This document offers guidance for national governments interested in developing or refining a national preventing or countering violent extremism (P/CVE) strategy, national action plan on P/CVE, or P/CVE components as part of a wider counter- terrorism (CT) strategy or framework. It includes good practices that have emerged from experiences in this field over the past few years and draws on them to inform future efforts. Where a national strategy is not currently attainable, this document outlines initial steps that could be taken to lay the groundwork for future national CVE strategy or action plan development, e.g. initial dialogue between governments and communities targeted for radicalization and recruitment. In this context, P/CVE refers to the wide spectrum of largely preventive actions and interventions that involves identifying the local factors of radicalization and recruitment to violent extremism, and designing programming to prevent and counter these processes. This includes efforts that may be undertaken by governments, international organizations and civil society. This document builds work in support of the UN Plan of Action on Preventing Violent Extremism, which states that “each Member State should consider developing a national plan of action to prevent violent extremism which sets national priorities for addressing the local drivers of violent extremism.” In addition, this document aids with the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 2014) 2178) on addressing foreign terrorist fighters.