In the past few years, gender inequality and gender-based violence in the sports environment have been brought in the spotlight, following the #MeToo movement
What did not receive as much public attention was the key role of sports education institutions in addressing these issues and as such the need to implement major structural reforms to advance gender equality and eradicate gender-based violence in the sports ecosystems.
Sports institutions play a key role, not only in teaching techniques and training future athletes, but also in instilling ethics and fair play in future players, trainers, administrators, etc., and there are no ethics without gender equality and violence-free play.
This key role has been highlighted since the 1990s by the Council of Europe, the European Parliament through “calls to introduce a gender perspective into policy and for sports institutions to adopt measures for the prevention and elimination of sexual harassment and abuse in sport.” This led to the obligation to introduce “teaching and training materials on gender equality and GBV in education curricula.”
SUPPORTER, funded by the European Commission, will play its part in achieving gender equality in the sports and European Research Area by developing innovative gender equality plans, with a strong attention to gender-based violence, in eight sports universities in Central and Eastern Europe.
