Season 2 Episode 7: 'Radical Resistance to the Status Quo': A Look Behind the Scottish Coercive Control Law with Dr. Marsha Scott

Safety. Satisfaction. Self-Determination.  

For decades, domestic violence survivors have shared that these are the aspects of their life targeted by domestic violence perpetrators. Until recently, it was primarily the attacks on physical  safety that were reflected in the domestic violence laws across the world.   Slowly , with the passage of coercive control laws in a few countries,  survivors are seeing their wider reality reflected in legislation. Coercive control,  as definition of domestic violence, is now being considered from Australia to the United States.  Coercive control, which has been at the center of the Safe & Together Model's perpetrator pattern-based approach for 15 years,  stresses patterns of behavior that  lead to entrapment and  restrict the fundamental rights of the adult and child survivors. 

The laws that are being considered are far from uniform in their scope and sensitivity to the issues including preventing backlash against survivors, particularly survivors from poor and marginalized communities.  Because Scotland's coercive control law is considered one of the most progressive in the world,  David and Ruth interviewed  Dr. Marsha Scott , the executive for Scottish Woman's Aid .  The interview includes: 

• A discussion of the framing and development of the law
• How the law differs from other efforts
• The importance of the inclusion of children and pets in the defintion of patterns
• How a "reasonable person" standard helps keep the focus on the perpetrator's pattern 
• The importance of implementation planning  
• The importance of getting input from survivors as part of the process of developing coercive control laws and
• How to avoid coercive control laws rebounding against survivors from all backgrounds.

Read the Scottish Law
Check out  Scottish Women's Aid's website
Listen to our interview with Jess Hill on coercive control laws
Listen to our interview with Luke and Ryan Hart, major supporters of coercive control law
Listen our episode on coercive control and consent

Now available! Mapping the Perpetrator’s Pattern: A Practitioner’s Tool for Improving Assessment, Intervention, and Outcomes The web-based Perpetrator Pattern Mapping Tool is a virtual practice tool for improving assessment, intervention, and outcomes through a perpetrator pattern-based approach. The tool allows practitioners to apply the Model’s critical concepts and principles to their current case load in real

Check out David Mandel's new book "Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers: How to transform the way we keep children safe from domestic violence."

Transcript

[00:00:15] And we're back and we're back. Hi, welcome to partnered with the survivor, we're no longer saying episode numbers. That's right.  [00:00:23][7.6]

Speaker 1: [00:00:23] So we lock it up. That's right. And I am still David Mandel, the executive director of the Savings Other Institute.  [00:00:28][5.1]

Speaker 2: [00:00:29] And I am Ruth Stern's Mandel, the e-learning and communications manager.  [00:00:32][3.2]

Speaker 1: [00:00:33] And thank you for joining us today. And we're super excited because in a few minutes, we're going to introduce a good friend and colleague, Dr. Marsha Scott, the executive Scottish Women's Aid in Scotland, which is a good place for it to be.  [00:00:45][12.3]

Speaker 2: [00:00:46] Yes, it would be weird if Scottish Women's Aid was somewhere else just saying, but yes, that's how it is.  [00:00:50][4.7]

Speaker 1: [00:00:51] And and this is part of our ongoing series related to coercive control and coercive control. For those who don't know, the Safety Together model has been central to the monarch for 15 years, I mean, since its inception.  [00:01:06][15.1]

Speaker 2: [00:01:06] Well, it's very difficult to to establish perpetrators patterns if you don't understand coercive control as the major element behind those patterns of nonviolent intimidation. Nonviolent actions taken to control and harm adult and child survivors.  [00:01:22][15.7]

Speaker 1: [00:01:24] And like I always say that you can pick up incidents or isolate incidents of violence by using coercive control as your land. But you can't find patterns of force control if your focus is just on physical violence or isolated incidents. So coercive control for us has been central to integrating domestic violence perpetrators behavior and child abuse neglect. It's about giving context for survivors decision making, and it's really about identifying risk and safety concerns. So it's been central to the model. And now there is a global context that's been developing for a number of years now with with leadership from women sector and advocates all over the world to look at how coercive control fits into legislation, whether it's family court or  [00:02:07][42.8]

Speaker 2: [00:02:08] criminal, right? And we have this context arising not just in places like Australia, but here in the United States. We've had coercive control laws that have been proposed here in Connecticut, and we're seeing more and more interest in looking at coercive control, particularly as it impacts child well-being within the family courts. So we're really excited that on our show today, we have Dr. Margaret Cho, Marsha Scott. Yes, Scottish Women's Aid. Yes. And do you want to do the requisite interim introductions?  [00:02:41][33.0]

Speaker 1: [00:02:42] And while she's here because she's a friend, she's a colleague, and that Scotland has passed what is what is seen by by experts all over the world as the most comprehensive and best course of control laws. And we're here to talk with her about its implications for Scottish adult and child survivors. And just the overall global efforts around addressing domestic violence. So welcome, Marcia. Thanks for thanks for joining us and and we haven't seen you in person. You know, this is a little bit of personal stuff which we haven't seen you in person in, what, 12, 15, 18 months because of COVID.  [00:03:21][39.7]

Speaker 2: [00:03:22] Yes, I think we need another sit down and an Edinburgh bar with a glass of wine.  [00:03:26][4.5]

Speaker 1: [00:03:27] And I remember it well, yes. More than one glass of wine.  [00:03:32][4.9]

Speaker 3: [00:03:33] Yes, there was so over  [00:03:34][1.2]

Speaker 2: [00:03:34] all the amazing things that you all have achieved, especially after passing this law, because there has been some amazing movement that you have seen from the passing of this law.  [00:03:46][11.2]

Speaker 1: [00:03:46] So before we jump into the law, you know you are the executive Scottish Women's Aid, and people may notice and may control people that you don't speak with a heavy Scottish accent. So can can you just briefly give us a little bit of your history? Are our listeners a little bit of your history, how you ended up being there and in this position?  [00:04:09][22.7]

