Women Still Face Barriers in Sport Despite Progress – Latest Research

Europe-wide data shows that women still struggle to gain recognition, leadership roles or fair compensation in sport. Research involving 21 countries also showed that increasing numbers of sports organisations (federations, governmental departments and Olympic and Paralympic committees) have identified social platforms as being a problem for gender-balanced representation of athletes.

The research, discussed at a joint Council of Europe (CoE) and European Union (EU) event in Luxembourg yesterday, reveals widely different approaches to the issue of gender equality. It was presented as part of the joint project ‘All in Plus’.

It looked at gender equality indicators in strategic fields: sport leadership; coaching and officiating; participation; gender-based violence; gender equality programmes and politicies – and media/communications. It was drafted by the Mediterranean Institute of Gender Studies (MIGS).

The research report states that the overarching goal of All In Plus ‘is to highlight the benefits of greater gender equality in sport. The key objectives are to ensure that the relative invisibility of women in sport and the ongoing lack of awareness about gender imbalance in sport and related issues are brought clearly to the forefront’.

Key findings include:

– Women remain significantly under-represented in the most powerful sport roles. Only 12-14% of sports federations have female presidents, with Sweden, Finland and Iceland ranking high. Sixty percent – including Israel (a CoE member), France and Albania – have targeted initiatives to recruit more women as decision-makers.

– Women and girls represent only 37% of all sport federation members (with Finland standing out with a 50% figure)

– Across all of the 21 jurisdictions 35% of organisations have taken action to promote gender-balanced representation in the media and only 28% have specific guidelines

– Regarding social platforms, 36% of organisations surveyed have targeted them indicating a ‘growing awareness of the role of social media in shaping public perceptions of gender in sports’.