Over the last two decades our courts have become inundated with cases relating to sexual harassment in the workplace. Sexual harassment has become a major problem in the workplace hence the decision by parliament and our courts to implement policies in the workplace to try and curb the problem. The effects of sexual harassment on a victims’ job and career can be profound. It has been proven that many employees simply decide to leave their jobs or to request a transfer than to endure the harassment until they are psychologically destroyed by the embarrassing situation.The Employment Equity Act explicitly in section 6 prohibits unfair discrimination in very specific terms. It states that no person may unfairly discriminate directly or indirectly against an employee in an employment policy or practice on one or more of the grounds listed in section 6. Section 6(3) further states that harassment of an employee is a form of discrimination where the harassment is based on any one or more of the grounds listed in section 6 (1) which includes sexual harassment. Section 60 deals with the liability of employees for the conduct of their employees committed whilst the employees are at work, where such conduct contravenes the provisions of the EEA. If the conduct is brought to the attention of the employer he or she is obliged to take the necessary steps to eliminate the alleged conduct and to comply with the provisions of the EEA. Section 60(3) renders an employee vicariously liable for the conduct of an employee who contravenes the provisions of the EEA. An employee who cannot prove that reasonable steps were taken to ensure that the provisions of the EEA are not contravened will be held liable for the actions or their employees. An employer who can prove that reasonable steps were taken will not be held liable for the actions of the employee.The provisions of the EEA were applied in the case of Ntsabo v Real Security wherein an employee had been sexually harassed over a period of six months by a fellow employee. The employee had reported the incidents of sexual harassment to the corporation she was employed with which failed to take action against the senior employee. Instead of taking action the corporation moved her to a different work station and placed her on night shift. This gave her the impression that she was being punished for the deed of the senior employee which resulted in her resigning from the corporation and instituting a claim for constructive dismissal and damages for sexual harassment. The court found that she had been constructively dismissed and that the senior employee had contravened section 6(3) of the EEA. The court further held that the employer (corporation) was also liable for the conduct of the senior employee in contravening the Act. In terms of the doctrine of vicarious liability on the other an employer may be held vicariously liable for the actions of its employees committed during the course and scope of their employment. The test for vicarious liability is therefore whether at the time of the alleged act of sexual harassment the employee was acting within the course and scope of his employment. The doctrine came before the court in the case of Grobler v Naspers. In this case Grobler who was employed at Naspers alleged that has had been sexually harassed by her immediate supervisor Mr Samuels. Samuels acted as trainee manager for seven months. Grobler suffered a mental breakdown as a result of the harassment and contented that she was no longer fit to work. She approached the High court for relief and alleged that Naspers (employer) was vicariously liable for the actions of Mr Samuels and the damages she suffered. In Naspers the court had to decide whether Samuels was indeed responsible for Grobler’s condition and if so whether Naspers were vicariously liable for his actions. In coming to its decision various cases were cited by the court as authority that recognised underlying policy considerations of vicarious liability. This included considerations that the employer is in a better position to pay compensation than the employee and to render the employer liable, serves as a deterrent against similar conduct in the future. The court also remarked that the common law courts acknowledge that the evolution of the doctrine continues to be guided by policy. The court ruled that policy considerations justified the finding that Naspers was vicariously liable for the sexual harassment of Grobler. It held further that both Naspers and Samuels were jointly and severally liable for the compensation to be paid. The Code of Good Practice on the Handling of Sexual Harassment Cases which was published as an annexure to the Labour Relations Act was implemented in an attempt to eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace, to provide appropriate procedures to deal with the problem and to prevent its occurrence and to promote and to encourage the development and implementation of policies and procedures which will assist in creating workplaces free from sexual harassment. The cases quoted above demonstrate the different approaches adopted by the courts in seeking to grant relief to victims of sexual harassment. It is clear that policies and procedures should be in place in the workplace that will ensure that employers are not held liable for the actions of their employees committed during the course and scope of employment. The same can however not be said when there are no policies and procedures in place in the workplace.

