The Coercive Cycle
A model for understanding how abusive tactics are learned and reinforced.
Coercion in abusive situations promotes confusion for the sake of control. Confusing situations, therefore, are always easier to navigate and endure when you can name what you are experiencing, give it a description, and anticipate what might be next. Such insight can provide you with signposts to help orient yourself when the coercion leaves you disoriented and give you options for moving forward. Education brings clarity and with clarity comes a greater ability to choose for oneself.
I distinguish between acts of coercion - a flattering compliment, a threat, a false apology, a guilt trip - and patterns of coercion. When coercive tactics are used interchangeably across time with varying degrees of flexibility and speed and with different audiences, then patterns can be observed, and as those patterns are repeated and reinforced, a cycle can be observed in which the deceiver learns what works and what doesn’t work with different individuals, making the coercion increasingly more effective, more difficult to detect, and more damaging over time. In my experience, abusive individuals and institutions are often practiced in cycles of coercion. For instance, words that are used to humiliate and demonize another person or an entire group of people can be traced back to words that were used to exalt and deify the self. In other words, the deception didn’t start with the attack on another.
In this post, I introduce The Coercive Cycle and present basic definitions for each stage. You can think of each stage of a set of tactics - with each set containing numerous types of coercive behaviors. Not every situation of abuse follows this pattern and not every situation involves every stage. Many situations of abuse never get beyond the silencing stage as the abusive person or institution successfully maintains secrets.
Self-promotion: Many people in positions of trust who go on to abuse others used their ability to promote themselves to gain and increase that position of trust. They may have presented a false image of themselves by over-communicating characteristics that appealed to their audience and under-communicating characteristics that would have damaged that image. Showing off something positive to you becomes a way of hiding something negative from you.
Charms: One of the ways trust is coerced is through charming you. The self-promoter turns that image-shaping gift outward to deceptively charm those they want to use for their own gain. They engage in a con game to swindle you. This includes flattery, love-bombing, gift-giving, favor-rendering, over-helping, and other tactics designed to coerce trust so that the person doesn’t have to use force to take what they want.
Dismantling: For some, charms may coexist or become precursors to attacks. These attacks are dismantling behaviors that seek to gain control over another’s inner and outer worlds. The coercive person may belittle and shame you, dismantling your inner sense of self-respect, while pitting you against other family members, friends, or coworkers: dismantling your outer network of relationships. It’s at this stage that boundaries are often crossed: trust has been built while supports have been dismantled so that a targeted person can be more easily isolated and victimized.
Silencers: The dismantled person often holds the secret of the abuse and the secret of the abuser, who might still possess the trust of others and is still liked by most. In order to prevent any disruption to that image, a person or institution might coerce a victim into remaining silent through threats, NDAs, pleas for sympathy, and other tactics. Silencers can take very different forms yet have the same goal. For example, it’s not unusual for an abusive leader to act like a dangerous lion when seeking to silence a subordinate and then act like a helpless lamb when they no longer have the power to harm. They act one way when they have power over others and another way when others have power over them.
Defenses: If a coercive person or institution is confronted, exposed, or otherwise put in a position where they need to give an account for their actions, then they might respond with an array of defensive tactics meant to coerce others into accepting their innocence or helping them avoid accountability. Defenses include DARVO1, excuses, justifications, and comparisons with others.
Concessions: If defenses fail, the coercive person may offer partial confessions (only acknowledging what’s already been revealed) or simple statements of acknowledgement accompanied by an expectation that they will be met with acceptance and restoration. They coerce how people respond to their concession by saying things like, “I apologized. What more do you want?” They concede as way of disarming a threat and keeping the upper hand. For example, a person may temporarily withdraw hoping they can return to their former ways with the simple passage of time.
Demonstrations: The coercive person or institution seeking to repair its damaged image might engage in displays of change in an attempt to appear legitimate. They may seek ways to recruit good will and earn back trust without ever dealing with the truth of their past behavior and its impact. If they can successfully win over acceptance without laying down their coercive tactics, then they find themselves back at the start: promoting themselves and charming their targets; only they’ve learned new and more creative ways to confuse and control.
It can be devastating to realize that a person, institution, or belief system that you trusted has caused you harm. It is normal to feel anger, sadness, confusion, and helplessness in the face of that betrayal. Having some language to describe what happened to you can help you understand the dynamics of coercion that are so often at work in abusive situations. It can also help you identify the characteristics of transparency and safety that are necessary for you to thrive. In future posts, I will explore these dynamics of coercion in detail, starting with self-promotions, and propose ways in which our experience with others can be more authentic and life-giving.
DARVO stands for “Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender.” See: https://dynamic.uoregon.edu/jjf/defineDARVO.html