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Sixth Global Summit: Addressing Gender-Based and Intimate Partner Violence, and Misogynistic Hate

Publication Date:

05/02/2026

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Event Reports

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Digital HarmsGender-Based ViolenceIntimate Partner ViolenceMisogynist HateSixth Global SummitToronto

— 8 minutes reading time

This report provides a summary of discussions during the session and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Strong Cities Network Management Unit, Strong Cities members, event sponsors or participants.

Introduction

On 9 – 11 December 2025, the Strong Cities Network held its Sixth Global Summit in Toronto (Canada), bringing together more than 300 representatives of local governments, national governments, civil society organisations, academia, the private sector and international organisations. This included nearly 60 mayors and governors, as well as 110 other local government officials from 100 cities and 42 countries. Under the theme Stronger Together: Forging Safer, Connected, Thriving Cities in a Changing World, the Summit provided a platform for city leaders to share practical and innovative solutions to prevent and respond to hate, extremism and polarisation, and build safer, more resilient and more inclusive communities.

The Summit agenda included a plenary session on Gender-Based and Intimate Partner Violence and Misogynistic Hate, which explored how cities are responding to rising levels of violence, harassment and gendered hate, both offline and online, and the role local governments can play in supporting survivors and strengthening prevention efforts.

Scene-Setters:

• Anne Craanen, Senior Research and Policy Manager, Institute for Strategic Dialogue
• Hemanthi Goonasekera, CEO, Federation of Sri Lankan Local Government Authorities (Sri Lanka)
• Laura Neuman, Senior Advisor, The Carter Center (United States)
• Lily Cheng, City Councillor, City of Toronto (Ontario, Canada)

Key Takeaways

1. Effective prevention of Gender Based Violence (GBV) and related gendered threats requires coordinated, multi-stakeholder engagement at the local level, bringing together municipal leadership, law enforcement, health services, education providers and community organisations to deliver comprehensive and contextually grounded responses.
2. Trauma-informed and survivor-centred approaches are essential for achieving meaningful outcomes, ensuring that services are safe, accessible and shaped by the lived experiences of those affected.
3. Many survivors do not initially recognise coercive control, digital harassment or other non-physical forms of abuse as violence, which delays help-seeking and limits early intervention.
4. Awareness-raising efforts can significantly increase reporting but often expose critical gaps in service capacity, including shortages in shelter, counselling and specialised support.
5. Innovative tools such as safety apps can support prevention and reporting but must be paired with strong safeguards to protect survivor safety, privacy and consent.
6. Fragmented data collection across agencies limits the ability of local governments to understand the scale of GBV and related gendered threats and plan strategically, constraining evidence-based policymaking.
7. Prevention requires early engagement with young people and the active involvement of boys and men, particularly through education on healthy relationships, digital behaviour and masculinity.
8. Social norms, stigma and victim-blaming continue to shape public and institutional responses to GBV and related gendered threats, influencing reporting, policy action and survivor support.

Key Themes 

1. Local Governments as Coordinators of Prevention and Response to GBV and Related Gendered Threats

Speakers consistently emphasised that these threats cannot be addressed by any single institution acting alone. Effective prevention and response require strong coordination between municipalities, law enforcement, health services, schools and community organisations.

Lily Cheng, City Councillor, City of Toronto (Ontario, Canada), described the City’s FOCUS initiative – multi-agency coordination mechanisms where referrals often originate from police. These situation tables bring together social services, mental health providers and community organisations to support families during crises and divert individuals away from the criminal justice system. This model was highlighted as an example of how local governments can use their convening power to align frontline services, share information and ensure that survivors receive coordinated, holistic support rather than fragmented interventions.

Speakers also stressed that local authorities often identify emerging risks earlier than national institutions, particularly where community tensions, online harassment or domestic abuse trends are involved. However, without clear coordination structures, responses can remain reactive and inconsistent.

Participants noted that when awareness campaigns lead to increased reporting, cities must be prepared with adequate service capacity. Otherwise, survivors may be referred to overstretched shelters, counselling services or legal support systems that cannot meet demand.

2. Trauma-Informed and Survivor-Centred Practice

Across the session, participants stressed that survivor safety, dignity and agency must guide all prevention and intervention efforts. Speakers noted that survivors often disengage from services when responses feel procedural, judgmental or unsafe. Trauma-informed approaches – including empathetic communication, survivor choice and appropriate referrals – were identified as essential for building trust and ensuring continuity of care.

Participants emphasised that survivors should be engaged not only as service users but also as contributors to programme design and evaluation, ensuring that policies reflect lived experience and respond to real needs.

The importance of trust-building was reinforced by Laura Neuman, Senior Advisor, The Carter Center (United States), who described the Carter Center’s six-year municipal trust-building initiative – Inform Women, Transform Lives Campaign, a global effort to ensure that women can access life-changing municipal services and thrive in their communities. The programme prioritises strengthening institutional capacity before moving into community priority-setting. Through workshops and consultations, municipalities identified local needs such as access to hospitals and schools, ensuring community voices shaped programme design.

Carter Center funding has also enabled women-led initiatives to reach other women through creative engagement strategies, strengthening trust, participation and survivor confidence in local institutions.

