Debate: Research on Islam, Muslims and Radicalization
Professor Thijl Sunier delivered his inaugural lecture last Friday at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Before a very interesting seminar was organized with short contributions from Annelies Moors, Ruba Salih, Stefano Allievi, Nadia Fadil, Edien Bartels and others (including myself). Sunier published a short piece in the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad in which he stated (my translation):
In the last ten years policies [on migrants] have focused on crime- and radicalization prevention, security and more control over Muslims. Radicalization among young Muslims, confrontations between inhabitants of particular areas and several other issues are primarily seen as problems of integration. European states aim to pacify Islam and adjust it to national circumstances. This ‘domestication of Islam’ has become a priority of policy in almost all European countries.
No matter how understandable this may be from a policy perspective, researchers should, according to Sunier, not join this caravan but develop their own research agenda. According to Sunier this does not happen often enough for several reasons and the result is that the criterium of societal and/or policy relevance has directed most research on Muslims. This produces a one-sided images of Muslims and reduces them to categories of policy neglecting religiosity and religious practices among Muslims. In particular research on religiostiy suffers from a narrow focus on radicalization and problems of adjustment, Sunier claims.
Jean Tillie, chair of Electoral Politics, at the University of Amsterdam has responded to Sunier’s article. Tillie has done research on radicalization among Muslim youth in Amsterdam. Tillie regrets that Sunier uses radicalization researchers in order to make his point and does not agree with Suniers claim that these researchers (my translation):
Follow the Dutch state and do not develop their own research agenda. They suffer from narrowmindedness because they completely rely on the policy agenda of local and national authorities.
According to Tillie Sunier’s criticism is a severe accusation because it implies that radicalism research is not independent; a very strong principle that needs to be uphold in all scientific research. Sunier does not substantiate his claim according to Tillie; the sole fact that those researchers do research for the local and national authorities is enough to question the independency of their research. Tillie states that research on political integration and the workings of a multicultural democracy is important. Radicalization research for him is part of that broader research agenda on migration and democracy driven by the scientific, in particular of political studies, community. Tillie also states that a lot has happened with regard to ‘Muslimradicalism and extremism’ and that a large part of the Dutch population is very worried about political integration, albeit unjustified. Radicalization research therefore has a major societal relevance. Moreover research on radicalism among Muslims is also research on ‘ordinary Muslims’. Tillie claims that also Sunier’s colleagues do research in close cooperation with local and national authorities which doesn’t say anything about the whether it is independent or not and that Sunier should not present his research agenda dependent on those of other Islam researchers.
In turn, Thijl Sunier has responded to Tillie’s criticism on the NRC Expert Debates pages. Sunier who states Tillie did not read his article very well explains that research on Islam in Europe is more and more focused on issues of integration and security. The question what are relevant research questions should not be determined only by the state but also by scientific debate; the latter however is not happening enough. Sunier states that integration research has become its own industry with it is own basis assumptions and their own pet subjects. An issue that, according to Sunier, has been raised before in particular by IMES, the institute of which Tillie is chair. Sunier’s point is not, he tries to explain, that such researchers are not independent, but that the close relationship between integration research and the state means that particular questions are not looked into. The second point Sunier makes in his response is that research on Islam in Europe is characterized by a remarkable paradox. While on the one hand in public debates Islam is used as an explanation for a wide array on social issues, research on the development of religious practices and shapes they take is lacking. He uses an example brought to the fore by Tillie to explain his point. Tillie does research on the voting behaviour of Muslims, the degree to which Muslims inscribe themselves into democratic values and norms and the degree to which political integration fails and radicalism and extremism lure. Those questions, no matter how important, have two questionable assumptions: first of all the idea that Muslims are migrants. These are however different categories, often mixed in public and political debates but we should get rid off these mix ups. Second, there appears to be something like voting behaviour of Muslims which links religiosity to voting. This, according to Sunier, has nothing to do with Islam but takes Islam for grented. Thirdly Sunier tries to refute the argument of Tillie that Sunier discards existing research. Sunier replies that integration research is too much about the question if Muslims fit in ‘our’ national society and that research needs to be done on other areas and themes as well.
Looking at media theory explaing how and why particular issues become important and salient I think makes clear what the themes are Sunier refers to:
Agenda-setting: Who decides the agenda of scientific research and what are the consequences?
Framing: How are Islam and Muslims framed and what is the role of researchers? What are the political and ethical assumptions?
Priming: How is attention drawn to particular issues and what is left out?
Salience transfer: Which particular issues are important for people and why?
I agree with Sunier’s plea for a new turn in research on Islam in Europe and Tillie’s response to Sunier is well taken but besides the point I think. Researchers have to be aware of societal problems and take them up in their programs. As such research on crime, radicalization, integration is not by definition a problem but it becomes a problem when most of that research is initiated by the state and because of problems the state perceives (no matter how important). Sunier is certainly not the first who takes up the issue. I did it before in my Radicalization Series, Part II, where I refer to publications by Gunning and others where I try to take up the theme of critical radicalization studies:C L O S E R » Blog Archive » Radicalization Series Part II – What is it? A plea for critical radicalization studies
We propose therefore a slightly changed and more precise definition of radicalization as
a change in one or more of the components of a group’s identity and/or ideology and/or a change in the strategies and tactics employed or advocated by the group such that the total of the change or changes brings the group into a condition of lesser congruence with the prevailing social arrangements, values and means which are presented as legitimate by the institutions and elites concerned with maintaining these social arrangements and values.De Koning & Meijer, forthcoming.
