The Olympic Movement and Safeguarding Athletes: Exploring South Korea’s Journey to Protect Athletes

Abstract

This article explores South Korea’s journey to protect athletes from physical abuse and sexual harassment in response to the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic movement initiative to safeguard athletes’ human rights. The paper critically reviews a series of campaigns to protect athletes, providing an academic opportunity to understand how Olympic movement initiatives have been accepted and developed by the National Olympic Committees through a case study of South Korea. The analysis of these cases indicates that violations of human rights against South Korean athletes were mainly due to unequal balances of power within the structural hierarchy of the Korean sports apparatuses. Our conclusion of structural inequality within elite sports and a lack of individual human rights awareness proves consistent with previous discussions demonstrating an absence of ethical understanding fostered by a win at all costs mentality. Although the Korean government and the Korean Sports and Olympic Committee have failed to promote a safe sports environment for athletes over the past 15 years, they have made institutional reforms to safeguard athletes through numerous trials and errors.