Review Essay: Twenty Important Journal Articles on Radicalisation to, and De-Radicalisation from, Terrorism

Abstract

Keeping up-to-date with new research on terrorism can be challenging for both academic and non-academic researchers, with a multitude of books, articles and reports of varying degrees of quality being produced continuously. Andrew Silke noted that the publication of books on terrorism nearly jumped tenfold after 9/11, from 150 titles in 2000 to 1108 the following year, and 1767 in 2002 [1]. If one searches for books on terrorism with www.amazon.com one decade later, one gets over 30,000 results and the sub-genre ‘radicalisation’ already produces in excess of 300 books. Research on radicalisation took off in 2004 in response to the blowback from the American intervention in Iraq the year before. The London bombings in 2005 generated further interest in the phenomenon of “homegrown terrorism”, where apparently self-starting cells of radicalising individuals mobilized against their host countries with little or no material support from foreign terrorist entities. This has created a whole new field of empirical inquiry.