Child Protection Systems Strengthening in Settings of Armed Conflict

The past decade has witnessed a paradigm shift in international child protection. Traditionally, humanitarian and development workers addressed child protection concerns thematically, focusing on issues such as child... [ view full abstract ]

The past decade has witnessed a paradigm shift in international child protection. Traditionally, humanitarian and development workers addressed child protection concerns thematically, focusing on issues such as child trafficking, street children, or child labor separately. Recognizing the limitations of issue-based programming, international agencies have increasingly sought to promote a “systems strengthening approach” that focuses on the complex, cross-cutting challenges that heighten children’s vulnerability to exploitation, abuse, violence, and neglect. In humanitarian policy documents, systems strengthening approaches focus on developing effective mechanisms and processes of prevention and response service delivery by integrating previously fragmented programming and engaging diverse actors at multiple levels.

Despite growing support for a child protection systems strengthening framework, how to conceptualize and implement this approach in practice remains an area of ongoing discussion and learning. Within the broader global discussion about the nature and scope of child protection systems, a line of inquiry has emerged examining how efforts to strengthen national child protection systems have adhered in humanitarian settings. Humanitarian responses create arenas in which representatives of the international community—represented primarily by United Nations agencies and international organizations have significant interaction with national governments and emergency-affected populations. They represent, therefore, an opportunity to probe the extent to which there is shared understanding and appreciation of what “systems strengthening” means to various actors and how such efforts should be undertaken.

This workshop will present learning on child protection systems strengthening from areas recently or currently affected by armed conflict. In addition to sharing findings from a multi-country research process, the workshop will create an interactive discussion with participants with an eye to steering the design of upcoming guidelines for humanitarian actors who would like to adopt a child protection systems strengthening approach in their work.