‘Reimagining’ gender equality in media coverage?: feminist frameworks in European and Olympic portrayal guidelines

Abstract

European entities (such as the European Union, European Commission, Council of Europe, and the European Broadcasting Union) published several reports between 2019 and 2022 that addressed gender representation in sports media. Drawing on multiple types of sources, including peer-reviewed research, the reports make recommendations for gender balance and gender equality in media coverage pertaining to national-level and international sports. This study analyzes four such documents to identify how research informs recommendations. First, the study examines citation practices in terms of authors’ location and data scope to observe that the guidelines draw primarily on research based in the United States, while omitting data from several regions of Europe. Then, guided by feminist storytelling as a framework, we analyse which feminist concepts circulate in media guidelines. The guidelines use systematic reviews to address gender inequalities in coverage, draw on intersectionality without specific references to theory, and recommend a gender-mainstreaming approach in production practice. We highlight studies that would address asymmetrical citation practices and epistemological gaps in portrayal guidelines and propose future directions for feminist sport media studies and sociology of sport research. A transnational feminist approach would be useful in avoiding universal recommendations while making connections between local particularities and global patterns.