Coercive control rarely starts with a bruise. It begins with isolation, humiliation, surveillance and fear. By the time violence becomes visible, it has already inflicted profound harm. Across Canada, women are living under domination that leaves no outward marks but inflicts lasting harm on mind, body and spirit. Parliament now has a chance to confront this invisible but devastating reality.
Last December, the federal government introduced Bill C-16, which would amend the Criminal Code to recognize what survivors and advocates have long known: coercive control is violence in everything but name.
The invisible architecture of abuse
For decades, criminal law has focused primarily on assaults, threats, and sexual and physical violence. While this is essential, intimate partner violence — almost always against women — is rarely insular and sporadic. It has a pattern. It is cumulative. It is strategic.
The World Health Organization (WHO) defines intimate partner violence as behaviour by a current or former partner that causes physical, sexual or psychological harm. This includes intimidation, controlling acts, monitoring of a woman’s movements and reproductive coercion — not only physical assault.
Research over the past two decades has shown that psychological abuse and coercive control should not be considered “less serious” forms of violence. They are often the foundation upon which physical violence builds.
Systematic reviews have linked intimate partner violence to depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, substance use and thoughts of suicide. Unintended pregnancy and miscarriage, sexually transmitted infections and low birth weight in infants often accompany such violence.
The evidence is clear: This is both a criminal justice issue and a public health crisis.
What Bill C-16 would change
Bill C-16 includes a proposal to add new language to the Criminal Code that would make it an offence to coerce or control an intimate partner. Such behaviour would include:
- Compelling or attempting to compel a partner into having sex.
- Monitoring a partner’s location, movements or communications.
- Controlling finances, employment or education.
- Restricting access to health care or medication.
- Regulating dress, diet, gender expression or access to their culture or spirituality.
- Threatening suicide or self-harm to manipulate a partner.
The bill acknowledges vulnerability. It directs courts to consider whether the accused specifically targeted a partner’s weaknesses. If the bill is passed into law, coercive control will carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
Canada would join jurisdictions, including England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Australia, in formally criminalizing coercive control, thereby recognizing that patterns of domination can be as dangerous as physical assault.
Why coercive control matters now
Research consistently shows that coercive control is a predictor of intimate partner homicide. Patterns of isolation, financial domination, surveillance and threats often precede lethal violence.
The central purpose of the proposed law should be to get the justice system involved early. By recognizing coercive control, law enforcement and courts can act before it escalates to a fatal act.
This aligns with well-established research that shows violence is not spontaneous. It follows an identifiable course. Intervening earlier can reduce harm, reduce deaths and reduce long-term health and social costs.
The WHO has repeatedly emphasized that violence against women is preventable. Randomized control trials and prevention programs show that shifting social norms, addressing gender inequality and stopping controlling behaviours reduce violence over time.
Neurodiverse women overlooked
Any serious conversation about coercive control must also acknowledge who is most at risk.
Neurodiverse women are often overlooked. Women with autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or cognitive disabilities are more vulnerable to a coercive partner in relationships.
There is also increasing evidence that neurodiverse women are more likely to experience violence and may face additional challenges. Difficulties reading social cues and interpreting other people’s intentions can make it harder to recognize abuse early. They may also encounter obstacles to reporting it or being believed.
Women’s economic empowerment is crucial to counter gender-based violence
Coercive partners often exploit neurodivergent women’s different ways of communicating, their heightened sense of trust in individuals, their literal interpretations and struggles with day-to-day tasks. For example, someone who interprets language literally may take a partner’s words at face value and miss manipulative cues or hidden meanings. Difficulties with organizing tasks, managing time or juggling competing demands can be exploited by partners who deliberately create chaos, pressure or dependence.
These women are left particularly unprotected when the law fails to recognize coercive control. Bill C-16’s attention to vulnerability is particularly essential for these women. A justice system that ignores psychological domination effectively abandons those who are least equipped to resist it alone.
The law is necessary, but not sufficient
Prevention requires naming the harm accurately. And coercive control has too long remained legally invisible. Making such behaviour a crime is a step, but it cannot stand alone. Canada must invest in “upstream prevention,” which emphasizes evidence-based, people-focused interventions to protect potential victims before violence starts.
Intimate partner violence is learned behaviour shaped by gender norms, a sense of entitlement and social reinforcement of dominance. If coercive control is to decline, Canada’s support must include:
- Programs that teach boys problem-solving skills.
- Early education and mentoring on healthy relationships.
- Programs addressing harmful masculinity.
- Community-based intervention for men prone to violence.
- Survivor-informed policing and prosecution
- Culturally safe and disability-informed support services
Public health models emphasize that prevention works best when approached on multiple levels. Legal reform, education, economic support and changes to social norms must operate in tandem to reduce risk. They also need to include individual, relationship, community and societal factors.
Canada must also work to prevent men from turning to control in the first place by addressing harmful gender norms and integrating prevention strategies into key institutions, including education, health care and social support services.
Punishment reacts. Prevention transforms
Legislation alone cannot undo the conditions that produce violence. If we want real change, Canada must commit to preventing violence before it begins. Research on prevention is clear. Early childhood supports, school-based programs that teach about consent and how to control emotions, and addressing economic and social inequities reduce the likelihood of coercive control taking root.
The urge to dominate, isolate and deprive a partner does not form in a vacuum. It grows in environments shaped by inequality, rigid gender norms and unaddressed trauma. Criminalization may deter some of this controlling behaviour, but prevention changes the conditions that produce it. The real test of our commitment will not be how we punish offenders, but how we stop them in the first place.
Law can respond to harm. Prevention reshapes the future.
