A/HRC/35/5 African Union Campaign used traditional and religious leaders to prevent faith-based support to child marriage. During that time, community awareness campaigns led by chiefs entailed thousands of public declarations to stop celebrating child marriage. 35. Men and boys are also powerful actors of change. They have participated in advocacy campaigns in Brazil and Zambia to transform views on the practice of child marriage. Research has shown the need for the promotion of alternative models of masculinities. The experts stressed the need to work with fathers to change the understanding of what it means to “love” a daughter and encourage a shift in mindsets from “protecting her” to “empowering her”. Deconstructing the meaning of protection and linking it to human rights is crucial for families and communities to challenge the idea, for example, that marriage is to protect girls’ safety in contexts of insecurity and violence. 36. Efforts to address social norms must be grounded at the local level in order to strengthen credibility and to avoid perceptions around the imposition of foreign values. In order to counter possible backlashes resulting from efforts to dismantle harmful social norms, it is important to have a network of champions or supportive local influential figures. 37. While efforts to address social norms are critical, it is important to be mindful that understanding the socioeconomic dimensions of child and forced marriage is also fundamental. Continued discrimination on the basis of gender limits opportunities for women and girls and results in the notion that marriage is their best option. Efforts by communities, religious and traditional leaders and societies at large to address support for child and forced marriage must go hand in hand with efforts to expand opportunities for women and girls, ensuring the accessibility, quality and safety of education and the removal of legal, policy or economic obstacles to women’s participation in the labour force. For example, a traditional leader stressed how she had enlisted support against child marriage from families by stressing how educated girls would be an asset for them. However, the support received is not sustainable if families do not have the resources to cover school fees, access to transportation to schools and assurances about safety within educational facilities. Measures to reduce the financial burden of unmarried girls on families living in poverty have also been successful, including by guaranteeing livelihoods of families provided that they keep their girls in school and/or delay marriage. In Brazil, the economic empowerment of pre-adolescents and adolescent girls has helped to prevent early pregnancies, which are a common reason for girls to get married or enter into informal unions. 38. The need was stressed to strengthen funding channels and mechanisms for long-term engagement at the grass-roots level. V. Impact of protection measures 39. Experts agreed that the lack of adequate social and protective measures continued to be a reality in many high-prevalence countries. In some contexts, the services were so weak that victims considered remaining in a marriage as being their only option. For instance, where women and girls see no alternatives for survival, such as shelters or social security, and cannot rely on their families for support, they are left without the resources necessary to pursue a claim. Shelters are often not well located and in very poor conditions, and, in some countries, protection services are provided at the same institutions as the ones responsible for juvenile justice. At times, protection orders have resulted in the detention of girls and women victims of child and forced marriage. Costs relating to services were indicated as another important obstacle to their accessibility for many of the potential or actual victims. 40. There is a need to go beyond the specific legislation on child and forced marriage and use the full scope of available protection measures and mechanisms to provide assistance to potential and actual victims of child and forced marriage. This includes legislation on domestic violence, sexual violence or other specific forms of gender-based violence, as well as laws relating to the family. The mechanisms available in the different 7