The Communication Initiative
Development action with informed and engaged societies
The Communication Initiative

After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. 

Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future. 

On the transfer, co-founder Victoria Martin expressed her pleasure to see this work continue under Wits' leadership, knowing that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction. 

As Wits, we honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades and look forward building from that strong base. This includes co-founders Warren Feek (1953-2024) and Victoria Martin as well as La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA), which continues independently at lainiciativadecomunicacion.com with links to The CI Global site. We are also eager to forge new partnerships and entertain new ideas as we consider how best to contribute to social and behaviour change in our rapidly evolving environment.

If you are joining the International Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC) Summit in Panama, please join Wits and CILA on Monday, 22 June, to share your thoughts and suggestion for the relaunch of the Communication Initiative. We will be in Pacifica 5 from 12-1:25 for the Refuel, Reflect, and Renew Lunch Series: The Communication Initiative: celebrating a driving force for Communication for Social Change and the way forward. We will reflect on the legacy of Warren Feek and family in creating the Communication Initiative, consider the contributions of CI over the years and then turn our attention towards the future in this dynamic session. 

If you are unable to join us in Panama, we still want to hear from you. Please contribute your thoughts by following this link: https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026 or reaching out to ci_surveys@commint.com. 

You can also follow the QR Code:

 https://redcap.link/CommunicationInitiative2026

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Impact - Social Change and Behaviour Change related to UNICEF Strategic Priorities

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This UNICEF led work is focused on providing policy and funder decision-makers the compelling evidence they need, in the bite sized chunks they require, to demonstrate that social change and behaviour change strategies and actions have a significant, direct impact on key development challenges. They add significant value to making progress towards local and national Development goals; UNICEF Strategic Priorities; the SDGs and other key Development measures. As a result should receive increased policy and financial support.

The impact data linked below comes from:

  1. An extensive journal literature identification process
  2. Responses from people and organisations in The CI Network and internally within UNICEF, to nominate their top 10 pieces of research - which 10 research papers do they find most compelling and persuasive in demonstrating the direct impact of social change and behaviour change strategies related to development priorities?

The selection criteria set a high bar to ensure credibility with policy makers and funders.

  1. Only randomised control trials (with a researched population over 1,500).or ...
  2. ... systematic reviews that include some RCTs
  3. Must be in a peer review published journal
  4. Primarily that publication should be in the leading journals that have the highest credibility amongst funders and policy decision-makers;
  5. The research must produce a sentence or phrase that contains a numeric impact data point that can be quoted

This organisation of the impact research identified relates to the UNICEF Strategic Priorities (2022-2027 - check). Click on the one of interest to you to review the impact data identified through this process. (The data will also be organised according to other filters - more coming soon).

UNICEF GOAL AREA 1:

Every child, including adolescents, survives and thrives, with access to nutritious diets, quality primary health care, nurturing practices, and essential supplies

  1. Strengthening primary health care and high impact health interventions
  2. Immunization services as part of primary health care
  3. Fast-track the end of HIV/AIDS
  4. Health and development in early childhood and adolescence
  5. Mental health and psychosocial well being
  6. Nutrition in early childhood
  7. Nutrition of adolescents and women
  8. Early detection and treatment of malnutrition



UNICEF GOAL AREA 2:

Every child, including adolescents, learns and acquires skills for the future

  1. Access to quality learning opportunities
  2. Learning, skills, participation and engagement



UNICEF GOAL AREA 3

Every child, including adolescents, is protected from violence, exploitation, abuse, neglect and harmful practices

  1. Protection from violence, abuse and exploitation
  2. Promotion of care, mental health and psychosocial well-being, and justice
  3. Prevention of harmful practices



UNICEF GOAL AREA 4:

Every child, including adolescents, has access to safe and equitable water, sanitation and hygiene services and supplies and lives in a safe and sustainable climate and environment.

  1. Safe and equitable water, sanitation and hygiene services and practices
  2. Water, sanitation and hygiene systems and empowerment of communities
  3. Climate change, disaster risks and environmental degradation



UNICEF GOAL AREA 5:

Every child, including adolescents, has access to inclusive social protection and lives free from poverty

  1. Reducing child poverty
  2. Access to inclusive social protection