History

CWASU, originally The Child Abuse Studies Unit, was established in 1987 by two full-time staff of the then Polytechnic of North London - Mary MacLeod and Esther Saraga. Their concern at the time was to both develop feminist theory and practice, and take this perspective into professional training, especially that of social work. The Unit was founded following a historic conference on child sexual abuse in the spring of 1987 Child Sexual Abuse: Towards a Feminist Professional Practice that brought together survivors, women's groups and services and professionals. Liz Kelly was appointed the first full-time member of staff in September 1987, with a brief to develop research, information and networking. From the second year of the Unit's existence we have also focused on abuse of adult women in the home and other forms of gender violence. In 1994 we became the Child and Woman Abuse Studies Unit to more accurately reflect our work.

Since 1988 CWASU has had to rely on external funding for its continued existence, having no core funding. Not only have we survived thirteen years of market academia, but also we have expanded from a full-time staff of three to six in 2001/2. Today we operate with four full-time staff.

In the early years Mary MacLeod and Esther Saraga developed an important training initiative, and CWASU ran a number of small, but significant conferences and regular seminars. Conferences in the early 1990s included: Developing Whole School Policies, Organised Abuse and Joint Working and the seminar series which ended in 1992 addressed issues such as physical abuse of children and abuse by women. All were innovatory at the time, and a number picked up issues which feminists have since been accused of ignoring. CWASU has never been afraid of exploring complexity, of admitting that there are gaps in feminist theory and practice, of asking hard questions to which we have not had any immediate answers or solutions. We have also placed a high priority on conceptualisation, developing middle range theory, which draws on the experiences of women and children and of those who seek to support them.

In 1991 the founding mothers of the Unit took up posts outside the university, and the central focus of activity shifted to research, with training and speaking being used as the conduit for communicating findings and frameworks which emerged from current and completed projects. CWASU has built, developed and maintained creative links with statutory and voluntary sectors, researchers, practitioners and policy makers both within the UK and internationally. Most recently the Unit's work has expanded into the areas of evaluation, policy research and providing expert opinions for legal cases.

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