Gender Equality in Sport: Legal Frameworks, Structural Inequalities and the Limits of Institutional Governance

1. Introduction

Gender equality is firmly established within contemporary international human rights law. Its application to sport, however, remains considerably less straightforward.

Sport is commonly presented as a field governed by fairness, merit and equal competition. The institutions that organise it have not developed on an equal historical footing. Women have gained access to an increasingly broad range of sporting activities, but access alone has not produced equal participation in the distribution of resources, professional opportunities or institutional authority.

That distinction matters.

A woman may have the formal right to compete and still encounter barriers affecting sponsorship, remuneration, media exposure, career progression or access to leadership. The legal right exists. The conditions in which that right is exercised may nevertheless remain unequal.

The problem is therefore not confined to explicit discrimination. In many sporting systems, inequality is reproduced through institutional practices that appear neutral when examined individually but produce unequal effects when considered collectively. Recruitment networks, investment decisions, competition structures, professional pathways and media priorities can all contribute to that process (Burton, 2015; Claringbould & Knoppers, 2012).

Formal equality remains indispensable. It is also insufficient.

The distinction between formal and substantive equality provides the appropriate starting point. Formal equality requires comparable legal treatment and protection against unjustified discrimination. Substantive equality asks a different question: whether the institutional and social conditions surrounding the exercise of those rights allow equality to become effective.

This distinction has particular force in sport because sporting opportunities are not distributed in a vacuum. Historical patterns of investment and participation influence present outcomes. Present outcomes, in turn, can be used to justify future decisions concerning investment, visibility and resource allocation. Inequality can consequently become self-reinforcing.

International law has responded by progressively expanding the understanding of equality. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) provides a foundational framework, while international sports organisations have developed policies intended to increase women’s participation and representation. The European Union has moved in the same direction, combining equality principles with policy coordination, funding and monitoring.

The normative framework has therefore developed considerably.

Implementation has not kept pace.

Recent European evidence makes the point difficult to dismiss. The 2025 All In Plus project, based on data from 21 jurisdictions, found that women represented only 12% of sports federation presidents and 29% of vice-presidents or board members. Women accounted for 23% of registered coaches and 32% of sports officials. At the policy level, 67% of organisations included gender equality in their long-term plans, but only 34% had a written policy or action plan (Council of Europe, 2025).

These figures do not merely document inequality. They raise a governance question.

The issue is broader than participation. It concerns power.

This article examines that problem through the interaction of international human rights law, European policy, national regulation and sports governance. Particular attention is given to economic inequality, media visibility, professional development and women’s representation in decision-making structures.

The argument is not that the existing framework has failed. That would overlook substantial legal and institutional progress. The more precise conclusion is that the framework remains incomplete because it has developed stronger mechanisms for recognising equality than for demonstrating its implementation.

This article therefore proposes a shift from equality as a declared objective to equality as an institutional responsibility.

Such a shift does not require the abandonment of sports autonomy. Nor does it require identical outcomes across different sporting disciplines. It requires something more limited and, from a governance perspective, more defensible: institutions should be able to demonstrate what they are doing to identify, explain and address persistent gender disparities.

The central proposition is consequently straightforward. In the institutional context examined here, substantive equality is strengthened when the institutions governing sport are required to demonstrate how equality is being made effective in practice.

2. Methodological and Conceptual Framework

The relationship between gender equality and sport cannot be adequately examined through legal doctrine alone. The relevant rules are embedded in institutional structures, economic relationships and governance practices that influence how those rules operate.

This article adopts a critical doctrinal and conceptual approach, supported by selected institutional and empirical evidence.

The legal analysis focuses on primary and institutional sources concerning equality and non-discrimination, together with policy instruments adopted by major sports organisations. Institutional reports are used where they provide comparative data directly relevant to the governance dimensions examined in the article.

That relationship is central to the argument.

International federations and other sporting bodies are not legislative institutions in the conventional sense. Their regulatory authority is nevertheless considerable. They determine eligibility, organise competitions, influence professional structures and distribute opportunities. Their rules can therefore affect interests that extend well beyond the technical organisation of sport.

The analysis proceeds comparatively across three levels: international, European and national. Italy is used as a national reference point because its constitutional framework provides a particularly clear distinction between formal equality and the removal of substantive obstacles to equal participation.

The conceptual framework rests on the distinction between formal and substantive equality. Formal equality asks whether individuals are treated according to the same legal standard. Substantive equality examines whether apparently equal rules operate within conditions that remain structurally unequal.

