Terrorized by Immigration? Threat Perceptions and Policy Preferences
Does exposure to terrorism affect attitudes toward immigration policy? If so, is it the sense of threat that impacts these attitudes? Previous studies could not find conclusive evidence of increasing hostility toward out-groups as a direct consequence of terrorist events, as they struggle to separat...
Small Wars & Insurgencies
In recent years, Belgium and the Netherlands have been confronted with relatively many citizens or residents who have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join and fight with jihadist groups — 388 Belgian and 220 Dutch as estimated by the respective authorities. This article provides an overview of th...
Prosecuting child soldiers in the arab world: between the state, society, and retributive and restorative justice
The phenomenon of child soldiers in the Arab World could threaten peace and stability in the post-conflict phase. Many of these chil dren committed crimes against their society such that some com munities reject them and demand their prosecution, with no real attention from both the political and ...
Countering the Islamic State in the Lake Chad Basin: A case for a security-developmentgovernance nexus?
The Islamic State in the West African province (ISWAP) has gained prominence in Lake Chad Basin by filling in the security, service delivery, and governance gaps in Cameroon, Nigeria, and Niger. This has won the group recruits and support in some communities, entrenching it in the region. Using the ...
A transnational police network co-operating up to the limits of the law: examination of the origin of INTERPOL
INTERPOL was not created by a treaty, nor was it created by states. INTERPOL was developed by a group of diverse domestic police officers, who structured the international entity and designed its legal framework in order to co operate within the limits set by the laws of their respective countrie...
‘None-the-wiser’? Citizenship education in preventing radicalisation: contrasting European and Middle East perspectives
Radicalisation towards violent extremism within educational settings has emerged as a high profile and critical issue in many contemporary societies. Debates around the appropriate role of educational institutions should play in this regard have attracted intense media and public debate both in the ...
The nature and extent of the Taliban’s involvement in the drug trade before and after the regime change (1994–2022): insights from experts
This article considers what experts know about the nature and extent of the Taliban’s involvement in the drug trade from 1994 until 2022. The findings indicate that the Taliban has been consistently involved in the drug trade in various roles and capacities. This involvement, fortified by fami...
Securing the platform: how Google appropriates securit
Google is increasingly developing a manifold of security products for its users, businesses, and national security actors like the US Department of Defence. However, the company and its employees struggle with whether, and how, it should be involved in practices of security, war or weaponry. To ...
Securing the platform: how Google appropriates security
Google is increasingly developing a manifold of security products for its users, businesses, and national security actors like the US Department of Defence. However, the company and its employees struggle with whether, and how, it should be involved in practices of security, war or weaponry. To ...
End of the Lone Wolf: The Typology that Should Not Have Been
This research note argues that the “lone wolf” typology should be fundamentally reconsidered. Based on a three-year empirical research project, two key points are made to support this argument. First, the authors found that ties to online and offline radical milieus are critical to lone actors...
“Press F to Pay Respects”: An Empirical Exploration of the Mechanics of Gamification in Relation to the Christchurch Attack
There has been a long-standing yet largely unreported intersection between video-gaming and violent extremism, spanning across jihadist, far-right, and other types of ideologies. Within this framework, until late, scant attention has been paid to the concept of “gamification”; i.e. the applicati...
Analyzing the evolution of the threat al-Shabaab poses to Kenya post-Westgate attack perio
in the last decade, al-shabaab has carried out at least thirty terrorist attacks in Kenya, killing hundreds of people and causing damage to public and private infrastructure. the main objective of the research is to analyze the evolution of al-shabaab terrorist incidents in Kenya in the post-Wes...
Counter-radicalisation in UK higher education: a vernacular analysis of ‘vulnerability’ and the prevent duty
The UK Government defines vulnerability to radicalisation as, ‘the process by which a person comes to support terrorism and extremist ideologies associated with terrorist groups’. In 2015 legislation was passed to enhance the national capacity to pre-emptively identify vulnerable people by coopt...
Genocidal processes: social death in Xinjiang
Genocide is a series of long-term processes emerging from “states of emergency” to convert targeted groups and secure the nation. This paper builds on Critical Genocide Studies literature to historically contextualize China’s “fusion” policy, a narrative of emergency officially explai...
To look for another thing, and in another way: revitalising criticality with multimodal methodologies
This article proposes multimodal methodologies as a path to revitalising criticality in CTS. It begins by assessing the strengths of existing scholarship on “terrorism”, whilst also noting this scholarship’s overwhelmingly linguistic source materials. It considers shortcomings of such a monomo...
Education policy and ‘free speech’ on race and faith equality at school
Right-wing populists have recurrently created moral panics inter nationally about the supposed need to ‘protect free speech’ in higher education (HE), and ‘protect children’ from progressive speech in schools. This paper presents the first systematic analysis of how such dynamics function...
Terrorist alliance formation: the case of Islamic State and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi in Balochistan (Pakistan)
The Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), along with its ally Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), has adversely affected the security landscape of Balochistan, Pakistan. Moreover, this alliance has posed a significant threat to the security of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects in the provin...
EU religious engagement in the Southern Mediterranean: Much ado about nothing?
