A collection of news articles, reports, and publications available in the public domain, which are relevant to UK policing.
Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Service (HMICFRS) have published a report detailing the findings of an inspection examining the role of the police in the Prevent programme, a strand of the Governments CONTEST strategy, including the capability to respond terrorist threats.
The report contains seven recommendations none of which are directed at forces, however, they may have an impact on forces at a later date.
The report can be read in full here.
Source: HMICFRS
The Ministry of Justice has announced an independent review of the effectiveness of the statutory Multi-agency public protection arrangements (MAPPA). The terms of reference state that the review will make recommendations to strengthen the operation of the entire MAPPA framework for managing TACT and TACT-related offenders.
The review will apply to England and Wales and will be submitted to the Home Secretary and the Justice Secretary.
Source: Gov.uk
Psychologist Christopher Dean from the Healthy Identity Intervention (HII) scheme reported that it can never be certain that terror offenders have been ‘cured’. The aim of the HII is to make individuals less willing to commit offences on behalf of extremist groups or ideology. The article refers to Usman Khan who was shot by the police following the stabbing of two individuals on 29 November 2019 at London Bridge. Khan participated in the rehabilitation programme and appeared to be making progress before his release from prison. At the time of writing, HII scheme cannot be tested for its effectiveness, but it has been assessed to be based on the best-available evidence about challenging extremist mindsets.
Source: BBC
Whilst speaking at the UN General Assembly in New York, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced funding to support research to develop industry-wide technology that will enable improved identification of violent videos online.
It is hoped that new technology will be able to identify online videos that currently avoid existing detection methods, thus limiting the length of time such videos are online. In order to do this, an algorithm will be created that can be used by any internet company to detect violent and harmful videos such as terrorist footage and prevent them from being shared online.
Source: GOV.UK
An article in the Metro featuring comments from Nick Lowles, founder of the charity Hope not Hate, has stated that in order to stop the growing threat of far-right extremism, politicians must stop using inflammatory language when talking about immigrants, Muslims and other minorities.
The comments come at the same time as a speech by Neil Basu who named far-right extremism the fastest growing terrorist threat. Mr Lowles noted that when politicians talk negatively, it normalises the rhetoric of the far-right.
In addition to discussing the language used by politicians, Mr Lowles also discussed the need to tackle homelessness and deprivation. He said that feelings of feelings of hopelessness and despair stemming from homelessness and deprivation often lead to extremism, as far-right groups often target feelings of alienation and despair.
Source: The Metro
The UK head of counter-terrorism Neil Basu, has stated that the fastest growing terror threat in the UK comes from the far-right. Whilst he noted that the greatest threat came from jihadists, Mr Basu stated that the far-right terrorist caseload had increased by 4% in the last two years, whereas the Islamist threat had remained largely similar, though at a much higher level.
Mr Basu discussed the police approach to right-wing threats saying that some of the criticism around the police not always looking at white supremacist right-wing violence as terrorism in the past was justified. However, he also praised the more recent work between MI5 and counter-terrorism police to tackle right-wing extremism.
Source: BBC News
In recent weeks a number of papers relating to extremism have been published. This post will summarise some of them.
Critiquing approaches to countering extremism and terrorism via Prevent – H Fenwick
This paper notes that the reliance on the Prevent Strategy has been criticised for creating stigmatisation of Muslims, damage to social cohesion and as representing a striking recent increase in securitisation in the UK. However, it also notes that Prevent’s role in encouraging critical thinking and pluralism has also received some support.
Exploring radicalisation and Extremism online – an experimental study – M Littler
The paper uses the data collected from a 1,700 respondent poll conducted by You-Gov on the evening of Tuesday 16th April 2019. The research sought to explore the relationship between exposure to online extremist content, and social and political attitudes including support for violence. The results did not match the hypothesis. No relationship between the phenomena was found. Suggestions for this include ineffective stimulus material, or the conditions of the research. Sources for the stimulus material included information from the EDL. Further analysis found little evidence for the availability for extremist content to impact or or shift social and political attitudes.
Extremism online – analysis of extremist material on social media – I Awan, H Sutch & P Carter
This paper examines the differences between general online discussion of extremism and discussion inspired by offline events through the analysis of tweets and YouTube comments. The study focused on two events: the Shamima Begum case and the New Zealand Christchurch terrorist attacks. The paper states that cyber-meditated crime such as online extremism is not comparable to conditions of offline crime. Extremists may take advantage of how the internet provides the potential for a greater audience (reach/impact) with the ability to remain anonymous. This can lead to deindividuation.
