In diverse contexts, community-based child protection mechanisms (CBCPMs) are front line efforts to protect children from exploitation, abuse, violence, and neglect and to promote children’s well-being.2 Defined broadly, CBCPMs include all groups or networks at grassroots level that respond to and prevent child protection issues and harms to vulnerable children. These may include family supports, peer group supports, and community groups such as women’s groups, religious groups, and youth groups, as well as traditional or endogenous community processes, government mechanisms, and mechanisms initiated by national and international non- governmental organizations (NGOs). Some of these supports–family and peer group supports, for example, are nonformal since they are not part of the Government led system of child protection. Other supports–such as Chiefs and elders in the Kenyan context–are arms of the formal, Government led system. Which aspects are formal or nonformal vary by context, and to make matters even more complex, particular structures or mechanisms may intermix Government led and civilian led elements, as might occur when a Child Welfare Committee included both civilians and a Chief who was paid by the Government.
In 2009, a global, inter-agency review of the effectiveness of CBCPMs reported a number of significant gaps in knowledge and practice pertaining to CBCPMs. For one thing, the evidence base regarding the effectiveness of CBCPMs was very weak, as few evaluations included robust designs or measures of actual outcomes for children. Having noted that among seven effectiveness factors, community ownership was the most important determinant of the CBCPM effectiveness and sustainability, the review noted that most NGO facilitated CBCPMs achieved only low to moderate levels of community ownership. Overall, there was a tendency to establish CBCPMs such as Child Welfare Committees as parallel structures that did not build upon existing community mechanisms. This approach not only resulted in low levels of sustainability but also caused unintended harm by weakening existing supports. The review also found preliminary evidence that one could strengthen CBCPMs by linking them with formal mechanisms such as district-level3 child protection networks and supports, thereby enabling effective referrals and also capacity building.