GIGI ALFORD

Ginous ‘Gigi’ Alford is a global human rights advocate with nearly two decades of hands-on, grassroots experience in pioneering new fields for human rights, including online, in business, within sport and with faith-based communities. As Director of Sport and Human Rights at the World Players Association, she recast how international institutions and key partners and stakeholders view professional athletes, as workers, human rights defenders, and individual people with intersecting identities. She previously coordinated the Sport & Rights Alliance (SRA), a global coalition of NGOs and trade unions, representing the SRA on the interim governance committee that oversaw the formation of the Geneva-based Centre for Sport and Human Rights. Ginous worked in the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor and facilitated the first Sporting Chance Forum in 2016. She is a former Knight Foundation Journalism Fellow and has a Master’s in International Human Rights Law from Oxford University, where she wrote about FIFA’s human rights responsibilities and the Swiss government’s duty to enforce them.

gigi.alford@uniglobalunion.org
+41 (0)22 365 2190

Project CARE (Census of Athlete Rights Experiences) aims to ensure that the rights of child athletes are promoted and protected throughout world sport.

A fundamental issue that World Players aims to address is the fact that the internationally recognized human rights of athletes are currently not embedded in world sport. Child athletes are particularly vulnerable to this gap.

The lack of systematic data regarding the extent to which the rights of elite child athletes are respected.


The need for a coordinated, survivor-led and trauma informed global effort that engages with key stakeholders to address sexual violence, harassment and abuse in sports.