The recent ratification of ILO Convention 190 on the elimination of violence and harassment in the world of work has reactivated the discussion on workplace harassment (acoso laboral) across various forums. Currently, legislative file No. 20,873, titled “Law to Prevent and Sanction Workplace Harassment in the Public and Private Sectors,” is moving through the legislative process, and its eventual approval promises to transform how organizations approach this issue.

However, while this bill undergoes the necessary legislative procedures for enactment, it is equally necessary to understand which behaviors have been deemed by Costa Rican courts as not constituting workplace harassment. The courts concur that for workplace harassment to be established, at least one of these three elements must be present: the intent to undermine the individual's dignity, repetition over time, and the purpose of exclusion, insofar as it seeks to pressure the individual into resigning from their position. In the absence of an express statutory rule that defines with precision what constitutes workplace harassment, delimiting this concept becomes indispensable to prevent it from being confused with the legitimate exercise of the employer's managerial prerogative (poder de dirección). In this context, a key question arises: what behaviors do not qualify as workplace harassment?

First, the reasonable, proportionate, and justified exercise of employer faculties does not constitute workplace harassment. In this sense, the employer's authority to issue orders for the fulfillment of duties is not harassment—such as reporting absences, requesting compliance with schedules, requiring reports, demanding quality in performance, supervising workplace performance, applying disciplinary measures within the legal framework, and reorganizing functions without an intent to humiliate, exclude, or harm.

In this regard, the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (Sala Segunda de la Corte Suprema de Justicia), in its Resolution No. 212-2017, concluded that there was neither tortious intent nor systematicity, and that the measures responded to technical needs rather than a personal vendetta. In said judgment, the court indicated that: “Such a conclusion cannot be reached based on the evidentiary elements existing in the case file, since, as a matter of principle, the Administration holds the power to self-regulate the distribution of its competences; that is, to assign the performance of certain functions to one department or another within an agency.” The ruling subsequently noted that: “It is observed that this practice stems from reasons of order; they are work procedures that every administrator of an office can and must implement, and secondly, in the case under review, it was a general measure applicable to all officials, not just the plaintiff, which rules out any taint of discrimination.” Mind you, the line between managerial prerogative and workplace harassment is often a thin one.

Second, a tense work environment does not automatically imply workplace harassment either. In this regard, the Labor Court of Appeals (Tribunal de Apelación de Trabajo), in its Resolution No. 265-2021, although determining that a tense work environment existed within the workplace, subsequently considered that it involved general meetings and not targeted attacks aimed at affecting the employee, thereby ruling out harassment on those grounds.

It is important to highlight that not every workplace conflict constitutes harassment, but it is equally vital to consider that human relations are complex; thus, situations may arise that require a much more detailed analysis to determine the true nature of the conduct. Consequently, it is fundamental for every company to implement an internal policy against workplace harassment and to ensure that the respective investigation is conducted whenever an employee files a complaint involving claims of this nature.