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- Title
Sexual harassment in the hotel housekeeping department.
- Authors
Oliveira, Irina; Ambrósio, Vitor
- Abstract
One of the purposes of this paper is to do a research on the daily problematic and victimization which hotel maids come upon in their daily work chores. Many in the media have focused on how sexual assault allegations will affect the career of many politicians for instance the French politician "Dominique Strauss-Khan", but the affair underscores the tough challenges hotel maids face working in isolation, and for often unsympathetic bosses. People who work in this industry do face a lot of forms of abuse and exploitation, and sexual abuse and harassment are certainly one of those form. This paper aims to analyze the phenomenon of sexual harassment in five hotels in Portugal, one being an International hotel chain (that is, a foreign brand) and the other four being national hotel chains (that is, Portuguese brands). We interviewed 60 housekeepers, with the participants being identified only by age. The results show that more than 50% of the respondents have experience some kind of sexual harassment, and that the fundamental issues housekeepers are related to isolation, lack of security, abusive guests and fear of confrontation. Based on our findings, we propose several policy recommendations that help prevent sexual harassment, and suggest directions for future research.
- Subjects
PORTUGAL; SEXUAL harassment; HOTEL housekeeping; HOTELS; HOTEL management; PREVENTION of harassment
- Publication
International Journal of Management Cases, 2013, Vol 15, Issue 4, p180
- ISSN
1741-6264
- Publication type
Article