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The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of field dependence and age on the information-processing abilities of children of ages 5, 7, 9 and 11. A third purpose was to test a Ncopiagetien model of developmental task circumstances different to those under which it was initially tasted. Each age group was divided into a field dependent (FD) and field independent (FI) group on the basis of the Children's Embedded Figures Test. They were then administered a test which constituted a Finite Equal Differences task as described by Pascual-Leone (1967). Training consisted of teaching each age group a specific number of separate schemes. That is, one simple stimulus was associated with one simple response. Each schema then constituted a separate piece of information. The testing session was designed to determine how many separate schemas the children could integrate at one time, that is, to determine the information-processing capacity of the groups. Simple stimuli consisted of dimensions such as shape and colour. Testing stimuli were multidimensional combinations of these. Stimuli were projected on a screen. Response mode was pushing buttons on a panel. Each simple stimulus was associated with a specific button. The results supported the predicted superiority of performance of Fl Ss over FD Ss for each age group. Fl Ss were able to coordinate more separate schemas than FD Ss. The analysis of variance approached significance at the .05 level for the main effect of field dependence-independence: the mathematical expectation was higher for the Fl group at each age level: and the Fl variance was greater at each age level. The predicted superiority of performance with increasing age was also confirmed. The analysis of variance was significant at the .005 level for the main effect of age; mathematical expectations increased with age for both Fl and FD groups; and variance increased with age for both the Fl and FD groups. The analysis of variance showed no interaction effect. The performance of the groups in this study in general did not match the performances predicted by the model, nor the empirical results of Pascual-Leone (1967). Reasons for this were discussed in terms of the different effects of the mode of stimulus presentation on attentional factors; differences in response discriminability; and the effect of task activity requirements on the arousal level of the subjects. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

Colombia's telecommunication industry has changed drastically in the last decade. Among the most salient events, a series of mergers between some of the industry's largest providers which resulted in a reduced number of competitors. One would expect that this reduction in the number of competitors would translate into higher prices. However, competition is at such high level that the media even talk about a "price war". My dissertation aims to shed light on the causes of this apparent inconsistency between a smaller number of competitors and more competitive outcomes. I start by showing that, in effect, the latest of these mergers, the one between Comcel and Telmex, had a pro-competitive effects on the provision of broadband. Next I show that the services provided by Comcel and Telmex were complements and that the pro-competitive effects of the merger can be explained by this complementarity. Finally, I study the effects of price discrimination under oligopolistic competition. In chapter 1 I assess the ex-post short-run effect on broadband provision of the Comcel-Telmex merger. Employing administrative data about the universe of plans and firms providing wired telecom services, I use several difference-in-difference specifications to obtain estimates for the effect of the merger on price and download speeds of plans provided by the merging firm and its rivals. My estimates suggest that, in markets affected by the merger, download speeds rose by .6 Megabits per second on average. The average increase in the markets resulted from increases in the plans offered by the merging firm (1.2 Mbps) and increases in the speeds of plans provided by its rivals (.5 Mbps). In chapter 2 I study mergers of firms producing complementary goods. Mergers of firms producing complementary products have ambiguous effects on consumer welfare. The merged firm may lower prices because the merger internalizes the profits originated by the complementarity. But with the merger the firm gains the ability to bundle and with bundles the firm can exert price discrimination, increasing the prices of standalone products. I employ a comprehensive, administrative data set, which records prices, market shares, and plan attributes of the universe of Colombia’s telecom carriers, to assess which effect dominates. I estimate a random-coefficient discrete choice model of consumer demand model for bundled and standalone telecom products, in which the degree of substitutability or complementarity among products is an essential parameter of interest. I find that major telecom products display a mix of substitutability and complementarity, but in general hardwired and mobile services are perceived as complements by Colombian households. My counterfactual experiments using the estimated model, indicate positive net effects of mergers with complements: despite a small increase in the price of standalone goods, consumer surplus increases by around 7 million dollars per quarter. Finally, in chapter 3, I study price discrimination in an oligopolistic setting. Economic theory is not conclusive about the effects of banning third degree price discrimination under imperfect competition. Price discrimination can enhance competition if the firms practicing don't agree on the ranking of their markets. In this case, price discrimination can lead to lower prices in all markets. Thus, forcing the firms to charge uniform prices can increase their profits and reduce consumers' surplus. Using data on prices, market shares and characteristics of telecommunication services sold under price discrimination by Colombian telecom providers, I estimate a model of competition. The estimates allow me to simulate a counterfactual scenario in which firms lose their ability to exert price discrimination within a city. Simulating a ban on price discrimination has negligible effect on consumer surplus and increases profits slightly.

