Tolmie, JuliaSmith, RachelWilson, Denise2023-11-232023-11-232023-10-09Violence Against Women, ISSN: 1077-8012 (Print); 1552-8448 (Online), SAGE Publications, 10778012231205585-. doi: 10.1177/107780122312055851077-80121552-8448http://hdl.handle.net/10292/16995How intimate partner violence (IPV) is conceptualized affects what we see when we look at situations involving IPV and what we think the solutions to the problem of IPV are-either in individual cases or in the development of broader legal and policy responses. In this article, it is suggested that while conceptualizing IPV as coercive control is an improvement over previous understandings, it does not go far enough. Coercive control must be located within a broader conceptualization of IPV as a form of social and systemic entrapment if it is not to operate in a harmful manner for victim-survivors.© The Author(s) 2023. Creative Commons License (CC BY 4.0). This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/coercive controlentrapmentintimate partner violencecoercive controlentrapmentintimate partner violence48 Law and Legal Studies4805 Legal Systems4402 Criminology44 Human SocietyViolence Against WomenViolence ResearchMental Health16 Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions5 Gender Equality11 Medical and Health Sciences16 Studies in Human Society18 Law and Legal StudiesCriminology42 Health sciences44 Human society48 Law and legal studiesJournal ArticleOpenAccess10.1177/10778012231205585