Non-Binary People in the Labor Market

An Integrative Literature Review

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.16930/2237-766220253618

Keywords:

Non-binary People, Labor Market, Inclusion, Organizations

Abstract

The article explores the experiences and challenges faced by non-binary individuals in the workplace. Non-binarism refers to gender identities that transcend the male-female binary, challenging the cisnormative structural norms of society. It is estimated that 1.19% of the Brazilian population identifies as non-binary, representing around 2.4 million people. Globally, this number could reach 160 million. The exclusion faced by these individuals in the labor market is exacerbated by organizational practices based on a binary view of gender. Norms such as bathroom segregation, promotions, and dress code policies perpetuate the marginalization of non-binary people. Furthermore, organizational literature still pays little attention to their experiences and challenges. Therefore, the study adopts Queer Theory and the notion of gender performativity to critically analyze the existing literature and discuss ways of inclusion. The review found 17 articles addressing the topic, highlighting the marginalization of these individuals and the lack of inclusive policies in global organizations. The research suggests that companies should promote gender diversity training and reconsider diversity management in the workplace. The review points to the need for more studies investigating how exorsexism manifests in the corporate environment and the legal implications of the omission of gender discrimination.

References

Acker, J. (1990). Hierarchies, Jobs, Bodies: A Theory of Gendered Organizations. Gender and Society, 4(2), 139–158. https://doi.org/10.1177/089124390004002002

Anderson, K. A. (2023). Cisnormative symbolic colonization and transgender and gender nonconforming individuals in the workplace. Gender, Work & Organization, 31(1), 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.13048

Barbosa, I. I. (2023). Trajetórias e experiências de pessoas não-binaries: Reflexões teóricas para a construção de uma agenda de pesquisa. Revista Zabelê, 4(1).

Butler, J. (2002). Gender trouble. Routledge.

Butler, J. (2018). Problemas de gênero: feminismo e subversão da identidade. Editora José Olympio.

Butler, J. (2024). Quem tem medo do gênero?. Boitempo Editorial.

Cavalcanti, C., Barbosa, R. B., & Bicalho, P. P. G. (2018). Os tentáculos da tarântula: Abjeção e necropolítica em operações policiais a travestis no Brasil pós-redemocratização. Psicologia: Ciência e Profissão, 38, 175–191. https://doi.org/10.1590/1982-3703000212043

Círico, Juh. (2024). Vozes da resistência: vivências de pessoas transgêneras e travestis na contabilidade brasileira. [Tese de Doutorado em Ciências Contábeis, Universidade Federal de Uberlândia]. Repositório Institucional. http://doi.org/10.14393/ufu.te.2024.280

Círico, J., & Galvão, A. A. (2021). Não há vagas: discussão sobre os desafios enfrentados por transgêneros, travestis e transexuais no mercado de trabalho formal no Brasil. Cadernos de Gênero e Tecnologia, 14(44), 374–390. http://dx.doi.org/10.3895/cgt.v14n44.13669

Darwin, H. (2020). Challenging the Cisgender/Transgender Binary: Nonbinary People and the Transgender Label. Gender & Society, 34, 357–380. https://doi.org/10.1177/0891243220912256

Donders, M., (2020). “He, She or They – Does it matter in the workplace?”, EWOP in Practice, 12(1), 39–55. https://doi.org/10.21825/ewopinpractice.87121

Enogieru, I., Blewitt-Golsch, A. L., Hart, L. J., LeGrand, S., Whetten, K., Ostbye, T., & Johnson, C. Y. (2024). Prevalence and correlates of workplace violence: descriptive results from the National Transgender Discrimination Survey. Occupational and environmental medicine, 81(4), 178–183. https://doi.org/10.1136/oemed-2023-109197

Fausto-Sterling, A. (2006). The five sexes, revisited. In T. E. Ore, & P. Kurtz. The social construction of difference and inequality. Mayfield Publishing.