The latter requires attention to several dimensions of sporting activity: participation, economic resources, professional development, media visibility and institutional representation. These dimensions should not be examined separately. They interact.

Limited investment can reduce visibility. Reduced visibility can weaken commercial opportunities. Weaker commercial opportunities can then be invoked to justify lower investment. Similarly, limited access to leadership can affect the priorities through which resources and opportunities are subsequently distributed.

The article therefore treats implementation as part of the legal problem rather than as an administrative question external to it.

The existence of an equality policy does not establish its effectiveness. A target does not demonstrate compliance. A commitment does not, by itself, create accountability.

The analysis consequently asks four questions throughout the article: What does the relevant framework require? Which institution is responsible? How is progress measured? What happens when significant disparities persist?

The final question is particularly important.

A regulatory system may recognise equality in principle while providing few mechanisms through which institutional performance can be assessed. Where that occurs, equality risks remaining declaratory.

The proposed accountability model responds to this problem by connecting normative recognition with institutional responsibility, measurement, transparency, scrutiny and proportionate response.

This is also where the article’s theoretical contribution begins to emerge. The argument is not that accountability is simply a useful administrative technique. It is that, where sporting institutions exercise substantial regulatory and distributive power, substantive equality requires an institutional architecture capable of making equality measurable and reviewable.

3. Gender Equality as a Principle of International Sports Law

Gender equality in sport forms part of a wider development in international human rights law. Sporting institutions may possess regulatory autonomy, but they do not operate outside the normative environment created by fundamental rights.

The principle of non-discrimination is the starting point. International human rights instruments recognise equality between women and men as a condition of effective participation in social, economic and cultural life. Sport belongs within that wider sphere.

CEDAW is particularly significant. Adopted in 1979, it requires States to eliminate discrimination against women and to adopt measures capable of ensuring their effective participation across different areas of public and social life. Article 10 is especially relevant to education and physical education. More broadly, the Convention reflects an understanding of equality in which formal neutrality cannot always be separated from structural conditions (United Nations, 1979).

That observation translates directly into the sporting context.

Women’s participation has expanded considerably. The institutional structures within which that participation occurs have changed more slowly. The historical predominance of men in competition, administration and governance continues to influence access to authority and resources.

The International Olympic Committee provides one example of this evolution through its gender-equality and inclusion policies. International federations have followed a similar path, although unevenly.

Their importance should not be underestimated. These organisations determine competition rules, eligibility requirements, development programmes and access to international sporting opportunities. Their regulatory decisions can therefore shape the professional and economic position of athletes.

This creates a distinctive legal tension.

Sports organisations insist, with good reason, on the autonomy required to regulate international competition. Yet the consequences of their decisions may extend into areas governed by equality and fundamental-rights principles.

Autonomy is therefore relevant, but it is not dispositive.

The fact that a sporting organisation is privately constituted does not eliminate the consequences of its regulatory choices. Where an organisation controls access to competitions or professional opportunities, its decisions may affect interests that the broader legal order protects.

FIFA’s Women’s Football Strategy 2024–2027 illustrates the increasing institutional recognition of this responsibility. FIFA’s strategy addresses development and growth, professionalisation, commercialisation, governance and leadership, and other dimensions of women’s football. It also establishes measurable objectives, including the aim of increasing female participation to 60 million players by 2027 (FIFA, 2024).

This development is important because it marks a movement away from general declarations towards institutional targets.

Yet targets remain only one part of the problem.

The international framework now contains three increasingly visible elements: non-discrimination, substantive equality and institutional responsibility. The unresolved question is how effectively these elements are connected.

That question leads directly to the distinction between formal and substantive equality.

4. From Formal Equality to Substantive Equality

Formal equality remains the necessary starting point of any legal analysis of discrimination. It cannot, however, be the endpoint.

The reason is simple. Equal treatment can operate within unequal conditions.

Sport demonstrates this particularly well. Women may enjoy the same formal right to participate while encountering materially different conditions in relation to coaching, facilities, remuneration, sponsorship, media exposure or access to leadership.

The problem is therefore not always the rule itself. It may lie in the structure surrounding the rule.

This is why substantive equality matters.

Substantive equality does not require identical outcomes. Nor does it assume that every difference between men’s and women’s sport is evidence of discrimination. Fredman’s multidimensional framework is useful here because it directs attention not only to disadvantage, but also to stigma and stereotyping, voice and participation, and the structural accommodation required to make equality effective (Fredman, 2016).

