Through the analysis of thousands of Twitter accounts following prominent white nationalists and anarchists, ICSR’s latest report —Who Matters Online: Measuring influence, Evaluating Content and Countering Violent Extremism in Online Social Networks – offers new quantitative tools to identify highly engaged extremists in large social networks and to evaluate tactics…

Islamophobia has become the predominant form of racism in Europe today. It is proving to be potent and multifaceted, manifesting itself at state, popular and party political level. It represents a profoundly divisive force, not least because the “Muslim question” is a central component of the “war on terror” characterised…

In 1904 Sir Halford Mackinder, one of the fathers of geopolitics, put forward a ‘Heartland’ theory. Referring to the land mass of Central Asia as the ‘World Island’ he suggested the theory that: ‘Who rules Eastern Europe commands the Heartland; who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island; who rules the…

The paper presents a new theoretical framework to explain terrorism in an age of interconnectedness and globalization. It argues that we cannot truly understand terrorism inthe 21st century let alone counter it effectively unless we also understand the processesof communication that underpin it. In doing so the analysis raises questions…

Terrorists have been very successful in capturing the hearts and minds of the young people. They have done so by developing and disseminating a rhetoric that depicts their cause as both righteous and heroic against an adversary both evil and cruel. In this particular aspect, the terrorists have seized the…

Over the past seven years, jihadist activism has proliferated across multiple arenas, joined by an unprecedented number of individuals who have become foreign fighters. Much of the focus has understandably been on foreign fighter flows to Syria, but Libya has also seen a major influx. In fact, Libya now stands…

In adopting its resolution 2253 (2015), the Security Council expressed its determination to address the threat posed to international peace and security by Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as Da’esh) and associated individuals and groups. In paragraph 97 of that resolution, the Council requested that…

Some 5000 men, women and children have travelled from Europe to Syria and Iraq since 2012. An estimated 1500 of these foreign terrorist fighters (FTF) have returned so far. Some came back disillusioned, or traumatised by their war experiences, but others returned with malicious intentions. The first successful attack by…

This policy paper focuses on the specific factors and drivers of violent extremism in Macedonia, and aims to address the core roots of this issue by investigating the dynamics of its development and manifestation, with the hope of contributing toward building more resilient communities. The research period underwent several phases…

The ability of terrorists to cause mayhem, ruin lives and generate fear is something that we continue to witness in almost every part of the world and on an almost daily basis. More and more, however, we are beginning to observe that their ability to wreck damage goes far beyond…

This policy brief offers a practitioner’s perspective on how police-community relations eventually were moved from a place of distrust in certain sections of society to one of wider acceptance and partnership with improved long-term gains against violent extremism. It highlights how implementing a comprehensive community policing strategy can serve as…

This report is a comparative assessment of approaches to counter-radicalisation and de-radicalisation within four countries from the European Policy Planners’ Network (EPPN). It begins by setting out the definitions of key terms. It then provides an overview of the recent history of extremist violence and the approaches taken in tackling…