Radicalization and Political Violence
http://thewasat.wordpress.com/2013/05/08/radicalization-and-political-violence/
May 8, 2013 by Daveed Gartenstein-Ross Leave a comment
Rolling Stone has published a new article entitled "Everything You've Been
Told About Radicalization is Wrong." It is primarily an attack on the NYPD's
study Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat, written by Mitchell
D. Silber and Arvin Bhatt, but it more broadly makes the bold claim that
there is no causal connection between radicalization and violence. (I will
define some of these terms subsequently - something that Rolling Stone
failed to do, and that certainly contributed to the piece's lack of
clarity.)
In studying what drives people to undertake terrorist violence, it is
extremely important to be open to new ideas, and new ways of thinking about
the issue. Further, I have my own criticisms of the NYPD's model, which I
have already outlined at Al-Wasat. But the major problem with Rolling
Stone's argument is that it is a broadside against entire lines of inquiry
without actually presenting evidence that these ways of thinking about the
problem set are flawed.
Framework
It is worth beginning any discussion of radicalization by exploring what the
concept refers to. I'll offer two definitions. Since Rolling Stone is
attacking the NYPD's study, we might start with how that study
conceptualizes the process of radicalization.
The NYPD's study views salafi jihadist ideology as "the driver that
motivates young men and women, born or living in the West, to carry out
'autonomous jihad' via acts of terrorism against their host countries."
Radicalization, according to that study, is a four-step process (sequential
though not necessarily linear) that terminates in a final step that it
refers to as jihadization. NYPD defines this phase:
Jihadization is the phase in which members of the cluster accept their
individual duty to participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as
holy warriors or mujahedeen. Ultimately, the group will begin operational
planning for the jihad or a terrorist attack. These "acts in furtherance"
will include planning, preparation and execution.
NYPD's study notes that "individuals who do pass through this entire
process," to the jihadization phase, "are quite likely to be involved in the
planning or implementation of a terrorist act."
Now, if I were critiquing the NYPD's study, I would argue that the
definition of jihadization makes the study's conclusion almost tautological.
Is it any surprise that people who "accept their individual duty to
participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as holy warriors," and
then take the extra step to "begin operational planning" for a terrorist
attack are "quite likely to be involved in the planning or implementation of
a terrorist act"? But, oddly, Rolling Stone takes the opposite tack. It
actually argues that there is no connection between completing the steps in
NYPD's study and the propensity to undertake violence.
Moving away from the NYPD's definition of radicalization - which, as I said,
seems to contain a tautology - let's also employ a more generalized
definition of radicalization. I find the definition offered by Peter Neumann
and Brooke Rogers useful: "radicalisation describes the changes in attitude
that lead towards sanctioning and, ultimately, the involvement in the use of
violence for a political aim." In other words, under this definition
radicalization refers to various changes in attitude that culminate in the
idea that using violence for political aims is acceptable. So if we're
querying whether there is a causal connection between radicalization and
political violence, the question is if embracing an ideology that holds
political violence to be acceptable or even required makes one more likely
to engage in political violence, or if it makes no difference.
Finally, I should mention that there is no single pathway to terrorism: this
discussion is not about whether ideological radicalization is the only cause
of terrorist violence. As I wrote on Al-Wasat earlier, sometimes "political
anger, group dynamics, even sense of adventure" may be the dominant factor
driving people to violence. Rather, this discussion is about whether
ideological radicalization is one such pathway to terrorism, or whether that
causal connection is a myth.
John Horgan: "The Greatest Myth Alive"
"The idea that radicalization causes terrorism is perhaps the greatest
myth alive today in terrorism research."-John Horgan
I recognize Horgan as a talented academic, albeit one whose past work has
sometimes had a blind spot with respect to the role of religious ideas. So I
was interested to see the evidence for such a bold claim. But none of the
points he made to Rolling Stone establish that the connection between
radicalization and terrorism is a myth. I engaged Horgan on Twitter, and he
provided two different sources that he said grounded his argument in far
deeper research than is reflected in the Rolling Stone piece. But neither of
those sources support his strong conclusion either.
