The Role of Banks in Addressing and Preventing Coerced Debt in the Context of Intimate Partner Abuse

Abstract

Diverse forms of economic abuse occur within intimate partner relationships, with serious consequences for women’s long-term physical and economic safety. Often overlooked, however, is the role that debt plays as a means of exercising coercive control. Drawing on findings from the first academic study about women’s experiences of coerced debt in the United Kingdom, this article demonstrates that banks not only create and intensify conditions of vulnerability for women victim-survivors of coerced debt, but are also uniquely positioned to safeguard them from economic harm. To help reduce the former and facilitate the latter, the article advocates for legal and regulatory reform, specialist economic abuse training for banking staff, and increased state protections for victim-survivors of coerced debt.