This unaltered story [1] was originally published on OpenDemocracy.org.
License [2]: Creative Commons 4.0 - Attributions/No Derivities/Int'l.
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Coercive control: why is it still missing from the social work curriculum?

By:   []

Date: 2022-03 

At the height of lockdown in April 2020, social workers visited six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes at his home in Solihull, near Birmingham, after concerns were raised about a bruise on his back.

But on the day of their visit, Arthur was given the “rare privilege” of playing outside in the garden, so appeared to be a “happy and content” little boy. His father, Thomas Hughes, and stepmother, Emma Tustin, convinced social workers that Arthur’s bruise was caused by “boisterous play”.

Two months later, he was brutally murdered by them both.

CCTV footage obtained from the family home reveals the “prolonged abuse” Arthur suffered in the months before he died: forced to stand to attention alone in the hallway for up to 14 hours a day, deprived of food, water and human interaction.

Like many perpetrators of coercive and controlling behaviour, Tustin and Hughes used “any tool or tactic to keep [Arthur] under their control”, which included manipulating anyone who tried to help him.

How did social workers miss what was going on?

The 2015 Serious Crime Act criminalised coercive control and acknowledged the need to look at the pattern of a perpetrator’s behaviour. But social workers are still not adequately trained to identify the coercive and controlling tactics used by abusers, which is putting victims like Arthur at risk.

Abuse doesn’t have to be physical

Coercive control “is a pattern of behaviour which seeks to take away the victim’s liberty or freedom, to strip away their sense of self,” as coined by US sociologist and forensic social worker Evan Stark. In his acclaimed book ‘Coercive Control’, Stark breaks the misconception that abuse always involves “physical violence”. He has revealed that up to 80% of domestic abuse cases present no physical signs at all.

But despite these findings, domestic abuse experts told openDemocracy that misconceptions still remain about what abuse entails.

Sue Penna, co-founder and CEO of UK company Rock Pool, which provides specialist training to NGOs and local authorities supporting victims of domestic abuse, is worried that social work training is still based on the “myth that abuse needs to be physical”.

In some of the most horrific cases Penna has dealt with,“there hasn’t been any physical violence.” It’s alarming, she said, that some social workers seem to be unaware that “you don’t have to touch somebody to terrify them.”
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[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/coercive-control-still-missing-from-social-work-curriculum/
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