Instead of recognizing wider society and its institutions, radicalization involves a turn away from wider society into an exclusive in-group membership of a group with an anti-systemic ideology and/or tactics (see also Beach 1977: 313). This also means however that we should not only take into account the intra-movement developments but also wider society and ask ourselves why do particular institutions and elites consider and label particular individuals, social categories or social movements as ‘radical’, how does the process of labelling occur and what are the consequences? Neglecting the latter will, I think, inevitably mean that counter-radicalization policies, or even radicalization research, is state-centric and problem-oriented (with its focus on short-term imminent threats that take the state’s framing as self-evident – not very remarkable for policies of course) and moreover reducing issues of poverty, islamophobia, religionization and religion-based activism, lack of political influence into a matter of (the threat of) violence and/or a dangerous lack of cultural integration and social cohesion (or short; deviance). The fact that global inequalities and ucertainties, imperialism and (Western) interventionism in for example Iraq and Afghanistan (or the lack thereof in for example Chechnya) also play a role and provide fertile ground for militant oppositional ideologies and politics, is obscured in this way. In that sense labelling an individual, social category or movement as ‘radical’ is a political strategy that serves to protect particular interests.
I think with regard to radicalization research, Sunier’s call not only relevant but urgent. Looking into several studies no matter how important and well done, the overall result is poor because it hardly takes up the wider issues mentioned above nor does it link up to international research and debates. Taking into account right wing radicalism as well, the overall picture becomes even more bleak.
Radicalization studies can learn from critical terrorism studies:
C L O S E R » Blog Archive » Radicalization Series Part II – What is it? A plea for critical radicalization studies
an acute sensitivity to the politics of labelling and the acceptance of the fundamental ontological insecurity of the ‘terrorism’ label and thus extreme care in its use during research; a commitment to inter-disciplinarity and a willingness to engage with research from disciplines outside of international relations (there is some excellent terrorism research from anthropology, for example); a commitment to transparency regarding the values and political standpoints of researchers, particularly as they relate to the geo-political interests and values of the states they work in; a willingness by researchers to expand the focus of their research to include topics such as the use of terrorism by states, gender dimensions of terrorism, ethical-normative analysis of counter-terrorism, and the discursive foundations which make ‘terrorism studies’ possible in the first place; adherence to a set of responsible research ethics which take account of the various users of terrorism research, including the ‘suspect communities’ from which terrorists often emerge and the populations who bear the brunt of counter-terrorism policies; a commitment to taking the subjectivity of both the researcher and the researched seriously, particularly in terms of being willing to ‘talk to terrorists’; and a commitment to normative values and a broadly defined notion of emancipation. These commitments go beyond simply the call to engage in more rigorous and self-reflective research. In their normative dimensions in particular, these kinds of commitments amount to an orientation that shares many of the same attitudes and approaches as the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory and the Welsh School of Critical Security Studies.
The call for the establishment of a new, more reflexive ‘critical’ terrorism studies (CTS) is a self-conscious and deliberate attempt to try and overcome some of the problems that have been noted about the broader field of terrorism studies, and to attract scholars who study terrorism but are uncomfortable associating with a field that has historically been closely aligned with the state. The initial aim of CTS advocates has been to map out a new ‘critical’ set of approaches to the study of political terrorism, and to generate a new, broader research agenda.
In short, what I have stated at Sunier’s seminar: The state’s policies, the politics of labelling and the ‘extremism of the center’ should therefore be as much part of radicalization research. Lacking in much of the analyses is a critical reflection on the role of the state and its institutions, the ethical-normative aspects and discursive foundations of counter-radicalization policies, and not to forget what is the significance of mere existence of radicalization studies and (more in particular) its focus on Muslims. Why do states and their institutions label particular individuals, groups and movements as radical and what are the consequences in terms of rights, policies and the position and daily lives of the targeted groups? Several of the current studies (and the one by Tillie is an example) do touch upon these issues but we need a more thorough approach.
Related to that is a second point that Sunier refers to mostly. Why is it that a counter-radicalization policy and radicalization studies emerge after 9/11 and the murder of Theo van Gogh but not after the violent actions of Moluccans in the 1970s or right wing militants in the 1980s or 1990s or left wing militants? Or why is it that much studies into crime pertain to migrants and/or Moroccan-Dutch youth? These fields are important fields of research, but they are related to what the Dutch state perceives as societal problems. It can maintain such a stance because other groups (native youth and crime) remain neglected. As such these studies, no matter how well carried out, serve to put the blame for all kind of societal problems on migrant youth or Muslim youth and to uphold the image of Dutch native youth as not so problematic. Both are one sided, both are false. As Fadil stated during the seminar, we as researchers have to be very carefull not just to follow, re-produce and sustain hegemonic ideas about ‘the Other’ and as such contributing to the othering of Muslims as a dangerous homogeneous and easy recognizable category. Research (and that is also the reason for my plea for critical radicalization studies) needs to question those hegemonic ideas and seemingly self-evident facts. Research on integration of Muslims not only reinforces the idea that something is problematic with integration of Muslims but, as Sunier points out, takes religiosity of Muslims as self evident. Islam and Muslim identity do not explain anything, they have to be explained as I have stated in my PhD.
Basically what Sunier refers to and I have tried to explain as well, is that knowledge has a history and a societal context. Knowledge that is produced is not just there and free of political influence because scientific work is free, true, proven and so on. We should be critical on how choices are made, how particular knowledge becomes dominant and how scientific knowledge is embedded in power relations and moreover is itself a product of power as Maximilian Forte tells us in an essay on Zero Anthropology (quoting among others Bourdieu). There is no escaping here, I’m as much part of the game and I have and do submit to the rules of the game as much as any other. What we need is a critical and reflexive approach towards state, society and ourselves and as such Sunier’s article (and for that matter his entire inaugural lecture) serves as a relevant and important reminder.