Speaker 2: [00:04:10] Absolutely. And I'm really glad you asked that because of course I don't hear it anymore. You know, I'm just like part of the the the wallpaper here in Scotland and the sadly other people probably wish they didn't hear it so much. But yeah, so I my Scottish accent actually originated in New York, which is where I was born and raised and still the land of my people. I wound up coming to Scotland 20 years ago, now working on twenty one to do a Ph.D. in social policy, which was a study of Scottish domestic abuse policy and power and partnership. And I never left and I made Scotland my home and I wouldn't live anywhere else. Although I had more money, I'd have a flat in here. But yeah, so. So I did d. I came from a background of working and violence against women and girls in New Hampshire. And I think that David and I have some good acquaintances that go go back that far. So over 20 years, some of the work that he did there and then I started working in local government here for which so local authority, which is kind of like a state government only quite a bit smaller here in Scotland. No surprise. And got to set up a service, the domestic and sexual assault team, and then wound up about six years ago, now getting the job as chief executive, Scottish Women's Aid. So, you know, it's been a series of accidents, really of life that that allowed me to wind up doing this work I'm so passionate about.  [00:06:07][116.7]

Speaker 3: [00:06:08] That's great, and it's great to hear your story again and know that you're you're a transplant, and I remember meeting you for the first time ago. Wait a second. She's not Scottish. She's American. You know there is. This guy is really quick. I am. But I noticed right away that she wasn't Scottish. She was American. That's why you want to tout that, you know? But no, but but tell us a little bit, you know, just real briefly, what what your. Most proud of religious scholars, women's aids work, you know, and maybe it is the Segway of coercive control, or maybe there's something else, but I want to give people a context because as women aids organizations all across the UK, there's women sector work being done, obviously in Australia and Canada and the United States. So just give our listeners who can be advocates or could be survivors themselves or, you know, child welfare workers. You know, we have a whole range of folks just a little bit about what makes you think Scottish Women's Aid so special.  [00:07:06][57.5]

Speaker 2: [00:07:08] We've been around for about almost 50 years now, and I'm still in this from somebody, I really should try and remember where I got it. You folks might have heard it before, but you know, I really do. I firmly believe that it's true that every important social movement in the world started around a woman's kitchen table, and that is absolutely a great description of the Women's Aid movement in Scotland. And you know, the organization I had now is the Scottish Women's Aid, but it's an umbrella organization for thirty six grassroots organizations that work from tiny staff to to massive well in our in our free massive. From little islands, Orkney and Shetland to huge urban centers for Scotland, huge urban centers and an all of those, every single one of those services grew out of a radical resistance to the status quo in the communities that those women lived in and and essentially saying this is not on, it's not OK, that women are consigned to the private sphere and that the violence and abuse that they experience and have for centuries is a private matter and isn't a matter of public order. And until they found, you know, they got together, just like in the states in many ways, the they created refuges, you know, shelters in the states, refuges here, they ran them as feminist collectives. They, you know, they challenged power at every level. And and I couldn't be prouder. I have to say, standing on the shoulders or more, you know, wondered really to stand on the shoulders of the women who still do that every day, but also who did it forty five years ago when the context was even more difficult.  [00:09:21][132.1]

Speaker 3: [00:09:22] I think that's an amazing line. It really struck me. The radical resistance to the status quo we think of the status quo is being a fixed point in time. But it's a continuous point in time. We have the status quo today and I see the challenging, the social challenging around the narrative of coercive control to be part of that. And it really is challenging the status quo as we exist right now. And I think that it's really important to thank and acknowledge all of the women who who shoulders we stand on and continue that commitment of challenging, challenging the status quo within ourselves, within our systems, within our governmental organizations and agencies. And I'm I'm just really I love that line. Dr. Scott, I'm going to be using that line all the time now.  [00:10:20][57.4]

Speaker 1: [00:10:20] Oh, just call me. The other thing I would say is one of the unique aspects of the Women's Aid movement in Scotland. I think this is certainly reflected to some degree in the other Women's Aid. Absolutely. And to the work that's happening in the other countries, whether the countries of the U.K. or or with the U.K., which is that quite early on in Women's Aid Movement realized that if we were not fighting the battle for women's equality, we were not fighting the battle to end domestic abuse. And that and we've challenged all along this notion that somehow if we could just tell people that what they were doing is wrong, we would have domestic abuse. And and I think that's it's a relatively recent realization for me about coercive control. That actually coercive control is the most illuminating spotlight we have for for linking the structural inequality that children and women live with, that that makes domestic abuse possible. So, you know, the reason that women, for the most part, are not perpetrators of coercive control is because they don't have the tools in the toolkit. You know what I mean? They're not. They are more likely to be poor. They are, you know, well, really less likely to be at the tables of power that distribute resources in their communities, in their workplaces, in their courts, in their police departments, in their universities. And they are absolutely more saddled with unpaid work and the responsibilities for everything that happens in the family, whether it's mostly if it's bad. And as a mother, I can absolutely attest to the we're responsible for everything that happens in our family and nothing good. So. So I just think that, you know, if you if you actually see how coercive control operates, you suddenly have these huge light bulb moments that say, Well, this is what Liz Kelly meant when she said that domestic abuse is the cause and consequence of women of women's inequality.  [00:12:37][137.0]

Speaker 3: [00:12:39] I love that cause and consequence language. I think it kind of connects the two. So let's talk. You know, this idea of coercive control, which I think is talking about radical resistance, is a radical transform. I think of the understanding of domestic violence and how we respond to it. Can you talk a little bit in Scotland in the Scottish context? How this went from an idea that might have been discussed around the kitchen table to legislation, I know that's a big question, but let's start on that, which is where where did you start?  [00:13:09][30.3]

Speaker 2: [00:13:11] And I could get that. Yes. What happened and in part because I did research for some, for some chapter I was writing. So I went back and talked to some of the women who were who were the early enablers, I suppose, of Evan Stark's work. And I think Evan himself will tell you that the Scotland that he spent a lot of time in Scotland after he published his book in 2007 because people in the U.S. weren't that interested. However, Scottish Women's Aid and an organization in Glasgow called the Women's Support Project put together a couple of conferences, and somebody had read Evans book and well, actually this before it's published seen some of his work invited him over to talk to an audience that was mostly women's aid workers. They were multiple people in the sector. And and when he was describing his his critique of the existing typology of domestic abuse of domestic violence he hit, it struck such a chord with those of us who had seen, you know, decades of work to try and provide services and essentially what I call secondary prevention, but absolutely no evidence that the prevalence of domestic abuse was reduced. And really, what what happened said that really, you know, blew our minds, I think was the reason it's not going down is because we're not addressing the causes, we're addressing the symptoms. And so yes, we have much better services as a result of all that work, but we still have no evidence that the prevalence of domestic abuse is going down. And I would challenge anybody who says they can because the data gathering on its care, but so so it really struck a chord with us. And also, you know, we were about seven or eight years then into a violence against women strategy that essentially said cause and consequence women's domestic abuse, other forms of violence against women, the cause and consequence of women's inequality. But it really didn't wasn't. It was really under conceptual was. So what we couldn't say is, OK, so if you if you addressed the indicators of women's inequality, well, abusers suddenly not want to abuse anymore. And and it's coercive control that reveals the mechanisms of all of that, but that also links it with gender stereotyping. And that's why safe and the other is such a powerful model, I think, because it's so integrated with understanding about the the asymmetrical expectations of parenting in families.  [00:15:57][165.8]

