Binary logics and the discursive interpretation of organizational policy: Making meaning of sexual harassment policy

Abstract

Although workplace policies are written in neutral terms that give the appearance of rationality, research shows that policy meanings are in fact constructed and negotiated through discursive practices. Sexual harassment policies illustrate this phenomenon. Sexual harassment is a highly complex and fluid phenomenon that is dependent on context and culture for its meaning. Although sexual harassment policies tend to use language that appears to lie outside of the interpretive stream, these policies are in fact always subject to discursive interpretation. One particularly powerful form of discursive interpretation lies in the interplay between binary logics and binary language. This study explored the interplay between macro-level binary logics, mezzo-level sexual harassment policy and micro-level binary language during organizational members’ discussions about their organization’s sexual harassment policy. Our analysis of focus group and interview data revealed that participants discursively produced what we have termed a complex binary web that reshaped the meaning of the policy, such that usage of the policy contradicted organizational norms and values. Understanding sexual harassment policy discourse as constructed in a binary web reveals that rational assumptions underlying sexual harassment policy may be inconsistent with the lived experiences in organizational cultures.