Tag: abuse of power

Abuse of Power occurs when power is used to exploit, subordinate, punish, override, extract from, improperly constrain, or otherwise violate another person’s agency, dignity, boundaries, reality, or access to independent life.

The analysis does not require power itself to be illegitimate; abuse can occur through the misuse of an otherwise legitimate role, relationship, resource, or authority.

  • The Survivor Should Not Subsidize the Failure of Care

    When care fails, the consequences do not distribute themselves evenly. A therapeutic relationship ruptures. A clinician makes a consequential error. Supervision fails. An institution mishandles a report. Care ends without adequate continuity. A professional boundary is crossed. The person receiving…

  • The Cost of Differentiation

    A person can be told she is free while living inside a relationship where becoming distinct carries consequences. She can technically disagree. Technically say no. Technically leave. Technically choose differently. Technically set a boundary. But if exercising that freedom threatens…

  • Genuine Care And Harmful Dynamics Can Coexist

    Preserving What Was Real Without Diluting Accountability One of the hardest relational truths to hold is that care can be genuine and harm can still be real. A clinician may have provided meaningful, even substantial, help and later fail in…