Extremely Together

Organisation

Extremely Together and its Chapters are part of the Kofi Annan Foundation, a non-profit organisation founded by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2016.

The mission of the Kofi Annan Foundation is to mobilise political will to overcome threats to peace, development, and human rights.

Legal status: Not-for-profit organisation

Type of Organisation: Foundation

Project description

Extremely Together (ET) is a youth-led movement that supports young people’s leadership in preventing violent extremism (PVE). 

Started in 2016 by Kofi Annan and 10 young leaders working on PVE in their respective countries, the movement has now established four country Chapters in Somalia, Uganda, the Philippines, and Pakistan who work to promote youth-led solutions to violent extremism (VE) in their countries and beyond. 

Since their creation in 2020, the Chapters have led large scale national peacebuilding activities, and worked together to influence regional and international policymaking. Building on innovative approaches to PVE like art-based advocacy or interfaith dialogue, ET works to harness the potential of youth to become actors of change in their own communities. It equips them with the appropriate skills needed to identify, question, and reject violent extremist narratives. This also serves to encourage young people to become active citizens, openly challenge stereotypes, and support peers who may be struggling with issues related to VE or extremist recruitment. 

Given the success of the four country Chapters in engaging with young people and working with them on such sensitive issues, the movement is now expanding to the Sahel region with the creation of two new Chapters in Niger and Burkina Faso underway.

Deliverables

East African Chapters:

In Somalia and Uganda, the 80 ET Champions who were trained to detect patterns of VE and provided with community mobilisation skills, engaged over 1,500 young people in PVE activities, including 40 trainings, advocacy, and outreach programs.

Experience sharing was facilitated between the two Chapters through a 4-day hybrid exchange and subsequent panel discussion in March 2021. During this exchange, participants swapped experiences and best practices, but also shared their culture and traditions with each other. Highlights from this exchange can be seen in this video and the lessons that the two Chapters shared with decision-makers can be found in this article.

South & Southeast Asian Chapters:

Following the research conducted in the Philippines, Pakistan and Bangladesh on the drivers of violent extremism among urban youth (see research summary here), more than 2,100 young people were trained in the three countries by our ET Chapter networks. The trained youth led more than 40 PVE projects and initiatives across the region. 

13,489 young people were engaged in different activities organised by our Chapters regionally, 51% men and 49% women. 16 youth groups were established at different levels in the three countries. Of their members, 44% were women and 69% were from religious and ethnic minorities. In addition, 9.3 million people were reached indirectly through PVE and peace initiatives conducted both online and offline. 

As a result of this experience, the “Building Peace Together” Guide was created in consort with our Asian Chapters and is destined to help young people build peace in their communities. It outlines 3 main objectives that help foster a youth-led approach to PVE and addresses 7 major challenges that young PVE practitioners face in their work. It also includes 10 case studies from diverse youth-led and youthcentred groups and organisations from across the region. It is one of our most popular publications. 

A three-part video toolkit series was produced. It can be found on our regional chapter page alongside other resources that were produced as part of ET’s work in South and Southeast Asia. 

The Chapter in the Philippines also produced a series of three printed magazines to make their research on PVE accessible to hard-to-reach communities. An overview of its contents can be found here. 

A PVE training resource for young activists 

On the basis of the experience accumulated through the Chapters’ experience, a training guide entitled “Empowering young people to prevent violent extremism” was published in 2023. As a free resource, it seeks to help young activists train their peers on how to prevent violent extremism and counter the threat of radicalization in their communities. Available in English and French, the guide delves into: what is violent extremism; how to build self-resilience; and what PVE actions can be taken.

Contact details

Address

Rue de Varembé 09-11
P.O.B. 157
1211 Geneva 20
Switzerland

Contact person: Maud Roure
Telephone: (+41) 229 197 520
rourekofiannanfoundation [dot] org (Email) | Website