protection and correction.

After the Wang Guiyuan incident of the National People's Congress, Shaanxi Normal University and Shandong University of Technology were successively exposed that tutors sent indecent photos to female graduates, and female high school students reported university teachers for concealing their marital status and having extramarital affairs.

The lack of mechanisms has forced victims to seek help online in a way that exposes their privacy, and many more victims are blocked from the door by extremely high barriers. "Intellectual" talks to sociology scholar Li Jing, who has long been engaged in political sociology, intellectual sociology, and sexual harassment prevention and control.

As a university teacher, she has witnessed the changes in the handling of sexual harassment cases in colleges and universities over the years, as well as the obstacles encountered in institutionalized practice. She also pointed out that the lack of a mechanism is a harm to both teachers and students, "technically it is not a particularly difficult thing, not that it cannot be done in three or five years", the key is whether there is a willingness to respond to public expectations. Whether it is sexual harassment or academic bullying in colleges and universities, the change of power relations within colleges and universities cannot be ignored. As for the further gender segregation caused by the prevention of sexual harassment, such as the reduction of male teachers and the recruitment of female students, Li Jing believes that we should establish gender equality committees to jointly deal with sexual harassment incidents and other gender issues in universities. Finally, most importantly, we need more public discussion.

Intellectuals: The success of this sexual harassment report against Wang Guiyuan of the National People's Congress cannot be ignored because of the extremely high threshold for victims, how difficult it is and what kind of preparation is needed, can you explain it to you?

Li Jing: This example is very special, the person concerned has retained quite complete audio materials, as well as evidence of WeChat conversations, which is actually very difficult. Many parties do not have the conditions to preserve evidence, which makes it very difficult to collect evidence in the later stage. A fundamental problem is that cases of sexual harassment generally occur in private spaces, where there is a lack of witnesses, and often because the incident occurs suddenly, the parties do not have the conditions or psychological preparation to make audio or video recordings and other actions to preserve evidence.

Therefore, alternative evidence is to see whether the person concerned resisted, expressed dissatisfaction, and left some form of traces, such as the movement of the utensils in the private space, the scars left by the victim on the perpetrator, etc., which can be used as indirect evidence. Another important piece of evidence is whether the person concerned talked about the incident with other people, such as classmates, relatives and friends, on WeChat or other forms of communication, and expressed clear feelings of resistance and disgust.

Recently, everyone may know that the case of the University of Macau is also a case that has aroused a lot of repercussions ("The Sexual Harassment Case of Mao Haijian, Former Distinguished Professor of the University of Macau, Upholds the Original Verdict"). If you look carefully at the indictment, in fact, the key witnesses did not see the process of the perpetrator committing the crime, but the witnesses heard the words of the parties expressing dissatisfaction and resistance at the scene, which can be used as a key evidence for the establishment of the case, but it is generally more difficult.

However, in practice, I have found that this is not the biggest obstacle to determining the fact of sexual harassment. In fact, many parties do not have time to react during the whole process, and more often than not, they do not realize that they have been sexually harassed, so they do not resist, or worse, in order not to break social etiquette, they even agree with the other party to some extent.

Echoing the other side is not an isolated case, it is a very common phenomenon. Many people only realize the nature of their experience after the fact, and hate themselves for not responding in a timely manner, and are self-loathing. This is the biggest obstacle to the determination of sexual harassment, which brings us to another issue: the determination of evidence. How do you understand the context of language and behavior? Does it cause harm? It is difficult to determine, and whether or not harm has been caused to the person concerned is also different from person to person.

I was a little shocked by the fact that the NPC case school had completed the verdict in just one day and expelled the so-called "perpetrator" from public office and party membership, but it was not surprising. In fact, in several cases that had a wide impact on the Internet before, the school also made a decision in just a few days, such as the case of Wang Yulei of South China University of Technology, and it is even difficult to say that it constitutes a case, because Wang Yulei was accused of rape on the first day, and the school expelled him the next day, and there was no corresponding handling result by the public security organ to say whether he was suspected of rape, and it only took one day for the school to expel him. I understand that this is a bit like an act of throwing off the burden of the school.

