Michael Salter, Organised Sexual Abuse, Oxford: Routledge, 2013, 208 pp, hb £75.00.

AuthorSiobhan Weare
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2230.12043_2
Date01 September 2013
Published date01 September 2013
does not lend itself to use on small-medium sized and non-profit companies, and
perhaps for good reason, its lucid argument and clarity of expression nonetheless
make it eminently suited to feature on the reading lists of company law and
corporate governance courses. Beyond the academic world, it can also be
recommended to members of government or those in practice, who will find it
a valuable guide to how the EMV principle can be construed and applied in the
wider corporate governance context. A further strength is that its international
outlook will remain relevant even when the Companies Act 2006 is updated,
something that is not likely to happen for quite some time given that it took so
long from the time when the CLR’s final report was delivered in 2001 to the
emergence of ESV in 2007.
Daniel Attenborough*
Michael Salter,Organised Sexual Abuse, Oxford: Routledge, 2013, 208 pp, hb
£75.00.
Sexual abuse featured prominently on the legal, political and social agenda
throughout 2012 and into 2013, with prosecutions in various high profile child
abuse cases, the sexual abuse allegations against the late Jimmy Saville, and, more
recently, the abuse allegations made against the late Liberal Democrat MP, Sir
Cyril Smith. The Rochdale sexual abuse case in August 2012, in which nine
men were found guilty of running and participating in a child abuse and
exploitation ring, has focused particular attention on the issue of organised sexual
abuse. Given its topical nature, Michael Salter’s book on organised sexual abuse
is to be welcomed.
Although there has been much research on child sexual abuse, organised
sexual abuse as a distinct area of research is still an emerging field. Much of the
research relating to organised sexual abuse has taken place, as Salter says, ‘[i]n
relation to child pornography . . . and/or child prostitution . . . ‘sex rings’ . . .
multi-perpetrator sexual abuse in child care settings and ritual abuse’ (27–28). It
was not until La Fontaine’s coining of the term ‘organised abuse’ (J. La Fontaine,
‘Defining Organised Sexual Abuse’ (1993) 2 Child Abuse Review 223) that this
distinct category of abuse could be examined. Two of the earliest studies
on organised abuse were conducted in Britain by Creighton (S. Creighton,
‘Organised Abuse: NSPCC Experience’ (1993) 2 Child Abuse Review 232) and
Gallagher, Hughes and Parker (B. Gallagher, B. Hughes and H. Parker, ‘The
Nature and Extent of Known Cases of Organised Child Sexual Abuse in
England and Wales’ in P. Bibby (ed), Organised Abuse: The Current Debate
(London: Arena, 1996)). Both studies produced similar findings, with examples
of both extra-familial and family-based organised sexual abuse, while the latter
study ‘[a]lso emphasised institutional settings of organised abuse, in which
*Lecturer in Law, University of Leicester.
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Reviews
© 2013 The Authors. The Modern Law Review © 2013 The Modern Law Review Limited. 943
(2013) 76(5) MLR 935–948

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