A fund to help prevent violence against women and girls

[Akhil]

Summary

Ahead of International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on 25 November, I am very excited to announce the addition of several highly impactful charities focused on preventing violence against women and girls to The Life You Can Save’s help women and girls fund, and their all charities fund.

Background

One in three women will experience physical or sexual violence, or both, in their lifetime. High quality studies show that preventing violence from occurring in the first instance are effective, and that community-led programs that aim to shift individual, interpersonal and society level attitudes and norms around gender are particularly effective (more information in this previous post). Violence against women and girls is undoubtedly an important area (more information here), and there are specific, cost-effective preventative interventions that can help address this global issue (more information here)

What is happening

The Life You Can Save is proud to provide recommendations for a broad range of important issue areas. They are now adding nonprofits focused on preventing violence against women and girls—with far-reaching benefits to families and entire communities.

• Center for Domestic Violence Prevention, CEDOVIP, is an Ugandan nonprofit that implements community-driven, cost-effective programming: $150 for a woman to live a year free from violence. Their program implementation has shown a 52% reduction in intimate partner violence, with effects that continue after 3 years.

• Breakthrough Trust in India promotes culture-based change, focusing on girls and boys at ages 11-24 by redesigning school curricula and running mass media campaigns. Breakthrough’s programs reduce early marriage, increase girls enrollment in school and increase health care access.

• Raising Voices (inclusion in fund pending due diligence) identifies the most impactful ways of reducing violence against women and children -( including the programming implemented by CEDOVIP), supports evidence-generation on best practice in violence prevention, and has worked with over 600 organisations throughout Africa, Asia Pacific and Latin America to build the capacity of community-based violence prevention centres.
  

Caveats

While the data underscores the measurable success and high cost-effectiveness of community-led programs in reducing violence (you can see here for some estimations of the same), it’s crucial to recognize the profound, and enduring, and more intangible impact of such initiative in changing cultural and societal norms. Changing the culture that perpetuates violence creates freedom for women to thrive—reducing ongoing fear of violence, improving family and child wellbeing, and increasing women’s ability to contribute productively in society and the workforce. Long-term social change demands a multidimensional, intersectional approach, focusing on the transformation of attitudes and norms. These intangible benefits, immeasurable in their impact, work towards creating a more just and equitable world.

What you can do

If you would like to help contribute to ensure that violence against women and girls is prevented, and we can live in a world where respect, equity and understanding flourish, please consider donating to this fund. If you are interested in having a more extended chat or would like to consider a more bespoke/​tailored giving strategy, please feel to reach out to me (via DM or email at [e-mail]) or TLYCS team.

Acknowledgements

It was an honour to work as a fund manager alongside Ilona Arih, Matias Nestore and Katie Stanford, as well as the rest of the The Life You Can Save team

[NickLaing]

Thanks Akhil! Can you point me to the study on CEDOVIP program and the research you are discussing. They seem to do as bunch of different things thanks!

[Mo Putera]

Hi Nick, since Akhil mentioned TLYCS you may be keen to check out https://​​www.thelifeyoucansave.org/​​best-charities/​​cedovip/​​ where they mention it “scaling the SASA! community mobilization program throughout Uganda efficiently and effectively”. Akhil previously mentioned this program in footnote #3 of his VAWG report https://​​forum.effectivealtruism.org/​​posts/​​uH9akQzJkzpBD5Duw/​​what-you-can-do-to-help-stop-violence-against-women-and#fnshutzmwzwyj

[NickLaing]

Thanks yes I get it now! I think it might be important (if the charity even allows) to have a mechanism to share only to that program rather than just the charity “in general” itself—much like Givewell does with Malaria Consortium’s seasonal malaria prevention.

Otherwise a lot of money donated to that charity might go to less effective, unproven programs.

[Mo Putera]

Absolutely agree. I’m unsure if donating to CEDOVIP via TLYCS helps you achieve this (vs donating directly to CEDOVIP) -- while their webpage only talks about the SASA! program, they don’t clarify if the donations are directed as such.

[tobytrem]

Hi Akhil. This seems like a great idea!
To clarify- is this a new fund, or are new charities being added to an existing fund? I couldn’t tell from this line:

I am very excited to announce the addition of several highly impactful charities focused on preventing violence against women and girls to The Life You Can Save’s help women and girls fund, and their all charities fund.

Thanks!

[Akhil]

Added to an existing fund, although there is the option to give specifically to VAWG charities

[tobytrem]

Thanks Akhil!