Of course, many of my friends applauded the incident of the National People's Congress, but I think it is doubtful to act so quickly: because students must be protected, which is the duty of the school, but on the other hand, teachers are also employees and assets of the school, and the reputation and interests of teachers also need to be protected.

In 2022, there was a false accusation incident at Nanjing University. A male student falsely accused a counselor in a female tone. According to the teacher at Nanjing University, this is a completely false accusation, and of course there are other possibilities, which I don't know very well. Are there any opportunities for teachers to provide evidence and arguments?

And for such a complex matter, the investigation of evidence and the interrogation of both sides cannot be completed without more than a month or even a few months. The University of Macau, for example, took more than a year. In just one day, the school was ostensibly beneficial, but it did not guarantee fairness and fairness. At present, it seems that most of the measures taken by domestic colleges and universities are not to deal with them publicly before they are exposed, and they will quickly clear up public opinion if there is a problem. If there is no reflection on this matter and no further institutionalization, the entire anti-harassment policy and system construction will not be sustainable.

Intellectuals: You once said that "the political and social interests of colleges and universities are relatively simple, and they can also be used as an important experimental field to provide a mirror for promoting national policies", but on the other hand, colleges and universities are considered to have extremely solidified power relations, and tutors hold the power of life and death. When dealing with sexual harassment incidents in colleges and universities, do we have to understand from the perspective of the relationship between students and students, can we explain the seriousness of sexual harassment in colleges and universities and the difficulty of cracking? What are the differences and commonalities compared to sexual harassment in the workplace?

Li Jing: Yes, the power structure and interest relations within universities are relatively simple compared to other fields in society. Of course, power relations in universities have deteriorated in recent years. As the job market and competition for further education abroad become more and more fierce, young students have a growing sense of powerlessness, and the only thing that can be grasped is to improve their grade points, which strengthens the structural power of teachers. Especially for graduate students, everyone wants to graduate early, and the later they graduate, the greater the pressure on the job market, and the graduation time and publication of articles are more restricted by their supervisors. For example, I am a liberal arts teacher, and in recent years, domestic C journals have required tutors to hang a work, otherwise it will not be published, mainly for the sake of citation rate. If it is a supervisor, at least an associate professor or above, more people will cite this article, and the pressure of journal rankings is also transmitted to the university, and the possibility of doctoral students submitting their own papers is very low. Even in the way of scientific research in the liberal arts, there have been important structural changes in recent years, and the power of mentors is rising. There is a clear asymmetry of power within universities, which provides the necessary conditions for sexual harassment by a very small number of people.

However, it should be noted that the greater change in colleges and universities in recent years is that the administrative power has overwhelmed the professional power of scholars and teachers, and the rise in the power of many tutors is a derivative product of the rise in administrative power. Academic bullying is more widespread and typical than sexual harassment, such as pressuring students to do more experiments and stealing students' scientific research results. These behaviors are a derivative of the structural changes in the rise of administrative power and the increase in faculty pressure within universities.

And in enterprises and governments, this phenomenon should be more common, because the benefits that can be exchanged and coerced are greater, such as losing your job, not being able to work in an industry, and universities are not the hardest hit areas anyway, or what we call the Qingshui Yamen. And theoretically, the legitimacy of universities always comes from their academic independence and their discursive power, for example, serving science is an important discursive power, and it is very important for the professional ethics of its practitioners, serving public values and promoting human welfare, and it raises itself very high morally.

On the other hand, colleges and universities are relatively weak in the power structure of the whole society, and they are more likely to be challenged by online public opinion, forming a contrast between high morality and little power. I don't say this to defend these people, or to say that the victims are wrong, and I admire their courage, but intellectuals have been the primary targets in history. We need to use a kind of "sociological imagination" to understand these questions.