Before addressing Horgan's arguments, let me point out that the idea there
is some causal connection between radicalization and terrorism is one of the
more intuitive connections in all of terrorism research. One would expect
that someone who believes in an ideology that justifies the use of violence
for political ends would be more likely to engage in politically-motivated
violence than someone who does not. Of course, sometimes the intuitive
answer is not the right one - so let's look at Horgan's evidence.
Arguments to Rolling Stone. Horgan provides two arguments to Rolling Stone
about why the idea that radicalization causes terrorism is a myth. First, he
says that "the overwhelming majority of people who hold radical beliefs do
not engage in violence." I agree with this, and in fact made a similar point
in a recent CNN interview. (When I said this, I was defining "radical
beliefs" in a different way than the NYPD does in its jihadization phase,
and Horgan is almost certainly employing a different definition as well.)
But the point that most people who hold radical beliefs don't engage in
violence doesn't disprove a causal connection. I find that, because people
tend to be uncomfortable discussing religion, they have a far lower
threshold for accepting evidence discounting the connection between
religious ideas and terrorist violence than they might in other contexts; I
noted this tendency in a recent review of a book by Clark McCauley and
Sophia Moskalenko. So let's take this out of the context of religion and
examine parallel claims and refutations:
Poverty is a causal factor in crime. "That's not true. The overwhelming
majority of poor people do not commit crimes."
The widespread availability of firearms is a causal factor in gun
violence. "That's not true. The overwhelming majority of gun owners do not
commit gun violence."
Government repression is a causal factor in revolutions. "That's not
true. The overwhelming majority of repressive governments do not experience
revolutions."
In these cases, the refutations do not disprove the initial claims.
Similarly, Horgan's statement makes the point that there is hardly a
one-to-one relationship between radical ideas and terrorism. But that
doesn't mean there is no causal connection.
Horgan's second argument is that "there is increasing evidence that people
who engage in terrorism don't necessarily hold radical beliefs." I asked him
about this on Twitter, and he explained that "it's not that they don't hold
extreme beliefs. It's that the beliefs don't always precede involvement."
This is obviously a different claim than his quotation in Rolling Stone.
Since I don't have access to the data he's referring to, I can't really
speak to it, except to make one point: the fact that in some cases
involvement in a violent extremist movement doesn't precede beliefs does not
disprove a causal connection between radicalization and terrorism.
Horgan also makes a third point later in the Rolling Stone article: "There
are the bigger social, political and religious reasons people give for
becoming involved. Hidden behind these bigger reasons, there are also hosts
of littler reasons - personal fantasy, seeking adventure, camaraderie,
purpose, identity. These lures can be very powerful, especially when you
don't necessarily have a lot else going on in your life, but terrorists
rarely talk about them." But as Adam Elkus pointed out on Twitter,
multicausality is part of social science. While Horgan's point is, again,
true, it doesn't substantiate his claim that the causal connection between
radicalization and violence is a myth.
Terrorism and Political Violence. Horgan pointed me to his article in
Terrorism and Political Violence (Jan. 2007) entitled "A Conceptual
Framework for Addressing Psychological Process in the Development of the
Terrorist." It was an interesting and worthwhile read, but did not
demonstrate that the causal connection between radicalization and terrorism
is a myth. Here is what that article had to say about ideology and terrorist
violence:
The influence of ideology in a psychological sense has been little
explored with respect to terrorism. As noted earlier, Hall describes
ideology as ''the framework for thinking and calculations about the
world-the 'ideas' that people use to figure out how the social world works,
what their place is in it and what they ought to do.'' In a psychological
sense, this implies influences on an individual's cognitive state, a point
noted by Aaron T. Beck in his paper on terrorism: ''Ideology concentrates
their thinking and controls their actions.'' For Beck, ideology implies not
only cognitive influences, but that it operates as a process, changing or
''controlling'' behaviour; ideology therefore might be expressed in forms of
cognitive structure, but it also has a sense of content that may exercise
significance influence over behaviour. From a different context, as noted
earlier, Louis Althusser also emphasises the significance of meaning and
representation expressed through language and social action and practice.
