Exploring victim-survivors’ lived experiences of coercion and coercive contexts in forced marriage

The presence of coercion is a key criterion for recognising cases of forced marriage (FM) and triggering the appropriate protective response from legal and support services. Existing research and case law have examined the ways in which explicit coercion exercised through physical force or emotional pressure vitiates consent in the context of marriage. However, research has seldom explored the complex, often subtle forms of coercion that arise within different sociocultural and community contexts. Based on an analysis of police case files and life-history interviews with FM victim-survivors across England and Wales, we explicate the lived experience of coercion across a range of contexts. Our findings extend existing conceptualisations of coercion, going beyond explicit physical and emotional force to illuminate the coercive power of sociocultural contexts. This expansion enables a deeper understanding of the total coercive burden that vitiates consent in FM. We also explore the ways in which victim-survivors exercise agency within and through these constraints.