I recently spent a week at the University of Cape Town for the Safe Sport 2026 conference. The conference was a collaboration between Safe Sport International, The African Union Sports Council and the Sport for Social Change Network Africa.
The conference brought together 460 delegates from 73 countries, many of whom are in safeguarding and leadership roles in national and international sports organisations. This was not purely a research conference, but also an opportunity for sharing practical solutions that can be applied in daily practice. The conference theme was ‘Global Voices, Shared Solutions’, emphasising a commitment to ensuring that safe sport conversations are informed by diverse perspectives and shaped for their unique local contexts, while being connected to a global movement for change.
This was the first time a Safe Sport International conference had been hosted in Africa, providing a much-needed platform for African insight into global safe sport solutions and an opportunity to learn from case studies and best practices across the continent.
Collaborative Spaces for Safe Sport Conversations
As well as presentations and panel sessions, the conference also included breakout sessions where participants could come together to collaborate, exchange and share ideas for safe sport solutions. As a Safe Sport International trustee, one of my roles was to facilitate some of these breakout sessions. In addition, I was also part of the conference safeguarding team, and was responsible for safeguarding support for the survivor speakers and delegates.
My first breakout session was for participants from Asia & Oceania, in which we discussed contextual challenges and strategies for advancing safe sport in these regions.
The second was a session titled Safer Sport Through Lived Experiences. With the common understanding that we can’t create meaningful safe sport solutions, we engaged in thoughtful, structured discussions on how this can be done in ways that centre wellbeing, intersectionality and accountability. Participants discussed barriers they’ve faced in their various roles, and what progress they’d like to see in this space. They also shared examples of organisations and initiatives doing exemplary work to centre lived experience to share knowledge and resources.
On day 2, I co-facilitated a workshop on networks of care for safeguarding leads, in collaboration with Rose Mae Lanticse of Safe Sport Philippines. This session brought safeguarding leads together to discuss how they can cultivate strategic networks which support both impacted people and practitioners. While safeguarding should be everyone’s responsibility, in practice, the burden often falls to safeguarding leads alone, who subsequently have to act as advocates within their organisations to get buy-in from leadership and colleagues. As well as leading to insufficient outcomes, this also makes this work unsustainable for safeguarding staff. Instead of working in silos, we must actively cultivate networks, both within organisations and with externally with other organisations and sectors, to take a collaborative approach that supports best practice.
I opened the workshop by sharing my experience of cultivating my own support network, firstly as a survivor and advocate, then as a safe sport researcher and safeguarding professional, and how this network has been crucial for supporting my work and my wellbeing. Rose Mae then shared some insights into her work developing safeguarding systems for national sports organisations in the Philippines.
Safeguarding representatives from the IOC, World Athletics, World Rugby, national governing bodies of sport in African countries, and various non-profit organisations then came together to share insights from their unique contexts in group discussions, describing what’s working well for them and what barriers they’re facing.
I also facilitated a session in partnership with Safe Sport International’s Athlete Voice Group, titled ‘Athletes as Partners in Safe Sport’. This was an opportunity for us to seek input from participants to inform the work we’re doing at SSI, and ensure we continue to be led by the voices of impacted people.
Key Takeaways
- Effective safeguarding requires practical implementation, not just policy development.
- Stronger collaboration between countries, organisations and sectors is essential.
- Safeguarding systems must be globally connected while remaining locally relevant.
- Sustainable change requires leadership, accountability and long-term commitment.
The Safe Sport 2026 conference report noted the importance of athlete and survivor perspectives in shaping safer sporting environments, and moving beyond consultation towards true partnership. This conference also emphasised the importance of a collaborative approach, and the need to share knowledge and resources across regions, sectors, organisations and sports disciplines. I’m grateful to have had the opportunity to take an active role in the event, and connect and collaborate with so many people with a shared goal to make sport safer for all.
Emma Thomas
Founder of Under the Ropes
Emma is a safeguarding and lived-experience consultant specialising in survivor-centred approaches to tackling sexual violence in sport. She’s also a survivor-advocate, and has been writing about gendered issues in Muay Thai since 2013.
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