The relevant issue is narrower: whether significant and persistent disparities can be objectively explained, and whether institutions are addressing those elements of the disparity that they can reasonably influence.

The All In Plus evidence makes the distinction visible. Women accounted for 12% of federation presidencies and 29% of vice-presidential or board positions across the participating jurisdictions. Women also represented 23% of registered coaches and 32% of officials (Council of Europe, 2025).

These figures do not establish that every underlying difference is discriminatory. They do establish that formal access has not produced balanced participation across the institutional hierarchy.

Participation is therefore necessary, but it is not sufficient.

The same applies to economic equality. Different revenues may reflect different audience sizes or broadcasting markets. That explanation may be legitimate. It does not follow that institutional decisions have played no role in producing the difference.

Investment can affect visibility; visibility can influence sponsorship; and sponsorship can, in turn, affect future investment.

These interactions may create a reinforcing institutional cycle.

Jensen and Smith’s 2024 analysis is useful here because their study of more than 750 event title sponsorships found that sponsors were just as likely to renew sponsorships involving women’s events as comparable men’s events, after controlling for relevant factors. The finding does not prove that women’s sport is commercially identical to men’s sport. It does, however, challenge the assumption that lower commercial confidence is an inevitable consequence of women’s sport itself (Jensen & Smith, 2024).

A similar problem appears in media representation. Fink’s review of women’s sport media coverage identifies persistent quantitative and qualitative differences in the treatment of female athletes and men’s sport (Fink, 2015). Coverage can increase dramatically during major events without producing comparable visibility throughout the ordinary sporting calendar.

The question is not simply whether women appear.

It is whether they remain visible.

The distinction also matters in governance. A woman may be formally eligible for election to a federation board while remaining structurally less likely to reach the position. Eligibility is a legal condition. It is not proof of equal access to institutional power. Burton’s review demonstrates how institutional practices, stereotypes and organisational cultures contribute to women’s underrepresentation in sports leadership (Burton, 2015).

For that reason, substantive equality requires attention to the processes through which opportunities are distributed.

Recruitment networks matter. Financial allocation matters. Career pathways matter. Media practices matter. Governance matters.

The same conclusion emerges across all these areas: formal equality removes an explicit barrier; substantive equality asks whether the structure beyond that barrier remains unequal.

This is not merely a conceptual distinction. It changes how institutional performance should be assessed.

An equality policy without measurable indicators is difficult to evaluate. A target without monitoring can remain aspirational. A commitment without responsibility can remain symbolic.

Substantive equality therefore requires an institutional architecture capable of identifying disparities, explaining them and responding to them.

5. Sport Governance and Institutional Accountability

The transition from formal to substantive equality inevitably raises a broader question concerning the governance of sport. If sporting organisations are expected to translate equality principles into practical outcomes, their institutional structures must also be capable of assuming responsibility for the consequences of their regulatory and organisational decisions.

Contemporary sport is characterised by a complex distribution of authority. Public authorities, international organisations, national federations, professional leagues, clubs and other entities exercise different forms of control over participation, competitions, employment, funding and professional development.

Gender equality is consequently not determined by a single institution or legal instrument.

The autonomy of sport has traditionally represented one of the defining characteristics of this system. Such autonomy has contributed to the development of coherent international competition. It cannot, however, be understood as an institutional space in which fundamental principles of equality cease to apply.

Autonomy and accountability are not necessarily competing principles. Properly understood, accountability provides a condition for the legitimacy of autonomy. An organisation exercising significant regulatory power should be capable of explaining how that power is exercised, identifying the standards against which its decisions can be evaluated and demonstrating that its institutional policies are implemented consistently.

The 2025 All In Plus project exposes the difficulty. While 59% of sports organisations had taken action to increase women’s representation, only 12% of federations had a female president. At policy level, 67% included gender equality in long-term plans, but only 34% had a written policy or action plan; only 56% of organisations with a plan reported a monitoring and evaluation mechanism, and only 39% allocated financial resources (Council of Europe, 2025).

Recognition has therefore moved faster than implementation.

This is not an argument against policy strategies. It is an argument for accountability.

The same point emerges from research on sports governance. Pape and Schoch’s study of the Union Cycliste Internationale shows how gender-equality initiatives are shaped by organisational power relations, coalitions and the historical accumulation of advantage within the governance field (Pape & Schoch, 2023). Equality policy cannot therefore be detached from the institutional environment in which policy is made.

