Exploring the role of legislative frameworks in cultivating systemic safety to prevent workplace sexual harassment

About this project

Help stamp out sexual harassment in the workplace

If you are keen to advance your career in policy and professional services and motivated to help eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace, the University of South Australia – Australia’s University of Enterprise – is offering a hands-on project-based PhD within the Centre for Workplace Excellence (CWeX), in partnership with key statutory office holders with regulatory oversight of the relevant legal frameworks subject to analysis as part of this project. 

Workplace sexual harassment is a serious global problem with significant adverse effects for victims, observers, organisations and society. Despite its high prevalence, affecting 20% of Australian workers annually, sexual harassment is not inevitable – it is preventable. 

The greatest risks lie within workplaces rather than with workers per se; employees with the propensity to harass others are less likely to do so in certain work environments.

But we need to know more about how Australia’s intersecting and complex legal frameworks understand and respond to sexual harassment, so that we can improve their effectiveness as tools to promote workplace safety. 

Our project will map the existing State and Federal legislative frameworks that regulate different Australian workplaces and identify high performing aspects of existing legislative frameworks and areas that need reform.  

You will help us identify and circumvent the underlying risk factors for sexual harassment at work and improve the effectiveness and accessibly of our sexual harassment laws. We also want to develop practical resources to support employers throughout Australia to cultivate widespread change in how organisations approach, manage and reduce sexual harassment. 

You will be welcomed into the Law Discipline within the Justice and Society Unit at UniSA, which has a diverse range of internationally recognised scholars and a supportive approach to mentoring and engaging with HDRs.  

Our project feeds into a broader multidisciplinary, Australian Research Council-funded project called Cultivating Systemic Safety and Inclusion to Prevent Workplace Sexual Harassment. This project aims to explore and transform the risk contexts for workplace sexual harassment and create workplaces characterised by systemic safety. 

You will have the opportunity to interact with our partners on this overarching project, which include three universities (University of South Australia, Griffith University, and University of Queensland) and ten foundational Partner Organisations that play important roles in mitigating sexual harassment in Australian workplaces. 

The ARC project is also supported by a technology partner (Teamgage) whose software platform is focussed on supporting healthy workplace interactions, which will provide another translation pathway to scale up the potential for impact.  This will provide multiple opportunities you to collaborate with peers, mentors and industry partners and participate in joint publications and media engagement.

What you’ll do

In this project-based research degree, you will undertake legal analysis and legal research to first map the existing State and Federal legislative frameworks that regulate different Australian workplaces. 

Next, you will identify key features of these laws that are explicitly or implicitly designed to prevent workplace sexual harassment. Lastly, you will analyse the extent to which these legislative frameworks conceptualise workplace sexual harassment – or the risk of workplace sexual harassment – as a systemic issue.  

You will also be involved in engaging with key community, government and industry stakeholders to co-design and test evaluative criteria to determine the extent to which legislative frameworks can be used as a tool to transform the risk contexts for workplace sexual harassment and create workplaces 

There will be opportunities to share key findings and research design insights with UniSA colleagues and national experts (including the Australian Discrimination Law Experts Group). 

You may also have the opportunity participate in relevant law reform or parliamentary inquiries and/or present at relevant national or international conferences focused on legal responses to addressing workplace safety and sexual harassment. 

Where you’ll be based

You will be based at CWeX, where we make it our business to give organisations the knowledge to empower them to achieve excellence in organisational productivity and employee wellbeing. 

Through our evidence-based research, we uncover invaluable insights and best practice on topics such as employee health, safety and wellbeing; workforce diversity and inclusion; bullying and harassment prevention; leadership, culture and performance; and human resource management systems, practices and structures to demonstrate how organisations can address the workplace challenges of today and into the future.

Our solutions-focused approach will help you to identify what really works in the workplace, where changes can be made and how organisations can evolve to become front runners in the global marketplace. 

We do the hard work through our multidisciplinary research to make sure that your workplace can function at its best, with guidance from the latest practices in workplace excellence.

Regular engagement will also be facilitated with key statutory agencies and end users including the SA Equal Opportunity Commission, the Australian Human Rights Commission and the Working Women’s Centre. Financial Support 

This project is funded for reasonable research expenses. Additionally, a living allowance scholarship of $35,200 (2025 rate) per annum is available to Australian and New Zealand citizens, permanent residents of Australia. Australian Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander applicants will be eligible to receive an increased stipend rate of $52,352 per annum (2025 rate). A fee-offset or waiver for the standard term of the program is also included for this group. For full terms and benefits of the scholarship please refer to our scholarship information. International applicants will not be eligible to receive the scholarship.

Eligibility and Selection 

This project is open to applications from both Domestic and International applicants.

Applicants must meet the eligibility criteria for entrance into a Master of Research or a PhD. Additionally applicants must meet the project selection criteria: 

• Undergraduate qualifications in law. 
• Desirable related qualifications include academic qualifications in psychology or social work and/or criminology and gender studies. 
• Relevant work experience in human resources and/or employment law contexts would also be desirable, as would experience undertaking co-design research or engagement activities, or representing or advocating for groups who have experienced harassment, discrimination or marginalisation.

All applications that meet the eligibility and selection criteria will be considered for this project. A merit selection process will be used to determine the successful candidate.

The successful applicant is expected to study full-time or part-time, and to be based at our City West Campus in the heart of Adelaide. Note that international students on a student visa will need to study full-time.

Essential Dates 

Applicants are expected to start in a timely fashion upon receipt of an offer. Extended deferral periods are not available. Applications close on Tuesday 14 January 2025.