Pioneering new, evidence-based approaches

The Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for The Elimination of Violence Against Women (CEVAW) is focused on providing solutions to one of the major challenges of the 21st century.

Awareness of the problem of violence against women has grown exponentially, but solutions to eliminate it have not.

About us

The CEVAW is led by Professor Jacqui True from Monash University, together with a team of 29 other CIs and PIs.

Professor Bronwyn Carlson, Macquarie University Department of Indigenous Studies, is Deputy Director (Indigenous) for the centre.

Professor Carlson supports the centre in the commitment to Indigenous research ethics, approaches and governance models, and assists the Centre Director in defining the overall research strategy.

As a node leader at Macquarie University, Professor Carlson also coordinates, manages and supports all Macquarie team members, including new recruits and PIs.

Professor Carlson leads the Indigenous pillar, and two of its three workstreams:

  • the violence of colonialism
  • racial analysis
  • anti-racism praxis.

The Indigenous pillar will apply Indigenous scholarship to understand violence as shaped by the dominant norms/beliefs and institutional structures, including colonial, racialized and gender hierarchies.

We aim to transform our understanding of the problem by:

  • examining the structural drivers that cause and compound violence against women
  • pioneering new, evidence-based approaches to radically improve policy and practice across Australia and the Indo-Pacific.

The Macquarie node is also responsible for the delivering a CEVAW-wide research and ethics training program.

The program will ensure that inclusive methodologies and ethics are consistently adopted across the CEVAW. It will also ensure that all investigators, including postdoctoral fellows and Graduate Research Students (Masters by research and PhD), are trained in:

  • Indigenous-centred and context-sensitive research ethics
  • ethics that centre survivors’ voices while also prioritising researcher wellbeing.

The expertise of PIs from Pacific Islands and Aotearoa (NZ) will also be involved in research training.

This overarching, inclusive approach will ensure that the core activities are fully integrated across all research pillars and workstreams.

The research and ethics training program follows the core values of the CEVAW and include:

  • ‌Indigenous leadership and governance
  • relationships first
  • material equity
  • community benefit.

The centre mobilises:

  • survivor-centric and Indigenous methodologies
  • interdisciplinary collaborations
  • Indo-Pacific partnerships.

We intend to deliver scalable approaches to eliminate violence against women across the legal, security, economic, health, and political systems of Australia and the region.