Representation should also be understood beyond numerical presence. A governing body may include several women while the most significant positions remain concentrated elsewhere. The relevant question is not simply how many women are present, but where decision-making power is located.

Transparency is consequently essential. Relevant information concerning participation, remuneration, leadership, investment and media exposure must be collected if institutional performance is to be evaluated. Transparency, however, is an information condition rather than accountability itself.

Following Bovens (2007), accountability is understood here as a relationship between an institutional actor and a forum before which the actor must explain and justify its conduct, may be questioned and assessed, and may face an appropriate consequence. Reporting therefore functions as an information mechanism; monitoring as an evaluative mechanism; independent review as a scrutiny mechanism; and corrective response as a possible consequence. Recent scholarship on sport organisations likewise shows that accountability remains conceptually fragmented and requires clearer theoretical specification (France et al., 2024).

The relevant forum depends on the source of the institution’s authority and the applicable legal or governance framework. Depending on context, it may be an internal governance body, a stakeholder or athlete representative body, an independent reviewer, a funding or accreditation authority, or a public authority where legally competent.

The future of gender equality in sport should not be framed as a choice between public regulation and sporting autonomy.

The more productive approach is regulated autonomy: in this article, a proposed governance model rather than an established legal doctrine. Institutions retain their legitimate regulatory functions, but those functions operate within minimum standards of equality, transparency and accountability.

6. Economic Inequality, Media Visibility and Career Progression

Economic inequality is one of the most visible dimensions of gender inequality in sport, but it is also one of the easiest to oversimplify.

Differences in revenue, audience size and broadcasting value are real. They matter. Yet they do not provide a complete explanation for the distribution of investment and opportunity.

A market is not an independent force operating outside institutional decisions. Sporting organisations influence scheduling, promotion, competition structures, broadcasting arrangements and development programmes. Those decisions help shape the market in which women’s sport subsequently competes.

The relationship can therefore become circular.

Lower investment may reduce visibility. Reduced visibility may affect sponsorship. Lower sponsorship may then be invoked to justify lower investment.

That cycle is not proof that every economic disparity is discriminatory. It indicates that economic outcomes cannot always be treated as independent of governance.

Sponsorship is particularly revealing. Jensen and Smith (2024), analysing more than 750 event title sponsorships, found that sponsors were just as likely to renew women’s-event sponsorships as men’s-event sponsorships after controlling for relevant factors. The finding is important because it complicates a common assumption: that women’s sport is inherently a weaker commercial proposition.

The point is not that the commercial market has become gender-neutral.

It has not.

The point is that commercial performance can be influenced by institutional opportunity, and that women’s sport should not be evaluated through assumptions that the empirical evidence does not necessarily support.

Media visibility operates in a similar way. Fink (2015) documents persistent differences in the quantity and quality of media treatment of female athletes. Visibility matters because it contributes to audience formation, sponsorship, athlete recognition and the commercial development of competitions.

But visibility should not be measured only during major international events.

A sporting system can produce temporary parity during an Olympic Games or World Cup and still maintain a substantial imbalance across the ordinary calendar. Structural visibility requires continuity.

Career progression adds another dimension. Professional sport increasingly involves employment relationships, commercial contracts and long-term career planning. For women, pregnancy and parenthood may intersect with these structures in ways that are not adequately addressed by a formal equality rule.

The issue is therefore not whether maternity is a private matter. It is whether the professional structure of sport has been designed around a career model that assumes uninterrupted participation.

Where that assumption operates, formally neutral arrangements may produce unequal effects.

The Italian reform of sporting work is relevant here. Legislative Decree No. 36 of 2021 created a more structured framework for sporting employment and professional relationships, including specific regulation of sporting work (Italy, 2021). The reform does not itself resolve gender inequality. It does, however, provide a stronger legal basis from which questions of contractual protection and career continuity can be addressed.

Economic equality, media visibility and career progression should therefore not be treated as separate policy areas.

They are connected.

A woman who receives less media exposure may receive fewer commercial opportunities. A woman with weaker commercial opportunities may have less capacity to sustain a professional career. A woman who leaves professional sport earlier is then less likely to reach coaching, administrative or governance positions.

Inequality can reproduce itself across the career cycle.

The regulatory response should therefore examine the whole pathway rather than one isolated outcome.

7. Women in Sports Governance: Representation and Decision-Making

The distribution of decision-making power is one of the most important dimensions of gender equality in sport.

