Digitalisation and third-party violence and harassment: Challenges and risks

The aim of the online meeting was to explore concrete links between digitalisation and third-party violence and harassment at work. Together with other trade unionists as well as managers and researchers, CESI and its members had the opportunity to share their views on timely questions such as: Which are the specific impacts of digitalisation on third-party violence? What dimensions does cyberviolence have in the world of work and how widespread is it? Why is data security so important for workers and why is personal data considered a concern for occupational health and safety? Are the European multisectoral guidelines on third-party violence which were adopted in 2010 by a variety of European social partner organisations, including CESI, fit for the challenges raised by the recent digitalisation of work? What can social partners do to protect workers in the digital era?

The webinar started with an introduction to a recent report by the European Parliament on ‘Combating gender-based violence: Cyber violence’. It was mentioned that from a trade union perspective it is regrettable that the report fails to mention workplace and social dialogue issues but that it nevertheless includes relevant data to show the overall scope of cyber violence, noting that for instance that 4 to 7% of women in the Union experienced cyber harassment during the 12 months prior to report, while between 1 and 3% suffered from cyberstalking.

Jane Pillinger, independent researcher and consultant for the project, presented the key conclusions of a previous third webinar of the project which had been devoted to the creation of a preventative risk assessment culture at work. She also gave an overview of the results of an ongoing survey on the matter under the project which focusses on hospitals, prison services, employment services, front-line workers in local and regional government, secondary schools, urban public transport as well as telecoms, and mentioned that 15% of the respondents reported that cyber harassment is a predominant type of third-party violence.

Mathias Wouters, postdoctoral researcher at the Labour Institute of KU-Leuven University and co-author of a recent ILO report on links between digitalisation and violence and harassment at work presented possible concrete measures to constrain such behaviours. In particular, he underlined the role that persistence and repetition as well as an unequal power relations play in the act of ‘bullying’, which can be found also in ‘cyberbullying’. He explained how in cyberbullying one can also lead to multiplying ‘snowball effects’: Online aggressions can circulate a lot faster than in the analogous world and aggravate exponentially.

Tim Tregenza from the EU Agency for Safety and Health at work (EU-OSHA) described how occupational health hand safety-related risks in ICT can be prevented by holistic, systematic and systemic approachs and stressed the need of a coherent framework which brings together aspects of data security, harassment, telework and occupational health and safety. As Mathias Wouters, he confirmed that the social media have become an established vector of harassment and online violence. He also pointed out how data protection has become a health and safety concern as new technologies and social media blur private and work life.

For CESI, this webinar constituted the continuation of an awareness-raising action on the topic started with its own project on third-party violence at work (2019-2020) and particularly including an own #NOVIOLENCEATWORK campaign based on a video and manifesto against third-party violence at work, be it offline, or online.

The speakers’ presentations of this fourth webinar, as well as a report in English, will be available here.

About the multisectoral European social partner project

“The role of social partners in preventing third-party violence and harassment at work” is a joint project of HOSPEEM, EPSU, CEMR, CESI (co-applicants) and ETF, ETNO, ETUCE, EUPAE, UITP (associated organizations), co-funded by the European Commission, for the years 2021 to 2023.

The project aims to assess the effectiveness at the national level of the EU multi-sectoral social partners’ Guidelines to tackle and prevent third-party violence and harassment related to work (2010), which CESI signed in 2018, as part of the TUNED delegation, for the central government administrations’ sector. It will identify areas for improvements and explore possibilities for reviewing the Guidelines’ content and nature considering recent legislative developments and the ILO Convention 190 on Violence and Harassment (2019). The final objective of the project is to become an awareness-raising tool on a gender-sensitive approach to third-party violence and harassment at the workplace.