Helen Beckett Editor

Helen Beckett is Director of The International Centre: Researching child sexual exploitation, violence and trafficking and a Reader in Child Protection and Children’s Rights at the University of Bedfordshire, UK. She has twenty years' experience of undertaking and managing applied social research across academia and the voluntary and statutory sectors. She holds particular specialism in CSE and related adolescent safeguarding issues, and in ethics around engaging vulnerable individuals in sensitive research. Dr Beckett has published and presented widely on issues of sexual harm against children and regularly consults on research, policy and practice in this field.

Jenny Pearce (OBE) is Professor of Young People and Public Policy at the University of Bedfordshire, UK, where she was Founder of The International Centre: Researching child sexual exploitation, violence and trafficking. She is a Visiting Professor at Goldsmiths College, London, and is the Chair of the Local Safeguarding Children Board for the London tri-borough partnership (London boroughs of Hammersmith and Fulham, Westminster, and The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea). She was Chair of the Academic Advisory Board for The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and continues to advise on reviews and inquiries into child sexual abuse.