Health and Communities Programme
How can individuals and communities best support survivor health and wellbeing?
The experience of modern slavery is often characterised by extreme physical, emotional and psychological abuse. For survivors, this can lead to a range of complex physical and mental health challenges. Within any given locality a complicated network of actors and agencies exist to provide support to survivors. However, what works, in what circumstances and for who is missing from the research literature.
To answer these questions, the Health and Communities programme focuses on the impact of individual and community vulnerabilities on modern slavery; how these can be mitigated; and the implications for support provision. Underpinned by a social-ecological framework, we seek to identify the wider contextual factors that influence health. Rather than taking a deficit view (what is wrong with someone) we seek to understand survivor strengths and assets – and those of their communities – to support health and wellbeing.
Our Health and Communities Programme combines learnt experience (experts from health, public health, social sciences and politics) and lived experience (people who have experienced modern slavery and human trafficking) to explore these complex issues. For example, we are conducting research into cognitive impairment, maternity care, mental health, and public health, and exploring survivors’ experiences of services. Through this work we will uncover how communities and individuals can best support survivors.
Lived experience is central to our work and our Survivor Research Advisory Board (SRAB) informs our work, from helping us to identify the questions that matter to survivors, to thinking through the most appropriate research methods to use and how best to share the learnings from our projects in order to make a difference in practice.
Programme experts
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- Rights Lab Associate Director (Health and Communities Programme) and Associate Professor in Mental Health
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- Rights Lab Assistant Professor in Public Policy and Administration
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Cognitive Impairment and Exploitation
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Cognitive Impairment and Exploitation
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Forced Child Begging
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- Rights Lab Senior Research Fellow in Policy Evidence and Survivor Support
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- Rights Lab Associate Professor in Politics and International Relations
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- Rights Lab Anne McLaren Fellow in Modern Slavery and Public Health
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Survivor Wellbeing and Scholarship
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Slavery-Free Communities and PhD Student in Politics & International Relations
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- Rights Lab PhD Student in Sociology and Social Policy
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Communities and Societies and PhD Student in Mental Health and Wellbeing
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Faith and Survivor Care and PhD Student in Sociology & Social Policy
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- Rights Lab Research Associate and PhD Student in Forced Marriage
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Prevention of Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking
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- Rights Lab Associate Professor of Geography
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- Rights Lab PhD Student in Public Policy
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- Rights Lab Professor of Midwifery
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- Rights Lab Associate Professor of Maternal Health and Wellbeing
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- Rights Lab Visiting Professor of Human Trafficking and Gender-Based Violence
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- Rights Lab Visiting Fellow in Slavery-Free Futures and Freedoms
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- Rights Lab Research Fellow in Survivor-Informed Repatriation and Reintegration
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