Speaker 3: [00:15:58] Yeah. And I feel, too that we've done a really poor job in training professionals, on power dynamics, on understanding power and control within relationships and how that locks victims and survivors into these situations and an understanding that is really important for our services. Because if we are going to provide adequate services for people living in domestic abuse, suffering from coercive control, we do have to review the way that we've provided those services based off of violence, primarily as an indicator, right? And so I feel like the whole conversation is beneficial not just in the legislative sense, but in the cultural change, sense and change in our language and systems. Yeah.  [00:16:48][50.6]

Speaker 1: [00:16:49] The other issue I was going to say that was really resonant for us is that and I think that I'm a little embarrassed about this. As a member of the women's second, women and children have been telling us for decades that the trauma that was most difficult to recover from was not the broken arm. You know, it was the coercion, the the lack of agency that they experienced, you know, the the emotional and psychological impact of coercive control and and they told us that over and over and over. And what do we do? We created responses that were based on violence. And that's because our criminal justice system was totally calibrated for injury for visits to the all. The police calls were calibrated and severity was, I think you use to use Evans phrase. There was a calculus upon us. You know, I mean, and if there was a broken bone, that was a serious incident. You know, if there was massive emotional trauma, clearly not so much, right?  [00:17:51][61.3]

Speaker 3: [00:17:51] And never recognizing that using that as the measure pushes women and children to be harmed, that we have to be harmed. First, before we can reach out for assistance, we have to be injured, that we have to be so physically harmed to be able to ask somebody for help is really inhibited within our systems. So it's really amazing the shift.  [00:18:15][24.2]

Speaker 1: [00:18:16] I just want to say just one small point. In case people are not familiar, Marcia keeps referring to Evan Stark. And if you're not familiar with there, there's literally a book called Coercive Control, right? That she's talking about that Evan Star, who is a pioneer in the domestic violence movement. And he's right here in Connecticut. You know, and he is a friend and colleague of mine and and he himself and his his partner and flip craft Dr. Amphlett craft. They did some of the earliest research on women's visits to hospitals and has been involved with looking at kids in child welfare for years. And and so coercive control really gained some notoriety. It's a reflection back of what survivors have been telling us. Right. But it really the concept really kind of came together in Evan's book and I remember meeting Evan. He got me connected to Skyler because he was there on some sabbatical or spent some time there, and I came over and he set me up to do to do a talk in in Glasgow. And as my first experience with Glaswegian Glaswegian as an accent was  [00:19:30][73.7]

Speaker 2: [00:19:30] that  [00:19:30][0.0]

Speaker 3: [00:19:31] it's it's a it's a journey, you know, is a journey to sort of really to do that. But but there was such a this is about twenty fourteen or twenty thirteen and there was such a receptivity to safe fit together already at that point in 2013, in part because the groundwork I think laid by Evan and other people at that point around coercive control. And I didn't fully appreciate that.  [00:19:51][20.6]

Speaker 2: [00:19:52] I think Scott Forms would had played a role in and advocating for safe and together. That's right. It was a dream come true in some ways that somebody had finally delivered some tools that that were just, you know, I just filled such a vacuum. But to finish the story about that, yeah, because I've distracted myself, as I often do. That's OK. There was there was a very receptive political landscape. We had a new government in 2008, which was the SNP came into power. And like every new government, anywhere, they wanted to distinguish themselves from the previous government. And so one of the things that they started to talk about was a new a specific event, and they only talked about it because we told them to talk about it. I mean, it's not like they have this great idea. And we were like, Oh yeah. And part of that is the power of advocacy and organizations like mine, like Rape Crisis Scotland, feminist organizations that are very clear about the dynamics of power, not only in relationships, but in politics. Yes. And and so that it started a collaborative process, wasn't always very successful. Took quite a few tries. The development of what wound up being passed as the final version of the Domestic Abuse Act Domestic Abuse Scotland Act in twenty eighteen had at least a dozen different iterations prior to that. And it was it was hugely substantially changed by interactions with the sector and more importantly, with survivors facilitated by critiques by survivors, including children,  [00:21:50][117.8]

Speaker 3: [00:21:51] which is very important, so important.  [00:21:53][2.2]

Speaker 1: [00:21:54] So the first piece of legislation that I think you can say passed by the Scottish Parliament, which reopened in 2000, that that really demonstrates the voices of survivors in in the way it was developed and in the language of the bill itself.  [00:22:12][18.1]

Speaker 3: [00:22:13] That's amazing.  [00:22:13][0.2]

Speaker 1: [00:22:14] Can I have a couple of things right in my head? One is that you just described a ten year process, so that's, you know, from 2008 to 2018. So I just underscore that that that was a lot of dedication, hard work, persistence by lots of people, I assume to make that stay at the forefront or keep bringing it up to the legislative experience. But do you have one example? I think that both Ruth and I would love to hear if there's one anecdote about the voice how the voice of a survivor or survivors, whether it dealt a child, came in and changed the law. Because I think I think for people who are trying to great because people are trying to formulate laws in Australia or the United States, you know, we all are concerned that laws get passed that actually are intended. To do well, but do harm instead. Or don't do the good things that we want them to do, so we  [00:23:03][49.4]

Speaker 2: [00:23:03] don't have implementation plans. Funding behind them in order to compel them to change society systems.  [00:23:11][8.2]

Speaker 1: [00:23:13] Well, I think implementation is still very much a lot of questions. So we'll lot of  [00:23:18][5.1]

