WomenSport International (WSI) completely supports the statements from the International Working Group (IWG) Statement, the Japan Society for Sport and Gender Studies (JSSGS), Human Rights Now on the sexist comment made by Mr. Yoshiro Mori’s, the President Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee. We call for urgency to directly face the gender inequity that is rooted deeply in the Japanese sport society and take actions for meaningful changes.
WSI Statement on Gender Inequity in Japanese Sport Society
February 2021
WomenSport International (WSI) completely supports the statements from the International Working Group (IWG) Statement, the Japan Society for Sport and Gender Studies (JSSGS), Human Rights Now on the sexist comment made by Mr. Yoshiro Mori’s, the President Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee. We call for urgency to directly face the gender inequity that is rooted deeply in the Japanese sport society and take actions for meaningful changes.
It was shocking that such a biased and disparaging view of female colleagues is held by the national Olympic leadership, and further his behavior made it clear that he believed his other colleagues would allow and tolerate his sharing such a view. It was a particularly embarrassing revelation as the current home site of the Olympic representation.
We also emphasize the important perspective made by the IWG Representative for Asian region. She was concerned that the gender inequity issue in Japanese sport society would be masked by simply replacing the chairman. Taking this incident as an opportunity to develop a meaningful action plan is a necessity.
Significant resources have been implemented toward female athletes and their performance improvement by the Japanese government since 2012 the Sport Basic Plan, which, on the surface, has had a positive impact on gender equity in Japanese sport. There has also been encouraging initiatives and movements toward gender equity in Japanese women’s sport, especially by the Women and Sports Commission of the Japanese Olympic Committee (JOC) and JSSGS. Human Rights Now recently announced their effort on implementing Title IX in the U.S. for gender equity in Japanese Education. Unfortunately, too often, those voices and efforts are not recognized enough to make significant actions. Additionally, limited resources have been distributed toward social and organizational changes around gender inequity in Japanese sport society, as the leaders in women’s sport in Japan conveyed.
WSI urges the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee to revisit the importance of gender equity supported in the Olympic Movement. WSI also calls other governmental organizations, like Japan Sports Agency (JSA), Japan Sport Council (JSC), JOC, Japanese Para-Sports Association(JPSA)/Japanese Paralympic Committee (JPC) and Japan Sport Association (JSPO) to once again review and follow the IWG Brighton+Helsinki Declaration, the UN agenda on SDG 5 (Gender Equality), as well as other principles, policies and provisions listed in the JSSGS’s statement. We ask those governmental organizations to develop an impactful action plan to follow, so the initiatives and the movement toward gender equity and social justice around the world of sport, especially led by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and International Paralympic Committee (IPC), are positively carried over to the people and the community in Japan.