Women’s participation as athletes has increased substantially. Their representation within the institutions responsible for governing sport has not developed at the same pace.

This disparity matters because governance is not merely an administrative layer placed above sporting activity. Governing bodies establish strategic priorities, allocate resources, regulate competitions and influence professional development.

Who governs sport therefore matters to how equality is produced within sport.

Burton’s review shows that women’s underrepresentation in leadership cannot be explained by a single cause. Institutionalised gender practices, stereotypes, organisational cultures and career structures operate at different levels (Burton, 2015). Pape and Schoch similarly show that international sports governance can preserve historically accumulated advantages through the strategic relations of organisations and actors within the field (Pape & Schoch, 2023).

The implication is important.

A woman may be legally eligible for a leadership position and still encounter a structure in which reaching that position is significantly less likely.

The distinction between eligibility and access should therefore remain central.

Representation itself also requires careful definition. Descriptive representation concerns how many women occupy positions. Substantive representation concerns whether women have meaningful influence over decisions.

A federation may increase the number of women on a board without changing who controls strategic committees, financial decisions or executive authority.

Numerical presence is therefore necessary but not conclusive.

Institutional change requires attention to electoral procedures, recruitment networks, leadership development, mentoring, transparency and access to positions in which decisions are actually made.

Sotiriadou and de Haan’s study of international and national triathlon governance is particularly relevant because it identifies the role of organisational actors who actively challenge stereotypes and facilitate the implementation of gender-equity strategies (Sotiriadou & de Haan, 2019). Institutional change is not automatic. It depends upon actors capable of converting policy into organisational practice.

This suggests a broader principle: gender equality should not be delegated to a specialist committee and then removed from ordinary governance.

It should influence strategic planning, budgets, appointments, recruitment, competition development and evaluation.

Targets may be appropriate where persistent underrepresentation has been demonstrated. They should nevertheless be evidence-based, proportionate and periodically reviewed.

The objective is not to replace merit with arithmetic.

It is to recognise that merit is assessed through institutional procedures, and those procedures may themselves be shaped by historically gendered structures.

A more credible governance framework should therefore combine gender-disaggregated data, transparent selection procedures, measurable representation objectives, meaningful access to executive positions and periodic independent evaluation.

Women’s representation is not simply an additional indicator of equality.

It is part of the institutional capacity to produce equality.

8. The European Union Framework

The European Union provides a particularly useful regional framework because gender equality is embedded within its constitutional order while sport remains largely a field of supporting and coordinating competence.

Article 23 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights establishes that equality between women and men must be ensured in all areas, including employment, work and pay, while expressly permitting measures providing specific advantages for the under-represented sex (European Union, 2016). This provision is significant because it places equality beyond a purely negative prohibition and recognises the legitimacy of corrective measures.

The Union’s broader framework has developed through gender mainstreaming, anti-discrimination law and policy strategies. The Gender Equality Strategy 2020–2025 provided a central framework for the period, while the European Commission adopted the Roadmap for Women’s Rights on 7 March 2025 as a longer-term political framework for women’s rights and gender equality (European Commission, 2025).

Sport occupies a distinctive position within that framework. Article 165 TFEU provides for Union action that supports, coordinates and complements Member State action in sport while recognising the specific nature of sport. The Union therefore cannot simply replace national and sporting governance with a single harmonised sports regime.

Its influence operates through coordination, funding, policy development, monitoring and institutional cooperation.

The All In Plus project is a particularly important example of this approach. Jointly developed by the European Union and Council of Europe, the project collected data across 21 jurisdictions and examined six areas: leadership; coaching and officiating; participation; gender-based violence; media and communication; and gender-equality policies and programmes (Council of Europe, 2025).

The value of the project lies not only in its findings but in its method.

Gender equality becomes an object of institutional measurement.

That matters because a policy cannot be assessed solely by its language. It must also be examined through outcomes and implementation.

The All In Plus data show precisely where the implementation gap lies. Women remained underrepresented in leadership, coaching and officiating, while written equality plans and monitoring mechanisms remained considerably less common than general statements of commitment.

The European framework also illustrates the value of funding and coordination. Programmes such as Erasmus+ can encourage organisations to integrate gender equality into ordinary sporting activity rather than treating it as a separate project.

Yet European policy has the same limitation identified elsewhere in this article.

The Union can establish standards, provide resources and create monitoring frameworks. Much of the implementation still depends upon Member States and sports organisations.

