Full Description
This edited collection offers a comprehensive, multidisciplinary examination of how the EU has addressed violent radicalization as a key precursor to terrorism.
Set against the backdrop of the post-9/11 security landscape and the evolving threats of jihadist, far-right, online, and lone-actor extremism, the volume analyzes the gradual shift from state-centered counterterrorism to preventive and cooperative frameworks. The book combines international, legal, and policy analyses with local and individual-level perspectives. The first part explores EU-level policies, legal competences, and cooperation mechanisms developed to prevent violent radicalization, highlighting both achievements and structural limitations. Chapters examine the evolution of EU prevention strategies, the adequacy of EU law to address emerging trends, the development of the European Security Union, and the risks of counterproductive securitization through concepts such as the "extremism trap." The second part focuses on emerging threats and practical prevention experiences, emphasizing gaps in existing responses. It addresses underexplored phenomena, such as incel ideology, far-right digital activism, and lone-actor terrorism, as well as the role of mental health, education, and identity dynamics in radicalization processes. The chapters in this second part include empirical studies and program evaluations largely drawn from European and Spanish contexts.
This book will be of interest to academics, researchers and advanced students in the fields of terrorism and counterterrorism studies, radicalization, the prevention of violent extremism, international law, European politics, criminology, and security studies more broadly.
Contents
Introduction, Roberto M. Lobato and Inmaculada Marrero 1. Radicalization: The history of a contested concept, Roberto M. Lobato Part I: Policy and jurisdiction in the prevention of violent radicalization in European Union Member States 2. The prevention of violent radicalization in the European Union, Inmaculada Marrero 3. The inadequacy of EU law to prevent current (violent) radicalization trends, Lucas J. Ruiz Díaz 4. The creation of a new counterterrorism environment in the EU: The Security Union, José Luis de Castro Ruano 5. The "extremism trap:" A converging threat and the imperative for holistic prevention, Daniel F. Pérez García 6. EU strategies for preventing radicalization in the digital age, Paula Cano-Cruz 7. Narrative power and cognitive warfare: Preventing radicalization and violent extremism through strategic communications, Javier Ruipérez and Antonio Sánchez 8. National security and terrorism: Its influence on the tightening of European prison systems, Salvador Berdún Carrión Part II: New threats and prevention experiences in addressing the challenge of violent radicalization 9. Religious culture and functional relationships between the need for cognitive closure and activism and radicalism intentions, Humberto M. Trujillo, Miguel Á. Cano, and Manuel Moyano 10. Attitudes, beliefs, and adaptation trajectories in young Spaniards of Maghrebi origin: An exploratory study, Irene González Jiménez, Manuel Moyano, Miguel Ángel Maldonado Herves, and Humberto M. Trujillo 11. The incel threat: Analysis through the "Coercion, Manipulation, Persuasion framework (CMPF)", José Luis Salido-Medina 12. From policy to platform: How Italian far-right extremists movements harness migration narratives and digital spaces, Karen Latricia Hough, Chiara di Stasio, and Fabiana Ciccarella 13. Lone actors: The significance of mental health in radicalization and terrorism process, Eva M. Jiménez González 14. Fit for purpose? Teaching and learning resources to prevent violent extremism: A realist review, Julia Gracia Ordóñez 15. Fénix Andalucía: A program to prevent violent extremism, Roberto M. Lobato
