SEA/SH on construction sites: from code of conduct to effective sanctions

An incident of sexual exploitation is reported at a workers' camp. The contractor has a code of conduct, signed by each worker and displayed in three languages. Yet no dismissal has ever been pronounced, and the works contract provides no penalty in case of breach. The lender finds a paper arrangement. This article details how to move from the displayed code to a sanctions regime actually applied, from mapping the labour influx risk to the contractual lever that makes sanctions credible, through to referral of services for survivors.

SEA/SH: defining the scope on a construction site

The acronym SEA/SH designates a precise subset of gender-based violence: sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) and sexual harassment (SH). It is not synonymous with GBV. It is the part of the problem that the project can directly prevent, because it implicates its own workers.

The distinction is operational. Sexual harassment concerns mainly internal relations, between workers, in a highly masculinised environment. Exploitation and abuse target people from neighbouring communities, through economic power relations. Both call for different responses, but the same set of rules and sanctions.

The overall GBV action plan, its five pillars and its dedicated grievance mechanism are addressed in our article onGBV in infrastructure projects. This article complements it on a precise point: how to make the sanctions regime effective on the construction site itself.

The World Bank formalised this approach in its Good Practice Note on SEA/SH in major civil works projects. It addresses three distinct forms: sexual exploitation, sexual abuse and sexual harassment (World Bank, Good Practice Note on Addressing SEA/SH, 3rd edition, 2022). On the IFC side, the requirement relates to two standards. ThePS2 on working conditionscovers the employment relationship and harassment between workers. PS4 covers the health and safety of communities exposed to project labour. These two standards also underpin theworking conditions requirements on DFI projects.

Mapping the labour influx risk

Labour influx is the risk multiplier. A major construction site concentrates hundreds, sometimes thousands of external workers in a territory where the local economy shifts within a few months. The SEA/SH risk is not intuition. It is mapped, scored and documented.

The mapping combines several measurable parameters. The size and origin of the workforce. The ratio between external workers and local population. The duration of the works. The accommodation mode, closed camp or dispersed housing in villages. The proximity of facilities to dwellings, schools and water points. The presence of vulnerable populations. Finally, the actual capacity of local care services.

The product of this exercise is not a list of good intentions. It is a justified risk level, low, substantial or high, which sizes the entire arrangement. A high risk requires a reinforced code of conduct, a detailed sanctions scale, a separate grievance mechanism and contracted services before the first spade. A lower risk permits a proportionate arrangement, without ever cancelling it.

This assessment falls jointly under PS2 and PS4. It is carried out during the impact study, not at the start of the works. An SEA/SH plan improvised after team mobilisation is a plan already chasing the risk.

The code of conduct: a behaviour contract

The code of conduct is not a poster. It is an individual, enforceable commitment that defines what is prohibited and what happens in case of breach. International good practice structures it in three complementary levels.

The company code commits the company to its prevention and response obligations. The supervisor's code commits management, who must prevent, report and never cover up. The individual code commits each worker to specific behaviours. All three are signed, dated and archived.

A code that holds in use states concrete prohibitions, not vague principles. Prohibition of any sexual harassment behaviour. Prohibition of any exchange relationship, favour, employment or money for sexual act. Absolute prohibition of any sexual activity with a person under eighteen years of age, regardless of the age of majority under local law, ignorance of age never being an acceptable excuse. Obligation, for any witness, to report.

Two conditions make this code real. It applies identically to sub-contractors, who often concentrate the most exposed and least supervised workforce. And it is presented in working languages, orally during induction, with an individual signature not a collective attendance list. But a code, even perfect, is worth only the sanctions it announces.

The graduated sanctions regime

This is the heart of the arrangement, and the most frequently failing link. A credible sanctions regime rests on two qualities: gradation and certainty. Gradation adjusts the sanction to the gravity. Certainty guarantees that a proven breach is always followed by effect.

Gradation translates into a written scale, known to workers before they take up their function. The scale runs from written warning to transfer, suspension, dismissal, then reporting to authorities for acts constituting a criminal offence. Each category of behaviour is linked in advance to a sanction level. One does not negotiate the sanction case by case, under pressure from the schedule or the hierarchy.

Some lines are not graded. Any sexual activity with a minor results in dismissal and reporting, without exception. Any retaliatory measure against a person having reported a fact results in a heavy sanction. Purchased silence, discreet arrangement, transfer disguised as promotion are themselves breaches. Each disciplinary decision is documented, respecting the confidentiality of the person concerned.

Making sanctions effective: the contractual lever

Here is the most frequent blind spot. A sanction against an employee bites only if the employer acts. Yet the employer is often a works contractor whose immediate interest is to deliver the site, not to lose a competent team leader. The code of conduct then hits the contractor's inertia. The response is contractual.

SEA/SH obligations must feature in the works contract and cascade to sub-contracting contracts. The contract provides financial consequences in case of breach: retentions, penalties, activation of the performance bond. It conditions payments on proof of a living arrangement. The breach by a worker thus becomes a risk for the contractor, not only for the individual.

Lenders have toughened this requirement. The World Bank has built a contractor accountability and disqualification mechanism. It asks to set expectations in the contract conditions, then provides that a non-compliant contractor "will not receive further Bank-financed contracts anywhere in the world for a period of two years" (World Bank, Contractor Accountability and Disqualification). The sanction no longer targets only the offending worker. It reaches the contractor who allowed it to happen.

This requirement translates into expected evidence. A lender does not settle for a displayed code. It verifies application. The coherence between the mapped risk, the signed contract and the decisions taken is read in the documents. A credible arrangement knows how to show not only its rules, but its treated cases.

Referring survivor services

A sanctions regime makes sense only if it is accompanied by care for persons. Service referral is the human counterpart of the sanction. It is prepared before the site, not after the first incident.

To refer is to map then contract the mobilisable services: emergency medical care within useful timeframes, psychosocial support, legal assistance, emergency accommodation if necessary. These agreements are signed in the preparatory phase, when the risk is still theoretical. Seeking a service on the day of an incident is already to have failed.

Referral follows a survivor-centred approach. Safety, confidentiality, non-discrimination and respect for the person's choice take precedence over any investigation logic. Decisions on follow-up, complaint, discreet support or medical referral alone, belong to the survivor, not the project. Care is funded without awaiting the outcome of the investigation. This pathway is clearly distinct from the treatment of routine complaints, described in our article on thegrievance mechanism. The disciplinary process must never depend on the survivor nor put pressure on her.

The code of conduct is the beginning of the arrangement, never its proof. The proof is the sanction applied and the survivor cared for. Three reflexes separate a credible arrangement from a paper arrangement.

Map the labour influx risk and derive a level that sizes the rest. Write a graduated sanctions scale and apply it regardless of the author's rank. Anchor the obligations in the works contract, so that a worker's breach also engages the contractor. To these three reflexes is added a non-negotiable condition: survivor services contracted before the first day of works. An arrangement that brings together these four elements passes due diligence. An arrangement that limits itself to a displayed code suffers it.