But there is another problem in colleges and universities that the victims are young women who have not set foot in society, including men, who are in the period of developing three views, which is more harmful in some aspects, and some injuries may accompany them for a lifetime and affect their subsequent views on love, and there is also a very serious side to the views on sex and marriage, and we have to look at the problem separately.

Intellectual: From a research point of view, what is the nature of sexual harassment?

Li Jing: There are different theories about the understanding of sexual harassment, and it is difficult for me to give an uncontroversial answer.

There is a corresponding definition in our Law on the Protection of Rights and Interests of Women, a corresponding definition in the Civil Code, and different definitions in European and United States law.

Personally, I think that Ronald · McKinnon, a famous scholar and lawyer who promoted the sexual harassment justice movement in the United States in the seventies, has a great influence on me, and I share it with you here: sexual harassment is a manifestation of gender power inequality. Sexual harassment is considered to be discriminatory against women (and other gender minorities), or as violence against women (there are many forms of violence), based on power asymmetry, and is more aimed at disciplining gender roles and reinforcing heterosexual binary gender systems.

Much sexual harassment is not motivated by sexual solicitation, sexual urges, or direct sexual gratification. We can see that not only women, but also sexual minorities are often targeted for sexual harassment. It means that you have to return to your rightful gender position, and through this violent act, he has to guard the boundaries of gender.

United States had a very important study, and I was very impressed when I read it. Surveys have found that female executives in companies are sexually harassed more than ordinary women. As a female executive, she broke through gender roles and challenged the gender power structure, so she had to be suppressed even more.

With this in mind, we have developed and implemented some policies in a targeted manner. The reason why it is necessary to stop sexual harassment is that its serious social consequences are that in addition to harming individual women, it structurally prevents women from sharing public space equally and entering the public sphere of work and study because they fear discrimination and harm. Thus, McKinnon distinguishes between two: the exchange type and the hostile environment type. At present, the first type of news is broken on the Internet. The second type also needs to be taken seriously, the so-called hostile environment type, for example, a teacher tells a lot of pornographic jokes in class that have nothing to do with the curriculum, which spoils the environment, hinders women's willingness to further their education, and makes students uncomfortable, which is also a form of sexual harassment. The second type is more extensive and more difficult to determine, and it has relatively high technical requirements for legislation, and there are many things that we have not yet started to do.

This is a very typical United States way of understanding, and we can understand it differently at all. In Europe in the eighties and nineties, sexual harassment was understood as a violation of labor rights, so sexual harassment was the same as harassment in the workplace of minorities and people with very low classes, and women were not separated. China has also followed the basic concepts of the civil law system, with the Civil Code introduced in 2020 considering sexual harassment a tort.

For university teachers, these behaviors are also a serious violation of their professional ethics, because teachers' duty is to teach and educate people. Therefore, it is possible to impose penalties at the professional level and then at the general legal level.

Intellectuals: What is the current progress in the construction of sexual harassment prevention and control mechanisms in colleges and universities? Since 2018, many schools have issued draft anti-sexual harassment regulations, but there has been little response in the later stage.

Li Jing: Since 2018, the state has issued a lot of new administrative regulations and changed legislation. In addition to the Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests and the Law on Property Rights, there are also regulations of the Ministry of Education on the conduct and ethics of teachers, which are now vetoed by one vote in the evaluation of professional titles, the so-called zero tolerance. In addition, our Civil Code, which came into force in 2021, also defines sexual harassment as a tort. Each school may have its own regulations. The state and schools are pushing forward with this, but it seems that there are still big problems.

For example, most importantly, who decides on the issue of sexual harassment? This is a complex technical issue. At present, colleges and universities have not set up relatively independent institutions or temporary committees to deal with such issues, but are handled by party committees and discipline inspection commissions at the department or school level. It mainly depends on whether it has become public opinion, whether it has a significant impact on the school, and there is no specialization at all. The result of this is that there is no progress in institution-building.

