From the growing number and severity of climate disasters to ongoing political upheaval, the number of children and families living in communities vulnerable to shocks and facing emergency situations is growing, with potentially devastating impacts on children and their childhoods. When crisis hits, effective social protection support is often a crucial factor in determining whether children can quickly return to normality or whether their life paths will be permanently altered. All too often, however, national systems are either too weak to respond, or are not designed to have the flexibility to adjust, for example, through rapidly expanding to reach those that need support or temporarily increasing transfer size while families and communities recover.