This article is the first detailed academic analysis of the background, organisation, content, and immediate outcomes of the first World Conference on Women and Sport which took place in Brighton, UK, between 05-08 May 1994. Women and sport conferences are now commonplace in many parts of the world. Yet in the mid-1990s, Brighton was ground-breaking and the result of concerted activism for women and sport by agents who had participated in various advocacy organisations for decades.
Titled ‘Women, Sport, and the Challenge of Change’, the Conference convened approximately 280 delegates, including representatives of major sporting and non-sporting organisations, based in over eighty countries. They contributed toward establishing a more coordinated and purposeful international strategy for women and sport.
However, confusion and competition between existing organisations advocating for women and sport is apparent before and during Brighton. The Conference has also encountered criticism for Western ethnocentrism and liberalised political outcomes. This article contributes to understanding the galvanisation of a collective identity and politicisation of advocacy for women’s sport, and the salience of conferences as sites enabling this.
Archival document analysis and interviews with key agents involved with the advocacy were employed to understand the relations, politics and significance of the Conference.