Sexual harassment : Deploying 'respect' and 'leadership' to maintain men's abuse of women

This chapter applies the sociology of social problems to elucidate the seemingly intractable character of men’s sexual harassment of women. Such gendered abuse is predictably a residual side effect of a patriarchal society pursuing dominant goals and norms and continues as these underlying structural causes are not addressed. Instead the issue is converted from a contested and political problem into a non-controversial technical solution within the administrative realm. The important role played by two key buzzwords, respect and leadership, in depoliticizing sexual harassment is demonstrated.