Speaker 3: [00:23:18] what comes out will come around. Yeah.  [00:23:19][1.3]

Speaker 2: [00:23:20] But in terms of survivor impact on the law, on the creation of the law itself, and this is a bit of a contrast with the original coercive control law, which was passed before ours in England and Wales, which was developed in six weeks. So six weeks are 10 years, but it was formally four years in Scotland. So yes, I can give you an example because I was there. So one of the things that we did was we facilitated. Engagement between critical actors in the political process, both the bill team, but most the example I'm going to give is the Justice Committee. So the Justice Committee is a standing committee in the Scottish Parliament, and all justice legislation goes to them first. They do, and they do evidence sessions oral and written. They do a report back to the parliament and that then takes the original bill, critiques it and and sends it for for the first debate and vote. And so I've given evidence to that justice committee many times. But what we were able to do was just that was to facilitate a closed session with three survivors. Well, for the group, I was with three survivors and with a sub subgroup of the committee because the committees big and the one of the members of that subgroup was the chair who was a member of the of the toy party. Margaret Mitchell and she had expressed when the original bill was launched by the government, she had expressed some skepticism about whether there was a need for this legislation and couldn't. We continue to prosecute domestic abuse under existing laws which were not specific to domestic? So like so many countries in the world, we had no, no specific domestic abuse legislation. Domestic abuse was prosecuted under stalking or under harassment and threatening behavior. Breach of the peace was the most common and and Margaret was was sincerely cynical that another piece of legislation was going to help. And she was in the subgroup and she heard the stories of three women. Really moving stories as they all are. And along with two other of her committee members, and she did a complete turnabout and she wound up becoming was she was a powerful woman chair of the Justice Committee, the time or convener of the Justice Committee at the time. And and she went from being really pretty opposed to being a huge supporter, and the law essentially passed unanimously. The only vote against it was a mistake, and it was Margaret's mistake, and she was so sorry that she just didn't ever glasses on and she pressed the wrong button because we have not done so. But it was it was a it was such an important moment. The other example I can give you is that is the input from children and young people. So we we had we have we would already have been work on participation projects with children and young people. There were two projects. One was called everyday heroes and the other one was called power up, power down. And it was about children's experiences of the court system and the criminal justice system. That's great and that the some of the the information that we got from children and young people in that was shared with the Justice Committee and with the bill team. And one of the examples was that young people have told us over and over that the use of pets to threaten them or to threaten the pets, or just restricting access to the pets by the non. But the abusive parent were was it was a huge issue for them in their lives. And we heard those stories, but I don't think we took them that seriously until we heard them over and over when we actually paid attention to participation at work. And and you'll find pets mentioned three times in the Scottish law and they, you know, they might have gotten a passing mention prior to this, but they were absolutely clear. And the bill team heard loud and clear that the use of pets was a powerful, powerful tool from perpetrators that would not be there if their children and young people had not had their voices heard around that trigger warning.  [00:28:38][317.5]

Speaker 3: [00:28:38] We know one of the first things that a perpetrator in my childhood did to show us what was possible is he would kill a pet. He was doing a pet up. He would kill a pet. So very good perpetrator pattern way to establish lethality and risks to children as well. I wanted to segway Marcia into talking about the portion related to children and the reasonable person standard under the law, which is really unique to the Scottish law. So if you could talk a little bit about those two aspects? Yeah.  [00:29:09][30.9]

Speaker 1: [00:29:10] So the reasonable. So there's a there's a mechanism in the law that is that child aggravation. So if the if the prosecution can demonstrate that children were used in the abuse, that children were harmed by the abuse, that the abuser intended to harm the children and really importantly, or if a reasonable person when they knew the details of the relationships and the actions of the perpetrator in that child's life thought that those behaviors would harm them. Right. So that reflects a similar mechanism in the in the larger part of the bill for for adult victims. And it's a really, really important innovation. And I have to give the bill team full credit for it because what it what it does is it removes the requirement from the prosecution to demonstrate or I think, obviously to demonstrate harm. Right. And they can they can lead evidence in a case that that harm was experienced, but they don't have to. And that is such a critical element for us because otherwise what has happened and was clearly true in the in the few cases that were prosecuted under the original England and Wales law was that women were were required to parade their trauma in a courtroom and they couldn't win because the way that gender works in courtrooms is if she was calm and and relatively flat about describing her experience, she. Is lying. And if she was emotional, she was hysterical and not trustworthy. And it was absolutely, you know, a Catch 22 for women and children. So having this ability to focus the law and the law is all about the behaviors of the perpetrators. It's nothing about the, you know, it's this is proof if if you can prove intent to harm or if you can improve that, prove that a reasonable person. But we know how difficult intent is to prove that a reasonable person would think that much  [00:31:33][142.3]

Speaker 3: [00:31:33] like I would be curious about the measures under the use of the law for establishing reasonable person just out of the concern of knowledge, knowing that perpetrators use trauma, PTSD diagnoses to undermine and claim that the other parent is not reasonable is not a fit parent. So how is Scotland establishing that reasonable person standard?  [00:31:57][24.0]

Speaker 1: [00:31:58] And this is where the guidance notes to this law are revolutionary, really in some ways because there are extensive. It's a complex law and there are extensive notes that absolutely use the language that survivors use with the building. And they said essentially what it is is you're proving whether the that that the the behaviors of a perpetrator can have any of these effects. And it's not an exclusive list. I mean, it's only and things like this and what women really wanted on that list was loss of autonomy. They wanted essentially what Evan calls it's, you know, it's a liberty crime, so. So they really wanted a law that described the constrictions of their own space and agency, so their space for action in their agency. And and it's all through the bill. So you can have if you so if you can demonstrate that that he attempted to, whether he did or not attempted to micromanage your everyday life, who she went, who she talked to, who how she used your phone, you know, how she interacted with her children. Those are all effects of coercive control. And they're described tellingly with the words of the survivors through the through the bill. So it's about these are the possible effects of this behavior. And and happily, you therefore do not have to talk about whether you succeeded. You only have to say, did he do these things right?  [00:33:37][99.1]

Speaker 3: [00:33:38] It's very behaviorally  [00:33:38][0.5]

