Tackling the scourge of violent extremism while respecting democracy and the rule of law.

The Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism program aims at improving global, regional and national responses to violent extremism by channeling the collective expertise of policymakers, media representatives, experts, practitioners and the wisdom and experience of the CdM Members. The WLA-CdM joins forces with political and religious leaders, governments, international institutions and non-governmental actors.

This program aims to promote a vision of a world founded on democratic values and committed to effective cooperation in the fight against violent extremism. Since terrorism is a transnational phenomenon requiring a global response, the organization convened the International Summit on Democracy, Terrorism and Security in March 2005. As a result, WLA-CdM members created the Madrid Agenda, a plan of action to confront terrorism within a framework of democratic values.

In 2015, the WLA-CdM agreed that the challenges had evolved and a revision of its democratic response to violent extremism was needed. For this, the WLA-CdM convened the Madrid+10 Policy Dialogue in October 2015. The main outcome of the debate, the Global Consensus, constitutes the basis for a comprehensive, action-oriented framework that rejects one-sided and one-dimensional approaches to preventing radicalization and violent extremism.