Rethinking Religion and Radicalization: Terrorism and Violence Twenty Years After 9/11 - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1350350079 ISBN 13: 9781350350076

Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic, 2025

Synopsis

With contributions from a range of regions and disciplines, this open access volume offers theoretically compelling and empirically rich new insights on the relationship between religion and violent extremism.

The role of religion and religiosity in processes of radicalisation to violence has been at the forefront of debates around terrorism and extremism for decades. The events of 9/11 gave new impetus to these debates, cementing assumptions about the role of Islam as the key driver for religiously inspired violent radicalisation, and defining the way in which radicalisation to violence is understood. The years since 9/11 have seen a striking diversification in the terrorist and violent extremist landscape, yet the treatment of how religious beliefs, concepts and histories are entangled with established and emergent violent ideologies and social movements has changed far less. By looking beyond Islamist-inspired or attributed terrorism, this volume explores how violent extremists instrumentalise religion and religiosity in unexpected ways, from Orthodox Christianity and Hindutva to 'conspirituality', far-right extremism, and single-issue social movements.

The eBook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com

About this title

About the Authors

Michele Grossman is Research Chair in Diversity and Community Resilience at the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation at Deakin University in Australia, where she is also Director of the Centre for Inclusive and Resilient Societies. Widely published as a terrorism studies scholar, Michele's research focuses on engaging communities in countering violent extremism. She is the founder and inaugural convenor of the AVERT (Addressing Violent Extremism and Radicalisation to Terrorism) Research Network; Associate Editor of the journal Terrorism and
Political Violence; Visiting Professor at University of Huddersfield (UK); and a past Robert Schuman (Distinguished Scholar) Fellow at European University Institute in Florence (2018–22) in her role as a chief investigator and steering committee member on the Horizon 2020 GREASE project. Michele was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the King's Birthday Honours List 2023 for significant service to tertiary education through research.

H. A. Hellyer is Senior Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (UK), and Middle East programme scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (USA). His work in geopolitics, security studies and belief centres particularly on MENA, Europe, and Southeast Asia. He was elected as Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Royal Society of Arts in recognition of his scholarship, which includes seven books in his subject areas. A member of the international steering committee for the Horizon 2020 GREASE project, which produced this volume, he has held positions at Harvard University, Cambridge University, the Brookings Institution and the American University in Cairo.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Publication date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1350350079
• ISBN 13: 9781350350076
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 312
• Editor: Grossman Michele, Hellyer H.A.