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Launched in 2017 with an initial investment of over 500 million USD from the European Union, Spotlight Initiative is the United Nations Secretary-General’s High Impact Initiative to end violence against women and girls (EVAWG). Recognized as one of the 12 High-Impact Initiatives – driving progress across the sustainable development goals – Spotlight Initiative represents an unprecedented global effort to address violence against women and girls at scale.
During its first phase (2017- 2023), Spotlight Initiative helped cohere the UN system to implement 34 programmes across five regions. This included two civil society grant-making programmes – established in collaboration with the UN Trust to End Violence against Women and the Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund – which helped channel additional resources directly to civil society. By fostering a “One UN” approach under the leadership of the Resident Coordinators at the country level, Spotlight Initiative has leveraged various UN agencies’ complementary expertise, deepened collaboration, and streamlined operational processes, allowing for stronger programme delivery and better results for women and girls.
Through its deep partnerships at country and regional level – including with governments, civil society, faith-based and traditional leaders, academic institutions, media, the private sector, and others – Spotlight Initiative drove significant progress across response and prevention efforts. A strong commitment to meaningful engagement with civil society in particular, including local and grassroots organisations and feminist and women’s rights groups, has been central to the Initiative’s approach, as well. Under its first phase, nearly half of the Initiative’s activity funds were channeled directly to civil society, ensuring local ownership, buy-in, and sustainability of the Initiative's investments. At the global level, the Initiative forged a range of strategic partnerships, including with the Group of Friends, a coalition of 93 UN Member States advocating to end violence against women and girls, and the UN Foundation, which helped launch the WithHer Fund to channel more funding directly to local organizations.
Through its comprehensive approach – working to pass progressive laws and policies, strengthen institutions, deepen prevention programming, improve access to services, and generate data, and by centering partnerships – particularly with civil society – the Initiative has been shown to be 70% to 90% more effective at reducing the prevalence of violence against women and girls than siloed, single-pillar approaches. By aligning its interventions with national and local priorities, Spotlight Initiative works to deepen capacity, political will, and long-term commitment to ending violence against women and girls and advancing gender equality and women’s rights.
Unique to the Initiative is a whole-of-society approach that places ending violence against women and girls at the heart of national development priorities and gives local communities the tools they need to address violence in their specific context. The model works to support the development and revision of gender responsive laws and policies; strengthen institutions and data collection on VAWG; promote gender-equitable attitudes and positive social norms, and provide quality services for survivors of violence and their families. It does this work in partnerships with government and, critically, with civil society and women’s movements at every level, enhancing civic space and driving sustainable, transformative change.
International Organization for Migration
IOM's approach to addressing GBV is guided by the principles set out in IOM’s Institutional Framework for Addressing Gender-Based Violence in Crises (2018, “GBV in crisis framework”). Furthermore, in 2024 IOM launched a new Gender Equality Policy (having been adopted in late 2023). The IOM Gender Equality Policy 2024 emphasizes a “whole of organisation” approach, highlighting the importance of integrating gender considerations into all areas of IOM's work. This policy builds on previous progress and embodies an evidence and results-based approach that contributes to achieving institutional commitments on gender equality. The policy includes a focus on programmatic results from gender mainstreaming and targeted interventions including to address GBV, as well as enabling factors such as funding allocation, capacity requirements and achieving gender parity.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) is committed to the principle that humane and orderly migration benefits migrants and society. While not part of the United Nations system, IOM maintains close working relations with United Nations bodies and operational agencies, as well as with a wide range of international and non-governmental organizations. In addition, IOM is the designated cluster leader for camp management in humanitarian settings for natural disasters. Through its gender equality policy adopted in 2015, IOM is committed to ensuring that a gender perspective is mainstreamed throughout all IOM policies, activities and programming.
IOM (2020). Displacement Tracking Matrix for GBV.
IOM (2024). Intersectional Gender Analysis Toolkit.
IOM (2024). Gender Equality Policy.
17, Route des Morillons. CH-1211 Geneva 19. Switzerland
IOM primarily focuses on the three pillars of the GBV in crisis framework: mitigating risks, supporting survivors and addressing the root causes. However, IOM also works on human trafficking, predominately affecting women survivors. Furthermore, IOM’s approach includes ensuring that actions are taken to mainstream GBV across all IOM programmes, promoting safe and ethical GBV-related data collection, and strengthening engagement with women-led and women’s rights organizations to address GBV and promote gender equality.
