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Stages of the Radicalization and Deradicalization Process

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Stages of the Radicalization and Deradicalization Process Practicies Project Objective H2020-SEC-06-FCT-2016 Research and Innovation Action (RIA) Partnership against violent radicalization in cities Project Number: 740072 D3.3 – Stages of the radicalization and deradicalization process Version Def. 31 October 2018 Practicies | 740072 D3.3 – Stages of the radicalization and deradicalization process 1. Change Control 1.1. Document Properties Deliverable No. 3.3 Work Package No 3 Work Package Title Etiology of the processes of radicalisation and radicalisation levels tipping point Author/s Dounia Bouzar Contributor/s Laura Bouzar, Sulayman Valsan Reviewer Séraphin Alava, Lluís Botifoll Official deliverable name The stages of the radical process report Date 31-10-2018 Dissemination Level Public 1.2. Revision History Version Date Comments 1st version Mai 2018 Writing 2nd version June 2018 Contributions 3rd version October 2018 Ethics section Final version October 2018 Review This document has been produced in the context of the Practicies Project. The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 740072. All information in this document is provided "as is" and no guarantee or warranty is given that the information is fit for any particular purpose. The user thereof uses the information at its sole risk and liability. For the avoidance of all doubts, the European Commission has no liability in respect of this document, which is merely representing the authors view. Page 2 of 210 Practicies | 740072 D3.3 – Stages of the radicalization and deradicalization process 2. Contents 1. Change Control ...................................................................................................................... 2 1.1. Document Properties ......................................................................................................... 2 1.2. Revision History ................................................................................................................. 2 2. Contents ................................................................................................................................ 3 3. Executive summary ............................................................................................................... 4 4. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 4 5. Approach ............................................................................................................................... 6 6. Ethics issues .......................................................................................................................... 9 7. The anxiogenic emotional approach in the process of radicalization ................................... 11 7.1. The feeling of discrimination at the beginning of the radicalization process in primary explicative schemes. .................................................................................................................. 12 7.2. A systematic anxiogenic emotional approach leading to the internalization of discrimination and persecution feelings, including for individuals who did not direct ly experience it .............................................................................................................................. 15 7.3. The appropriation of the feeling of discrimination/persecution due to the anxiogenic approach ................................................................................................................................... 42 8. The individualization of the “jihadist” involvement ............................................................. 64 8.1. Adequacy of dysfunctional solutions proposed by the "jihadist" discourse to various cognitive and emotional aspirations of young people (or engagement motives) ........................ 67 8.2. Adherence to violence and double dehumanization ....................................................... 106 8.3 Young people who choose pacifist dysfunctional compensatory solutions or the question of the “low-cost pietist salafism” ............................................................................................. 125 9. The radicalization exit ............................................................................................................. 147 9.1 Proposing a substitution group or the relational aspect ................................................. 149 9.2 Trusting again loved ones to trust society again or the reassuring emotional approach 164 9.3 Realizing the untruthful nature of the “jihadist” propaganda to initiate a cognitive opening . 169 9.4 The ideological approach: a long and hard work ............................................................. 185 9.5 Proposing alternative commitments rather than alternative discourses ......................... 189 10. Annexes ............................................................................................................................ 204 10.1 Annex I. Warning indicators ........................................................................................ 204 10.2 Annex II. Lexical tool ................................................................................................... 209 10.3 Annex III. Livre Blanc «Les désengagés» ...................................................................... 210 Page 3 of 210 Practicies | 740072 D3.3 – Stages of the radicalization and deradicalization process 3. Executive summary This report presents a collection of qualitative data on what has originally conditioned the engagement of the young people that have been monitored, starting from the assumption that “to become authoritative, a discourse must make sense”. We could do so because we have followed them up on an average duration of one year and a half. In addition, we had access, thanks to families’ participation, to data on their conversations and personal stories. 4. Introduction Introducing the process of radicalization will require us to rely on Costanza’s definition1 : “The path of radicalization is the process or progression which enables to understand how an individual or a given group moves through time towards radical beliefs, in a volatile social environment which is constantly evolving”. In addition, those radicalized beliefs lead to violence. Since Horgan’s article “From profiles to pathways and roots to routes”2 written in 2008, researches have ceased to revolve around the question “why?” to focus on “how?” radicalization occurs, giving up the idea of finding common grounds but instead studying the process of radicalization “step by step”3. Indeed, Horgan considers that when comparing the weaknesses of profile studies, trajectory-based studies allow to better understand the dynamic of progressive involvement of individuals. In that particular case, trajectory-based studies enable to understand why an individual is getting involved or disengaged, and which factors are explaining this evolution. At the international scale, academicians have suggested several schemes to explain the radicalization process. However, editors of the report “How to prevent radicalization: a systematic review”, from the International Center for Criminality Prevention (ICCP/CIPC), noted that most of the schemes are characterized by a unidirectional vector suggesting phases or steps of radicalization linked to a causal order4. This implication does not conform to the complexity of the radicalization process. Although some authors integrate the group component in their approaches, most of them attempt to explain the radicalization process primarily as an evolution focused on the individual, adding in a second or a third step the group dimension. Those schemes agree on the fact that the radicalization process involves an individual change determined by 1 COSTANZA, W. An interdisciplinary framework to assess the radicalization of youth towards violent extremism across cultures, Georgetown University, 2012, p. 26. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com/docview/1520334378?accoun-tid=28979 2 HORGAN, « From profiles to pathways and roots to routes: Perspectives from psychology on radicalization into terrorism», The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2008, 618 (10), pp. 80-94. 3 COLLOVALD A. & GAÏTI B. (dir.), La démocratie aux extrêmes. Sur la radicalisation politique. Paris, La Dispute, 2006. 4 CIPC, How to prevent radicalization: a systematic review, December 2015, p. 50. Page 4 of 210 Practicies | 740072 D3.3 – Stages of the radicalization and deradicalization process external factors.5 Further critics have been addressed. Indeed, academicians based their schemes on case studies of past radicalization in order to explain retroactively the radicalization process of individuals.6 The correlations defined in those models are empirically difficult to establish.7 Although some individuals have experienced the same phases, they do not necessarily radicalize. It is therefore not practicable to consider a causal relationship. Moreover, many of those schemes lack empirical data proving their validity in practice. Most of them rely on secondary sources to formulate their 8 conclusions, restricting themselves to theory. Those models are built on particular cases involving radicalized (Muslim) men. It is a problem as they neglected the diversity of their radicalization trajectories even though their points of departure may be the same –
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