Institutional Betrayal As Cross-System Structural Trauma Among Sexual Violence Survivors In Post #Metoo Taiwan

Background:

In the aftermath of Taiwan’s 2023 #MeToo movement, increased public awareness has encouraged sexual violence (SV) survivors to disclose their experiences and engage formal support systems. However, institutional responses do not uniformly promote recovery and may instead generate secondary harm. Drawing on Betrayal Trauma Theory and institutional betrayal (IB), this study conceptualizes IB as relational and structural trauma arising when trusted systems fail to protect. Critically, existing research remains largely siloed, examining IB within single systems (e.g., legal, campus setting), despite the reality that survivors’ help-seeking unfolds across multiple, interconnected institutions. This gap obscures how harm accumulates through cross-system interactions. This study addresses this limitation by centering survivors’ real-life trajectories and examining IB as a cumulative, cross-system phenomenon shaping recovery processes.

Methods:

Using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), this qualitative study explored the lived experiences of 12 adult female SV survivors in Taiwan between March and July 2025. Participants were recruited through purposive and snowball sampling. In-depth semi-structured interviews examined survivors’ interactions across legal, law enforcement, social welfare, healthcare, education, and workplace systems. Analysis followed iterative IPA procedures, including coding, theme development, and cross-case comparison. A feminist and anti-oppressive lens guided interpretation, foregrounding power, gendered structures, and socio-cultural context.

Results:

Findings demonstrate that IB operates as a cross-system, structurally embedded process rather than isolated institutional failure. Six interrelated forms emerged: (1) institutional complicity and perpetrator impunity, (2) structural power abuse, (3) systemic investigative failures, (4) failure of protective responsibility, (5) responsibility shifting and denial, and (6) bureaucratic proceduralism prioritizing process over people. Survivors’ narratives reveal how these dynamics accumulate across systems, producing compounding harm characterized by disbelief, fragmentation of care, procedural retraumatization, and relational disconnection. Consequences included erosion of trust, self-blame, and withdrawal from help-seeking. IB thus functioned as structural violence, reproduced through patriarchal norms and rape myths across institutional contexts. While instances of institutional courage were identified, they were largely individualized and insufficient to counter systemic patterns.

Conclusions and Implications:

This study makes a theoretical contribution by reconceptualizing IB as a cumulative, cross-system process embedded in survivors’ lived help-seeking experiences, rather than discrete failures within individual institutions. Findings highlight a critical misalignment between fragmented service systems and the integrated nature of survivors’ recovery needs. Addressing IB therefore requires not only system-specific reforms, but coordinated, cross-system transformation. Implications for social work include strengthening inter-system collaboration, embedding trauma-informed and survivor-centered practices across service networks, and institutionalizing accountability and institutional courage at the structural level. Reframing IB as systemic and cumulative provides a foundation for rethinking recovery, restoring trust, and advancing social justice.