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

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

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.