The Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission’s science and knowledge service, published a report that provides evidence-based scientific support to the European policymaking process.

Background

The EU Directive 2011/93 sets out several provisions that require Member States to invest in prevention programmes targeting:

1. People who fear they may offend,
2. People undergoing criminal proceedings or who are serving a prison sentence for crimes relating to sexual offences against children,
3. People coming out of prison to avoid recidivism.

In order to enhance these efforts, the Commission set up a network on prevention, bringing together relevant practitioners and researchers. This network aims to:

• encourage more research in the field;
• support Member States in implementing usable, rigorously evaluated and effective prevention measures targeted both at perpetrator prevention and more broadly to raise awareness of this crime;
• support the sharing of knowledge to carers/parents and professionals working with children;
• give children the right tools to identify risky situations;
• consider the creation of a repository for good practices/tools/programs;
• facilitate the exchange of best practices;
• strengthen the EU’s capacity to decrease the prevalence of child sexual abuse in the EU and globally.

Joint Thematic Workshop

This report is a result of a workshop held in May 2021. It was focused on classification criteria and identified a baseline on which to build evaluation criteria in the future.

The available information about prevention initiatives is limited, unclear and unstructured. In order to raise awareness of existing prevention programmes, it was deemed necessary to firstly, categorise and, secondly, evaluate them. The classification criteria were discussed in the thematic workshop. They should not be seen as exhaustive, final and definitive, but rather as a baseline to prompt discussion and possibly more research. Classification of prevention programmes by criteria will provide insight for EU Member States on initiatives put in place by other entities, and inspire and support the launch of similar efforts that could be adapted to their own national, societal and cultural context.

This technical report can be seen as a reference document for individuals (such as people seeking help, helpers, practitioners, probation officers, researchers, educators, etc.) and entities (such as Member State Authorities, organisations, NGOs, universities, clinics, research centres, etc.) involved in setting up and running prevention programmes relating to Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation.

You can find the full report on the JRC Publications Repository: https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC127262