Since the conjoint development of capitalism and the nation-state in eighteenth century Europe, the practical and theoretical problems of socio-economic reproduction and socio-political order have confronted social scientists of all ilks as different sides of the same coin. In its infancy, sociology drew its formative inspiration from classical political economy, and long after the new discipline had carved out its own niche from the theoretical vacuum created by the rise of neoclassical economics, the dialogue between social and economic theory persisted, especially within the Marxist tradition. Nowhere is this symbiotic relationship more apparent than in the field of labour market studies. The labour market constitutes a microcosm of capitalist society where the related problems of economic reproduction and social order are manifest in their myriad, contradictory forms. One such form is the dyad of racial inequality and conflict. This thesis focuses on how racial conflict is conceived in the contemporary Marxist, neoclassical economic and Weberian literature, and examines the contribution of radical labour market theory to a Marxist theory of racial conflict. The purpose is to meet the challenge extended by a recent, neo-Weberian critique and reformulation of class theory as a unified, theoretico - methodological framework for articulating the relationship between racial groups and social classes, racial conflict and class struggle in the labour market, community, state and international system. It concludes that radical labour market theory represents an important departure from previous Marxist approaches to race and class. Theoretically, radical labour market theory breaks with Marxist tradition by distinguishing group forms of domination like discrimination, from class forms like exploitation, and by relating group and class, market and production relations to racial conflict and class struggle. Methodologically significant is the attempt to apply a non-reductionist class analysis that situates the race - class nexus in the historical context of collective struggles in a dynamic, open-ended class formation process. The implications of these theoretical and methodological directives for Marxist theories of race, class and the State are critically evaluated, and a non-reductionist model of racial conflict is proffered as a preliminary step toward a Marxist theory of inter-group conflict. / Arts, Faculty of / Sociology, Department of / Graduate

Occupational data for industrial labour forces reveal sexual division of labour in the form of occupational segregation by sex (OSS). There are two principal dimensions of this phenomenon. First, male and female workers are distributed differently among occupations, an aspect of OSS referred to as occupational differentiation by sex (ODS). Second, there is considerable variation in the internal sex compositions of occupations, such that women are overrepresented in a few jobs, and underrepresented in others. This dimension of OSS is referred to as occupational sex-typing (OST). Some patterns of OSS suggest that male and female workers are not merely segregated into different jobs, but also stratified into occupations readily ranked according to conventional criteria. Such sexual stratification of the labour force is referred to as sexual inequality of occupational status (SIS). Although economic, socialization, discrimination, interdisciplinary, and ecological explanations of change in OSS and SIS identify important determinants of these phenomena, none of these perspectives provides an adequate theory of change in OSS and SIS. As well, the various approaches have led to contradictory conclusions about trends in OSS and SIS. Some authors argue that there has been no change in the degree of these phenomena. Others contend that OSS and SIS have grown more pronounced, while yet others claim declines in these phenomena. Much of the confusion concerning trends in OSS and SIS results from methodological inadequacies, which render inconclusive many of the findings of previous research. The thesis of this study is that there should be inverse relationships between the level of industrialization and both OSS and SIS. Specifically, it is argued that (1) the development of machine technology tends to eliminate the necessity to select workers for some jobs on the basis of strength, i.e., usually by sex; (2) the commitment to productivity characteristic of industrial societies implies hiring and promoting workers on the basis of their probable contribution to production; (3) the industrial urban milieu is characterized by conditions conducive to the employment and advancement of women (e.g., low birth rate, career opportunities); and (4) the bureaucratization accompanying industrialization ideally implies the selection and promotion of workers on the basis of achieved qualifications, determined by formalized, calculable standards, rather than on such traditional, ascriptive, and often economically irrational, criteria as sex. Accordingly, it is predicted that ODS, OST, and SIS will be inversely related to technological development, productivity, urbanization, and bureaucratization, and that as the levels of the latter dimensions of industrialization increase over time the degree of ODS, OST, and SIS will decline. Indexes of each dimension of industrialization and of JDDS, OST, and SIS are calculated with official Canadian data for the census years 1891 through 1971. The results are graphed and correlated, and subjected to regression and trend analysis. Generally, the findings are consistent with the thesis of inverse relationships between both OSS and SIS and each dimension of industrialization. Declines in OSS, however, are slight, with considerable sexual division of labour remaining at the end of the period studied. The theoretical and methodological implications of these findings are discussed, and several directions for subsequent research indicated. / Arts, Faculty of / Sociology, Department of / Unknown