Fletcher, L., & Marvell, R. (2022). Furthering transgender inclusion in the workplace: advancing a new model of allyship intentions and perceptions. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 34(9), 1726–1756. https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2021.2023895

Fletcher, L., & Swierczynski, J. (2023). Non-binary gender identity expression in the workplace and the role of supportive HRM practices, co-worker allyship, and job autonomy. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 1–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2023.2284191

Foucault, M. (2013). Vigiar e punir. Leya.

Foucault, M. (2011). Microfísica do poder. Paz & Terra.

Freitas, A. L. S. (2013). Dicionário Paulo Freire. Belo Horizonte: Editora Autêntica. Revista Lusófona de Educação, (24), 203–206.

Galvão, A. A. (2023). Exorsexismo: Desconstruindo Preconceitos Contra Pessoas Não Binárias. Núcleo FEA de Pesquisa e Extensão em Gênero, Raça e Sexualidade - Generas USP. https://generas-usp.com

Galvão, A. A., & Círico, J. (2025). A non-binary body in accounting. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 38(1), 445–446. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-01-2025-254

García Johnson, C. P., & Otto, K. (2022). Illegitimate tasks: obstacles to trans equality at work. Gender in Management: An International Journal, 37(6), 763–781. https://doi.org/10.1108/GM-02-2020-0055

Goryunova, E., Schwartz, A. K., & Turesky, E. F. (2021). Exploring workplace experiences of transgender individuals in the USA. Gender in Management: An International Journal, 37(6), 732–750. https://doi.org/10.1108/GM-02-2020-0055

Gutierres, S. M., & Lordello, S. R. (2023). Empregabilidade e diversidade: uma análise das experiências profissionais de travestis, transexuais e não-binárias. Revista Brasileira da Educação Profissional e Tecnológica, 2(23). https://doi.org/10.15628/rbept.2023.12741

Halberstam, J. (2021). The Queer Art of Failure. Multitudes, 82(1), 205–213.

Hennekam, S., & Köllen, T. (2023). Trapped in cisnormative and binarist gendered constraints at work? How HR managers react to and manage gender transitions over time. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 1–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2023.2255824

Huffman, A. H., Mills, M. J., Howes, S. S., & Albritton, M. D. (2021). Workplace support and affirming behaviors: Moving toward a transgender, gender diverse, and non-binary friendly workplace. International Journal of Transgender Health, 22(3), 225–242. https://doi.org/10.1080/26895269.2020.1861575

Jesus, J. G. (2019). Xica Manicongo: a transgeneridade toma a palavra. Revista Docência e cibercultura, 3(1), 250–260. https://doi.org/10.12957/redoc.2019.41817

Johnson, I. R., Pietri, E. S., Buck, D. M., & Daas, R. (2021). What’s in a pronoun: Exploring gender pronouns as an organizational identity-safety cue among sexual and gender minorities. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 97, 104194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2021.104194

Jones, A. (2023). Cisgendered workspaces: Outright and categorical exclusion in cisgendered organizations. Social Problems. https://doi.org/10.1093/socpro/spad017

Laqueur, T. (2001). Inventando o sexo. Relume Dumará.

Losty, M., & O'connor, J. (2018). Falling outside of the ‘nice little binary box’: a psychoanalytic exploration of the non-binary gender identity. Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, 32, 40–60. https://doi.org/10.1080/02668734.2017.1384933

Marinho, S. (2017). Juventude (s) trans: subjetividades e corporalidades possíveis no mundo do trabalho?. O Social em Questão, 20(38), 111–131.

Melo, B. A., Oliveira, T. A., Silva, C,. Pereira, C. E., & Chiareto, J. (2022). Diversidade no ambiente organizacional: a inclusão e permanência de transgêneros no mercado de trabalho brasileiro. Caderno de Administração, 30(1), 47–64.