Embedding human rights in countering extremism: reflections from the field and proposals for change – K E Brown, F Londras, J White
This paper states that generally speaking seven domains of Counter Extremism (CE) activity can be identified:
The majority of the work in CE is carried out at the local and community level and is concerned with addressing extremist narratives and ideology. The challenges and risks with the existing approaches are political and philosophical, institutional and functional. The paper recommends re-framing CE towards human rights as both a process and an “end-state”. The paper then proposes a set of guidelines to achieve this, and the establishment of an independent evaluative review body.
This paper suggests that current policy has generated and continues to generate criticism from educators and faith groups. The paper highlights the issue that individual liberty barely features in the lists of values promoted in schools. Moreover, the paper highlights that the notion of ‘Britishness’ may be considered particularly divisive and problematic. It notes that schools tend towards other values frameworks that favour the promotion of values more universal and inclusive in nature.
The independent Commission for Countering Extremism has published several reports on the subject of countering extremism:
Modernising and Mainstreaming: The contemporary British far-right.
Research by HOPE not Hate. By analysing the rhetoric espoused at a series of major far-right events across 2018 and comparing it to societal polling it becomes evident that large parts of the contemporary far-right’s platform – namely anti-Muslim politics, co-option of the free speech debate and an anti-elite populism – have widespread public support.
National Action: links between the far right, extremism and terrorism.
Research bu the Centre for Hate Studies, University of Leicester. In 2016, National Action made history for being the first far-right group to be proscribed in the UK. Investigating the group’s history, ideology and activities, this article considers how its commitment to a ‘pure’ form of nationalism helped it to transition from non-violent to violent extremism.
Overview of the far-right.
Research by the Centre for Research and Evidence on Security Threats, Lancaster University. The paper provides an overview of the far-right in the UK by covering the various ideological strains that inhabit the far-right space as well as some of their different aims and objectives. The paper also sets out some of the available indicators of the scale of far-right support in the UK.
Talking our way out of conflict: critical reflections on ‘mediated dialogue’ as a tool for secondary level Countering Violent Extremism (CVE).
Research by University of Manchester and Tim Parry Jonathan Ball Peace Foundation. The paper reflects on a researcher-practitioner collaboration in conducting a mediated dialogue between young people from an ‘Islamist’ milieu and from an ‘extreme right’ milieu. It situates the intervention in the literature on the effectiveness of intergroup contact in reducing prejudice and on social cohesion and suggests how it might be developed for use in community led counter extremism practice.
Violent extremism tactics and the ideology of the secretarian far left.
Research by King’s College London, the University of Bristol and Goldsmiths University of London into British far-left secretarian groups. These groups were defined as small, ideologically homogeneous groups which reject parliamentary politics as a route to socialism and instead aspire to become ‘vanguard parties’. There was a strong correlation between the belief system disseminated by the secretarian far left – termed as ‘revolutionary workerism’ – and sympathy with violent extremism tactics. There was also a positive relationship between ‘anti-imperialist’ geopolitical ideology and sympathy for violent extremism, in that those that saw the US and the UK as a greater threat to world peace than NATO strategic adversaries such as North Korea.
Extremism in England and Wales: Statistical summary of responses.
The Commission for Countering Extremism carried out a consultation between November 2018 and January 2019 that aimed to improve understanding of extremism and its impact on individuals, communities and wider society. The Commission was interested in two cross-cutting issues, the interaction between online and offline spaces, as well as the drivers of extremism. The call for evidence asked for information on 5 themes:
The Global Risks Report 2019 is published against a backdrop of worrying geopolitical and geo-economic tensions. If unresolved, these tensions will hinder the world’s ability to deal with a growing range of collective challenges, from the mounting evidence of environmental degradation to the increasing disruptions of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
The report presents the results of our latest Global Risks Perception Survey, in which nearly 1,000 decision-makers from the public sector, private sector, academia and civil society assess the risks facing the world. Nine out of 10 respondents expect worsening economic and political confrontations between major powers this year. Over a ten-year horizon, extreme weather and climate-change policy failures are seen as the gravest threats.
This year’s report includes another series of “what-if” Future Shocks that examine quantum computing, weather manipulation, monetary populism, emotionally responsive artificial intelligence and other potential risks. The theme of emotions is also addressed in a chapter on the human causes and effects of global risks; the chapter calls for greater action around rising levels of psychological strain across the world
Source: World Economic Forum
The charity Campaign Against Criminalising Communities (Campacc) has warned that new counter-terrorism measures which criminalise all individuals who go to certain areas overseas could be an abuse of civil liberties.
Campacc argues that people often travel to such areas for a number of reasons such as visiting family, humanitarian work, or to fight against terrorism. However, the Home Office has responded by saying that exceptions to the rules can be made in reasonable circumstances, such as those listed above. Moreover, it stated the necessity to have such legislation in place to limit the numbers of people being exploited by terrorist groups, and to protect the public.
Source: Rights Info
Police Horizon Scanning 