As I said earlier, sexual harassment is complex in nature and difficult to determine. The degree of minor behaviour varies from being reprimanded by the head of the department to being handed over to the judiciary after professional punishment. How to judge the severity is also a technical problem, you can't assume that the other party has always had such behavior, there must be a chance to rehabilitate, many men themselves do not realize that it is sexual harassment, and they may adjust their behavior after realizing it, and they can't be beaten to death with a stick. At present, there are no rules or precedents to follow. Generally, this kind of thing happens in the department, and it is impossible for others to understand the process and learn it. So we either see that the years are quiet, or something big happens.

Second, many schools have not established smooth complaint channels, have not written into the student handbook, students still do not know how to protect their rights and interests, and there is no clear process and how to deal with it. This is not in line with the newly revised Law on the Protection of Rights and Interests of Women, which clearly states that schools have an obligation to educate students and provides psychological counseling after the fact. So after all these years, the web is still the main way, because there is no other way, this is probably the only way out.

Third, the more serious problem is that the problem of sexual harassment is entangled with other issues of teacher style and morality, such as the management of teachers' ideology and politics. This has led to the issue of sexual harassment quickly becoming a tool to control university faculty and exacerbate the administrative power of universities. On the other hand, it is also used as a tool for internal struggle, and various internal reports can involve the issue of sexual harassment. Conversely, if someone stands up against sexual harassment, they will also be labeled as political battles and long-term jobs.

Another point that I think is very important is the tendency to be moralistic, and there is no distinction between sexual harassment/sexual assault, teacher-student relationships, and extramarital affairs. Once public opinion arises, in either case, if the teacher himself is a young teacher and has no power, he will be dismissed.

Sexual harassment has just been talked about a lot, and then let's look at teacher-student love, if there is no direct interest (classroom teacher, tutor), such as between different departments, between graduated students and teachers, teacher-student love is allowed. If there is a direct relationship, one of the partners can start an intimate relationship after leaving the school. In order to preserve intimacy, teachers can leave their jobs, and there are no legal and ethical problems, although there are very few male teachers who do so.

Extramarital affairs, on the other hand, involve private morality, which has nothing to do with the previous two, and the school has no right to manage and punish them. For example, a young teacher in the Department of Philosophy of Sun Yat-sen University had an extramarital relationship with a postdoctoral fellow, and later the school expelled him because of the outbreak of public opinion ("Sun Yat-sen University Responds to "Associate Researcher Was Reported by His Wife for Cheating on Female Postdoctoral Fellow": Dismissed with Li Moumou, Yang Moumou Withdraws from the Station).

Pan-moralization is dangerous and detrimental to our continued anti-sexual harassment practices.

Intellectuals: When we talk about the prevention of sexual harassment in colleges and universities, we have repeatedly mentioned increasing gender segregation, and some male tutors have tried to avoid the so-called risks by suspending female students. How to solve this problem?

Li Jing: In my opinion, this is actually a relatively common phenomenon, and it is also a very important issue. I don't have any statistics, but many male teachers have told me that sexual harassment has affected their admissions, and they choose not to recruit girls for fear of trouble. Put yourself in my shoes, if I were a man, I would probably have this kind of thought, which is a very normal psychology.

But overall, it's not particularly serious, because a few years ago women were more enrolled in graduate school than men, and in recent years there have been more of them. This is not to say that women's rights are on the rise or that women are more educated. This is a symptom of gender discrimination in the job market, there is no way to find a good job, and you can only pursue a higher degree in college, so many times, especially in the liberal arts, there are not many options for male teachers. It is in a state where it is not obvious overall, but there are many cases.

By extension, there is an important theoretical question behind this, that is, how can specific gender policies balance gender equality and gender differences? In many cases, especially in the case of United States modeled policies, anti-sexual harassment policies are intended to protect women, although men and sexual minorities may also be victims, but most are women. It is based on the belief that women are more vulnerable, and therefore more about differences. As a possible counterproductive, schools and workplaces tend not to recruit girls, which he finds cumbersome to deal with or spatially gender-segregated. In the long run, it may damage the fundamental rights and interests of women, fix the image of female victims, and be detrimental to the ultimate goal of gender equality.