The European framework therefore provides the ingredients of accountability without creating a single accountability regime.

That is both its limitation and its opportunity.

The next stage is not necessarily another general declaration. It is the connection of measurement, reporting and institutional responsibility across the different levels of European sport governance.

9. The Italian Legal and Institutional Framework

Italy provides a useful national case study because its constitutional framework expressly combines formal equality with a positive obligation to remove obstacles that prevent equality from becoming effective.

Article 3 of the Italian Constitution establishes equality before the law and requires the Republic to remove economic and social obstacles that limit freedom and equality and prevent the full development of the individual. Article 37 establishes equality in the employment relationship and provides protection concerning women’s work and remuneration.

The constitutional framework therefore supports the distinction developed in this article.

Equality is not exhausted by identical treatment.

The State also has responsibility for addressing the conditions that prevent equal participation.

The reform of Italian sports law is relevant to this framework. Legislative Decree No. 36 of 28 February 2021 reorganised important aspects of professional and amateur sporting entities and sporting work, creating a more structured legal framework for employment and professional relationships in sport (Italy, 2021).

This development matters for gender equality because the legal regulation of sporting work shapes the contractual and social-protection conditions within which career continuity can be addressed.

The reform does not, by itself, eliminate gender disparities. Law cannot create substantive equality simply by changing the legal classification of sporting work. It can, however, alter the conditions within which professional inequalities are addressed.

The Italian sporting system also demonstrates the complexity of institutional autonomy. CONI and the national sports federations exercise regulatory and organisational functions within the framework established by Italian sports law.

This creates the same accountability question identified at international level.

Who is responsible when inequality persists?

The answer cannot always be “the legal system”. The legal system may establish the framework while the relevant sporting institution controls implementation.

Leadership is one example. Formal eligibility for federation office does not establish equal access to institutional power. Recruitment, electoral procedures, professional networks and access to executive functions remain relevant.

Economic equality raises a similar issue. Differences in remuneration cannot automatically be classified as unlawful discrimination because revenues, broadcasting and commercial conditions differ between disciplines. Yet those differences should not be treated as beyond institutional influence.

The appropriate question is whether the criteria governing allocation and remuneration are transparent, objectively justified and capable of review.

Media representation also requires a distinction between visibility at major events and continuous coverage. Temporary attention may increase public awareness without changing the ordinary structure of sports journalism.

Italy therefore confirms the broader argument of the article.

The country possesses a substantial legal foundation for gender equality. What remains less certain is the capacity of the institutions governing sport to translate that foundation into measurable outcomes.

The issue is not the absence of law.

It is the distance between law and institutional practice.

10. The Limits of Self-Regulation in International Sport

The autonomy of sport has legitimate foundations. International federations require sufficient independence to regulate competitions, maintain technical standards and operate across different national jurisdictions.

The difficulty begins when autonomy is treated as a complete answer to questions of institutional responsibility.

A sporting organisation may be private in legal form and still exercise substantial regulatory power. It may determine who competes, under which conditions, with which resources and through which institutional structures. The consequences of those decisions can extend into employment, economic opportunity and fundamental rights.

The distinction between private form and public consequence is therefore important.

It does not follow that sporting organisations should be treated as public authorities in every context. It does follow that the exercise of significant regulatory power should be accompanied by appropriate standards of transparency and accountability.

Voluntary equality commitments illustrate the difficulty.

A commitment can express institutional intention. It does not necessarily establish institutional responsibility.

The All In Plus findings are instructive. Although two-thirds of organisations included gender equality in long-term plans, only one-third reported a written policy or action plan, and only 56% of organisations with a plan had a monitoring and evaluation mechanism (Council of Europe, 2025).

The problem is not that organisations have failed to recognise equality.

They have recognised it.

The problem is that recognition does not consistently produce implementation.

Internal monitoring is necessary, but it may not be sufficient where the organisation determines both the standard and the evaluation of its own performance.

Independent scrutiny can therefore strengthen, rather than undermine, institutional autonomy.

Such scrutiny could involve public authorities, independent experts, athlete representatives, funding bodies or accreditation mechanisms. The purpose would not be to manage competitions from outside. It would be to test whether equality commitments are being implemented.

Funding is particularly relevant. Where public resources support sporting organisations, proportionate equality and reporting requirements can be attached to those resources. The same principle can apply to accreditation or development programmes.

Athlete representation provides another safeguard. Athletes experience the consequences of institutional decisions directly. Their participation can therefore reveal problems that organisational statistics do not fully capture.