Speaker 1: [00:33:39] focused. I just I'm just sitting here admiring the brilliance of the bill and and just the approach, you know, because it really resonates a lot with with safe and together in a lot of the things that that we've seen where things go awry for survivors. One is so there's a few things. One is that it doesn't. It lets room for resistance. You know, it doesn't like. It doesn't mean you have to be a puddle to on the floor to get aid. And I think a lot of times that's worked against in the U.S., for instance, black women who are often perceived stereotypically as being aggressive or being, you know, being, you know, assertive or or have learned to serve present strongly so that they're safe in the context of structural racism. And so that's worked against a need that you express it so beautifully that bind if if survivors present flatly. Either because they're scared or because they're traumatized or because of their overemotional, that they lose either way. So I think that brilliance is there. The other piece is that I and I've been kind of a little bit of a rant lately about this, and it's it's part of a project we're doing in Australia. I think what the law does is reclaim some ground that has been. Inappropriately ceded to mental health right around this issue and OK, and you know, which is just that this idea that we can boil the whole problem down to a diagnosis. Does she have PTSD or not? Does she have a mental health disorder where I think we've actually had a lot of power to the mental health professional? My degree is in mental health, so I'm like, I get the I feel like I get to talk about this freely and be very critical of the field because I think what's happened is that we framed a lot of the impact around diagnoses, mental health treatment, what happens in that clinical space and what the Scottish law does says no, no, no. This at a core is about entrapment. It's about liberty being taken away. And yes, you may have some survivors who have anxiety or other mental health features, but that's not central to the story. The central part of the story is that the the taking away of liberty and freedom and agency and autonomy and safety is part of that obviously is part of that.  [00:35:58][138.7]

Speaker 2: [00:35:59] It's just funny because if you think about standards for the law and how we focus on different types of crimes, you would never go to an arson victim and make them parade their pain between, you know, just to get some type of judgment that would give justice for the crime that was committed against them. But in domestic violence, in sexual violence, this is often exactly what is done, changing the focus from the behaviors and the choices of the person who's perpetrating that crime to focus on the victims. And we don't want systems to focus on victims because when systems focus on victims that way, victims get hurt and perpetrators manipulate systems because they have more money, they have more power, they have more system integration, they control trial status, you know. And so this is an amazing law,  [00:36:49][50.9]

Speaker 1: [00:36:50] and it makes me think about the failure in a lot of child protection systems around the maltreatment of of a most emotional maltreatment, emotional abuse, then the U.S. context, people say, Well, we can't put that on the situation and I'll say, why not? Because it's so clear that one of the biggest impacts of of of somebody chooses violence and abuse and control is the emotional impact. Emotional maltreatment. Right? You know, if I target a pat and they would say to me, Oh, we need a clinician's diagnosis to demonstrate emotional maltreatment. And so you get a sense of the way this has been centered. I love the Scottish law is saying, wait a second, this is about control. This is about changing how people's lives.  [00:37:28][38.2]

Speaker 2: [00:37:29] And that's also why the reasonable person test is critical because this isn't about a diagnosis. You know this, and I have to say, I'm right with you there, David on on my anxieties about this, the focus on trauma at the moment. And and I'm and I really welcome trauma informed trauma, blah blah blah. All of that work. And it's really, really big in Scotland right now. And I think it's going to deliver some really healthy changes to our system. But I'm desperately worried that it's not gendered and that it isn't that it, that it doesn't avoid pathologizing victims and survivors. So I worry about that. But the reasonable person test that is really, really important. Therefore, because it's not about who she is, it's about what he did, right? And the other thing I think just to to bring it back to the aggravation is that the reason we wanted originally wanted children as victims in this law. And that's because in Scotland, and I know this is true, at least in many places here in the US and in Australia, the there's a chasm between what happens in criminal court and what happens in civil court. And and so children are collateral damage. They are not victims. They are. They are. They're their value to the criminal justice system is to witness. And the evidence that they can bring to winning a case or losing a case and and the original language of our law was the children. There could be an aggravation if children saw present were present, saw or heard the the violence again right there back on a boat, on an incident model, but also completely ignoring what we had been saying and the academia had been saying for a long time, which is about the fact that if women are being controlled in a domestic abuse situation, then children are being controlled.  [00:39:38][128.4]

Speaker 3: [00:39:38] I am constantly, constantly surprised by the ability of professionals to divorce the reality of family ecology and the reality that what perpetrators make as choices as parents, whether it's limiting a child's ability to have contact with their extended family to go to school, make forcing them to be homeschooled, forcing them into situations where they don't have appropriate contact with authorities who are mandatory reporters. These are all ways that perpetrators harm child well-being and development, and not seeing that is really diminishing the impact of that coercive control on a whole family and on a whole sort of ecosystem. Because everybody becomes habituated to believing that the actions of the perpetrator are normal and do not think about the impact of children as a whole unless that child is being directly beaten by that perpetrator. And that is just as a child abuse survivor, not acceptable.  [00:40:50][72.2]

Speaker 1: [00:40:51] And I sing the same song over and over again, and I think it's so connected to low standards for men. As parents, I think we, we just we we create these scenarios, and I think we're somewhat in the in the in the domestic violence sector. I think we're somewhat culpable to some degree. I know Marcia, how you feel about this, but you know the the the struggle to connect, you know, language to say, intimate partner violence. We talk about that makes the kids invisible. You know, the field has struggled with this child witness to violence. I always talk about this or children exposed to violence reinforce this sort of that. The nexus is that I'm in the room I saw with my eyes model, and we're really struggling against that as well to say, wait a second that if he's a parent and he causes her to lose her job and they lose their housing because he either got arrested because she lost her job or because of the disruption from the violence that we need to be able to pull that back right to that person who made that choice, that your parent, your behavior contributor, caused your your children homeless homelessness. That should be a really simple story to tell  [00:41:53][61.8]

Speaker 2: [00:41:54] you, because children's starvation, that's the parenting  [00:41:57][2.5]

Speaker 1: [00:41:57] balance that has to be really simple. I think and it is what you change the lens, it actually gets easier, right?  [00:42:02][5.1]

