The Youth Cafe (TYC) is committed to forging a link between developments, which we strive to achieve amongst Youth from disadvantaged communities and the Investment World. We accomplish this by seeking to evaluate our transformation mandate against both revenue targets and social impact outcomes.

Through our solution-oriented model, we can provide our partners with measurable solutions. We recognize that to work with integrity, we must ‘walk the talk’ and ensure that anyone who comes into contact with TYC is protected from any form of injustice, discrimination, or abuse.

Safeguarding refers to the policies and processes an organization puts in place to prevent and respond to harm by staff or those working on our behalf. TYC’s SHEA and Safeguarding policies sit under the AAI Code of Conduct and are informed by and reinforce TYC’s feminist leadership approach.

TYC is committed to preventing any form of sexual harassment, exploitation, and abuse (including child abuse and adult at-risk abuse) and responding robustly when these harms occur.

SHEA and Safeguarding incidents are rooted in an imbalance of power, particularly gendered and sexualized abuses of power. The #metoo and #aidtoo movements have reminded us that those working with TYC have increased power and privilege. We must do everything we can to stop staff/representatives from abusing power and the privilege they hold.

TYC views any form of sexual violence as a gross violation of human rights. We will not tolerate our staff or other representatives carrying out any form of sexual harassment, exploitation, or abuse towards anyone we contact through our work.

Zero tolerance means we will always take action when Safeguarding harm takes place, ensuring that we offer support to all affected and that the organization learns from the harm, so it does not happen again.

We recognize that gendered forms of sexual violence disproportionately affect women and girls, and our work also recognizes the impact on boys, men, transgender, and non-binary people.

We are committed to working with the marginalized, oppressed, and hard-to-reach groups, recognizing the impact of sexual violence on people living in poverty, the LGBTQI community, and people of different ethnicities, religions, races, classes, and abilities.

We will listen to and learn from them so that our SHEA and Safeguarding approach supports their work to promote their rights and live lives with dignity.

As part of living out our feminist principles, we will champion intersectionality by recognizing diverse and connected experiences and taking action to ensure we do not compound harm. We will take action to ensure our approach is anti-racist, inclusive, and safe for all.

We must acknowledge that some staff and other representatives will use their position of power for personal gain, exploiting the trust placed in them to harm others. We must do everything we can to reduce the likelihood and respond swiftly and robustly when incidents occur.

Because of the power imbalances inherent in the international aid sector and within the broader social norms and structures in which we work, we must prevent and respond to sexual exploitation and abuse allegations. 

We take all concerns seriously and conduct timely and robust responses to allegations of harm. No one will be victimized for making a complaint, and TYC is committed to taking a survivor-centered approach throughout.

We work with survivors to ensure they are central to any response, are not further harmed or disempowered by any processes, and receive support throughout. 

SHEA and Safeguarding are fundamentally rethinking our sector’s humanitarian and development work approach. It asks us to question the work cultures we create and perpetuate and to challenge the norms and power structures inherent in aid work. In doing so, we can create new radical approaches which help to ensure that our behaviors, work cultures, and processes do not deliberately or inadvertently cause harm.