Transatlantic cooperation on terrorism and Islamist radicalisation in Africa: the Franco-American axis

Transatlantic cooperation on security has a long history. In Africa, transatlantic cooperation on security is basically between France and the United States. This paper asks why the two former competitors in Africa started to cooperate and also why they are so willing to engage militarily. The central argument in this paper poses that France and the US cooperate because it is indispensable to both parties. To France, the cooperation is indispensable because the US is the only power with sufficient financial means and with sufficient air-lift capacity to transport French and African troops into conflict-ridden countries. To Washington, cooperation with Paris is indispensable because the French authorities have unique access to intelligence and knowledge about large parts of Africa. By applying a foreign policy analysis framework, the paper analyses how perceptions of decision-makers, the role of personality and leadership, the role of government institutions and political systems have impacted the relevant decisions. It is emphasised that the two different decision-making systems – the French “state dominated” and the American “society dominated” – produce the same result, namely collaboration. It suggests that the perception of a serious threat from terrorism and Islamist radicalisation overrules differences in decision-making systems.     

The geography of pre-criminal space: epidemiological imaginations of radicalisation risk in the UK Prevent Strategy, 2007–2017

ABSTRACT

This article explores geographical and epistemological shifts in the deployment of the UK Prevent strategy, 2007–2017. Counter-radicalisation policies of the Labour governments (2006–2010) focused heavily upon resilience-building activities in residential communities. They borrowed from historical models of crime prevention and public health to imagine radicalisation risk as an epidemiological concern in areas showing a 2% or higher demography of Muslims. However, this racialised and localised imagination of pre-criminal space was replaced after the election of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition in 2010. Residential communities were then de-emphasised as sites of risk, transmission and pre-criminal intervention. The Prevent Duty now deploys counter-radicalisation through national networks of education and health-care provision. Localised models of crime prevention (and their statistical, crime prevention epistemologies) have been de-emphasised in favour of big data inflected epistemologies of inductive, population-wide “safeguarding”. Through the biopolitical discourse of “safeguarding vulnerable adults”, the Prevent Duty has radically reconstituted the epidemiological imagination of pre-criminal space, imagining that all bodies are potentially vulnerable to infection by radicalisers and thus warrant surveillance.     

The Muslim paranoia narrative in counter-radicalisation policy

With the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the issue of radicalisation has loomed large in Western policy debates. Recent summits on countering violent extremism have sought to highlight the importance of undermining extremist narratives, mobilising moderate Muslims who oppose ISIS and working to address drivers of radicalisation. This article explores the ideological underpinnings of this approach. It focuses on what I call the “Muslim paranoia narrative”, a recurring feature of Western radicalisation discourse that helpfully captures its ideological commitments and their contemporary significance. Analysing its manifestation in American political culture, I argue that the Muslim paranoia narrative indicates a powerful process of ideological reproduction that works against approaches to counter-radicalisation centred on engagement and collaboration with Muslim communities.     

Interpreting “Cumulative Extremism”: Six Proposals for Enhancing Conceptual Clarity

The concept of “cumulative extremism”—described in 2006 by Roger Eatwell as “the way in which one form of extremism can feed off and magnify other forms [of extremism],” has recently gained considerable traction in academic, policy, and practitioner discourses about extremism. Yet in spite of the growing usage of the term, particularly in analyses of the dynamic between extreme Islamist and extreme Right-Wing or anti-Muslim protest groups, there has to date been scant interrogation of the concept itself or of its application. In this article, we make a series of six proposals as to how we might enhance the conceptual clarity of these conversations about “cumulative extremism.” Our aim in doing so is to increase the likelihood that the concept might become a useful addition to the debates on extremism rather than becoming, to borrow a term from John Horgan—something of an “explanatory fiction”—an idea that appears to enable us to explain a great deal, but whose explanatory value is largely lost because there is insufficient scrutiny of the claims that it is used to make and whose liberal application becomes increasingly conducive to poor science.     

British Muslim youth: radicalisation,terrorism and the construction of the “other”

Academic interest in Muslim youth, Islam, radicalisation and Islamic-inspired terrorism exploded in the aftermath of 9/11, aimed at discovering the connection between Islam and terrorism, radicalisation and terrorism and how to detect and understand those who might become involved in them. Radicalisation as a process has increasingly become associated with Muslim youth, particularly male Muslim youth, as the precursor to Islamic-inspired violence against Western states. In an effort to understand these youths, the radicalisation of, or potential radicalisation of, Muslim youth is linked in the literature to alienation due to living in separate or parallel communities, identity crisis and intergenerational conflict. Because of this, terrorism, radicalism and extremism have become entangled with notions of identity, integration, segregation and multiculturalism, and this entanglement has made being a “Muslim youth” a precarious designation in the United Kingdom. This article examines some of the concepts that are central to the process of radicalisation as it is described in the literature. Using empirical data from a study with Muslim youth, the article examines the realities of the emergence of new transcultural identities and generational change amongst Muslim youth in the United Kingdom as a feature of their lived experience, rather than as evidence of a process of radicalisation.     