Speaker 2: [00:42:04] I was going to say, is that the sort of Segways into the implement some of the implementation questions. But when one of the big questions that came up, especially with around the reasonable person issue from folks on the Justice Committee and from the wider community when we were debating this law was how are you going to get across, you know, how are you ever going to get a conviction because it's this soft, difficult to prove emotional abuse? And that was so laughable in the face of what we know coercive control actually looks like. And and and I and I often recount a story about that. A prosecutor from one of our island communities said how what a gift this law was to him because he said it allowed him to read so much more evidence in a domestic abuse case because it's a course of conduct. You know, it's not about an intent to conduct offense that allows them to lead all of the information about a relationship. And in that it's it is it is rich with evidence about coercive control. Mobile phones are filled with evidence about coercive control. So, so essentially, what he said is this is so much easier to prove, and it's so much easier to ask for a higher sanction because the the picture that is painted is so much more damning.  [00:43:33][88.8]

Speaker 3: [00:43:34] And you know, one more thing know I want to. I just want to make sure that all our listeners are clear about what the law actually in general does. But another detail, I guess I'm so I guess I'm a huge fan is when I read the law, it it included things that happened inside or outside the jurisdiction. And I think that is, you know, when you think of a course of conduct, kind of practical. Houston, or a pattern we talked so much about, pattern base is it isn't limited by geography, it isn't limited by where it happened. That doesn't matter to her that he threatened to kill her in Thailand on vacation. In fact, it may be scarier. And then we're back in Scotland, for instance, you know, I mean, so I think there's just there's so many little details that the law picks up.  [00:44:23][49.6]

Speaker 2: [00:44:24] But you know why that's in there, actually, because we were very involved in trying to get the UK to complete its ratification process of Istanbul and in order to be compliant with Istanbul, our laws needed to be to cover extraterritorial jurisdiction and always sounds like a duty to me, but extraterritorial jurisdiction. And the first version of the bill didn't. And and so we were like, Oh my God, this has to go in and they put it in by the the third stage and. And it so it accomplished compliance with this bill. But it also did some other things we probably weren't thinking about at the time, which was again more evidence available.  [00:45:13][49.5]

Speaker 3: [00:45:14] So now I can't remember if the law is this specific or not, but I was understanding the Scottish law as not even being limited to one relationship. So you could bring evidence of other patterns of coercive control or is that not correct? Am I incorrect in that?  [00:45:30][15.7]

Speaker 1: [00:45:32] This is a complicated thing, and I'm I am not a legal expert, so I may not explain it all that well. But Scotland. Scotland's criminal justice system has a really, really ancient and out, you know, out of date as far as many of us are concerned. Element which requires corroboration and. Corroboration has become interpreted in many ways in order for the criminal justice system to not be totally paralyzed. But if you think about domestic abuse and sexual assault are two obvious examples being able to find somebody who can corroborate that the crime happened. In addition to the victim, when the perpetrator is denying it is very, very difficult. So what we have, what they have done is created schemes of laws that there's the more doctrine which says that if you can demonstrate that this that this guy, for instance, was involved in this kind of behavior in multiple cases, then that can serve as a corroboration for this particular case. Right. So in that sense, we're not convicting him under this law of of any of those crimes against other people, but we are using them as evidence in this case, and that is great.  [00:47:00][88.4]

Speaker 3: [00:47:01] And that's very similar to how we practice safe. And together we say, what's his pattern, of course, control and actions taken on the kids. And people say, Well, what about this family? I said, No, I want to know across all his relationships. You know, I want to know what his pattern of violence actually to strangers. I want to know about his behavior. You know, in different settings, you know, that matters.  [00:47:19][17.8]

Speaker 2: [00:47:19] And there's no really specifically for child well-being. In light of some of the cases that we've seen recently arise out of custody disputes where there was multiple families with multiple children, with one perpetrator who perpetrated across families. And the instance I'm thinking of is is a case in Australia, where there were three families with one perpetrator involved and with the last family, he killed the children. He murdered the children and none of his prior perpetration towards his previous partners or towards his other children was ever recorded as part of the potential for lethality. And so it's really important to establish that for child well-being because perpetrators tend to become more emboldened if they're not held accountable. And if you see that pattern cascade, you're going to see a child that's going to be hurt or is going to be dead if we don't pay attention to that corroboration to those prior patterns as well.  [00:48:25][65.8]

Speaker 1: [00:48:26] So absolutely links to another reason why coercive control is so important in our responses, in our police responses and our risk assessments and and the the existing risk assessment tool that is used almost exclusively in the UK and is used widely in the rest of the world. Also, the dash, the evidence for its insensitivity to coercive control is mounting and has been around since 2014, I think. And since we have so much evidence that coercive and controlling behaviors are one of the few indicators that you really need to be worried about lethality, then the fact that we're using risk assessment tools that are insensitive to coercive control makes no sense.  [00:49:14][48.1]

Speaker 3: [00:49:14] It's, you know, that's a whole other topic. Maybe for another on another podcast because you just raised that risk assessment tools and and and my sense of their how they're used, their gaps, their gaps, but also their lack of helping people tell the story of harm and impact on family functioning and contextualizing victims decision making. And you know, I can talk a lot about about the challenges of those teams. But but yes, we're going to pivot to implementation, but what I want to do? Have you read this going? Let's do the pivot. But Marcia, what I'd like you to do as we move into time and implementation both what was intended, how it's going successes, if you can summarize sort of when when you saw the the the law passed, you were working on it. And I remember seeing the video of when it was passed in Scottish Parliament. You said it to me, people were crying. There was just so much emotion. It was so beautiful and I was proud that got the pay play a tiny part. Give a little bit of feedback at one point, you know, to around the kids stuff. And but but can you just say what was your hope about what it would do, what it would change? And then let's talk about what's happened on the ground like what? What did you hope at that point?  [00:50:29][74.3]

Speaker 2: [00:50:31] I guess overall, the hope was that Scotland would finally have a law that reflected what women and children said they experienced. Instead of a law that was that was archaic and had had developed out of what the criminal justice system found easy to demonstrate and respond to to to to to honor the voices, the experiences, the advocacy, the you know, the campaigning, the marching, the rioting, the singing, all of the five decades of work that had gone on by, you know, by women and children who lived with domestic abuse and and were radically radically changed by it and insisting that the existing status quo was was just not acceptable. And and we really, you know, I knew implementation was going to be a big, big, big mountain to climb. But if you don't even start with something. That's authentic then. Then where what, what, what where are your hopes, really? So I think that that overall, what was the the marker we were putting down? And in a way, it lent it let a real passion to the implementation phase because this was about making it. So this was OK, this is what we've been told. Now we have to make it work. So, you know, I think that was my biggest hope and the jury's still out.  [00:52:22][110.4]

