”Vulnerable, exposed and invisible?” A Qualitative Study on Violence and Abuse against women with Physical Disabilities

This paper which was presented at the 20th World Congress of Rehabilitation International in Oslo in June 2004, is the first part of a three year study on violence and abuse against women with physical disabilities financed by the Foundation for Health an Rehabilitation. The main contributions of this paper are, first, an attempt to create a more comprehensive typology of abuse based on a classification of personal and structural abuse, second, a mapping of a more complete picture of the context of the abuse with a special focus on the arenas of the abuse, the time perspective and the consequences for the women, and, thirdly, an attempt to illustrate that depending upon the situation the reasons for the abuse may be related either to the women’s disability, their gender, age or to the hierarchical structure of the institutions with which they have to deal.