Community mobilisation symposium - materials now online

Presentations from the community mobilisation symposium hosted by the Clearinghouse on 19 August 2015 are now available online.

Community mobilisation is an approach to preventing violence which enables and builds local community ownership. Principles of community mobilisation include: social change, whole community engagement, collaboration, community leadership and a vision for a better world. Community mobilisation is an emerging approach to addressing family violence, however there are international examples that show a reduction in violence in relatively short periods of time.

At the symposium, Sheryl Hann provided an overview of community mobilisation and talked about initiatives happening around Aotearoa New Zealand. Shirleyanne Brown talked about E Tu Whānau, a movement to create positive change, help whānau thrive and prevent violence. E Tu Whānau is designed and led by Māori with support from government.

The keynote address was given by video by Lori Michau. Lori is a Co-founder and Co-director at Raising Voices, a non-profit organisation working toward the prevention of violence against women and children in Uganda. Raising Voices developed SASA!, a community mobilisation initiative that works to prevent violence against women and HIV by addressing gender inequality. SASA! is one of the few community mobilisation initiatives worldwide that has done comprehensive research and evaluation. This found that the initiative lead to decreased rates of intimate partner violence: 52% lower than in control communities. It also led to a wide range of positive changes in people's relationships and the community.

SASA! is an acronym for the four phases of action (Start, Awareness, Support and Action) and also means "now" in Kiswahili. In her presentation, Lori spoke about how SASA! engages people by talking about power. This includes fostering the "power within" staff and community activists, encouraging critical thinking about men's "power over" women, joining "power with" others to support change, and fostering the "power to" make positive change.

All presentations are available on the Clearinghouse website. Additional resources are available at the links below.

Additional material

Creating change: Mobilising New Zealand communities to prevent family violence by Sheryl Hann and Cristy Trewartha NZFVC Issues Paper 8, 2015

E Tu Whānau website 

It's Not OK Campaign website

including the It's not OK Campaign Community Evaluation Project (2105)

Social change toolkit

SASA! (Raising Voices) website

SASA! (Raising Voices) on YouTube

Prevention of violence against women and girls: Lessons from practice by Lori Michau, Jessica Horn, Amy Bank, Mallika Dutt and Cathy Zimmerman The Lancet, 2015

Community mobilization: Preventing partner violence by changing social norms by Lori Michau UN Women in cooperation with ESCAP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF and WHO, 2012

Image: Community of people by Frits Ahlefeldt-Laurvig. Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)