Speaker 3: [00:52:23] The jury's still out. So we're still working at it, right? You know, from our outsider's perspective over here in the USA, looking at the numbers that we see based off of, you know, prosecutions and convictions, it looks like there's some movement. Of course, one of the biggest concerns that has been had about this particular law is about how it will impact minority groups indigenous group in light of systemic racism. Will criminalizing coercive control harm those populations disproportionately, rather than focusing on those powerful abusers who employ coercive control within the context that society feels this is reasonable and and acceptable because they have power? So can you speak a little bit to how it's been perceived in those groups?  [00:53:19][56.2]

Speaker 1: [00:53:20] I think there's two things I want to say about that. One is those are such healthy questions. People absolutely need to be asking those questions about will this. What are the possible unintended negative consequences of any kind of legal innovation? And and one of our biggest concerns, as in the in the year between passage of the law and implementation, was that we know that there's there's ample evidence that when you pass a law or make a new policy, the changes arrest policies for domestic abuse that what happens not intended, but what happens is that you see a spike in arrests, if mistaken, arrests of women. Right. Women who are reaching out to the system for safety as victims and we're getting arrested and prosecuted, some of them for being perpetrators of domestic abuse. And, you know, I mean, it's all the way back to the Sherman book, you know, research that just so evident that that was a big danger and we were petrified. And in Scotland, we already had way too high arrests of women. There've been some good work and there's a good protocol between the Crown Office, which is our prosecution service and the police on on trying to reduce the amount of dual arrests, which is essentially as far as I'm concerned, an indicator of inadequate training. Right, right. So we have seen dual arrests start to come down. We still have arrests of women between 13 and 15 percent of the total domestic abuse arrests. Totally inappropriate. Huge miscarriages of justice. And you know what? What could absolutely guarantee that a woman will never call the police again would be, you know, being arrested as a perpetrator. So we were really worried that this was going to explode that number up higher. So we did some work with Michael Johnson and quants guy in the US who was retired but helped helped us out a little bit anyway. And also with Andy Michael, who's a researcher at the College of Policing. And we said, what should the number of women perpetrators, female perpetrators of coercive control look like? Hmm. And they said, Well, if you look at the survey data and then Andy, you done massive amounts of case reading for the research in the College of Policing around coercive control of domestic abuse. Both of them said. Under five percent. Mm hmm. And this reflects what we've been saying about women don't have those tools now. Women do terrible things. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying, Oh, well, none of us are saying, first of all. And secondly, we do terrible things. We just don't have the tools to be caught.  [00:56:13][173.9]

Speaker 3: [00:56:16] Oh, go ahead.  [00:56:16][0.3]

Speaker 2: [00:56:16] Yeah, so so so we held a couple of Pretty High-Level seminars in which we had representatives from the judiciary, the Justice Department, the police, etc. and we invited some academics to lay out the evidence about who does coercive control. And and we said, we want you to count from the very first minute of implementation of this bill, and we will want really fast turnaround data on what the gender disaggregated arrest figures are. And we're going to be watching this like a hawk. And and our data systems are not all that sophisticated. Then the criminal justice system. I have to say that we were really nervous that the police got on a big nod that they they made sure that that data is there's a gray area about something a bit of it, but you don't care about that anyway. So and the Crown Office also the prosecution. So if you look at the first year's implementation data, you will see that that the number, the percentage of the. So there are a thousand passed over a thousand prosecutions in the first year. That the percentage of women who were prosecutors perpetrators under section one, which is the coercive and controlling behaviors section of the law was four percent. Mm hmm. I think that was a massive victory and a massive victory. I don't think you can count on that happening in other places unless those same kinds of conversations are being had about what would a miscarriage of justice look like under this new law?  [00:58:07][110.2]

Speaker 3: [00:58:07] Yeah. And I think to the the measures that you created within the law, which are very behaviorally focused and do speak to power and control and power dynamics and the tools themselves is really important. A lot of the coercive control laws that we're seeing saying come up are tied to roads are tied, you know, to these measures that are that are going to be used purely against victims because they don't have the behavioral information embedded within the law about the measures themselves, about what constitutes force of control. They just use the term coercive control. It's really interesting and I've  [00:58:48][41.0]

Speaker 1: [00:58:48] heard from experts in Australia that they've had coercive control in a civil law for a number of years, and you may have had the conversations as well there and that the law has been used without training, without support and been used against Aboriginal women. Yeah. To to to to, you know, so again, I think we have to be realistic about that one, the context of where the law is being looked at and and to listen to your story, which is that you know that in Scotland, not only was the law, but there was a creating of a context of saying what's what's just in fair implementation look like? What is this? What should this be? And I can tell you, the safety of the mob cut its teeth in Connecticut, where we're recording from with high to hide your restaurant. Same 15 percent in the numbers out here as it should be. Two or three. Four percent is what the numbers I've always sort of said. And so we have triple, we had triple or quadruple the numbers. And I can tell you, I would regularly have child welfare workers come through, say, I've got two perpetrators solely because they both got arrested. And and I'd say and we were part of the same methodology using coercive control was tell me about each person's pattern, of course, control and actions taken to harm the kids. So you'd separate them out and you wouldn't look at them as a unit, you'd look at their individual patterns. And what I can tell is that almost to a case, not all of them. Based on the facts that that worker had, it wasn't equal. It wasn't mutual. There was a clear primary aggressor and was almost always the male. Not always, but but you take 100 hundred cases. I would say 98 of them fit that part.  [01:00:25][97.0]

Speaker 2: [01:00:26] There's another important piece and that the arresting information for the victim was an act of resistance to that coercive control, which was misidentified by that law enforcement agent. And therefore the perpetrator was able to manipulate that, maybe even intentionally create that situation to assure that that she got arrested.  [01:00:46][20.2]

Speaker 1: [01:00:47] But even more interestingly, more broadly, because you're talking about specific situations that based on the information, we weren't going to reinvestigate those cases. I was sitting with a worker with their file at their desk and the information was there to make the right assessment. They just weren't trained to use it correctly. I mean, I think that really speaks the power. Going back to the beginning of the podcast, the idea of coercive control, the concept and the revolutionary nature of it. I think that  [01:01:13][26.5]

