During the December 2024 Program, Rethinking Youth Safety and Justice Systems: Supporting Youth, Reducing Violence, and Increasing Resilience, Fellows created and self-selected into five dedicated focus groups, each tasked with developing targeted solutions to systemic challenges in youth justice and safety. These groups have continued their work virtually, refining strategies and exploring pathways for implementation.
In the coming period, and in the lead-up to the next program in December 2025, Salzburg Global will focus on supporting and scaling the efforts of these five established focus groups. This includes sustaining momentum, planning for the dissemination of findings, systematizing innovations and learnings, and identifying any critical gaps not yet addressed. Where needed, additional strategies will be developed in Phase 3 to fill these gaps and advance the Program’s broader goals.
Creating Safe Spaces, Fostering a Sense of Community and Belonging.
This focus group aims to use education as a transformative tool to foster belonging, empowerment, and community among youth. The focus is on incorporating innovative approaches like gamification, edutainment, and technology-driven solutions to create an inclusive learning ecosystem. The objectives are to design an AI-driven system that identifies curriculum gaps and recommends projects to build competencies like collaboration, empathy, and critical thinking.
The group plans to implement prevention and intervention strategies to mitigate pathways to violence and disengagement, ensuring education is relevant, engaging, and accessible. By empowering schools, communities, and families to create supportive environments, the group seeks to address systemic barriers that prevent youth from thriving. Policymakers, educators, and technology experts will be invited to collaborate in developing and scaling this model for maximum impact.
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This group focuses on offering a structured and collaborative approach to reforming juvenile justice systems by addressing critical issues such as violence against children and youth in contact with the justice system, as well as children’s rights violations in the criminal justice system, while recognising the importance of response to crime, prevention work and children’s neurological development. The general objective of the group is to develop a toolkit for change that will help children and youth with lived experience of the justice system, changemakers and advocates who support children and youth, to be more effective in their action and to advise them to create structured strategies in order to create meaningful changes within communities. The work of the group will be inspired by existing successful built into the proposed methodology.
The group is informed by international human rights frameworks, in particular the Convention on the Rights of the Child and other key international standards, norms and principles, which include the UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice (Beijing Rules), the UN Rules for the Protection of Juveniles Deprived of their Liberty (Havana Rules), the UN Guidelines for the Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency (Riyadh Rules), the Guidelines for Action on Children in the Criminal Justice System, and the Guidelines on Justice in Matters Involving Child Victims and Witnesses of Crime
Incorporating the lived experiences of children under 18 and young adults aged 18–24 who have experienced justice system violations in potentially three locations worldwide will be an added value to ensure practical and inclusive solutions. The group plans to hold regular bi-monthly meetings, at least until the next Salzburg Global meeting in December 2025, looking into comparative analyses of global reforms, successful practices, and human rights violations. The proposed methodology will include developing pilot projects, advocacy initiatives, and stakeholder engagement strategies. It is planned to present the proposed toolkit during the December Salzburg Global meeting.
The Toolkit for Change aspires to become a replicable model for changemakers worldwide, which proposes scalable methodologies to drive impactful juvenile justice reform.
The composition of the group is interdisciplinary, and includes experts in child justice, in neuroscience, law, community work, police, etc.
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This working group aims to address structural injustices that perpetuate racial and economic disparities in justice systems globally. The focus is to advocate for resource redistribution from punitive systems to community-based care, including mental health services, housing stability, and education. The objectives are to challenge incarceration-focused budgets and promote investments in long-term societal benefits.
A key focus is to foster honest discussions about power, politics, and systemic inequities. Through collaborative action, the group aims to inspire systemic reform that prioritizes dignity, equity, and empowerment over punishment and harm.
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This focus group aims to advance meaningful reform in child and youth justice systems by leveraging the principles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The focus is to emphasize the inherent dignity and worth of all children while addressing systemic challenges such as low minimum ages of criminal responsibility, dual-status children, and inequities in justice practices. The objectives are to develop legislative, litigation, and practice-focused toolkits that provide actionable and adaptable guidance for diverse legal systems across local, state, and global contexts.
The group plans to conduct systematic reviews and collect successful global case studies to establish measurable metrics that demonstrate the benefits of justice practices aligned with CRC principles. Engaging policymakers, practitioners, and communities will be central to ensuring reforms are inclusive, resource-effective, and sustainable. The aim is to foster collaborative approaches and share insights at international forums to bridge divides and advance justice systems that prioritize children’s rights, public safety, and societal well-being.
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This focus group focuses on understanding the socio-political and economic factors driving youth involvement in organized crime and gangs. The objectives are to examine how systemic inequities are exploited by criminal organizations and to identify strategies to strengthen community cohesion and resilience. The group aims to analyse the interplay between organized crime and state actors, including corruption and electoral influence, to develop actionable and impactful interventions.
Proposed initiatives include foresight exercises to anticipate emerging challenges, parenting support programs to enhance family resilience, and reframing youth networks as community assets. The group plans to leverage social network analysis to quantify the impact of targeted interventions on transforming vulnerable youth into community leaders. Collaboration and knowledge exchange will be central to creating globally adaptable tools and insights.
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