OBSERVATORY AGAINST DISCRIMINATION IN SPORT-MAURO VALERI

Duration: 12 months: 1st October 2021 - 30th September 2022

Location: The project has national significance and involves 10 territorial committees:

• Bologna
• Cagliari
• Caserta
• Florence
• Genoa
• Matera
• Rome
• Turin
• Trento
• Vicenza

Applicant / Coordinator: The project is carried out by UISP APS

Funding body: UNAR- National Office Against Racial Discrimination at the Italian Presidency of the Council of Ministers

SUMMARY:

Discrimination in sport does not only concern professional sport and major events that receive wide media coverage, it also occurs in amateur sport. In this field, incidents are often linked to offenses that incite hatred to the point of violent acts. The 2010 FRA report also shows that only 16 Member States (out of 27 surveyed) have taken action in the event of racism and ethnic discrimination in sport. Although the problem is well known in football and is addressed by many European associations, in other sports this phenomenon is often overlooked and the availability of data is limited to major media reported incidents limiting knowledge of "everyday discrimination".

Furthermore, there is no common data comparison system shared by the various federations.

A similar situation occurs if you try to analyze what happens in activities promoted by grassroots sport (which has a movement of athletes far superior to professional sport): there is a lack of information on accidents occurring during competitions and tournaments or during training .

Given the role that grassroots sport plays in the various communities as an instrument of aggregation and socialization, a role played in particular by sports associations, it is essential to have certain and comparable data on what happens in the "suburban fields" (as they are often defined) , where episodes of discrimination in sporting practice risk having very wide repercussions in the reference community, exacerbating situations that are sometimes already very tense (for example in neighborhoods at high risk of marginalization, violence or radicalization).

Precisely by virtue of these considerations, on 31 July 2020, UNAR signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the UISP and the Lunaria Association for the launch of the "National Observatory against discrimination in sport - Mauro Valeri".

OBJECTIVES:

1. Identify 10 Uisp local committees to act as sentinels against discrimination in the world of sport
2. Promote the activities of the Observatory on the territory
3. Collect data on episodes of discrimination in the world of sport, starting with the basic amateur one
4. Support ASDs in carrying out anti-racist actions and projects
5. Collect the best practices on the territory

PROJECT ACTIONS:

1. Selection of 10 UISP local committees which, on the basis of their experience in the management of activities against discrimination, will act as territorial offices ("nodes") to collect and monitor discriminatory episodes in amateur and amateur sport.
2. Update and in-depth webinar addressed to athletes, coaches, match judges, sports managers of the ASD and SSD, in order to make them active subjects in monitoring and combating discriminatory episodes in the world of sport. The course will be organized and managed by qualified UISP experts, who will also make use of the support of Unar and Lunaria
3. Organization, with the participation of the 10 territorial nodes, of a local awareness campaign addressed to young people and aimed at education, integration and dissemination of the values of sport. Each UISP territorial node will organize a series of local meetings for sports managers, referees, judges, managers of sports facilities who will actively participate in the collection of data through: the transmission of referee reports, collection of any complaints in their sports facilities.

Report any discrimination suffered

 Contacts Territorial Nodes

For more info: progettazione@uisp.it