Routledge Handbook of Deradicalisation and Disengagement

Stig Jarle Hansen, Stian Lid, Stig Jarle Hansen, Stian Lid

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781315387406
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politique et relations internationales
• Subtopic: Terrorisme

The Routledge Handbook of Deradicalisation and Disengagement offers an overview of the historical settings, theoretical debates, national approaches and practical strategies to deradicalisation and disengagement.

Radicalisation and violent extremism are major global challenges, and as new and violent extremist groups and environments emerge, there is an increasing need for knowledge about how individuals physically exit these movements and how to change their mindset. Historically, much of the focus on these topics has been highly securitised and militarised; by contrast, this volume explores the need for more community-based and 'soft' approaches. The handbook includes discussions from both right-wing/left-wing political and religiously inspired deradicalisation processes.

The handbook is organised into three parts:

1 definitions, backgrounds and theories;

2 actors;

3 regional case studies.

This handbook will be of much interest to students, researchers, scholars and professionals of deradicalisation, counterterrorism, political violence, political extremism, security studies and international relations in general.

1

Why do we need a handbook on disengagement and deradicalisation?

Stig Jarle Hansen and Stian Lid

Radicalisation and violent extremism are global challenges. Although the allure of the Islamic State weakened when the latter faced battlefield defeats in Syria and Iraq, the Islamic State has gained recruits in other places, and racist and hate groups have increased their activities in the West (Kennedy, 2014; Koehler, 2016; Pestano, 2016). There are no signs of these challenges diminishing in the future; rather the contrary. The rise of the Islamic State saw between 27,000 and 31,000 fighters travelling to Syria and Iraq, many of whom returned to their home countries after the battlefield defeats suffered by the Islamic State after 2014. The Islamic State has also mobilised sympathisers around the world (Khalil and Shanahan, 2016). There are also numerous reports on increasing right-wing violence in many larger countries, such as the United States (Jones, 2018).

As new and violent extremist groups and environments emerge, there is an increasing need for knowledge of not only how individuals physically exit these movements, but also how to change their mindset and how to stimulate the deradicalisation and disengagement processes. As of today, a veritable marketplace for new deradicalisation and disengagement efforts has been established. Not all of the new actors are serious. Moreover, the knowledge foundation was, at times, lacking (for examples, see Hansen, Lid, and Okwani, 2019; Schulze, 2008). A plethora of methods has been used, and a large number of different types of deradicalisation and disengagement programmes have been developed for different arenas (Speckhard, 2011). Yet, the expansion was based upon uncertain foundations, difficult dilemmas and imperfect understandings (Altier, Thoroughgood, and Horgan, 2014; Dechesne, 2011; Feddes, 2015; Schuurman and Bakker, 2016). The literature focusing on the disengagement and deradicalisation programmes has primarily been more isolated descriptions of specific programmes or countries, and many studies have focused on prison-based offender rehabilitation programmes. The regional focus in the studies or edited volumes has mainly been on the Middle East or South Asia or on the Western perspective (Koehler, 2017, pp. 28–30).

The aim of this book is to start to fill some of these gaps in the literature on disengagement and deradicalisation. This volume has the ambition of contributing with new knowledge on the approaches, strategies and initiatives taken by various implementing actors globally to support disengagement and deradicalisation processes. The book includes new perspectives on the softer approaches to counterterrorism applied by transnational organisations, local governments, civil society, religious actors, prisons and others. In addition to its global perspectives, it will include specific regional chapters, and contain both the perspectives of practitioners and researchers, and regional and global organisations. The book will shed light on the various debates around different approaches to and thinking around disengagement and deradicalisation processes in addition to bringing forward new and less known perspectives not only from a theoretical angle, but also from a more practical perspective in relation to experiences and lessons learned from specific groups and areas.

Concept and problems

One of the major problems is the definition of radicalisation, as well as disengagement and deradicalisation (Altier, Thoroughgood, and Horgan, 2014; Bjørgo and Horgan, 2009; Koehler, 2017). The lack of conceptual and theoretical clarity has “led to political and practical action executed with largely absent theoretical frameworks or clear-cut concepts” (Koehler, 2017, p. 2). A rough point of departure would be to look at a process in which a person’s commitment to ideological violence is reduced, differentiating deradicalisation and disengagement from prevention. Prevention is actually to be implemented before a person has the ideological commitment to violence. However, there are grey areas between prevention, disengagement and deradicalisation. Following Koehler in this book, prevention is a part of deradicalisation work partly to prevent recidivism into violent or extremist behaviour and thought patterns after an intervention has taken place, reducing existing commitment to the group and cause. Prevention also comes into play with cases in early stages of radicalisation, where one can try to prevent further radicalisation, which is where intervention and preventative methods mix. The key to deradicalisation, however, is to intervene with an existing commitment to a violent extremist group and ideology and to reduce that commitment.

