Harassment

The Federal Equal Treatment Act also prohibits the following forms of discrimination

• sexual harassment
• gender-related harassment
• harassment on the grounds of ethnic origin, religion or belief, age, or sexual orientation

What does the Act define as “harassment”?

Harassment on the basis of one of the grounds listed above, occurs when conduct related to that sphere:

• violates the dignity of a person and is unwanted, inappropriate, degrading, offensive, or objectionable for the individual concerned, and
• creates an intimidating, hostile, or humiliating work environment for that individual, or
• when the fact that a person rejects or tolerates such conduct by an employer’s representative (the university) or by colleagues is explicitly or implicitly used as a basis for decisions affecting that person’s access to education and training, employment, continued employment, promotion, remuneration, or any other decision concerning the employment or training relationship.

Such conduct may be carried out directly by a representative of the employer (the university), or may result from the employer’s failure to take appropriate action to remedy harassment by third parties.

Discrimination also includes instructing another person to engage in sexual harassment.