The appropriate model is consequently neither state control nor unrestricted self-regulation.

It is regulated autonomy.

Under that model, sporting organisations retain responsibility for technical and organisational governance while operating within minimum standards concerning equality, transparency and accountability.

Autonomy without accountability risks institutional opacity.

Accountability without autonomy risks disproportionate external intervention.

The task is to hold the two together.

11. Towards an Accountability-Based Model of Gender Equality

The preceding analysis suggests that the principal weakness of contemporary gender-equality governance is not the absence of normative recognition. It is the absence of a sufficiently clear connection between recognition and institutional responsibility.

This article therefore proposes an accountability-based model of substantive equality.

The model begins with an analytical architecture:

formal equality → substantive equality → structural analysis → institutional power → institutional responsibility → accountability → demonstrable implementation.

The sequence is analytical rather than causal. It identifies the institutional questions that arise when substantive equality is assessed within autonomous governance structures.

Formal equality establishes the prohibition of unjustified discrimination. Substantive equality requires attention to the conditions in which rights are exercised. Structural analysis may reveal why identical legal treatment leaves unequal conditions intact, including where historically embedded structural inequalities shape the conditions in which rights are exercised. Institutional power identifies the organisations capable of influencing those conditions. Institutional responsibility concerns the conditions within an institution’s reasonable sphere of control. Accountability then provides the relationship through which the exercise of that responsibility can be explained, scrutinised and assessed.

Fredman’s framework supplies the substantive equality dimension of the model, while Bovens supplies its accountability relationship. The present article connects the two through institutional scrutiny: substantive equality identifies the dimensions of disadvantage to be examined; accountability identifies the relationship through which the responsible institution must explain and justify how it has exercised its relevant powers (Fredman, 2016; Bovens, 2007).

The analytical architecture identifies the relationship among equality, structure, institutional power and accountability. The operational model then translates that architecture into six institutional requirements.

The first requirement is therefore the allocation of responsibility.

Each equality objective should have an identifiable institutional owner. A federation should be responsible for the equality implications of the rules and programmes it controls. Clubs should assume responsibility for employment and professional conditions within their authority. Public institutions should establish and enforce the general legal framework.

Responsibility without measurement remains difficult to evaluate.

The second requirement is therefore measurable standards.

A gender-equality dashboard should monitor, at minimum, participation, progression, economic investment, remuneration, sponsorship, media exposure, governance, coaching and officiating, maternity and parental protection, and safeguarding.

The purpose is not to reduce equality to a single score.

It is to make structural differences visible.

The third requirement is transparency. Organisations should publish periodic gender-disaggregated data and explain progress against established objectives. A lack of relevant data should itself be treated as a governance weakness.

The fourth element is the principle of explainable disparity.

A significant and persistent disparity should not automatically be classified as unlawful discrimination. Nor should it be accepted simply because it has existed for a long time. Explainable disparity is therefore not a synonym for substantive equality. It is an analytical trigger for institutional scrutiny.

The test has four dimensions. First, magnitude: what is the extent and material significance of the disparity within the relevant institutional context? Second, persistence: does it remain over time rather than reflect a temporary fluctuation? Third, institutional controllability: which of its causes fall within the institution’s reasonable sphere of influence? Fourth, institutional response: what measures have been adopted, and what change, if any, has followed.

Where the applicable governance or legal framework provides for such accountability, the relevant accountability framework should require the responsible institution to explain and justify the disparity. Explanation, however, is not equivalent to adequate justification. The relevant forum must be capable of scrutinising the explanation and assessing whether the disparity is adequately justified in light of the institution’s responsibilities and the applicable legal or governance standards.

This is a more demanding standard than either automatic equality or automatic deference to market outcomes. It asks whether the institution has exercised its power responsibly.

The fifth element is proportionate response. Where review identifies an inadequately justified disparity and institutional responsibility, the relevant forum may require or recommend a proportionate corrective response, according to the applicable legal or governance framework. Depending on the problem, this could involve targeted investment, revised recruitment, leadership-development measures, changes to competition structures, improved parental protection, media initiatives or safeguarding measures.

The sixth element is independent review. Internal ownership remains essential. External scrutiny can provide additional credibility and protection against self-assessment becoming the sole measure of institutional performance.

Internal ownership remains essential. External scrutiny provides credibility.

