Who we are
Founded in 2004 in Berlin, Violence Prevention Network is one of Europe’s largest civil society organisations engaged in preventing and countering violent extremism. We work nationally and internationally, with over 120 practitioners, researchers and advisers in 10 regional offices across Germany and abroad.
Facilitating support informed by practitioners’ experiences
- We have worked with over 3,700 individual cases of radicalised persons with different extremist backgrounds within prisons – and many more outside prison – to change violent behaviour and extremist mind-sets.
- Violence Prevention Network pioneers solutions for multi-stakeholder partnerships to prevent and counter violent extremism. We work with, support and train public authorities, prison and probation services, police and security actors and civil society practitioners to facilitate effective prevention work.
- Our unique case management process facilitates targeted cooperation between security and non-security stakeholders on a daily basis based on joint needs and risk assessments, security protocols, and effective communication and decision-making for tailored interventions.
Our vision and mission
We work to strengthen whole-of-society partnerships in the area of prevention, disengagement, deradicalisation, rehabilitation and reintegration – facilitating mutual learning and eye-to-eye cooperation among government agencies, local stakeholders, schools, refugee centres, civil society organisations and many more.
Whole-of-society approach
We are convinced that no state, organisation or individual can address violent extremism alone. It’s when a variety of actors come together to connect their ideas and resources in trusted collaboration that programmes for prevention of violent extremism can become effective and reliable – for partners, affected communities and the individuals that we work with.
Policy informed by practice
We work to empower first-line practitioners in playing an active role in the design, implementation and evaluation of multi-stakeholder efforts to address violent extremism. Integrating the experiences, voices and perspectives of practitioners more systematically in policy planning and programme design is key to make P/CVE efforts succeed in the implementation phase and reflect the needs on the ground.