Taylor and Taylor and Horgan explored the role of rule governance as one way
of understanding the behavioural process that might be involved in
ideological control over behaviour, and it may be that further empirical
exploration of this would yield valuable results.
Far from implying a lack of causal connection, this passage thus implies
that further research into the connection between ideological radicalization
and terrorism could "yield valuable results." So did something change in the
six years since his article came out to change his mind about that point?
START article. A second article Horgan pointed me to, published by the
University of Maryland's START center last year, speaks to that question. In
it, Horgan argues that we should "end our preoccupation with radicalization
so that we can effectively regain a focus on terrorist behavior." This
article is primarily concerned with problems with practically applying the
concept of radicalization. Nowhere does it provide evidence that there is no
causal connection between radical beliefs and violence. In fact, it
addresses his above-discussed point that involvement may precede beliefs. He
writes:
A lingering question in terrorism studies is whether violent beliefs
precede violent action, and it seems to be the case that while they often
do, it is not always the case. In fact, the emerging picture from empirical
studies of terrorists (including over a hundred terrorists I have
interviewed from multiple groups) is repeatedly one of people who became
gradually involved with a terrorist network, largely through friends, family
connections, and other informal social pathways but who only began to
acquire and express radical beliefs as a consequence of deepening
involvement with a network.
There are two things worth noting about this. First, it is useful that he
quantifies that radical beliefs "often" precede violent action. Second,
Horgan's statement is entirely consistent with the conclusions in the NYPD
study, which speaks of the role of social networks:
"The key influences during this phase of conflict and 'religious
seeking' includes trusted social networks made up of friends and family,
religious leaders, literature and the Internet." (p. 30)
"Clusters of like-minded individuals begin to form, usually around
social circles that germinate within the extremist incubators." (p. 31)
"These groups, or clusters of extremists . are not 'name brand'
terrorists or part of any known terrorist group. For the most part, they
have little or no links to known militant groups or actors. Rather they are
like-minded individuals who spend time together in clusters organized,
originally, by previously established social network links." (p. 85)
Overall, Horgan's paper makes some valuable points about practical
applications of the concept of radicalization, and about some of the lack of
clarity some scholars have when discussing radicalization. While I disagree
with some points that Horgan makes in his paper, it is a) a valuable read,
and b) one that does not support the very strong claim he made about the
causal relationship between radicalization and terrorism being a myth.
Rolling Stone's Other Arguments
I examined Horgan's ideas in depth because, as I said, I respect him as a
scholar. Though none of the rationales he gave support his strong claim that
"the idea that radicalization causes terrorism is perhaps the greatest myth
alive today in terrorism research," I wanted to examine them in detail and
point out where they contribute valuable critiques to our discussion of
radicalization as a concept. The rest of the article provides less meat,
although it does contain one critique with which I agree.
The critique I agree with comes from Jamie Bartlett, who states: "I have
found that many young home-grown al-Qaeda terrorists are not attracted by
religion or ideology alone - often their knowledge of Islamist theology is
wafer-thin and superficial - but also the glamour and excitement that
al-Qaeda type groups purports to offer." As I said in my last Al-Wasat post
on radicalization, "an on-point criticism of the NYPD study . is that it
assumes the primacy of ideology (religious or otherwise) in moving an
individual toward the embrace of violence." Ideology, as Bartlett notes, is
not always the primary moving force. However, this doesn't mean that the
study and the concept of radicalization lack value: I find that the NYPD's
study provides a useful conceptual framework in cases where ideology is the
predominant pathway toward undertaking terrorist violence. This seemingly
includes the case of Tamerlan Tsarnaev, thus making this a strange time for
Rolling Stone to launch a broadside against the concept of radicalization.
Other critiques that Rolling Stone offers:
If media accounts are to be believed, the accused Boston marathon
bombers were "radicalized" by watching American-born Yemeni cleric Anwar
al-Awlaki's YouTube sermons and reading Inspire, the al Qaeda magazine.