Mehta, M. & Kappal, J. M. (2025), "Good, bad and ugly experiences of non-binary gender inclusion at the workplace to frame employee value proposition", Personnel Review, 54(2). https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-10-2023-0878

Miller, J. (1999). Changing Ones: Third and Fourth Genders in Native North America Will Roscoe. Journal of Anthropological Research, 55(1), 160–162. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3630989

Moulin de Souza, E., & Parker, M. (2022). Practices of freedom and the disruption of binary genders: Thinking with trans. Organization, 29(1), 67–82. https://doi.org/10.1177/1350508420935602

Nascimento, L. (2021). Transfeminismo (1ª ed.). Editora Jandaíra.

O’Shea, S. C. (2019). Cutting my dick off. Culture and Organization, 25(4), 272–283. https://doi.org/10.1080/14759551.2019.1608203

O’Shea, S. C. (2020). Working at gender? An autoethnography. Gender, Work & Organization, 27(6), 1438–1449. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12513

Ozturk, M. B., & Tatli, A. (2015). Gender identity inclusion in the workplace: broadening diversity management research and practice through the case of transgender employees in the UK. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 27(8), 781–802. https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2015.1042902

Preciado, P. B. (2022). Eu sou o monstro que vos fala: Relatório para uma academia de psicanalistas. Editora Schwarcz-Companhia das Letras.

Prunas, A. (2019). The pathologization of trans-sexuality: Historical roots and implications for sex counselling with transgender clients. Sexologies, 28(3), e54–e60. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sexol.2019.06.001

Reis, G. M. M. D. (2022). Direito de ser e envelhecer: a aposentadoria programável de pessoas não-binárias no Regime Geral da Previdência Social. Escola de Direito, Turismo e Museologia, Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto.

Scott, J. (2017). Gênero: uma categoria útil de análise histórica. Educação & Realidade, 20(2). https://seer.ufrgs.br/index.php/educacaoerealidade/article/view/71721

Segato, R. L. (2012). Gênero e colonialidade: em busca de chaves de leitura e de um vocabulário estratégico descolonial. E-cadernos ces, (18). https://doi.org/10.4000/eces.1533

Silva, A. W. L. D. (2021). Identidades legitimamente diversas: um estudo pela visibilidade inclusiva da não-binariedade de gênero. [Tese de Doutorado - Programa de Pós-Graduação em Filosofia do Direito e Teoria Geral do Direito, Faculdade de Direito, Universidade de São Paulo]. Repositório Institucional. https://doi.org/10.11606/T.2.2021.tde-23092022-080858

Spade, D. (2015). Normal life: Administrative violence, critical trans politics, and the limits of law. Duke University Press.

Spizzirri, G., Eufrásio, R., Lima, M.C.P. (2021). Proportion of people identified as transgender and non-binary gender in Brazil. Sci Rep 11, 2240. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-81411-4

Suhomlinova, O., O’Shea, S. C., & Boncori, I. (2024). Rethinking gender diversity: Transgender and gender nonconforming people and gender as constellation. Gender, Work & Organization, 31(5), 1766-1785. https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.13073

Trotter, M. and Yates, J. (2024), Belonging beyond the binary: the positive experiences of visible non-binary and genderqueer individuals in the workplace. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/EDI-10-2023-0359

Torraco, R. J. (2016). Writing integrative literature reviews: Using the past and present to explore the future. Human resource development review, 15(4), 404-428. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484316671606

Torraco, R. J. (2005). Writing integrative literature reviews: Guidelines and examples. Human resource development review, 4(3), 356-367. https://doi.org/10.1177/153448430527828

Waite, S. (2021). Should I stay or should I go? Employment discrimination and workplace harassment against transgender and other minority employees in Canada’s federal public service. Journal of homosexuality, 68(11), 1833-1859. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918369.2020.1712140

Published

2025-05-06

How to Cite

Galvão, A. A., Nova, S. P. de C. C., & Círico, J. (2025). Non-Binary People in the Labor Market: An Integrative Literature Review. Revista Catarinense Da Ciência Contábil, 24, e3618. https://doi.org/10.16930/2237-766220253618

Issue

Section

Articles