It is possible to group definitions of deradicalisation into a “narrow” type that only includes rejection of ideological violence, and a “broad” version that includes rejection of an ideological worldview that could legitimise violence; the former type is often referred to as disengagement. During the first phase of the British Prevent programme, it may be that violent action is to be avoided, sometimes defined as disengagement – a mere physical and behavioural role change. However, the target could also be more comprehensive, such as changing the radical worldview itself. The target could also be a combination of the two. The first version becomes close to “disengagement” – behaviour changes – while the ideological or psychological aspects are left aside (Bjørgo and Horgan, 2009; Horgan, 2009; Koehler, 2017). Some researchers will maintain that disengagement is the more feasible option; others would say that without addressing the ideology’s attraction points there is a much higher risk of re-radicalisation and failure to exit. Successful programmes based on both views exist.

A focus-changing worldview could quickly develop into “thought policing” and even alienate potential allies by attempting to police opinions rather than actions (Edwards, 2016). Indeed, the end state you should “deradicalise” from is in itself contested. “Radical” is perceived as a relative concept (Schmid, 2013; Sedgwick, 2010). Some even see radicalisation as in some cases reflecting something positive, such as an inclination to act to improve society, that needs to be harnessed. Reidy (2019), for example, sees altruism as an important feature in such processes that can be harnessed, also for humanitarian purposes, avoiding violence in the process. There have been several efforts to define and make distinctions between “problematic” radicals and acceptable and unproblematic radicals; for instance, making the distinction between “(open-minded) radical” and “(close-minded) extremist” or between “violent extremist” and “non-violent extremist” (Schmid, 2013, p. 10). One has to keep in mind that deradicalisation programmes run in totalitarian, or semi-totalitarian, regimes, and a focus on deradicalisation as changing a mindset can be misused (Aggarwal, 2013; Joseba and Douglass, 1996; Smyth, Gunning, Jackson, Kassimeris, and Robinson, 2008; Winkler, 2006). Deradicalisation could easily become an excuse to prevent political activism for promoting democracy, political dialogue or the promotion of minority rights. Indeed, it could serve as a justification for avoiding deeper societal changes, as expressed by Al Jazeera’s Margot Kiser with regard to deradicalisation programmes in East Africa: “It [deradicalisation] seems a concept 100% politicised even before out the gate.”¹ Even in Western countries, the attempted change of a person’s religious or political opinions is morally questionable, as these are usually protected by democratic freedoms and not subjected to criminalisation. Some of these problems are also encountered in disengagement; after all, disengagement from groups striving for non-violent change in authoritarian regimes is another form of enhancing those regimes.

However, while deradicalisation and disengagement have an oppressive potential, they are also potential alternatives to the use of force. As shown by Hansen (2017), deradicalisation and disengagement can in some cases empower minorities, as they become seen as key allies in such processes. Deradicalisation can also be a soft alternative to security services and police. We should emphasise can here, as deradicalisation often is implemented by the police and/or other security services and can be used for intelligence or evidence gathering (Koehler, 2017). A separation between security services and the deradicalisation programme might present deradicalisation as a clearer alternative to the use of the police, and avoid reduction of trust in and legitimacy of the social services that provide deradicalisation programmes. However, a separation might lead to cooperation and coordination problems between various pertinent agencies. Access to relevant information from, for example, school and health services, depending also on the interpretation of the local legal framework, and police intentions of pursuing prosecution might hinder the use of deradicalisation programmes, or hamper the flow of information from the police to institutions doing deradicalisation (Lid, Winsvold, Søholt, Hansen, Heierstad, and Klausen, 2016).

There are other problems when trying to implement radicalisation programmes as well. Problems with implementing disengagement and deradicalisation programmes include the tendency to neglect the wider environment, under-prioritising the intersection between deradicalisation and reintegration, and how contextual factors mediate the success of these two (Marsden, 2017, p. 3; Clubb and Tapley, 2018). Instead, the problem is positioned in the mind of the individual (Marsden, 2017, p. 3). Successful disengagement and deradicalisation involve both leaving the extremist environment and re-engaging with the non-extremist milieu (Barelle, 2015).

