A Study on the Recognition of Athletes toward Human Rights Violations in Korea

Purpose: A new form of sports human rights platform is needed for policy-related officials, athletes, leaders, and parents to easily share information on sports human rights and to promote communication between the sports community and the outside. Research design, data, and methodology: Participants were collected from athletes (n=3,007) who were registered in Korean Sport & Olympic Committee. Participants were asked to respond the survey items measuring their experiences of human right violations in sport. Descriptive analysis, t-test, and ANOVA were used to analyze data. Results: The platform should include information on prevention and safety of human rights violations during sports activities, procedures and methods for reporting damage, countermeasures, leader education programs, human rights protection guidelines, roles and supervision of sports organizations and institutions, and related statues. It can form a community as well as exchange information in the Internet space through the operation of bulletin boards by professional athletes, student athletes, parents, and leaders, and plays a role in crisis counseling or information provision. Given the reality that players can be blocked from the outside world, information communication channels on SNS can be a useful means of protecting and improving players' human rights. Conclusions: Therefore, it is necessary to provide a foundation for creating related platforms so that sports human rights sites or SNS can be operated voluntarily. Implications and future directions were discussed.