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Global Innovations on Youth Violence, Safety, and Justice Program
Part of Salzburg Global's Peace & Justice Pillar
Our Purpose
The Global Innovations on Youth Violence, Safety, and Justice Program is a multi-year effort to tackle youth violence, promote youth safety, and advance justice reform across jurisdictions.
The Program was launched in 2021 by Salzburg Global in partnership with the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, and the David Rockefeller Fund.
Why It Matters
Serial failures to redress social, legal, and economic injustice and structural racism have underpinned violence and disproportionately shaped politics, policing, and judicial systems around the world.
Yet bold reforms in different jurisdictions have shown—and will continue to show—that cross-cutting interventions can be cost-effective and foster more humane, inclusive, and healthier societies. What can we learn, share, and take to scale for long-term results?
In many countries, including the United States, there has been growing recognition among policymakers and reform advocates that effective criminal justice reform must look beyond the toolkit and institutions of the justice system itself.
In an increasing number of settings, innovations based on community-centered, cross-sectoral approaches and socially integrative methods of engaging young people and violent offenders—before, during, and after encounters with the criminal justice system—have proven and will continue to prove more humane, just, and effective.
Bringing together global stakeholders—including young adults and formerly incarcerated individuals—the Program has compiled leading research, collected in-depth case studies from diverse geographies, and identified dozens of innovative, evidence-based practices.
While progress has been made, the Program recognizes that ongoing and interconnected challenges—ranging from post-pandemic mental health and education crises to racial injustice, climate change, forced migration, autocratization, and technological disruption—continue to shape the future of youth safety and justice worldwide.
Our Goals
The main goals of this program have been to enhance community safety and cohesion, reduce violence, crime, and incarceration, and transform judicial and prison systems.
Progress has already been made toward these objectives, and the Program continues to work toward accelerating systems change and generating lasting results at three interconnected levels:
1
Individual Lived Experience
By improving daily safety and well-being within communities.
2
Interactions with Systems of Authority
By reducing exposure to violence, criminalization, and incarceration.
3
Institutional Structures and Mandates
By rethinking the purpose, funding, staffing, metrics, and accountability of judicial and custodial systems.
Our Format
Across all three levels mentioned above, Fellows have identified—and continue to evaluate—approaches, tools, and technologies in four key areas:
- New intervention points with long-term potential to reduce violence, injustice, racism, and implicit bias within and beyond criminal justice systems
- Multi-country comparisons that spotlight successful criminal justice policies and practices across diverse jurisdictions
- Direct engagement with marginalized communities, including communities of color, to amplify lived experiences and embed their knowledge in reform strategies.
- New initiatives aimed at shifting attitudes, behaviors, and investments in response to global racial and social justice movements and the structural inequities exacerbated by the pandemic
We have brought together and will continue to convene a diverse, cross-sector, international, and intergenerational group of stakeholders—including young people, formerly incarcerated individuals, and victims and survivors of violence—to identify the most effective, viable, and replicable solutions to tackle youth violence and promote youth safety and criminal justice reform.
Phase One, which began in January 2021, established focus groups to address three primary goals:
- Enhance Community Safety and Cohesion
- Reduce Violence, Crime, and Incarceration
- Transform Judicial and Prison Systems
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, these focus groups were conducted online. In them, a core network of stakeholders was invited to:
- Identify key stakeholders and relevant institutions to collaborate and build a wider community.
- Generate ideas, critical questions, and research outputs on priority topics.
- Appraise measures and interventions along a continuum from radical innovation to gradual reform and maintenance of the status quo.
- Set priorities and build visibility for Phase 2 of the Program.
The Focus Groups identified five key areas, which were then taken up by respective virtual Working Groups through 2021:
- The Culture of Justice
- Public Health Approach to Justice
- Data & Metrics
- Public Communication
- Youth Violence and Safety
Drawing on the groups’ findings, content, and emerging questions, Phase One produced the first public version of an extensive report and included two to three larger-scale public webinars, co-created with partners and participants to raise visibility, generate momentum, and foster wider public and policy engagement for the next phase.
