Photo: Taking sport diplomacy from being a handshake between elite actors to diplomatic actions at the grassroots level (Flickr: Roy Luck, Fairfield Sports Association).

ISCA Secretary General Jacob Schouenborg has been invited to present ISCA’s new EU-supported project “Grassroots Sport Diplomacy” as one of three good practices in the European Commission’s Seminar on Sport Diplomacy next Wednesday 6 December.

Starting next year, the Grassroots Sport Diplomacy project will develop an entirely new concept in a new space within the sport sector – exploring how civil society organisations work across borders and take sport diplomacy from being a handshake between elite actors to diplomatic actions at the grassroots level. This is an ISCA first and a sector first, as Schouenborg explains.

“We are working on the only project dedicated to grassroots sport diplomacy,” he says.

“If sport diplomacy is going to grow as a concept, we have to invent our own term. Grassroots Sport Diplomacy relies on values that are connected to EU level sport: open and generous exchange, and facilitating learning for others. If ISCA is about civil society working across borders, then Grassroots Sport Diplomacy should fit right into the bigger picture.”

Other presenters at the seminar include Tarvi Pürn from the Undersecretary of Sport in Estonia, Bogdan Wenta, Member of the European Parliament, Niels Nygaard, Member of the Executive Committee and European Olympic Committees, Yves le Lostecque, Head of Sport Unit, DG Education and Culture, and Monika Puchner, Managing Director of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA).

On 4-5 December, ISCA will also take part in cluster meetings on “Encouraging participation in Sport and physical activity”.

See the full agenda below

EU Seminar on Sport Diplomacy agenda (PDF, 0.20 MB)