To measure success is also hard. Comparative studies are rare (El-Said, 2015; Horgan and Braddock, 2010); wider comparative studies of strategies have often not been done, a fact that we will attempt to remedy in this book. Second, in some cases, programmes have been so secretive that it becomes hard to assess their success or failure (El-Said, 2015; Hansen, Lid, and Okwani, 2019). Third, the process of leaving extremism, avoiding recidivism and fully reintegrating into mainstream society is a process that goes far beyond programmes, and is influenced by the reintegrating communities and contextual factors which shape the capacity to facilitate or resist reintegration. The complexity of factors that influence the reintegration process significantly complicate measuring the success of programmes (Clubb and Tapley, 2018). Moreover, some deradicalisation programmes depend on the participants themselves taking active steps to participate, leading to self-selection that might in turn enhance the success rate. Re-activism amongst imprisoned terrorists is also lower than for the common prison population, thus re-activism on its own might not be such a good indicator of success (Koehler, 2017).

Different types of goals also give different rates of success. A programme focusing on removing problematic ideology and behaviour is more complex than a programme that only focuses on behaviour, and success becomes harder to operationalise, making it harder to compare the programmes. This in turn opens up a wider discussion over cost efficiency. For example, in the United States, deradicalisation programmes have been limited compared to Europe, and very often implemented by private actors. Nevertheless, the United States has had relatively few radical jihadist groups and foreign fighters joining the Islamic State compared to European countries (Bakker and Singleton, 2016; Soufan Group, 2015).

There has been a lack of a thorough discussion of the type of territorial presence of groups from which individuals are to be removed. Radical groups may range from what resemble insurgency outfits to small clandestine networks, and such groups can actually control territories in a civil war-like scenario, or have a semi-territorial presence enabling them to punish participants in deradicalisation programmes, where working in radical groups actually pays better than other jobs (Hansen, 2019). Situations arise where radical groups actually have links to parts of the authorities (ibid). Targeting also needs to be discussed, as research increasingly shows that some of these networks, clustered in areas with relatively similarly socioeconomic characteristics, are for example more vulnerable to foreign recruitment than others (Perliger and Milton, 2016). Targeting can also lead to stigmatisation of wider groups if not carefully implemented (O’Toole, Meer, DeHanas, Jones, and Modood, 2016). Gender is also seldom discussed in the deradicalisation literature, although both the Islamic State and right-wing groups have placed the issue on the agenda (Braunthal, 2009).

This book hopes to highlight some of these problems, sometimes giving solutions, but at other times at least presenting the dilemmas and theoretical consequences. Indeed, the problems are many. Yet, deradicalisation and disengagement are important themes, because of the scope of the activities implemented in their name, as well as because of the number of genuine idealists involved. They do provide a tool to use against radical groups. The above problems should be seen as problems to be solved or dilemmas to be handled. Deradicalisation has great potential, which is as yet untapped. There are definitively both ethical problems and problems with regard to the lack of knowledge, as well as when it comes to the interaction between researchers, practitioners and even former participants, to make these projects more efficient. This book is also a way to promote such interaction, and bring conceptual differences to the forefront, thus contributors are allowed some conceptual freedom, yet categories of types of disengagement and deradicalisation are still needed.

Categorising disengagement and deradicalisation

Disengagement and deradicalisation is a field that is in need of being systematised, and categorisation may help us when studying the wider subject field; for example, different mechanisms of leaving, the different actors involved in the disengagement/deradicalisation process and variations in their roles.

The process of disengagement and deradicalisation can, for example, be voluntary or involuntary/forced. However, some programmes in prisons can be understood as a hybrid between voluntary and involuntary, taking into account the circumstances in detention facilities (El-Said, 2015). Second, the efforts are either individual or collective, and these processes may be distinctive. The latter refer to programmes or efforts addressing entire groups or organisations. Third, as discussed above, the process of leaving radical or extremist groups can be physical and/or psychological (disengagement or deradicalisation). Finally, the processes are permanent or temporary (Ferguson, 2010). In addition to these critical distinctions, we can draw a line between those who leave extremism on their own, without any support from formal institutions (governmental and non-governmental), which it is argued are the majority of former high-ranking terrorists and low-level extremists (Barelle, 2015; Horgan, 2009), and those who receive any kind of support. The latter group is the group primarily discussed in the chapters in this volume.

Another significant distinction when understanding the processes of leaving is between push and pull factors. Push factors are experiences related to an individual’s involvement in a particular social movement that drive him or her away and include disillusionment with the group’s strategy or actions, loss of faith in the ideology, disagreements with group leaders or members, and burnout. Pull factors are i...