Police Programmes That Seek to Increase Community Connectedness for Reducing Violent Extremism Behaviour, Attitudes and Beliefs

By Lorraine Mazerolle, Elizabeth Eggins, Adrian Cherney, Lorelei Hine, Angela Higginson, Emma Belton

There is limited evidence of how police programmes to generate community connectedness affect violent extremist behaviours, attitudes and beliefs. Police programmes to generate community connectedness are assumed to help reduce risk factors that lead individuals to radicalize to violent extremism. There is no robust body of evaluation evidence to verify this claim. This lack of evidence is because programme funders have not sufficiently invested in impact evaluations of policing programmes that aim to counter violent extremism by promoting community connectedness.

What is this review about ? Community connectedness and efforts to engage communities may help to mitigate the risk of individuals radicalizing to violent extremism. Police, under some circumstances, can play a key role in programmes aimed at tackling violent extremism. This includes working with communities and other agencies to tackle social isolation, economic opportunity, and norms and beliefs that lead individuals and groups to radicalize and support extremist causes. This review looked at whether or not strategies involving police in the initiation, development or implementation of programmes aimed at community connectedness had an impact on reducing violent extremist beliefs and behaviours.

Campbell Systematic Reviews, Volume 16, Issue 3 September 2020