Through the Citizen Security Network, the IDB aims at promoting the dialogue among key policymakers from Latin America and the Caribbean, in order to find common solutions to the challenge of preventing violence and promoting peaceful coexistence in the Region.

This network is constituted by vice-ministers and high level public officials of equivalent status responsible for citizen security policies, who meet annually to share experiences and lessons learned. The topics to be discussed in each meeting are based on key issues from the shared security agenda in the region. Meetings are preceded and followed up by a permanent virtual conference system that supports knowledge exchange between participants.

The network focuses on issues that affect transversally all countries’ citizens security, including those related to transnational crime and violence, as well as those that are key to local policymaking priorities.

Some of the key topics covered by the network include the cost of crime and the financing of security policies, legislative and procedural modernization, collaboration in applied knowledge generation and dissemination, leadership training, and institutional reforms that seek to provide democratic and integral solutions to the increasing crime rate.