Enhanced Capacity of UN Entity in Relation to Violence Against Women
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Background
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 12 UN 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.
Areas of Focus
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 supports local communities with the tools they need to address violence in their specific context. The model works by rolling out evidence-based interventions holistically: gender responsive laws and policies; strengthening institutions and data collection on VAWG; promoting gender-equitable attitudes and positive social norms, and providing quality services for survivors of violence and their families. It does this work in partnerships with government and, critically, with civil society - including particularly women's rights organisations – at every level, enhancing civic space and driving sustainable, transformative change.
| Cairo Regional Bureau (RBC) RBC gender hosted a session in collaboration with UN Women on The Costs of GBV in November 2018. The session discussed: Costs of GBV; Gender Status Update from the Arab States (Gaps and Opportunities); Gender and SDGs (Zero Hunger); HerStory Zero Hunger: WFP and UN Women collaboration
Dakar Regional Bureau (RBD)
Ecuador Country Office
El Salvador Country Office |
WFP actively participates in the interagency group, with contributions in the revision of the Spotlight strategy
During the reporting period UNRWA developed capacity building plans to extend and improve its capacity to respond, mitigate and prevent GBV in emergencies. The capacity building plans include tools to improve staff knowledge, attitude, and practice when addressing GBV. Further a monitoring and evaluation framework is in place to measure the change generated by the capacity building efforts.
The UN Trust Fund cooperates closely with 24 UN organs and bodies through Regional and Global Programme Advisory Committees.
During the implementation and monitoring stage, the UN Trust Fund provides training to UN Women field colleagues on the reporting requirements for the grantees, as well as on EVAW programmatic and technical aspects of the grantees’ project implementation.
In November 2018, the SRVAW and the CEDAW Committee agreed on a Framework of Cooperation as a means of strengthening already established cooperation on combating violence against women in line with their respective mandates, and to advance the rights of women and girls by preventing and combating gender based violence, and supporting the implementation of the Convention and its General Recommendation 35.
The UN Trust Fund as a UN system wide grant giving mechanism, specialized in ending violence against women, coordinates and collects inputs from 21 UN agencies present at the Program Advisory Committee of the UN Trust Fund’s governance body throughout the grants selection stage.
During the implementation and monitoring stage, the UN Trust Fund provides training to UN Women field colleagues on the reporting requirements for the grantees, as well as on EVAW programmatic and technical aspects of the grantees’ project implementation.
UNRWA has continued the implementation of its multi-year programme titled 'Building Safety' aimed at enhancing the Agency's capacity to address GBV in emergencies. Work has progressed during this period focusing on the following areas: i) prevention of GBV among Palestine refugees; ii) mitigation of GBV risks in emergencies; iii) enhancing the capacity of Agency staff to respond to GBV.
In Serbia, OHCHR organised and facilitated capacity building training sessions, including on topics of VaW and gender-based violence for Government officials.
In Colombia, OHCHR continued to strengthen its capacity to address sexual and gender based violence in conflict-affected areas, in the context of the Peace Agreement implementation. This included training sessions on the use of SGBV reference documents, such as the sexual violence case investigation manual and a practical guide to understanding the protocol to follow in the context of SGBV.
In the margins of CSW62 in March 2018, OHCHR organised a consultation bringing together international and regional women’s rights mechanisms to exchange experiences and practices in the protection and promotion of women’s rights. Another event was held on “Defending the Right to Life: Securing Accountability for Violence against Women and LGBTI Persons during Conflict” in support to the SR on summary extra judiciary killings.
Joint research activity with the Unicef Office of Research Innocenti on “Transformative Change for Children and Youth and the SDGs” (2017-2018) includes topic of violence against girls.
IOM is supporting the development of Interagency GBV Minimum Standards.