Similar discussions have taken place throughout history and in other parts of the world. I don't think there's a clear answer to this question about policies to support minorities and low-income groups, but we have to have more public discussion anyway. I can only say that in the process of implementing the policy, it is necessary to constantly adjust according to the changes in the situation, and that taking into account gender differences is the means, and the ultimate goal is gender equality. And we should always put the fight against sexual harassment and the promotion of gender equality together, for example, by putting the issue of sexual harassment within a gender equality committee, not only dealing with sexual harassment, but also dealing with other gender-related issues. These contradictions cannot be resolved all at once, unless gender equality is truly achieved, and it can only be said that there is a constant balance.

For example, the policies of the United States and the European Union are different. United States recognizes differences more, and the European Union wants to promote equality, making women equal citizenship as part of the entire labor force. Each has its own problems, the words of the United States have long solidified the weak status of women, while the European Union does not have enough actual protection for female workers, and it is difficult to implement it through administrative regulations, which is a bit like China. But in any case, it is a matter of practice that our society now needs to establish a basic prevention system, and what kind of system to establish needs more public discussion.

Speaking of public discussions, although there has not been much discussion in the public space on the topic of sexual harassment since 2018, I think there are two theoretical issues that deserve everyone's attention and will actually affect the specific policy direction.

First, since the sixties and seventies, the second wave of feminist movements has been divided over whether to increase women's substantial political and economic power (e.g., by raising women's wages in a coordinated manner and giving women more opportunities in work and politics) or whether to focus more energy and energy on the anti-sexual harassment movement. Many activists believe that the latter serves the consciousness of middle-class women, especially in the United States, who has taken the path of justice.

This is much like the first wave of the feminist movement, because there was a big debate about whether to focus on the actual welfare of women workers or on women's universal suffrage (for upper-middle-class women). In the Chinese context, this contradiction also exists, and it is difficult for me to give a perfect answer. However, the current anti-sexual harassment issue on the Internet and in practice is unprecedented, which cannot be ignored, and neither academics, legislators, administrative agencies, nor schools can ignore the huge energy behind this issue, and it is difficult to simply think of it as a middle-class feminist movement in the 70s.

Of course, we can only go further if the prevention of sexual harassment is combined with the improvement of women's substantive political and economic power in the future, and I think it would be better if there was more discussion about this in the public space, which is the first issue.

The second theoretical question has been raised by some domestic sexology and sexual minority researchers, which is certainly not new, and there have been many quarrels between scholars and feminist researchers in the field of foreign studies. Since 2018, there has also been an anti-sexual harassment movement in Europe, and many France entertainers and intellectuals have raised similar objections. They criticize that sexual harassment legislation, as well as policies, can easily converge with conservatism, disciplining the space for sexual exploration in society, suppressing the diversity of sexual behavior, and hindering pervasive behaviors such as "flirting." To explain here, flirting is based on the consent of both parties, while sexual harassment is against the will of one party and is a power relationship. There is an essential difference between the two, but in the context of widespread anti-sexual harassment actions, many flirtatious behaviors are identified as sexual harassment, eliminating the ambiguous space between people. The widespread criminalization of anti-sexual harassment also coincides with the neoliberal trend of excessive "criminalization" of social life.

Other scholars who study LGBTI groups say that the one-size-fits-all policy does not take into account the sexual morality of LGBTI people, where more lax and casual sexual solicitations are prevalent and for whom universal legislation is unfair.

Personally, however, I feel that these criticisms are some of the criticisms that have arisen within the gender equality camp after the important progress of gender equality in the West, and they would have been helpful for the further development of the gender movement. However, China is still in its infancy, and it needs to have some basic understanding of the problem, taking into account the issue of sexual minorities. There is also a great deal of controversy within the LGBTI community.

The addition of these two questions is to illustrate the need for more public discussion and more controversy. In the absence of debate, our understanding of this issue is always one-dimensional and prone to extremes. We need to have a more diverse range of issues, both pros and cons, and without these discussions, the movement could move towards another form of political correctness, which we don't want to see.