3. Social Norms, Awareness and the Recognition of Harm

A central theme of the discussion was that many forms of GBV and related gendered threats remain normalised and under-recognised, particularly coercive control, online harassment and street harassment.

Hemanthi Goonasekera, CEO, Federation of Sri Lankan Local Government Authorities (Sri Lanka), highlighted how harassment in public spaces and on public transport remains pervasive in Sri Lanka. While education efforts often focus on women’s safety, she noted that this alone is insufficient to shift harmful behaviours or challenge the social norms that enable abuse.

Speakers cautioned that awareness campaigns must move beyond encouraging reporting to also address victim-blaming, stigma and harmful gender norms. Without this, survivors may continue to feel unsafe coming forward, and perpetrators’ behaviour remains unchallenged.

At the same time, awareness-raising efforts were recognised as important for increasing service uptake. However, participants noted that higher reporting often exposes significant gaps in service capacity, including shortages in shelter, counselling and specialist support.

Lily Cheng highlighted the scale of unmet need, noting that while approximately 600 cases of GBV and other gendered harm are formally reported, this translates into an estimated 20,000 cases of intimate partner violence per year in the city. This gap illustrates the extent of underreporting and the scale of harm that remains hidden. While Toronto’s declaration of gender-based violence as an epidemic helped signal political seriousness, speakers emphasised that symbolic commitments must be matched by sustained investment and action.

Participants also stressed that fragmented data systems across agencies hinder effective planning and resource allocation. Burnaby’s (British Columbia, Canada) data dashboard and Toronto’s data initiatives were cited as promising examples of how cities can better track trends and improve strategic responses. However, even where data exists, it often underrepresents the true scale of harm.

4. Prevention, Youth Engagement and the Digital Dimension

Looking ahead, speakers stressed the importance of early prevention, particularly through education and youth engagement.

Participants noted that teenage boys are increasingly exposed to deepfakes, misogynistic content and online manipulation, which can reinforce harmful attitudes toward women and normalise abusive behaviour. At the same time, speakers emphasised that boys can also be victims of gender-based violence, a reality that remains under-acknowledged in many prevention frameworks.

Lily Cheng shared that Victim Services programmes operating in school systems in Toronto were found as effective by community partners and evaluators in shaping norms, engaging large numbers of young people and creating space for conversations about respect, boundaries and support services.

Speakers stressed that prevention must actively involve boys and young men, not only to challenge harmful behaviours, but also to foster positive role models and healthier understandings of masculinity.

Participants also discussed the use of digital tools to support prevention and reporting. Hemanthi Goonasekera described how Colombo (Sri Lanka) developed its own safety app, which includes features such as a flashlight and local safety information. However, speakers emphasised that municipalities must safeguard sensitive data – particularly the locations of women’s safe spaces – and ensure survivor privacy and consent remain central.

Next Steps

The discussion highlighted several areas where the Strong Cities Network can add value:

• Supporting cities to strengthen multi-stakeholder coordination among local government, law enforcement, health services and frontline practitioners.
• Facilitating peer learning on trauma-informed, survivor-centred service delivery models.
• Strengthening local data capacity to improve measurement, planning and accountability.
• Supporting youth and men’s engagement in GBV and related gendered harm prevention and healthy masculinity initiatives.
• Advising municipalities on the safe use of digital tools that prioritise survivor protection and privacy.
• Integrating prevention of GBV and other gendered harms into broader local governance and social cohesion frameworks.

The session underscored that preventing and responding to gender-based harms requires coordinated, multi-stakeholder engagement at the local level and the consistent application of trauma-informed, survivor-centred approaches. By strengthening partnerships, investing in service capacity, engaging young people and challenging harmful social norms, municipalities can play a critical role in building safer, more inclusive communities.

For the Strong Cities Network, the discussion reinforced the importance of supporting cities as conveners, coordinators and champions of holistic, locally grounded strategies to prevent GBV and other gendered harms.

Additional Resources

Recent Strong Cities policy briefs and resources:

• City Leadership in Partnering with Local Communities for Social Cohesion: Ten Considerations for Mayors and Local Governments, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• National-Local Cooperation: Opportunities and Lessons Learned for Secondary and Tertiary Prevention, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• City Leadership in the Face of Rising Incivility and Polarisation: Ten Considerations for Mayors and Local Governments, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• Innovations in Prevention: Piloting Multi-Actor Frameworks in Small and Mid-Sized Cities in the United States, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• A Toolkit for Cities: Building a Multi-Actor Local Prevention Framework, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• A Toolkit for Manitoba Municipalities: Addressing Anti-Government Hate and Harassment, Strong Cities Network, 2025
• A Guide for Cities: Preventing Hate, Extremism & Polarisation, Strong Cities Network, updated 2025
• A Guide for Mayors: Preventing and Responding to Hate, Extremism & Polarisation, Strong Cities Network, updated 2025
• A Guide for City-Led Response, Strong Cities Network, May 2024
• City Spotlights Library, Strong Cities Network

Donors & Partners

The Sixth Global Summit was co-hosted with the City of Toronto and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, and delivered with generous support from the Government of Canada, The Fourth Freedom Forum, The Toronto Foundation and Charities Aid Foundation.

Contact Information 

For more information about the Sixth Global Summit or the Strong Cities Network, please contact [email protected].

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