Resumen de Overlooked and underrated? The role of youth and women in preventing violent extremism
Violent radicalisation is a process of socialisation in which both youth and women are drawn to violent action through their peers:
youngsters mostly decide to join a violent extremist group through friends while most female recruiters initiate a bond with their recruit through a virtual sisterhood.
Youngsters are overrepresented amongst the perpetrators of terrorist attacks carried out in Europe in the past two decades.
Almost one out of five plots carried out in Europe between 2014 and 2017 (142 plots in total) featured women. A similar proportion of women (20%) were arrested in the EU in 2018 on suspicion of terrorism-related offences.
Preventing violent extremism (PVE) strategies tend to consider youngsters and women as victims of violent extremism, and thus as mere beneficiaries of PVE policies. However, there is an urgent need to truly involve youth and women in PVE efforts as they better understand their peer’s grievances.
