13.06.2017

Guide to discriminatory practices in world football launched 

The first global guide on discriminatory practices in football has been launched to provide insight and support action to tackle discrimination and exclusion in world football ahead of the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup in Russia.

The Global Guide to Discriminatory Practices in Football lists and provides expertise on discriminatory acts inside football stadiums around the world to help supporters, football governing bodies, governments and others involved in the game to recognise and prevent discriminatory abuse.

The guide is the first of its kind in sport and is available in five languages - English, French, German, Spanish and Russian. It has been produced by the Fare network and combines submissions from leading experts with findings from the Fare/FIFA Anti-Discrimination Monitoring System during the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying competition.

Piara Powar, the Executive Director of Fare, said: “This guide is the first of its kind in sport and seeks to highlight the most common discriminatory practices in football across the world, from all six football confederations.

"The guide underlines forms of discrimination directed at ethnic minorities, LGBT+ people, women and the disabled. As such it is an important resource that we hope will help question discrimination, conscious and unconscious, and prevent actions that exclude, insult and erase the dignity of players, referees, coaches, fans and others through football.”

The new resource follows the Monitoring Discriminatory Signs and Symbols Guide, listing discriminatory practices in European football developed by Fare as an educational and awareness-raising tool.

The guide is launched as Russia prepares to host the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup, a test tournament for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, which will see observers present at every match from the Fare network.

As part of this system Fare will deploy experts trained on issues of discrimination at international football matches to record data and feed incidents into the FIFA regulatory system.

Report incident