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Author	Ms Miaoyan Wan
Organisation/Institution	Fides Law & Consultancy
Country	CHINA
Panel	Legal Pluralism
Title	Coercive Control and Transnational Gender Justice: Cross-Border Recognition of Gender-Based Harm in Comparative Legal Practice
Abstract	Recent developments in gender violence research and criminal law scholarship have increasingly recognised coercive control as a significant form of gender-based harm. Rather than focusing solely on discrete incidents of violence, the concept of coercive control highlights patterns of domination, psychological manipulation, and behavioural regulation that undermine an individual’s autonomy and freedom. While several jurisdictions have begun to recognise coercive and controlling behaviour within their domestic legal frameworks, the transnational implications of such findings remain under-examined, particularly in Asian legal contexts. When gender-based harm is recognised in one jurisdiction, victims may face substantial legal challenges when seeking recognition or enforcement of such findings across borders. This paper examines these issues through the lens of transnational gender justice. Drawing on comparative legal practice and cross-border proceedings involving China and Malaysia, the paper explores how legal systems respond when findings of harassment, coercive behaviour, or psychological domination are carried into another jurisdiction through mechanisms of recognition or enforcement. By situating coercive control within broader debates on private international law, gender justice, and the cross-border recognition of legal decisions, the paper argues that existing legal frameworks often struggle to address forms of harm that are relational, psychological, and cumulative in nature. The paper concludes by considering how emerging legal understandings of coercive control may inform future approaches to the transnational recognition of gender-based harm.
Biography	Xuejiao Li & Miaoyan Wan are legal practitioners and socio-legal researchers based in Chengdu, China, combining practical expertise in transnational dispute resolution with academic inquiry into gender, law, and comparative judicial systems. Li is a registered lawyer and behavioural science consultant at Sichuan Dingchi Law Firm and EQL Consulting. Her professional background spans family and sexual-violence cases, forensic psychology, and cross-jurisdictional enforcement of judgments. She holds master’s-level qualifications in social work and legal studies and is currently pursuing research bridging feminist legal philosophy, coercive-control theory, and procedural justice in Asia. Wan is a senior associate at Sichuan Dingchi Law Firm with over ten years of litigation and arbitration experience in commercial and family-law matters. Her current research focuses on the Belt-and-Road judicial cooperation framework, recognition of foreign tribunal decisions, and the protection of women’s rights in civil proceedings. Together they lead a practice-based research group examining how cultural, linguistic, and institutional factors shape the enforcement of sexual-harassment tribunal awards across legal systems. Their collaborative work integrates doctrinal analysis with field practice, aiming to strengthen the intersection between feminist jurisprudence and comparative procedural law in the Asia-Pacific context.