Preventing radicalisation through dialogue? Self-securitising narratives versus reflexive conflict dynamics

Abstract

Critical scholarship has warned against basing the prevention of terrorism on a concept of ‘radicalisation’ which implies that violence is inherent to Islam, but various approaches disagree on how to base the critique. This article argues for reading counter-radicalisation policies as narratives in order to identify their potential in terms of conflict escalation. Analysis of the official Danish counter-radicalisation action plan, reactions to it, and reactions to the reactions finds that criticism from the targets of the policy and engaged scholars based on attention to conflict dynamics has had some success in modifying policy from securitising to governing risk. Nevertheless, the potential for re-securitisation remains.