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Bottom-up Approaches to Strengthening Child Protection Systems: Placing children, families, and communities at the center

Efforts to strengthen national child protection systems have frequently taken a top-down approach of imposing formal, government-managed services. Such expert-driven approaches are often characterized by low use of formal services and the misalignment of the nonformal and formal aspects of the child protection system. This article examines an alternative approach of community-driven, bottom-up work that enables nonformal–formal collaboration and alignment, greater use of formal services, internally driven social change, and high levels of community ownership.

Author(s): 
Michael G. Wessells
Year of Publication: 
2015
Geographic location: 
Resource Type: 
Journal article - open access
Language: 
English
Section: 
Resource Database