Women’s Counseling Centers empowered through “Purple Response to Gender-Based Violence”

The Purple Response to Gender-Based Violence Project, which aims to strengthen local service mechanisms in the fight against violence against women in Ankara, is building the capacity of specialists working in Women’s Counseling Centers. The project started in June 2025 and has completed nine months of implementation. It is implemented through a partnership between UN Women Türkiye and the Foundation for Women’s Solidarity. To date, 58 specialists have been reached through the project.

Date: Wednesday, 8 April 2026

KDV fotoğraf — Participants are at the training. Photo: The Foundation for Women’s Solidarity

Women’s Counseling Centers play a critical role as they are often the first point of contact for women subjected to violence. These centers, where women can be heard without judgment, access information, and receive multifaceted support, represent one of the first and most important steps in the process of moving away from violence. The project aims to develop the services provided at these centers through a rights-based and feminist approach centered on women’s empowerment.

Toward this goal, comprehensive capacity-building activities have been carried out for specialists working at the Women’s Counseling Centers of Ankara Metropolitan Municipality, Yenimahalle Municipality, and Çankaya Municipality. The project targets staff at women’s counseling centers in these municipalities and includes capacity-building workshops, supervision sessions, experience-sharing workshops, and trauma-informed yoga sessions to support well-being.

Capacity-building workshops covered topics including gender equality, forms of violence, feminist principles and methods, the legal framework (Law No. 6284), interviewing techniques, and data collection. Participants developed their knowledge and skills in non-judgmental listening, supporting women’s autonomy in decision-making, and adopting a solidarity-based approach when working with women.

Çankaya belediyesi — Specialists from Çankaya Municipality are at the Foundation's training. Photo: The Foundation for Women’s Solidarity

As part of the project, the Foundation for Women’s Solidarity also provided regular supervision support to help field-based specialists address the risks of secondary trauma and burnout. Supervision sessions addressed the emotions experienced in challenging cases, professional boundaries, and strategies for more effective case management.

Another component of the project was the yoga sessions. Trauma-informed yoga sessions, organized to support the well-being of specialists working in Women’s Counseling Centers, strengthened bodily awareness, nervous system regulation, and stress management skills. The sessions ran for eight weeks. At the end, participants reported increased professional resilience and an improved ability to sustain their counseling processes.

At the experience-sharing workshop, one of the project’s key components, specialists from municipalities, public institutions, bar association representatives, and civil society organizations came together. The meeting addressed challenges encountered in the field, barriers to accessing services, and the need for inter-institutional cooperation. Joint solutions were developed to strengthen women’s access to support mechanisms and ensure the sustainability of services.

When specialists facing similar challenges come together and share common experiences, it strengthens emotional solidarity and the sense of ‘I am not alone.’ Thinking together, sharing, and connecting with shared feelings nourishes both individual resilience and collective solidarity.

Gevher Gündüz Şenel, Foundation for Women’s Solidarity Psychologist

Yenimahalle Belediyesi — Specialists from Yenimahalle Municipality are at the training. Photo: The Foundation for Women’s Solidarity

"These discussions, on overcoming the barriers created by violence together, supporting women’s will to build their own lives, and generating collective solutions, open new perspectives for us to create real change in the field," says Ayşenur Korkmaz, a sociologist from the Yenimahalle Municipality Women’s Counseling Center.

"The strengthening of women-centered solidarity and the joint evaluation of field mechanisms have brought new perspectives to my professional practice. I believe that experience-sharing activities make meaningful contributions to the empowerment of those who work with and for women," says Fikriye Binici, a sociologist from the Altındağ Social Service Center.

Gender-based violence is not an individual but a structural problem. Based on this understanding, the project places women’s empowerment, as agents of their own lives, at its center. These strong local partnerships and solidarity networks play a vital role in supporting women’s efforts to build independent lives free from violence.

UN Women Türkiye will continue to strengthen partnerships at the local and national levels and to develop inclusive, sustainable solutions for preventing violence against women and promoting women’s empowerment.

Founded in 1993, the Foundation for Women’s Solidarity is an independent feminist organization dedicated to combating violence against women and advancing gender equality. Through its Women’s Counseling Center, the Foundation continues to provide legal, psychological, and social support to women subjected to violence, receiving applications from more than one thousand women each year.

The Purple Response to Gender-Based Violence Project, implemented by the Foundation under the second phase of the “Strong Civic Space for Gender Equality” project carried out by UN Women with the financial support of the European Union, aims to increase access to quality, women-friendly protective services for women subjected to violence, provided by local authorities.