False. My last Al-Wasat entry goes through media accounts carefully. This is
not the impression one would come away with after reading my entry. If
Rolling Stone's contention is that you'd get this impression by reading
narrowly and selectively within the media accounts. well, okay, but not the
best critique.
Jamie Bartlett, head of the Violence and Extremism program at the think
tank Demos, echoes these doubts. "The word 'radicalization' suggests a
fairly simple linear path toward an ultimate violent conclusion," he says.
Studies suggest that although there may be stages in the evolution of a
terrorist, placing them sequentially on a line, as the NYPD's report
literally does, is far too pat. The stages are fluid, not a simple
trajectory, and it is virtually impossible to predict who will or won't
engage in violence based solely on their beliefs.
Ignores what the NYPD study actually says. That study clearly states (p.
19): "Each of these phases is unique and has specific signatures associated
with it. All individuals who begin this process do not necessarily pass
through all the stages and many, in fact, stop or abandon this process at
different points. Moreover, although this model is sequential, individuals
do not always follow a perfectly linear progression."
As I flagged before, the idea that "it is virtually impossible to predict
who will or won't engage in violence based solely on their beliefs" is
rather absurd if those beliefs are represented by the "jihadization" phase
of the NYPD's study. Once individuals "accept their individual duty to
participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as holy warriors or
mujahedeen," it is probably a bit less difficult to predict who will or will
not engage in violence. Further, while the ability to predict violence is
relevant the utility of radicalization models, it does not really speak to
the truth of the models. In other words, a radicalization model can
simultaneously accurately describe the process leading one to commit
violence while also doing little to help us distinguish between those who
will drop out and those who will not.
"To be a radical means to reject the status quo, which in some cases
propels society forward," says Bartlett. "Equating radicalism with terrorism
can produce a dampening effect on free expression - either by government or
by self-censorship."
Employs a different definition of radicalism than either the NYPD study or
Neumann and Rogers. Salafi jihadism, the focus of the NYPD study, has never
propelled any society forward.
Conclusion
The Rolling Stone piece also mixes in a great deal of criticism of the
NYPD's policing efforts. This is a fair area for discussion, but even if one
concludes that the NYPD's efforts were wrong in every way, the policies
undertaken by NYPD do not invalidate the concept. Again, taking this outside
the context of religion and political violence, let's examine a few similar
claims to Rolling Stone's contention that the connection between
radicalization and terrorist violence is invalid because it led to what the
magazine considers to be bad, discriminatory policies:
A carbon tax would be an economically disastrous, awful policy.
Therefore, the idea that carbon dioxide causes global warming is invalid.
Gun control would put us on the road to dictatorship. Therefore, the
idea that the availability of firearms is linked to violence is invalid.
Abortion is a positive evil, akin to murder. Therefore the idea that an
abortion can ever be in the health interests of a mother is wrong.
Rolling Stone's readers would, I suspect, disagree with all three of these
propositions, and see the logical flaws in them. The fact that you might
oppose a carbon tax does not prove that global warming is a myth. Likewise,
one's views of the NYPD's policing practices do not invalidate the
connection between radicalization and terrorist violence. Overall, there may
be a strong argument that, as Horgan suggests, there are serious problems
with applying models of radicalization in the law enforcement context. But
that is a far different argument than the contention that everything we've
been told about radicalization is wrong.
Let me close by explaining, briefly, why the connection between extreme
ideas and violence matter. Last month I did field research in Tunisia, where
there has been an alarming amount of vigilante violence undertaken by
hardline salafis against artists, activists, women, and religious
minorities. If there were no connection between extremism and violence, we
would expect vigilante violence to be evenly distributed within Tunisian
society-undertaken sometimes by secularists, sometimes by Communists,
sometimes by sufis. It is not. And if radical ideas and terrorism are not
connected, then the growth of Ansar al-Sharia Tunisia, which openly shares
al-Qaeda's ideology, should not be seen as particularly problematic. After
all, since it is not currently engaged in a terrorist campaign, its ideology
should not be seen as predictive of future violence - right?
If we pretend that a connection between certain radical ideas and political
violence does not exist, we will be taken by surprise, time and again, by
future acts of non-state violence.
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