The European Women and Sports (EWS) network aims at promoting work on equality in sports at national level and at disseminating information with European sports organisations and bodies. Under the chair of Austria during 2004-2006, the network has concentrated on promoting good governance in sports.
Based on the two year discussions on good governance, the seventh European Women and Sports conference held in Vienna on 24 March 2006 decided that it is of outmost importance to promote gender perspective in sports structures. Currently, not enough women take part in the decision making in sports clubs and federations. This leads to a situation where priority is given to male sports activities and infrastructures, which might be one of the reasons why women generally do less sports than men.
The goal of getting more women involved in the decision-making can, according to the EWS, be advanced by promoting the quality aspect in sports management. Quality sports requires highly educated coaches and sport officers. Accordingly, the appointments to these positions in clubs and federations need to be transparent and performance-based - opening doors for more women, who might otherwise think they are not suitable for the work.
Cyprus has now taken the EWS chair until 2009 and is set to respond to the request of these decisions by promoting quality through equality. The eight European Women and Sports conference will be held in Cyprus in 2009.
