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In “Offers and Coercion,” Nancy Tuana examines the question of whether it constitutes sexual harassment when an employer, supervisor, instructor, or some other figure of authority uses offers of rewards to solicit sexual favors. One reason for thinking such offers do not constitute sexual harassment turns on what Tuana calls the standard analysis of coercion. According to this analysis, only actions involving intentional threats of harm can be correctly viewed as coercive. Since offers of rewards for sexual favors typically do not involve threats, such offers are, according to the standard analysis, not coercive. And because the central meaning of sexual harassment is the coercion of sexual activity, such offers are, by extension, not an instance of sexual harassment.
Tuana, however, rejects this conclusion. She does so not because she rejects the central meaning of sexual harassment as the coercion of sexual activity, nor because she denies that offers of rewards for sexual favors are typically made in the absence of threats and intentions to harm. Rather, she rejects the standard analysis of coercion as inadequate because it fails to account for the context in which actions are performed. When context is taken into consideration, we can see how offers can be coercive in the absence of any threat to harm. For the context in which an offer is made can be such that it is reasonable for a person to believe she would be harmed if she were to refuse. This is often the precise situation when a figure of authority offers rewards in exchange for sex. Although the figure in question may have no intention to harm when the offer is presented, and may likewise make no threat, he nonetheless has the power to harm the recipient and will likely be upset enough to exercise that power if rejected. Accepting an offer for fear of such retaliatory harm is not a free choice according to Tuana. Tuana therefore concludes that, pace the standard analysis, offers made in such contexts are rightly considered coercive.