Preventing Radicalization and Violent Extremism

This EU project is a three-year assessment and review program of transnational civil society initiatives aiming to counter radicalization and violent extremism (CVE). Shawn Powers and Abbas Barzegar, in coordination with the British Council and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (UK), will organize and implement a series of high-level, transatlantic, civil society-led dialogues and field events that, collectively, capture a ‘state of the field snapshot’ of global trajectories in explicit and implicit CVE work. These dialogues are informed by three complementary subjects that, collectively, assess empirically-driven programs addressing CVE in the short, medium and long-terms: (A) Ideologies; (B) Muslim NGOs; and (C) Youth Engagement and Mobilization.

Each theme encompasses a year-long review, dialogue and publication process. Specifically, within each theme, two high-level dialogues featuring prominent US and EU CSO thought leaders will be held (six high-level dialogues total). The first dialogue will feature civil society actors and provide a robust mapping and assessment of best practices in the field, based on presentations and in-depth interviews with civil society actors. This initial review will be drafted, shared, revised, and then discussed during the second dialogue, which will reconvene highlighted civil society organizations along with policymakers from the US, EU and other relevant organizations. In addition to sharing the findings and discussing best practices, the second dialogue will feature a panel of policymakers and CSO practitioners, and present an overview of the primary challenges they collectively face operating in a given space. Combining the map and best practices of the civil society sector with the challenges that policymakers face will make clear the opportunities for greater public- private partnership and synchronization of efforts moving forward.

The collective findings from both dialogues, interviews with participants and the public panels will inform final publications outlining key findings, best practices, shared challenges and policy recommendations for each of the year-long studies. A knowledge sharing platform will connect each of the subjects, helping the participants to remain connected throughout and beyond the project, and offering access to all publications, presentations, routine case studies, and reviews for public circulation.