Since the Arab uprisings, religious engagement is central to EU relations with the Southern Mediterranean. Given that the EU is a liberal-secular power, this article investigates why and how the EU is practising religious engagement and whether it is a rupture with past EU modalities of engageme...
Toward a Behavioral Model of “Homegrown” Radicalization Trajectories
This research note presents a dynamic risk assessment model of homegrown terrorists. The model was tested in a study of convicted “homegrown” American terrorism offenders inspired by Al Qaeda’s ideology. The New York Police Department model developed by Silber and Bhatt was chosen as the basis...
War Games of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the Collective Security Treaty Organization: Drills on the Move!
The SCO is a political, economic, and security organization that started its security policy in arms control and subsequently devel oped war games. Conversely, the CSTO is a military alliance with collective armed forces. The military exercises of the CSTO are focused on conventional warfare, pea...
Cognitive and Behavioral Radicalization: An Explanatory Split?
This article argues that the general principle that there is an explanatory split between cognitive radicalization and behavioral radicalization does not hold. It first sketches the principle and the evidence adduced in favour of it. The first major problem with the principle is that it is based mer...
China’s Proposition to Build a Community of Shared Future for Mankind and the Middle East Governance
The proposition to build a community of shared future for mankind is a new concept that the Chinese government has advocated after the 18th National Congress of the CPC, aiming to develop a new structure of international relations and upgrade the global governance model. As a Chinese proposition...
“Phantom operators”: special operations forces and asymmetric warfare in Northern Nigeria.
Across the world, Special Operations Forces (SOFs) play a leading role in asymmetric warfare. The unique trainings, skills, weapons, and equipment of these elite Tier 1 operators, differentiates them from conventional forces, making them the preferred choice in complex environments. SOFs are id...
Resilient non-radicalisers: beating the odds through non-radicalisation despite significant suffering
This study explores how and why some individuals are resilient to radicalisation by focusing on individuals who were labelled “terrorists” for their alleged involvement or support for an attempted coup that took place in Turkey on 15 July 2016, yet who have shown no sign of violent radicalisatio...
A state without a future: neoliberal despotism, crisis-fighting, and government through fear
This article is a study on the neoliberal state, its relation to time and its ongoing transformation through crisis. It is spurred by two seminal works – Hartog’s on historicity and Rosa’s on acceleration – that catalogue a collapse of the modern temporality defined by progression from p...
From Bombs to Books, and Back Again? Mapping Strategies of Right-Wing Revolutionary Resistance
This article begins by outlining four post-WWII strategies of right-wing revolutionary resistance: vanguardism; the cell system; leaderless resistance; and metapolitics. Next, the article argues that metapolitics became a preferred strategy for many right-wing revolutionaries during the 2000s and ea...
Securitization of a Political Conflict in Southeast Asia: Disengaging the Indigenous Audience in West Papua
The Indonesian government maintains a security approach to dealing with the armed conflict in West Papua. However, the state’s securitization results in more harm, evidenced by the increasing number of armed attacks in its Central Highlands. Why has the securitization failed to quell the confl...
Depoliticizing decolonization: the silencing of Palestine in universities
This paper argues that since 7 October 2023, universities across the West have remained complicit in the silencing of Palestine. It argues that this silencing has functioned through three key registers: Firstly, through the censorship and suppression of pro-Palestine voices, secondly through th...
Beheading the Hydra? Does Killing Terrorist or Insurgent Leaders Work?
As Alexander was troubled by the hydra-like nature of his Afghan opponents so today is NATO. The Taliban’s leadership has been pursued continuously and ever more intensely since the start of the conflict in 2001, and is now being killed, according to senior American and British commanders, ‘on a...
Security diplomacy as a response to Horn of Africa’s security complex: Ethio-US partnership against al-Shabaab
Following the attack on the United States of America, counterterrorism against al-Shabaab attracted the attention of great powers and countries in the Horn of Africa. The threat of al-Shabaab in the region continued to be critical as counterterrorism is persistently commenced in cooperation with pow...
Security assistance to surrogates – how the UAE secures its regional objectives
Amid a relative withdrawal of western, liberal states from the Middle East, the United Arab Emirates have taken over some of the burden of regional security assistance – doing so redefining norms and practices of security assistance. Unlike western counterparts, the UAE are investing into secu...
Critical factors to consider in the trade–security nexus of the African Continental Free Trade Area: A catalyst for establishing peace
ABSTRACT This study examines the geostrategic importance of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), discusses its potential trade impacts on African states, and considers whether it could support regional peace. Regional integration is crucial for achieving industrialisation, promoting tra...
Automating Terror: The Role and Impact of Telegram Bots in the Islamic State’s Online Ecosystem
In this article, we use network science to explore the topology of the Islamic State’s “terrorist bot” network on the online social media platform Telegram, empirically identifying its connections to the Islamic State supporter-run groups and channels that operate across the platform, with whi...
Whose (in)security? Gender, race and coloniality in European security policies: Introduction to the Special Issue
Building on feminist and postcolonial theoretical approaches across International Relations (IR) and security studies, this Special Issue advances an emerging research agenda within EU studies by shedding light on the gendered and racialised logics of EU security and their links to colonial his...
