As informed earlier this year, the IFF investigated the prevention policies on sexual harassment and abuse in national floorball associations. The main results were presented during the IFF Associations’ Meeting in conjuction with the Men’s WFC 2020 in Helsinki and are now made public to the whole floorball community.

The study was conducted by the IFF Information Coordinator Mari Myllärinen, who studied these topics for her master thesis. The data was collected first via online survey where national floorball associations had to evaluate to what extent they had implemented prevention strategies on the topic of sexual harassment and abuse. They were for exampled asked if their association has prevention policy or ethical guidelines in place, if they offer information on these topics and if they have a specific person managing this in the association. The respondents evaluated each action in a scale installed/planned to install/not installed and not planned). In the survey, the associations also evaluated their resources for implementing these kind of strategies in their associations. Different motives, barriers and facilitators were recognised from the interviews.

A total of nine associations took part in the study: Australia, Czech Republic, Finland, Norway, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Ukraine. These associations completed both the survey and the interview. Only a few associations had implemented an adequate number of preventive strategies on sexual harassment and abuse. The average number for installed prevention measures was four actions from the list of 12 possible actions. Two associations had not implemented any prevention measures but all associations had at least planned to install preventive policies for sexual harassment and abuse. Most often implemented strategies were the guidelines for team staff and volunteers and police record checks for employees. 77.8% of respondents agreed that prevention of sexual harassment and abuse is an important issue for their association.

Although the focus on this study was not on prevalence of harassment and abuse, one of the interview questions considered past cases and management of these cases. 2/3 of respondents had knowledge of past cases in floorball. The cases varied from verbal sexual harassment to physical sexual abuse and from the border of criminal activity to conviction and imprisonment. This result further confirms that these issues are present in every sport and also in the sport of floorball.

The most important motives for implementing prevention strategies were Safeguarding, Responsibility, Raising awareness and education and Governmental enforcement. The respondents felt they wanted to keep the sport safe and offer a safe environment for everyone. They also wanted to protect the image of sport as floorball is fairly young sport. They also felt they are responsible for prevention and that this is also expected from the outside of the sport community. The respondents also felt that their associations are responsible for education and raising awareness in these issues. Governmental enforcement or pressure considered especially the associations that did not yet have prevention policies in place and they feld this kind of pressure from the government or IFF could push them into implementing these preventive strategies.

Lack of resources, Distance from the clubs and the players, Culture and Lack of authority were the biggest barriers for implementation. Although associations mostly agreed having enough resources for prevention strategies in the survey, the interviewees mentioned the lack of resources as a challenge for implementation. The lack of resurces includes the lack of time, knowledge and staff. Prevention policies require knowledge and manpower as everything else. Associations are distant complexes when it comes to individual players or clubs and they are not there to recognise harassment or abuse happening in the club level. Information of cases might also not reach the association at all. Associations trust that clubs will forward the information and educate their players and staff about the prevention policies. Culture consisted a barrier when these topics are not discussed in the society. Sexual harassment and sexual abuse are not recognised in all cultures and this means that it is challenging for floorball association to take leadership in this or change it. Lack of authority considered mostly case management. Authorities are often needed to handle the cases which shifts the control from associations to other parties. At the same time, associations are not necessarily in a position to forward their knowledge about a perpetrator in order to protect other sports or ban this person from other sports in the country, they can only do it in floorball.

Last but not least, some factors that could facilitate the implementation of prevention strategies for sexual harassment and abuse were recognised. These are Cultural change, Assistance and Responsibility balance with clubs. #MeToo movement has changed the conversation culture and made it more open. This change has also reached sports. Association needs to strenghten the relationships with clubs. Association is responsible for education and clubs need to implement these strategies in their activities and also recognise harassment/abuse in their activities. The Associations also need assistance from other organisations or from the IFF to first implement these kind of strategies or to improve the strategies they have in place.

Sexual harassment and abuse in floorball. An empirical study of prevention policy in national floorball associations in Europe and Asia Oceania and other scientific studies of floorball can be found here