Violence Prevention Worldwide

The Canadian Red Cross has been addressing violence against children in Canada since 1984 through its award-winning violence and abuse prevention program.

Since 2005, the Canadian Red Cross has been working internationally on violence prevention by supporting the Red Cross movement as a whole in addressing problems of interpersonal violence. The Canadian Red Cross took a lead role in co-authoring the Red Cross movement’s Global Strategy on Violence Prevention, Mitigation and Response (2010-2020).

The Canadian Red Cross will continue to build on the movement’s global strategy and work with an increasing number of national societies to assess, develop, implement and evaluate programs that target the capacity of organizations and communities to deal with issues of violence prevention. This is all in the aim of protecting the most vulnerable members of society, with a particular emphasis on children and youth.

The Canadian Red Cross violence prevention program includes:

  • Educating adults and children on what constitutes violence, how to prevent it, and how to get help if needed
  • Developing organizational policies, procedures and systems to combat violence
  • Advocating on key humanitarian issues such as addressing violence in disasters
  • Particular attention is given to ensure evidence-based, locally-driven, and culturally appropriate programming is put in place.
Violence Prevention in Haiti: Youth Voices