The European Child Sexual Abuse Legislation Advocacy Group (ECLAG) is a coalition of child rights non-governmental organisations fighting to protect children from sexual violence and abuse. The organisations involved in ECLAG have joined forces to ensure child rights are prioritised in EU digital and social policy, an issue which is already firmly grounded in EU principles and strategies as well as law. They advocate for the Child Sexual Abuse Regulation proposed by the European Commission in May 2022 to be passed. The wider ECLAG participating group is comprised of more than 60 European and global organisations. The steering group consists of the Brave Movement, ECPAT, Eurochild, Missing Children Europe, IWF, Terre des Hommes and Thorn.
Child rights organisations have joined forces under a common mission: protect all children’s rights, including right to protection and care and to live free from violence, under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the EU Child Rights Strategy and the 2011 Directive on child sexual abuse and exploitation. They aim to safeguard children from the heinous crimes of sexual abuse and exploitation online. By fostering partnerships and encouraging collaboration among NGOs, government agencies, private sector organisations, and civil society, we strive for a comprehensive approach that leaves no child behind.
ECLAG emerged as a joint effort of child rights NGOs to optimise collective action by the child rights community and its key allies, with a common vision that the EU puts in place a robust legislation to end child sexual abuse and exploitation. It provides a framework for members, child rights organisations themselves, to share knowledge, ideas and materials related either directly or indirectly to EU and national legislative actions to fight child sexual abuse. It is also a focal point for advocacy and campaigns, including by members adopting and amplifying existing campaign materials individually or in groups.
It was created in April 2022.
ECLAG emerged from an informal coalition of several child rights organisations working to ensure the comprehensive protection of children in EU digital policy. It was created to build alignment and cooperation among civil society organisations with common goals, which are hallmark characteristics of civil society movements.
The steering group consists of the Brave Movement, ECPAT, Eurochild, Missing Children Europe, IWF, Terre des Hommes and Thorn.
Each member of the ECLAG Steering Group is registered in the EU Transparency Register.
The wider coalition currently consists of:
ECLAG is an informal coalition of civil society organisations and does not receive direct independent funding. Individual organisations within the coalition receive individual funding from a range of sources. The coordination of ECLAG campaigns is supported since July 2023 by Future Advocacy through funding provided by the Swiss Philanthropy Fund.
The Child Safety ON coalition started as a separate initiative from ECLAG. In Spring 2022, a coalition of child rights organisations decided to unite forces to launch a Child Safety ON campaign to raise awareness of the pressing need to protect children online in our ever developing digital world. This campaign is supported by the Purpose agency through funding provided by the OAK Foundation.
The ECLAG coalition and Child Safety ON have distinct memberships. However, as both initiatives share the same ambitions and many members, ECLAG and Purpose closely coordinate their campaign actions.
Purpose is a creative social impact agency, which was funded by the Oak Foundation to help ensure there are effective policies in place to protect children online, and to campaign to make the internet safer for children. As part of this work, Purpose has delivered creative public mobilisation campaigns with the Justice Initiative and the Child Safety ON campaign.
After more than a year working together, the ECLAG Steering Group needed extra human resources capacity to help coordinate the coalition’s work and its campaign actions. In July 2023, Future Advocacy started to support the work of the ECLAG coalition. Future Advocacy’s role is to coordinate ECLAG advocacy and campaigns efforts to raise awareness on child sexual abuse online.
Future Advocacy received funding from the Swiss Philanthropy Foundation, to provide campaigning and advocacy support to ECLAG.
Any questions about Swiss Philanthropy Foundation should be directed to SPF via their website: https://www.swissphilanthropy.ch/en/contact-us/
Any questions about Oak funding should be directed to [email protected]