Challenges to evaluating US military policy on sexual assault and sexual harassment

ABSTRACT

US military policy has come under fire by critics who charge that it does not do enough to prevent sexual harassment and sexual assault, to support and protect victims, and to hold perpetrators accountable. This article first outlines the challenges of collecting, understanding, and analyzing relevant military policies, even for scholars with access to the military community and experience studying it. Policies can vary across and within organizations, be documented in a wide variety of formats, and evolve (or devolve) over time. Next the authors review the types of data sources that could be used to try to determine whether selected policies are effective and where they may be having unintended consequences. To illustrate challenges and opportunities related to evaluating these policies, the authors narrow the discussion to focus on three types of sexual assault policies that have received recent scrutiny: policies aimed at sexual assault prevention, reporting, and offender accountability. The article concludes by mapping out a body of future research that would assist decision makers in Congress and the Department of Defense in more fully drawing upon the academic community to conduct research that can inform policy.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender discrimination
• military justice
• military policy
• sexual harassment
• sexual assault

Notes

1. An excellent source for DoD-level policy, which includes links to service policy sources such as the Army Publishing Directorate, is http://www.dtic.mil/whs/directives/index.html.

2. Note that the US Coast Guard is an unusual armed force in that it falls under the authority of the Department of Homeland Security, although there is legal authority to transfer control to the Department of the Navy, as was done during World Wars I and II. Most recently, the Coast Guard provided security to Naval vessels moored in foreign ports in support of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan—when doing this mission they were under control of the Navy. The Coast Guard conducts a wide range of missions, of which only some fall under DoD; still, its members are subject to military law.

3. This open website is also a valuable resource for scholars in that other research reports and policy updates are also posted here.

4. As noted in the introduction to this special issue, comparisons between civilian and military populations are problematic for many reasons, as the laws and populations differ in important ways, so we do not recommend such comparisons here.

5. Of course, effective response policies, programs, and practices also may bolster prevention efforts by deterring potential perpetrators who fear being held accountable for their actions.

6. Because of significant differences among state programs, the National Guard Bureau is beyond the scope of this article.

7. As another illustration of service leeway in meeting DoD requirements, each of the services’ status reports on their prevention efforts (published as enclosures of the 2014 SAPRO Report to the President of the United States on Sexual Assault Prevention and Response) vary significantly in detail and length (e.g., in 2014 the Navy’s prevention section is under four pages long while the Air Force’s is 36; SAPRO, 2014b).

8. A community of practice is a group of people who share information or experiences about their common craft or profession to promote learning and improved practices. In this case, SAPR Connect provides virtual and face-to-face forums for sharing lessons learned and promising practices as well as webinars and toolkits for military personnel working on sexual assault prevention and response.

9. Although the percentage jumped to 20% in fiscal year 2014 (SAPRO, 2015).

10. Two panelists dissented.