JUVENILE JUSTICE: Lessons Learnt in El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua

Summary: This case study is part of a compilation by Save the Children UK of lessons learnt in contributing to a national rights-based legal and policy framework for children. Similar reports for Bulgaria and Egypt will be made available on the CRIN website in the coming months.Save the Children UK’s programme in Central American and the Caribbean, created in 1974, has contributed to a national child rights framework, leading to dramatic changes for children and young people. The programme closed in March 2007, and its legacy continues through Save the Children’s partners through out the region.

This is a record of lessons learnt, challenges identified and recommendations made from Save the Children’s experiences over the last five years for all those involved in child rights and development work.

Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Guatemala: Juvenile Justice
This programme aimed to help reduce violence committed by and against young people. It helped define and advocate for State policies emphasising prevention and worked to eliminate anti-youth stigma and foment a social and community based culture of prevention that respects the rights of children and young people in conflict with the law, or are at risk of doing so.

Lessons learnt:

• Effective strategic planning should prioritise programme activities, identifying which aspects are crucial in the beginning stages, what inter-institutional coordination is needed, and what training will be needed to prepare programme staff and participants.
• Resource management should be carefully planned
• It is important to encourage broad non-politically aligned participation in the model, rather than limiting direct participation to a select group of leaders to broaden community support.
• Families have an important role to play in this process. Work with parents and sibling can ease the reinsertion of former gang members into society, etc.
• The complexity of youth violence associated with gangs should not be underestimated. It is the product of historical structural factors beyond the scope of programming and these causes.
• The police historically have been a source of violence in thse communities. It is necessary to have a deep understanding of police operations and capabilities of police in the target community.
• Introduce a public communication system so that successess can be relayed to the general public and awareness raised with regard to the existence of effective alternatives to the problem of violence and youth.

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