Strengthening resilience to violent extremism

Tana recently carried out an independent evaluation of the European Commission’s flagship project countering violent extremism in the Horn of Africa (STRIVE HoA). This assessed the extent to which STRIVE HoA has contributed to best practices and knowledge about how to strengthen the resilience of individuals and communities to extremism and violence, particularly amongst marginalised youth living in Kenya and Somalia.

The evaluation’s findings underline the importance of rigorous project design, partner selection, implementation and monitoring. Inter alia, it was recommended that CVE projects systematically adopt a theory of change approach that makes the underlying assumptions about the changes and results expected explicit, and that subsequent monitoring should regularly check and validate these assumptions, thereby contributing to risk management and knowledge about intended and unintended effects.

The evaluation was carried out in partnership with Conflict Management Consulting (CMC). It also features in a separate Lessons Learned report on STRIVE HoA that has been produced by the implementing partner, the UK-based Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).

Both reports can be accessed here