Chapiter 1 | For a Comparative, Anthropological and Contextualised Approach to Radicalization

In recent years, radicaliation resulting in violent extremism has increased considerably. In both East and West, it has become a social phenomenon that states have to deal with.

While it is difficult to understand the mechanisms of radicalisation and to act accordingly, the development of public policies aimed at curbing this phenomenon and the way in which the terrorist threat is managed demonstrate the extent to which Western states no longer consider radicalisation as an exceptional phenomenon but rather as a long-term social phenomenon.

Acting on people undergoing radicalisation implies understanding the problem and identifying the complexity of the process. Through this comparative study, the group of researchers tries to understand what this notion of “radicalisation” encompasses and demonstrates how important it is to accept plural definitions while avoiding the trap of culturalism, which too often tends to associate the phenomenon exclusively with the Muslim world.

By questioning exclusion, loss of reference points or lack of recognition, the study proposes an anthropological reading grid that provides keys to understand violent radicalisation. It also questions the role played by digital tools in the radicalisation process and highlights its limits, recalling that they are not the only “places” of radicalisation.

The study also underlines the importance of the “family” in radicalisation processes. The latter can constitute a “place of radical socialisation” where violent visions or even violent actions may emerge, while family history and the memory traces it has left behind can lead the younger generations to embrace a so-called “more fighting” Islam than that of parents considered as “the silent losers of history”.