Human Rights Playbook Series: How-To Implement Human Rights Responsibilities

Author - Alison Biscoe

Centre for Sport and Human Rights

The Human Rights Playbook is a new suite of guidance documents designed to help sport bodies and event organisers implement human rights due diligence.

Human rights due diligence is the process commonly used to identify and respond to human rights risks. This process is set out in international standards including the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. While there are some variations, broadly, human rights due diligence consists of four steps, outlined in the graphic below. The Playbook guidance "Integrating Human Rights in the Governance of Sport Bodies" explains in more detail how to conduct the steps of human rights due diligence.

Step 1 of the human rights due diligence process is making a commitment and embedding it into your organisation’s practices. Often this consists of developing a human rights policy. The Playbook guide "Commit & Embed - Step by Step Guidance on Drafting a Human Rights Policy" explains how to do this. The animation below outlines what is included in the guidance.

Broadly speaking, the first guidance in this series "Integrating Human Rights in the Governance of Sport Bodies" walks users through the entire human rights due diligence process. That means that for each step, it explains what the step means, what is involved to implement that step, and then some key questions to make sure each step is being implemented correctly. 

The second guidance in the series "Commit & Embed - Step by Step Guidance on Drafting a Human Rights Policy" only looks at Step 1. As making a commitment, and ensuring that commitment is properly embedded, is likely where organisations start their human rights work, this guide was developed to go into greater depth on this part of the process. It includes guidance on getting your organisation ready to make a commitment, as well as guidance on what the actual commitment should include. 

Both documents have been developed following engagement with various international sport federations and as such, follow as closely as possible how this work would be carried out by a typical federation. That said, there is no one size fits all approach and so they have been developed to be flexible and adaptable depending on where an organisation is in their human rights journey.

These documents are also just the beginning. At the Centre for Sport and Human Rights, we know there are many issues the world of sport is tackling right now. We also know that you have to start somewhere. These documents are just that - a start! We hope to be able to add thematic supporting documents over time.

The Centre for Sport and Human Rights offers occasional Advisory Services to organisations looking for support on implementing human rights throughout their sporting operations. If you need additional support, please get in touch to discuss how we can support you.