Military Equal Opportunity

Defense Department policy holds that equal opportunity is integral to the unity, readiness, and total defense capability of its forces. Unwarranted discriminatory behavior, including racial discrimination and sexual harassment, is not to be condoned or tolerated. From fiscal year 1989 through 1993, the number of equal opportunity complaints reported by the military services ranged from about 1,300 to more than 3,600--averaging nearly 2,900 per year. During the same period, the active duty military forces declined from about 2.1 million to 1.7 million. This report (1) identifies the military services' processes for handling equal opportunity complaints and (2) discusses whether opportunities exist for improvement. As part of its review, GAO conducted focus group sessions with more than 900 servicemembers to gain an understanding of the complaint system and equal opportunity environment from their perspective.

GAO found that: (1) in implementing the military EO program, the four military services have established different complaint processes; (2) among these differences are the deadlines for filing a complaint, the channels available for filing a complaint, and the documentation used to record complaint processing and followup reviews; (3) not all the commands GAO visited were following their service's prescribed complaint procedures; (4) most important, some commands could not document that they had followed up on complaints after they were resolved to determine whether the complainants had experienced reprisal or further discrimination; (5) GAO's review identified a number of areas that offer opportunities for improving the services' EO programs, specifically: (a) some EO specialists were not used effectively because they did not have direct access to the commander, served very large populations, or had too many other duties to perform; (b) some commands made no use or very limited use of climate assessments to evaluate and improve the health of the EO environment; (c) EO training for commanders, who are responsible for managing the EO program, and for servicemembers was incomplete and undocumented; and (d) some EO complaints and incidents were not reported up the chain of command; (6) the Defense Equal Opportunity Council (DEOC), in its May 1995 report, stated that although no single complaint process would be workable for all the services, some common standards should be followed; (7) DEOC also identified a number of opportunities for improving the military EO program, including the need to reduce servicemembers' fear of reprisal for filing a complaint; (8) based on focus group sessions conducted with servicemembers, GAO noted an overall sense that the military was a good EO employer and that although discrimination and harassment occur, these were not major problems; and (9) however, the focus groups also reinforced DEOC's concerns about problems with EO complaint systems.