Speaker 2: [01:01:13] what most doctors felt was saying about You want to talk about you, he wants your call. I just I want I want to acknowledge all of the hard work that she has and the fact that she's got a doctorate. And I love calling her Dr. Scott. But I'll call you, Marcia, if you want me to, because I respect  [01:01:28][14.3]

Speaker 1: [01:01:28] your you the way I'd like to not try.  [01:01:31][2.3]

Speaker 3: [01:01:32] I'm I'm acknowledging you. I think you're marvelous. So I, you know, I think it's also really, really important just to know that the tools that we use, the way that they push professionals towards a specific narrative, which is really incident's focus is challenging us on the ground and creating that situation because had the worker that you're talking about had a framework, a tool which allowed for them to see side by side these patterns, they would have easily recognized them. It would have been much different  [01:02:06][33.2]

Speaker 1: [01:02:07] to go back to the second part of the question about should should the minority women be concerned about miscarriages of justice by this criminal justice system? Absolutely, they should be. And this comes back to structural inequality. You know the. The reality is that the application of justice is not even handed. And when you say there were two perpetrators, there were two perpetrators. In that case, there was the individual male perpetrator and there was the justice system, which, you know, revictimized her. Do you know what I mean? So there were two perpetrators, and I would say that in rape cases, the issues of race and they come up a lot in our discussions with Australia, and I'm so glad that the issues are being raised. But I can tell you that the that the victims organizations that I've had links with are are, you know, they're really clear that the status quo is not acceptable for them either. This is not an either or. This is not a do we pass a law? Do we not pass? Because at the moment, the experiences of black women everywhere are are mediated by the racism of their system? So what if, whether you have an adequate coercive control or not, they are still suffering from that race? Right. And and and what I say is, you know, I don't know what the right answer is for Australia or New South Wales or for anybody. But I do know that nobody can close their eyes on me, even actually that exists. And if you name it, you have a much better chance of doing something about it.  [01:03:55][108.3]

Speaker 3: [01:03:56] I think that that is absolutely real, and I think that right now we're going through this major sort of global naming it, which I feel like we need to support and keep going. And I think this is a great place to to sort of pivot into what message you would have for your colleagues across the globe about this issue.  [01:04:21][24.9]

Speaker 1: [01:04:24] I guess, you know, I said it sort of just randomly when I was giving evidence to the Australian parliament and it obviously struck a chord there, but it just it helps me, I think, which is again, the status quo is not OK. You know it, there's overwhelming. There's mountains of evidence that the way that the law responds to children and women living with domestic abuse is is at the very best inadequate and at the at at its worst, the crime and and we have to do something. And what is the something? Well, the something is that we have to crack was that look a lot more like the phenomenon we're trying to eradicate. And that's the place I think we start. And you know, there's huge I mean, I I really would love to do a podcast just on implementation because the questions that have arisen for us about implementation and and our understanding of what what evidence based approach approaches to implementation are, are are really live about whether you you pass a law that looks pretty. And that makes absolutely no change to the lives of children and women in our in our families and our communities. Or do you do something that is radical resistance to the status quo?  [01:05:53][88.8]

Speaker 3: [01:05:53] Right? And then the next question that I would want to hear is what message you have for any survivors who might be listening, whether or not they have coercive control laws that have been passed or not in their jurisdiction. So what would you want to send along to the survivors that listen?  [01:06:10][16.5]

Speaker 1: [01:06:12] I think one of the lessons I learned personally through the process of working and advocating for Scotland's law was the power of children's and women's stories. Yeah, and the power. The huge power of those stories when women and children's voices share their. And I've always known that it was important that all of the media work, you do that you need to. You need to help people understand the phenomenon by a personal story. But the impact the the incredible impact of the courage that women and children demonstrated when clearly they were never going to get justice. You know, I mean, and that's what one of the survivors who spoke to our justice committee said, I'm never getting justice. You know, what happened to me happened well before this law was even a gleam in somebody's got. And and the only justice I can get at this point is by making sure it doesn't happen to some other woman. And and I, you know, I defy you to find one decent victims' organization that doesn't hear that every day. So I think that is for me. That's my learning, and that's my gratitude to the survivors in Scotland who really drove this from 50 years ago.  [01:07:45][92.9]

Speaker 3: [01:07:46] Well, Marsha, I can't tell you how happy I am to have to have spoken to you now and proud to know you and proud of the work that's being done in Scotland. So thank you very much for being on the show. Yeah, yeah. Thank you.  [01:07:59][13.7]

Speaker 2: [01:08:00] And I think that your idea about a panel about implementation.  [01:08:03][2.8]

Speaker 1: [01:08:04] Very good. Well, we'll start with my wheels. Yeah, we'll talk about it. So anyway, so thank you and for our listeners, thank you for joining us today and you've been listening to partner with the survivor.  [01:08:14][10.4]

Speaker 2: [01:08:15] And I'm Ruth Stern's Mandel, the e-learning and communications manager.  [01:08:18][3.3]

Speaker 1: [01:08:19] And I'm David Mandel, the executive director of the Safer Together Institute. And if you want to learn more well, if you subscribe to the podcast, please do this on Spotify platform.  [01:08:28][8.9]

Speaker 2: [01:08:29] And if you have any feedback or ideas for shows or people that we should be interviewing that you would be interested in hearing, please let us know because we're really trying to create a global network of domestic violence informed communities that can communicate with each other and collaborate with each other and support each other in this mission that we're on to transform domestic violence and child well-being practice. So please let us know.  [01:08:55][26.2]

Speaker 1: [01:08:55] That's right. And if you want to visit our website at safety and sitcom,  [01:08:59][3.7]

Speaker 2: [01:09:00] and if you would like to do any trainings, there is paid and free trainings on our Academy at Academy Dot Safe and Together Institute dot com, and I did make a coupon code for you and it is 15 percent off. I made a mistake last time and it's partnered all lowercase and we will be sharing some of Scottish Women's Aid resources with you and our show notes and passing those along. There is some powerful video that you can use and that you can, you know, think about modeling in your own context about coercive control and coercive control behaviors and coercive control advocacy. OK. All right. And we're and we're out.  [01:09:39][39.2]

Speaker 1: [01:09:40] We're out.  [01:09:40][0.0]

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