Coercive control may also be extremely subtle and insidious, and depleted of incidents of physical or sexual violence. It can exclusively consist of psychological tactics, such as gaslighting, with the common effect that the victim is constantly “walking on eggshells”. Understanding coercive control prevents interveners from wrongfully focussing on ‘isolated’ events of physical violence, and enables the understanding of abuse as a general, persistent dynamic in a relationship. Hence, Côté and Lapierre note that coercive control may include acts of physical violence, although not necessarily. If it does occur, violence is not a distinct or exceptional event in the relation dynamics: rather, it is a tool deployed by the abuser to better control the victim. In other words, the abuser may threaten to use force, and sometimes use it, as a strategy to create a climate of terror and reassert control. Plus, a single instance of physical violence can “be enough to terrorise a victim for several years”.
