Vulnerable children and families need a strong social support network that acts as a safety net to effectively and sustainably respond to the situation of children and families at risk. In order to find out more about how SOS Children’s Villages works with different stakeholders to strengthen social safety nets in communities, 58 interviews were conducted with SOS Children’s Villages staff and representatives of local partner organisations in 16 locations in Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria, South Africa, Togo, Uganda and Zimbabwe.
The aim was to learn from their experiences and to get to know what works in empowering communities, in achieving local ownership of family strengthening activities, and in being sustainable. The experience presented in this report is a ‘promising practice’ snapshot of SOS Children’s Villages’ work in relation to community development and sustainability – but does not represent a complete picture of the organisation’s family strengthening work. It shows how SOS Children’s Villages empowers communities who in turn support vulnerable children and their families. As a piece of qualitative research, the results are not fully comparable, but are indicative of issues and trends. Children and their families participating in the programme, as well as other individuals in the community were not interviewed, as the focus of the research was on operational, ‘how to’ aspects of strengthening and building social support networks.
The perspective that children and families have on central components of community empowerment such as participation, local ownership, and their role in a community-based social support system should be the subject of further research. To get the full picture of SOS Children’s Villages’ family strengthening work, further research would also be required on how families are empowered to provide quality care and protection to their children.