Phase Two, in 2022-23, brought together the core network of Fellows —in-person at Schloss Leopoldskron, Salzburg Global’s headquarters, as well as through collaborations among Fellows, to explore the program’s goals in a more integrated way.
During this phase, Fellows identified and advanced the most promising global examples of violence reduction and criminal justice transformation, grounded in research and proven to be effective, viable, and replicable.
Recognizing the urgency of finding solutions in increasingly polarized societies, further strained by the COVID-19 pandemic, stakeholders examined and evaluated practices, tools, and technologies across four key areas:
- New intervention points with long-term potential to reduce violence, injustice, racism, and implicit bias within and beyond criminal justice systems;
- Multi-country comparisons, initially focusing on jurisdictions that had pioneered innovative justice policies and practices;
- Direct engagement with people and communities of color and other marginalized groups to learn from and amplify their lived experiences;
- Initiatives designed to shift behaviors, attitudes, and investments in response to global racial and social justice movements and evolving post-pandemic risks.
Findings and strategies from Phase 2 were disseminated globally to policymakers and communities through publications, video interviews, media products, targeted recommendations, and the development of a cross-sector research agenda to shape future reform.
Phase Three, in 2024-2025, builds directly on the insights and momentum generated in Phases One and Two.
While meaningful progress had been made in many jurisdictions, Salzburg Global, along with the MacArthur and H.F. Guggenheim Foundations, recognized that overlapping global crises—such as post-pandemic mental health challenges, educational and social development losses, systemic racial and ethnic injustice, climate change, migration, rising authoritarianism, technological disruption, and economic precarity—were continuing to shape the outlook for youth and the justice systems that serve them.
In response, a follow-up phase was launched to examine whether youth safety and justice systems need to be fundamentally rethought and reconceived.
In 2024 and 2025, we are bringing together a renewed and expanded group of Fellows from policy, practice, and research, roughly half of whom participated in the earlier program phases.
The current phase is designed to equip stakeholders to better understand the changing contexts in which they operate and to co-develop forward-looking strategies that support youth, foster resilience, and address the deeper drivers of violence.
Program activities have been organized around four key thematic modules:
- Understanding the Global Landscape of Youth Disaffection and Violence: Fellows explored global and local dynamics influencing youth disaffection, including economic insecurity, rising social polarization, and the long-term impacts of the pandemic.
- Reframing Justice and Safety: This module challenged prevailing punitive frameworks and examined alternative models of justice and accountability that center on dignity, restoration, and community well-being.
- Innovative Interventions and Community-Led Solutions: Through case studies from Brazil, Kenya, Mexico, the Philippines, and South Africa, participants studied grassroots responses to systemic inequities and considered how to strengthen community engagement, institutional trust, and locally driven safety strategies.
- Innovative Policy and Practice Approaches: A mix of world cafés, workshops, and case-based dialogue focused on early intervention, alternative justice pathways, and collaborative policy design.
To carry this work forward, Fellows have formed five dedicated working groups, each focused on designing targeted responses to specific systemic challenges in youth justice and safety.
These groups continue to collaborate virtually—refining solutions, sharing knowledge, and building cross-sector momentum for implementation.
Our Outcomes
Outcomes from the Global Innovations on Youth Violence, Safety, and Justice Program have emerged through deep collaboration across regions, disciplines, and lived experiences, reflecting the contributions of Fellows across all phases of the Program.
These efforts have resulted in case studies, practical tools, focus group outputs, and research-informed strategies and resources to support youth, reduce violence, and transform justice systems.
Support Our Work
As a nonprofit organization, we rely on your generosity and support to gather open-minded leaders for breakthrough conversations.
Donations, no matter the size, help us create space for dialogue that overcomes barriers and opens up a world of better possibilities.
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