Young people's experiences of participation in democratic processes within sports associations

Because of the newly implemented law regarding the UN Convention on the rights of children this study aimed to examine how young people in sport organizations experience their role in the democratic processes in their sports. This was done by interviewing children between the ages 15-18 by asking them about their experiences and opinions concerning the democracy they encounter in their regular teams, as well as the democracy provided by their organization’s board. The conclusion of this study is that children experience the democracy in their teams as rather good but also that they do not necessarily feel involved in the organization's democratic processes. The conclusion furthermore includes that none of the participants shared their opinion with the board or attended their organization’s annual meetings, since they did not feel invited. Despite this the children expressed an overall satisfaction with the amount of democracy they are involved in. This is a law that Swedish sport organizations supposedly have followed since 2009 but we found in this study that regarding the UN Convention on the rights of children a lot of the organizations seems to not fully follow it to a satisfying degree