Global Extremes: Breaking the spiral of violent radicalisation

This page is devoted to critically examining the dynamics behind religiously inspired violent radicalisation and far-right extremism. It explores options for addressing these problems and building more resilient communities and societies.

The world is experiencing an alarming trend towards polarisation in public debates as well as a surge of violent extremism in different ideological milieus. While violent radicalisation is often religion-focused, confessional divides are also channeling anger and frustration resulting from economic insecurity, social marginalisation, feelings of being left behind, and distrust towards mainstream elites. There is growing concern that digitally amplified hate speech is generating a polarisation spiral that will be difficult to break.

The driving forces behind GLOBAL EXTREMES are the international research projects GREASE and BRaVE. Funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research programme, the projects have two principal aims: first, to deepen our knowledge of diversity, radicalisation and polarisation; and second, to explore ways of making societies more resilient in coping with these challenges. While GREASE focuses on the religious dimension in these challenges (looking at 23 countries in Europe, the MENA region, Asia and Asia-Pacific), BRaVE is examining polarisation more broadly, including the phenomenon of right-wing extremism.

A large share of the content in GLOBAL EXTREMES is being produced by the scholars and stakeholders in the GREASE and BRaVE research projects. More related content – including detailed scholarly reports – are available on the projects’ websites.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under the GREASE project (grant no. 770640) and the BRaVE project (grant no. 822189).

The opinions expressed in these blog posts are the sole responsibility of the authors. The European Union is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information or opinions contained herein.