Intellectual: There is a view that "the lack of prevention and control cannot simply be attributed to the lack of a special mechanism to prevent and control sexual harassment, and China's traditional culture of attaching importance to mediation is still valid, and it is recommended to set up a mediation mechanism, and it is not appropriate to antagonize the relationship between the parties at every turn", what do you think?

Li Jing: Personally, I'm not entirely opposed to mediation. There is also the idea that everything should be left to the judiciary and a strict and comprehensive law should be established, which I also disagree with. The widespread criminalization of social behavior is harmful, especially for the controversial behavior of sexual harassment, which has particularly high technical requirements for legislation, and it is difficult to comprehensively enact legislation in China at present.

Therefore, it is definitely necessary for the school and the employer to bear a certain responsibility. There are practical considerations, and there is theoretical justification. And for the school, there is an internal adjudication mechanism, not only for sexual harassment, but also for teachers and students to have a certain protective effect, so that teachers and students do not have to directly face the judicial organs, although this layer of protection mechanism is getting weaker and weaker after the administrativeization of colleges and universities.

Why don't I exclude mediation? We have also seen the situation in United States, the social and economic costs are too high due to excessive judicial channels, and the compensation that the parties can get in the end may not be as much as everyone thinks, the time is very long, and many times the problem cannot be solved, and there are also great drawbacks in judicialization.

But how exactly does mediation work? Will it be decided by a patriarchal adjudicator, or will it be attended by students, teachers, experts, and representatives of the school administration? Is mediation public? Or a certain degree of openness to protect privacy? It's all something to consider. If these basic parameters are not correct, mediation will become a performance, an instrument of power.

There are still many people who talk about using traditional Chinese culture to lead mediation, but from a sociological point of view, there has never been an essential thing called traditional culture. In different historical periods, countries and societies will re-select and reinterpret the so-called traditional culture according to their needs, and our era is no exception. In many cases, the so-called mediation in the name of traditional culture either internalizes the patriarchy in the tradition, or it is an attitude of calming things down, and in many cases actually sacrificing the power of the weak.

There is also a big question mark over how mediation practices can be applied to sexual harassment, and I personally hope to see more examples and more discussions, so that we can make progress.

Intellectuals: How can we create more space for discussion and build a positive gender culture in colleges and universities?

Li Jing: In the short term, I personally don't see any signs of improvement at the moment. In fact, in recent years, the administrativeization of universities and the deterioration of gender relations have occurred at the same time. This phenomenon has also been the norm throughout history. For example, in my discipline, in the 90s, there were many female scholars who were exemplary and academically excellent, but now there are fewer and fewer well-known female sociologists, and the number of women in the overall practitioners is very large.

Of course, there are many measures that can be taken to promote the construction of a gender culture, such as strengthening education. My colleagues and I try to give lectures on sexual harassment prevention or gender equality in general to new students when they enter the school, and we also accept student counseling. We have also been invited by the Graduate Student Union to give lectures to graduate students across the university to promote this issue. This is certainly a very important part, and in fact it is also required in the new Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests, and there is an obligation to provide education in this area, which is what we can do at the moment.

For the rest, in fact, I personally think that it may be necessary to change the power ecology of colleges and universities. If the power relations of hierarchy are not fundamentally loosened, the educational role of marginality is not particularly large. And what I just said, can we separate the issue of sexual harassment from other ideological and political management, and establish a relatively independent committee to promote and deal with it. In fact, it is not so difficult to formulate rules and invoke talents to deal with sexual harassment incidents, of course, it cannot be achieved overnight, but it does not mean that it cannot be done in three or five years, as long as the school is willing to do it, it can be promoted, because there is widespread support at the social level. However, at present, colleges and universities may not have a particularly strong will to do this, so in the end, many students can only use the Internet to report, which is a huge pressure on them personally, but it may also be a helpless move.

The professor of Renmin University was dealt with quickly, where is the prevention and control of sexual harassment in colleges and universities?

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