Preventing radicalisation in Norwegian schools: how teachers respond to counter-radicalisation efforts

ABSTRACT

This article explores how selected educators respond to the integration of counter-radicalisation efforts into Norwegian secondary schools. Our research participants describe having limited encounters with youth extremism in practice, yet their narratives exhibit a professional responsibility to prevent students from being radicalised towards any form of violent extremism. There are, however, diverging views on how prevention should be carried out in school. When faced with concerns of radicalisation, most participants draw on therapeutic prevention, which conforms to the dominant radicalisation discourse in global politics aimed at identifying and rehabilitating vulnerable youth. We argue that these therapeutic prevention strategies are a form of pedagogical control intended to recondition “illiberal” students under the pretext of national security. Considering the strong normative and political connotations of extremism-related issues, we recommend that educators tread cautiously in their prevention efforts. Educators must especially strive to find a balance between deterring students from radicalisation and violent extremism, while also ensuring that these efforts do not impede the agency and autonomy of young lives. Overall, this research raises some ethical and practical concerns about preventing radicalisation and violent extremism in Norwegian schools.     

The banality of counterterrorism “after,after 9/11”? Perspectives on the Prevent duty from the UK health care sector

Since 2015, the UK healthcare sector sector has (along with education and social care) been responsibilised for noticing signs of radicalisation and reporting patients to the Prevent programme. The Prevent Duty frames the integration of healthcare professionals into the UK’s counterterrorism effort as the banal extension of safeguarding. But safeguarding has previously been framed as the protection of children, and adults with care and support needs, from abuse. This article explores the legitimacy of situating Prevent within safeguarding through interviews with safeguarding experts in six National Health Service (NHS) Trusts and Clinical Commissioning Groups. It also describes the factors which NHS staff identified as indicators of radicalisation – data which was obtained from an online questionnaire completed by 329 health care professionals. The article argues that the “after, after 9/11” era is not radically distinct from earlier periods of counterterrorism but does contain novel features, such as the performance of anticipatory counterterrorism under the rubric of welfare and care.     

In Extremis: a Self‐defeating Element in the ‘Preventing Violent Extremism’ Strategy

The main policy reaction to the terrorist attacks of 7/7 and 21/7 of 2005 has been the development of the £6 million ‘Preventing Violent Extremism’ (PVE) initiative which aims, as part of the government's broader counter‐terrorism strategy (CONTEST), to tackle support for, and the promotion of, violent Islamist ideologies within British society. One crucial component of this strategy is providing support for Muslim groups and individuals to tackle radicalisation and extremism directly at the local level. Funding and charitable status for mosques, Muslim community and youth groups and initiatives, ‘forums against extremism’, anti‐extremism ‘road shows’, and the training of imams are included as part of this strategy. This article argues that this aspect of PVE is not only ill‐advised, but potentially deeply counter‐productive. It takes issue with two reasons that inform the PVE strategy: first, that what motivates individuals to join extremist groups are the religious ideas themselves; second, that government intervention or involvement is an effective method for rendering the moderate antidote attractive. Arguably, neither of these assumptions is warranted in the face of contrary evidence. Consequently, this arm of PVE is, at best, barking up the wrong tree; at worst, fuelling extremism.     

Radicalisation and Higher Education: Students’ Understanding and Experiences

ABSTRACT

Since 2015 universities have been placed under a legal duty of “due regard to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism.”¹ This reflects the belief in UK counter-terrorism policy that radicalisation exists and can be countered. Advice to universities is largely silent on how this duty applies to teaching. Yet many degree programmes generate lectures and seminar discussions where views of an allegedly radicalised nature could be aired. This article presents focus group research which elicits students’ understanding of radicalisation, and provides insights into their experience of debating contentious issues such as identity, community cohesion, and the causes of terrorism. We argue that students’ understanding of radicalisation is conflated with extremism and we explore students’ anxiety about debating these issues and reliance on educators to create the right environment for such discussions. Finally, the data presented here challenges some of the assumptions underpinning contemporary counter-radicalisation policy in the domain of higher education, which are premised on ideas of active grooming. We argue that this does not accord with students’ own experiences, as they regard themselves as discerning, critical thinkers rather than inherently vulnerable to manipulation by those espousing violent extremist views.     

Structural differences of violent extremist offenders in correctional settings

The process of radicalisation has received wide attention over the past decade. As the number of violent extremist offenders grows, the potential diffusion of radical ideologies inside prisons is gaining attention. Offender attribute data, both pre-custody and in-custody, routinely collected by Correctional Service Canada, were explored to determine whether violent extremist and mainstream offenders differed (that is, could be clustered); if so, what attributes have values that were systematically different for the two groups, and did those attributes lend themselves to predicting other offenders at risk for radicalisation.

Results from the pre-custody attributes show minute differences between the two groups. The in-custody attributes show visible, although still weak, differences. Combining the two data sets provides further evidence for differences, with some interactions between the two sets of attributes. Definitive answers about radicalisation were hampered by the small number of radicalised offenders (less than 1 percent) and several major differences in the offender population as a whole that obscure smaller distinctions. Nevertheless, the analysis suggests some attributes that may differentiate violent extremist and mainstream offenders. Although unanticipated, it also demonstrates that the entire offender population separates well into three clusters, and allows the qualitative pattern of attribute values that differentiates them to be determined.