Julian Hayes, Senior Partner at Berris Law LLP, discusses radicalisation in this opinion and expert-driven piece, including comment on what governments must do to preserve stability
“Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man” opined the Greek philosopher, Aristotle, who recognised that young minds were the most malleable, to be manipulated and shaped into the characters society wanted them to be. For want of a better term ‘grooming’ of youngsters with a radical agenda would ultimately bring its advantages to those who wished to maintain and develop influence and power.
History is littered with the radicalisation of the young. The Spartans took their boys into the wilds and developed them into the formidable fighters for which they became renowned. One only has to consider how the Nazis would indoctrinate a child’s mind through education in their schools and membership of the Hitler Youth to see how those with malevolent intent could easily radicalise the uninformed mind.
With the end of the Cold War, the idea of state- sponsored terrorism appeared to be on the wane and restricted to small pockets of the disenfranchised, fighting localised wars in faraway places. Those in the developed world perhaps felt smugly immune from all of that, and so it would perhaps have remained so, but the internet changed the landscape.
The impact of the internet on radicalisation
Over the last 30 years, the internet has been used for the most malevolent causes. Virtually borderless, the ‘net’ allows access to untapped markets to instil the malign influence of radicalism, whether it’s religious or ideological – and it is being used to great effect, with the most vulnerable being the prime market.
A second Cold War has returned; however, it is no longer restricted to the two monoliths of communism and capitalism. Religion and nationalism are principally on the agenda and its orchestrators have discovered the internet as a tool that reaches across borders and accessing audiences that would have hitherto remained untouched and unaffected in years gone by.
Putin’s Russia, as have the Chinese, has long since been suspected of using the web to surreptitiously manipulate countries, whether it was the 2016 Trump presidential election or the Brexit referendum, all calculated to destabilise and weaken the countries targeted and the organisations of which they were members, NATO and the EU; ISIS used it to groom many impressionable youngsters to swell their ranks; the far right have used it to nurture and generate hate and violence, the recent riots and civil unrest throughout the UK testament to this.
It is a perilous time; Gaza has given cause to any disaffected Muslim youth to be nurtured for terrorist activities in countries sympathetic to Israel (principally Europe). The rise of the far right across Europe, where immigration has been an excuse for a fifth column of terrorist activities to manifest across the continent with the aid of the internet.
Radicalisation: Governments must act to preserve stability
It is not hyperbole to say that democracy, law and order and civil society are under threat, and Governments must act to preserve stability. But what has Europe been doing to counter these threats to its security?
Radicalisation has been seen as a significant issue for many years now. The UK recognised this, and specialist units were set up to attempt to identify and manage the disaffected, to make contact with those they perceived as vulnerable, and work with them. The National Crime Agency (NCA) was established to deal with the most serious criminal aspects, terrorism and organised crime, where radicalisation often lay.
In 1998, Europol was founded in recognition of the need to tackle international criminal organisations that operated cross-border with impunity. Europol sets up and coordinates cross-border operations against the most dangerous criminal groups and facilitates direct communication between investigators from various authorities.
In recognition of the growing and effective use by criminal and terrorist groups, the EU Internet Forum (EUIF) was set up by the European Commission in 2015 to tackle the misuse of the internet for terrorist purposes by reducing accessibility to dangerous content online and increasing the volume of alternative narratives. Enhancing the fight against child sexual abuse online, was added to EUIF’s remit in 2019. In 2022, its scope was further expanded to cover drug and human trafficking online.
2020 saw the launch of the EU Counter-Terrorism Agenda. Its stated aim is “to step up the fight against terrorism and violent extremism and boost the EU’s resilience to terrorist threats” by:
- Preventing attacks by addressing radicalisation;
- Identifying vulnerabilities and building capacity to anticipate threats;
- Promoting security by design and reducing vulnerabilities to protect cities and people;
- Stepping up operational support, prosecution and victims’ rights to better respond to attacks; and
- Stronger mandate for Europol.
It recognised weaknesses and “blind spots” within the EU where issues of jurisdiction often served as a problem in either a country taking responsibility or overstepping its remit. The agenda was to reset Europol’s role and place it as the focal point for all European countries to address these issues. Regulations were introduced to address the dissemination of terrorist content online. This authorised EU countries, when identifying terrorist content, to direct the online platforms to take it down within one hour of identification. However, Europe appears to have been behind the curve, the damage has been done; manipulation of the democratic process by dark agencies abroad has led to the fracturing and weakening of the EU with the UK’s departure.
One of the most significant concerns over Brexit was the loss of cooperation with the UK and its European neighbours. Fortunately, this uncertainty was ended when, in September 2021, an agreement was reached for the UK to continue its involvement with Europol. It would also continue its close relationship with law enforcement and criminal justice, similar to arrangements agreed with countries such as the U.S. and Canada.
Threats posed by terrorists and organised crime groups
It is clear that this continues to be a work in progress and that the threats posed by terrorists and organised crime groups remain as potent now as ever before. People smuggling continues, and terrorist groups exploit the internet to spread their extremist agendas, very often with support from rogue states. The trouble is that all these steps have been reactive rather than proactive.
This is a war where it could be said that the frailties of the EU has led to a slow, and at times, inadequate response to the war that is being fought where more needs to be done to anticipate where it maybe vulnerable to attack and take the initiative by taking the fight to those malign agents.
