Child & survivor participation

The voices of children and young adult survivors continue to be missing from the dialogue

Why is this needed?

Despite some recent global attention on child sexual exploitation and abuse online, children and young adults with these experiences continue to be missing voices from the dialogue. Many children remain unidentified by law enforcement and support services and do not disclose their experiences at all. Of those who do, rarely are their views sought on how to improve prevention and response services.

Although important efforts have been made by some survivor activists and organisations working with survivors, there remain limited opportunities for survivor participation and to exchange views and experiences, promote solidarity, and develop a collective force for change. We want to change that. 

Creating trauma-informed safe and ethically appropriate spaces for consulting survivors must be prioritised and these insights translated into strategy, policy and action by policymakers, service providers and law enforcement.

Internet could become safer for children if:

reporting on phone

Reporting mechanisms are visible, clear and simple.

support services

Support services for child sexual exploitation and abuse online are available and accessible to everyone, including psychological support.

cybercrime info

Age-appropriate information and awareness campaigns are available for children, about cybercrimes, how to report them and how to ask for support.

training

There are widespread training opportunities for frontline support workers.

What is being done in this area?

Child sexual exploitation and abuse online: Survivors’ Perspectives

WeProtect Global Alliance, in partnership with ECPAT International and six of its network member organisations, conducted a research project amplifying the voices of survivors of child sexual abuse online. As part of this research, they published 6 country-level reports and a global one “Child sexual exploitation and abuse online: Survivors’ Perspectives”.

Learn more about our project on Survivors’ Perspectives
Framing the Future
83% of surveyed countries have a skilled, specialist workforce that is trained, coordinated and available to support victims/survivors of child sexual exploitation and abuse

Our and UNICEF’s Framing the Future report gives an insight into how 42 Alliance countries have responded to child sexual abuse online and some of their challenges and best practices.

When it comes to child & survivor participation, the report shows that:

Mapping survivor and youth participation activities

WeProtect Global Alliance’s members around the world work tirelessly to facilitate the participation of victims/survivors and youth during the development of policy, programmes, tools and/or legislation.

We are conducting a mapping of current activities in youth and survivor participation in relation to tackling online-facilitated child sexual abuse.

This mapping will highlight good practice and the impact of meaningful participation, as well as help us identify gaps in knowledge, or activity, in relation to adult survivor and youth-centred/led participation within our Alliance’s work.

If you have recently worked on a participatory initiative with survivors and/or children and young people, we kindly invite you to submit it for inclusion in our mapping exercise.

Submit your participatory initiative

See also

Child & survivor participation discussions in our Portal

You must be a logged-in member of the Portal to view more and join in the full discussions.

The Response Child & survivor participation

Discussing input from victims and survivors to inform response and support services, campaigns and strategies.

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