Sexism, violence, discrimination

Do you feel discriminated against because of your gender or have you experienced or observed sexualized harassment or violence towards others?

Sexual and sexualized assaults are an everyday reality. The International Labour Organization ILO estimates that every second woman has experienced sexualized harassment in the workplace.

The vast majority of sexualized harassment is experienced by women. However, men can also be victims.

Victims of sexualized transgressions experience these as humiliating or degrading. The experience can have a severe impact on the psychological balance of victims. On an institutional level, sexualized misconduct represents a massive disruption to the workplace, and a violation of labour and employment law obligations.

What is sexualized misconduct, discrimination, harassment and violence?

The Max Planck Society prohibits all forms of sexualized discrimination, harassment and violence. This includes physical harassment, stalking, and violence as forms of discrimination, for example, sexist or derogatory remarks or worse or better performance evaluation based on gender.

Who can you turn to?

In the Max Planck Society, you can contact various people to ask for advice or tomake a complaint.

• The Local Gender Equality Officer of your institute or facility and the Central Gender Equality Officer will support you with all questions and uncertainties concerning the topic of sexualized misconduct. For the protection of the persons involved, all Gender Equality Officers are subject to the duty of confidentiality. Their advice will only result in an official complaint if the person seeking advice wishes to do so. You can therefore confidentially discuss with the Gender Equality Officer whether and which steps you would like to take regarding your concern.
• The works council is also bound to confidentiality and can be a point of contact for information and complaints about sexualized discrimination, violence, and harassment.
• Furthermore, you can contact direct superiors as well as all persons with support and management functions at your institute or facility.

Please find all contact details of local contact persons on the intranet.