Protect positive values in football

FIFA used its considerable influence platform to reiterate the message that discrimination in any forms has no place in football or society in general with a series of digital campaigns in 2020. Forty FIFA Legends and current professional footballers, each sporting a black jersey, posted messages including #StopRacism and #StopDiscrimination on social media, reaching tens of millions of fans worldwide.

FIFA's interactions with various stakeholders in 2020 reinforced football’s core values of respect and fair play on the pitch. FIFA and the United Nations
Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) signed a memorandum of understanding to
jointly address threats posed by crime to sport, safeguarding football from
corruption and match manipulation, promote youth crime prevention, and
keeping children and young athletes safe from violence and exploitation.

The partnership expanded the reach of vital FIFA's vital educational messaging, which
included a campaign in December 2020 to fight against match manipulation, in which FIFA Legends united in a joint campaign on International Anti-Corruption Day to
encourage players, coaches and officials to recognise, resist and report
instances of match-fixing.

FIFA created a new human rights and anti-discrimination department in 2020. FIFA also committed to further embed human rights within its decision-making bodies following a recommendation of the FIFA Human Rights Advisory Board (HRAB), while continuing to engage with human rights stakeholders.

The most comprehensive measures to protect human rights as part of a FIFA tournament were made for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 in partnership with the local tournament organisers, focusing on labour rights, diversity and anti-discrimination, and accessibility. FIFA has required candidate host cities for the FIFA World Cup 2026 to develop human rights plans based on local stakeholder engagement and integrated human rights in the planning of the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023.

In addition, FIFA held discussions with the IR Iran FA for women to be granted access to stadiums, to build on the progress made prior to the coronavirus pandemic.

In order to further protect the game, FIFA has taken further important steps to strengthen players’ rights, including new FIFA regulations to protect female players, particularly in relation to maternity rights, and to initiate a process to revise regulations on the eligibility of players based on gender to ensure players’ human rights are respected.

FIFA’s commitment to promote safe sport in football was strengthened by the creation of an in-house safeguarding and child protection department to further develop and implement the FIFA Guardians Programme via FIFA tournaments and across FIFA’s member associations.

To support this, FIFA conducted a series of regional safeguarding workshops and launched the FIFA Guardians Safeguarding in Sport Diploma – a global education programme designed together with the Open University to strengthen and professionalise the role of Safeguarding Officers in football and help to raise safeguarding standards across the game.

Other important initiatives, ranging from the establishment of a minimum package of care provided to support victims and witnesses involved in FIFA ethics cases, to digital campaigns aimed at promoting the protection of human rights have been made in close collaboration with local, regional and global stakeholders.

In addition, an extensive multi-stakeholder consultation process has been launched by FIFA to establish a new independent international safe sport entity to investigate sexual abuse in sport.