Responding to coercive control in criminal justice domestic violence perpetrator programmes in England and Wales: Conceptual, operational, and methodological complexities
| Published date | 01 September 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/02645505221141952 |
| Author | Nicole Renehan |
| Date | 01 September 2023 |
Responding to coercive
control in criminal
justice domestic
violence perpetrator
programmes in
England and Wales:
Conceptual,
operational, and
methodological
complexities
Nicole Renehan
University of Durham, UK
Abstract
Evaluations of domestic violence perpetrator programmes have not produced evi-
dence that they are as effective at reducing male, non-violent, coercively controlling
behaviours. This article proposes such limitations are understood by adopting a
more complex conceptualisation of coercive control for which the reasons are both
gendered and biographically unique. Drawing on document analyses and in-depth
interviews with eight programme facilitators and an in-depth case study of one
male participant, this article explores the merits and limitations of the cognitive behav-
ioural, skills-based criminal justice programme, Building Better Relationships, in
addressing coercively controlling behaviours. The dual (re)conceptualisation of coer-
cive control proposed has implications for both practice and programme evaluation
methods.
Corresponding Author:
Nicole Renehan, Centre for Research into Violence and Abuse, Department of Sociology, The University of
Durham, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HN, UK.
Email: nicole.renehan@durham.ac.uk
Article The Journal of Communit
y
and Criminal Justice
Probation Journal
2023, Vol. 70(3) 242–260
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/02645505221141952
journals.sagepub.com/home/prb
Keywords
coercive control, domestic abuse, Building Better Relationships, domestic violence per-
petrator programmes, gender, emotions, cognitive behavioural therapy, methods,
evaluation
Introduction
Coercively controlling behaviour within intimate (and other familial) relationships
was criminalised in England and Wales in 2015 and is a core lens through
which domestic abuse is now viewed (Barlow and Walklate, 2022). The Serious
Crime Act 2015 defines coercive control as a pattern and range of ‘acts of
assault threats, humiliation’used to ‘harm, punish or frighten’the victim and to
make them ‘subordinate and/ or dependent’upon the perpetrator. Whilst domestic
abuse is overwhelmingly perpetrated by men and women the victims, coercive
control remains a contested concept regarding the extent to which it is gendered,
and many issues have been raised regarding how effective this legislation has
been when translated into practice (Barlow and Walklate, 2022). This article is spe-
cifically concerned with the conceptual, operational, and methodological complex-
ities in the aetiological explanations of male-perpetrated coercive control, and the
development and evaluation of criminal justice domestic violence perpetrator pro-
grammes (DVPPs) that seek to address associated behaviours. This is important
given DVPPs in general have been less successful at reducing coercively controlling
behaviours compared to violent incidents (Kelly and Westmarland, 2015) and
(some exceptions aside, Downes et al., 2019) few studies have attempted to
obtain men’s accounts of coercive control and change. This article will be the first
to explore such complexities within the Ministry of Justice approved, cognitive
behavioural criminal justice Building Better Relationships (BBR) programme in
England and Wales which de-centred its previous gendered underpinnings in
favour of more individualised understandings whilst centring emotion management
and cognitive skills as key tools for reducing violence and abuse.
In doing so, this paper is divided into three sections. The first section will provide a
critical overview of the concept of coercive control, some of its limitations when the-
orising male perpetration, and translating this into practice within the context of crim-
inal justice DVPPs. This will outline the merits of a gendered power lens (Downes
et al., 2019) but make the case for a more complex understanding of coercive
control which is reconceptualised as both gendered and biographically unique
(Gadd and Jefferson, 2007). The second section sets out the methods and rationale
for these and the third section examines the proposed psychosocial framework by
drawing on empirical research from a probation-based, BBR cohort which includes
facilitators’perspectives and an in-depth case study of one male participant, ‘Dale’.
The article concludes by summarising the practical and methodological implications
of this dual reconceptualisation of coercive control. Specifically, this article proposes
that the reasons for domestic abuse and coercively controlling behaviours are mul-
tiple and complex and that such complexities should be considered within
Renehan 243
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