The President of the Council of Rectors of Portuguese Universities (CRUP) said this Wednesday that support for victims of persecution is a priority and that complaints should be investigated with consequences “regardless of who is affected.”
The position of the President of CRUP was a response to allegations of harassment and sexual assault at the Center for Social Research of the University of Coimbra, which were reported by Diário de Notícias on Tuesday.
“The priority must be to support the victims from the first moment they feel they are the object of unacceptable behavior,” emphasizes António Sousa Pereira, quoted in a statement defending the need to listen and support victims from the start.
“It doesn’t make sense that people carry for years, sometimes decades, the burden of situations that have marked them for life,” he argues.
As for the response of universities, the representative of the rectors insists that accessible mechanisms should be in place to quickly identify, assess, punish and stop cases of harassment.
“When complaints arise, universities must investigate all cases presented to the end, regardless of who offended them, and draw conclusions from what is found,” writes the president of CRUP.
“The deans are committed to a thorough investigation of the facts, which obviously implies the presumption of innocence, as well as a thorough investigation of allegations of bad practice, in order to promote a good working environment in the departments and protect their students and the scientific and pedagogical reputation of its professors, assistants and research staff. “, he adds.
Three researchers who passed through the Center for Social Studies (CES) of the University of Coimbra denounced cases of harassment and sexual abuse by members of the research center in a book titled Sexual Misconduct at the Academy – For the Ethics of Nursing at the University, published by the international publishing house Routledge.
In this Wednesday’s issue, Diário de Notícias reports that the accused are sociologist Boaventura Souza Santos, director emeritus of CES, and anthropologist Bruno Sena Martins, a researcher at the institution, who have denied all accusations.
This is not the first time allegations of sexual harassment in higher education have been made public. About a year ago, the report of the Faculty of Educational Council of the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon was published, which received 50 complaints of harassment and discrimination in just one month.
In December, an investigation by the Academic Association of Lisbon found that about two out of ten university students had already been victims or witnesses of harassment.