M.B.A. / Barriers that hinder career advancement of women are both complex and varied. They have become top priority for organizations and the government. The "glass ceiling" is a term that symbolizes a variety of barriers that prevent individuals from advancing up the corporate hierarchy. Although many women hold management positions, few have made the breakthrough to toplevel positions. To determine what conditions are required for women to break the glass ceiling and attain management positions, an exploratory study was conducted to investigate the perceptions of the glass ceiling phenomenon amongst both males and female managers and what the implications of these perceptions are for change strategies targeted at including women in high level managerial positions. The research was limited to 48 respondents, all of different managerial levels and the responses indicated that both men and females agree that there are obstacles impeding the progress of women to higher managerial levels. However, a comparison in terms of perceptions of the various race groups was not established. There seems to be a change in focus by organizations in terms of their change management processes and of including females in management levels. Organizations are focusing on developing females to attain the various management positions available. However, despite the changes, some males have a nonchalant attitude towards assisting women attain higher managerial positions. Women have to get out of their mould and break through the obstacles of the glass ceiling in order to become victors in the corporate world

Discrimination against people of colour in the hospitality, labour, and housing markets has been causing harm throughout the history of the United States. Examining the discrepancy in outcomes for marginalized Airbnb hosts allows me to assess whether even those considered economically successful are harmed by racial and gender bias. Using an Ordinary Least Squares and a Propensity Score Matching approach, I find Airbnb hosts who are of Asian or Hispanic origin face both price and quantity penalties, having nightly prices on average 4% lower and receiving 3 percentage points fewer booked nights in a month than listings managed by white hosts. Black Airbnb hosts face higher nightly prices and a lower quantity of bookings; however, without holding neighbourhood constant, they charge approximately 12% less per night, indicating that Black hosts disproportionately own properties in low-price neighbourhoods. I also observe an intersectionaldiscrimination penalty wherein women of colour face even higher price and quantity penalties. / Graduate

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / AIM Racial identity has been shown to buffer against the effects of racial discrimination among African Americans. Recently, researchers have developed a more comprehensive assessment of racial identity through the construction of profiles. These profiles help better identify combinations of racial identity that are most protective, as well as those that have the potential to increase risk. To date a majority of the research has been conducted on internalizing and academic outcomes, with limited research on externalizing outcomes, such as substance use. The current study aimed to fill this gap in the literature. METHODS 345 African American college students (80.0% female, 88.4% USA-born, and Mage=21.56) completed measures on racial identity, racial discrimination, internalizing symptomology, academic motivation, and substance use. RESULTS Four racial identity profiles were identified and labeled race-focused (n=228), multiculturalist (n=64), integrationist (n=38), and undifferentiated (n=15). Several direct effects were observed. Multigroup analysis, stratified by profile, revealed several direct relationships between racial identity profiles and outcomes. The probability of being in the multiculturalist profile was negatively associated with depression and stress and positively associated with academic motivation. The probability of being in the race-focused profile was positively associated with cannabis use and the probability of being in the integrationist profile was negatively associated with academic motivation. Being in the undifferentiated profile was not significantly related to any of the outcomes. Two specific moderating effects were also observed; individuals in the integrationist profile were significantly lower in academic motivation as a result of racial discrimination than individuals in the race-focused profile (b=0.10, SE=0.05, p=0.046). Individuals in the integrationist profile were also higher in stress as a result of racial discrimination than individuals in the race-focused profile, however this effect was only trending toward significance (b=-0.14, SE=0.08, p=0.080). CONCLUSION Based on these results, there is evidence for the differential direct and moderating associations of racial identity profiles with various health and behavioral outcomes, such that some appear protective whereas others increase risk. These findings can be used to inform future research related to racial identity and interventions for African Americans experiencing racial discrimination.