This executive summary outlines the report detailing the results of the participatory research on obstacles to social cohesion and dynamics of youth violence in the urban spaces of Abidjan, and most notably the neighbourhoods of Abobo, Treichville and Yopougon.

Four elements have been identified through this research, as obstacles to social cohesion and contributors to urban youth violence: (i) the political economy of social diversity and rhetoric centred on identities, (ii) the disintegration of the education system, (iii) the recomposition of family structures and emergence of new models of social success, and (iv) the struggle for control of bus stations as economic spaces.