Case Studies from Four Cities: Beirut, Delhi, Kampala, and Santo Domingo

Throughout 2016, the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) partnered with local organizations in urban humanitarian settings, for the purpose of piloting gender-based violence (GBV) activities that would be at once innovative, community-driven, and responsive to evidence on local GBV risks and effective risk mitigation strategies. Four pilots were undertaken, in Delhi, India; Beirut, Lebanon; Santo Domingo, Ecuador; and Kampala, Uganda. Each Urban GBV Case Study presents an example of an urban-specific GBV risk prevention and/or response strategy. Each illustrates, in a different way, the untapped potential that exists within both refugee communities and host-communities, for mitigating urban refugees’ immediate and long-term GBV risks.

The case studies detail pilot actions and interventions designed and implemented based on five principle strategies of urban GBV risk mitigation:

1. Building relationships with host community members and stakeholders;
2. Strengthening refugees’ protective peer networks;
3. Building urban refugees’ assets and capacities to enhance their resilience;
4. Deploying multiple urban outreach strategies to connect with hard-to-reach refugees in cities, including peer outreach;
5. Meeting urban refugees where they are—whether that means in a particular geographic location or in the sense of supporting them in developing the protection strategies they prioritize, with the individuals who make up the ‘community’ that is most relevant for them.