“Securing the state” in post-2011 Tunisia: performativity of the authoritarian neoliberal state
In this article, I adopt the theoretical lens of authoritarian neoliberalism coupled with the concept of performativity to analyse posttransition Tunisian counterterror politics. In doing so, I argue that “securing the state” from discursively constructed “threats” such as terrorism, politic...
Intersectionality and rehabilitation: how gendered, racial and religious assumptions structure the rehabilitation and reintegration of women returnees
Women associated with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) are returning to their home countries from camps in northern Syria and require prosecution, rehabilitation and reintegration. Yet, as feminist security and terrorism scholars have demonstrated, rehabilitation and reintegration programm...
The Post-Imperial Politics of Security and Depoliticisation: Comparing Discourses and Practices of Ordering Across Central Asia
In this essay, we build on earlier discussions on the insufficiency of labels such as ‘post-Soviet’ and ‘postcolonial’ for Central Asian regimes and propose a consideration of their particular post-imperial character. We illustrate the usefulness of this lens through an analysis of securi...
Unpacking the varying strategic logics of total defence
What is the strategic logic of so-called ‘total defence’? At first glance, total defence may appear as one coherent strategic concept. Indeed, it was predominantly small, non-aligned states that pursued total defence during the Cold War. In this article, however, we demonstrate that depending...
Developing best practices “against terrorists who protest”: Regional organizations as learning clubs for autocracies
Regional organizations have long addressed cross-border challenges like environmental degradation and terrorism. While much of the existing literature analyzes how democratic regional organizations support democracy among members and aspirants, a growing body of research examines how authoritarian c...
The “War on Terror” and Public Diplomacy during the Cold War: Israeli–Turkish Relations and the 1980 Military Coup
ABSTRACT What influence does the digital diplomacy of the post 9/11 world have on our understanding of counter-terrorism (CT) diplomacy during the Cold War? This article explores this question and the intersection between intelligence, counterterrorism diplomacy and the digital transformation long o...
The Whole Is Greater than the Sum of Its Parts: Risk and Protective Profiles for Vulnerability to Radicalization
This study examines how behavioral indicators co-occur as “risk profiles” across different domains relevant to risk assessment as theorized by a Risk Analysis Framework, and how these profiles impact upon vulnerability to radicalization. We unpack both the inter- and intra-domain relationsh...
Applying the study of religions in the security domain: knowledge, skills, and collaboration
Since the 1990s, scholars of religion on both sides of the Atlantic have been drawn into engagement with law enforce ment agencies and security policymakers and practitioners, particularly for their expertise on new religious movements and Islam. Whilst enabling researchers to contribute to real ...
Investigating the Influence of Islamic State’s Discourse in Jordan
Guided by the general investigation of the “discursive assault” launched by Islamic State (IS) in the Middle East and beyond, this paper examines the resonance of IS’ use of language in grassroots populations living in Jordan. Representing IS’ communication cam paign as a sender-message-r...
The Fragility Dilemma and Divergent Security Complexes in the Sahel
Despite an exponential increase in international resources devoted to the Sahel, the situation on the ground continues to deteriorate. This is largely due to the so-called “fragility dilemma”, faced by fragile states that are in critical need of external assistance, but have limited absorption c...
Experimenting with Threat: How Cyberterrorism Targeting Critical Infrastructure Influences Support for Surveillance Policies
Governments worldwide are racing to implement a new wave of intrusive digital surveillance policies, driven by the ominous threat of cyberterrorism. The U.K. leads the charge with some of the most expansive surveillance laws in the democratic world. But does exposure to cyberterrorism actually foste...
Relocating the veil: the everyday lives of young hijabi Britons under ideological culturalism
This article centres the testimonies of young hijabi Britons as social landscapes shift toward ideological culturalism. Exploring the idea that culture is the defining element of social life and that individuals are bound to closed cultural categories, it sets out a context of endemic cultural r...
Informal Countermessaging: The Potential and Perils of Informal Online Countermessaging
Online countermessaging—communication that seeks to disrupt the online content disseminated by extremist groups and individuals—is a core component of contemporary counterterrorism strategies. Countermessaging has been heavily criticized, not least on the grounds of effectiveness. Whereas curren...
Disrupting Daesh: Measuring Takedown of Online Terrorist Material and Its Impacts
This article contributes to public and policy debates on the value of social media disruption activity with respect to terrorist material. In particular, it explores aggressive account and content takedown, with the aim of accurately measuring this activity and its impacts. The major emphasis of the...
Generation three and a half peacekeeping: Understanding the evolutionary character of African-led Peace Support Operations
African-led Peace Support Operations (PSOs) were established to support the African peace and security architecture by developing integrated capacities for deployment in crises. However, since the deployment of the first African-led PSOs, there has also been the emergence of new types of Afri...
Prevent and post-16 education: the implications for Muslim women
The “Prevent Duty” requires that UK public sector bodies have a statutory responsibility to stop individuals from supporting terrorism or becoming terrorists, including within education settings. Despite existing research that highlights the experiences of Prevent for Muslim students, the topic ...
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