The model contains two distinct layers. Its institutional requirements are responsibility, measurement, transparency, scrutiny and response. Its operational process can proceed progressively through five stages: recognition → measurement → reporting → review → proportionate response.

This is not intended as a punitive sequence in which every failure immediately produces sanctions. The objective is progressive institutional responsibility. The appropriate forum depends on the source of the institution’s authority and the applicable legal or governance framework. It may be internal, stakeholder-based, independent, funding-related or public where legally competent.

The model also respects proportionality. Different sporting disciplines have different structures, markets and participation patterns. Substantive equality cannot therefore require identical outcomes in every context.

It can require something more defensible: significant and persistent disparities should be objectively explainable, transparently assessed and addressed where institutional action can reasonably influence them.

The theory can be expressed in a single proposition:

Substantive equality in autonomous sports governance is strengthened when persistent and significant gender disparities trigger an institutional process of explanation, scrutiny and proportionate response within the responsible organisation’s sphere of control.

That proposition is the principal theoretical contribution of this article.

It also explains why the concept of regulated autonomy is necessary. Autonomy remains legitimate, but its legitimacy depends increasingly upon responsible self-governance.

The final objective is not numerical symmetry.

It is institutional responsibility for the conditions under which equality is experienced.

12. Conclusion

Gender equality in sport has undergone substantial legal and institutional development. International human rights law has established equality and non-discrimination as fundamental principles. European institutions have developed increasingly detailed policy instruments. National legal systems have incorporated these principles, while sports organisations have adopted strategies concerning participation, leadership, professionalisation and development.

The progress is real.

The problem lies elsewhere.

Formal recognition has not yet produced substantive equality.

Women participate in sport at significant levels, yet their representation declines as institutional authority increases. Economic opportunities remain uneven. Media visibility is often concentrated around major events. Professional careers can be affected by structures that were not designed around the realities of women’s sporting lives.

These disparities are not necessarily produced by one discriminatory rule.

They are often produced by the interaction of rules, resources, institutional cultures and historical advantage.

That is why formal equality, although indispensable, cannot be the final measure of institutional success.

Substantive equality requires attention to the conditions under which rights are exercised.

The governance dimension is particularly important. Sports organisations determine strategic priorities, allocate resources and regulate opportunities. Their institutional choices therefore influence the conditions under which gender equality can either advance or remain stalled.

The principle of sports autonomy does not remove that responsibility.

Nor does substantive equality require the destruction of autonomy.

The appropriate model is regulated autonomy: sporting organisations retain legitimate regulatory independence while accepting minimum standards of transparency, measurement and accountability.

The accountability-based model proposed in this article develops that proposition.

It connects formal equality to substantive equality, substantive equality to structural analysis, structural analysis to institutional power, and institutional power to responsibility.

Its practical process is:

recognition → measurement → reporting → review → proportionate response.

The model does not assume that every difference between men’s and women’s sport is discriminatory. It asks instead whether significant and persistent disparities satisfy the four-part test of magnitude, persistence, institutional controllability and institutional response; whether the explanation offered amounts to adequate justification; and whether the responsible actor has taken a proportionate response to any unjustified disadvantage.

This approach avoids two equally problematic positions.

The first is to treat any disparity as proof of discrimination.

The second is to treat every disparity as a neutral consequence of the market or of sporting autonomy.

Neither is sufficient.

The stronger approach is to examine institutional responsibility.

That responsibility is particularly important because sports governance is no longer confined to technical competition. Modern sporting organisations influence employment, economic opportunity, professional development, media visibility and access to institutional power.

Gender equality should therefore be considered part of the legitimacy of sports governance itself.

The accountability architecture proposed here is theoretically derived rather than empirically validated. Its effectiveness therefore requires testing across different sporting systems, organisational forms and regulatory environments. Future empirical research should examine whether the proposed indicators and accountability relationships improve the identification, explanation and institutional response to persistent gender disparities.

The future of the field will depend less on the adoption of additional general declarations and more on whether existing commitments can be converted into measurable institutional practice.

The transition required is consequently clear:

from formal equality to substantive equality;

from policy commitment to institutional responsibility;

from self-regulation to accountable self-governance;

and from equality as a declared objective to equality as a demonstrable institutional outcome.

The question is no longer whether women have formally been given a place within sport.

The more demanding question is whether the sporting system has been organised so that women can enter, remain, compete, progress, lead and exercise institutional power on genuinely equitable terms.

That is where formal equality becomes substantive equality.

It is also where the future development of sports law should now be directed.