By Michael German and Emmanuel Mauleón

On April 27, 2019, a white supremacist armed with a high-powered rifle walked into a San Diego synagogue and shot four people, one fatally, before fleeing and finally surrendering to police. A letter the gunman allegedly posted online shortly before the shooting claimed credit for a previous arson attack on an Escondido mosque, spewed racist “white genocide” conspiracy theories, cited earlier white supremacist attacks against a synagogue in Pittsburgh and mosques in New Zealand, and urged like-minded white Christians to commit further acts of violence.

 Was this crime an act of terrorism, a hate crime, or just another homicide? Under current Justice Department policies, how far-right violence targeting people based on race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability gets categorized is often arbitrary. But it has significant consequences for how federal officials label these crimes in public statements, how they prioritize and track them, and whether they will investigate and prosecute them. As a result, the Justice Department doesn’t know how many people far-right militants attack each year in the United States, which leaves intelligence analysts and policy makers in the dark about the impact this violence inflicts on our society and how to best address it. More importantly, the failure to properly label and respond to far-right violence deprives victimized communities of basic human dignity and equal protection of the law.

New York: Brennan Center for Justice. 2019, 51pg

By Jillian Peterson, James Densley, Stasia Higgins

This mixed-methods study examines social media use among public mass shooters in the United States as an extension of a comprehensive database of 170 mass shooters from 1966 to 2021. Here, we report findings from a systematic content analysis of public data and detailed timelines that were constructed for 44 mass shooters’ social media habits and changes to those habits during the period of time leading up to their shooting. The paper also presents as a case study, a sentiment analysis, and term-linkage network for one perpetrator’s total 3,000 tweets. Several themes were found in the data—there were shooters who changed their posting habits and in some cases, stopped using social media entirely in the lead up to their crime; shooters who used hate speech and were “radicalized” to violence online; shooters with a demonstrable interest in violence, who referenced past mass shooters in their own communications; shooters who exhibited signs of mental illness and suicidality; shooters who were already known to authorities; and shooters who like those described above, actively posted while shooting, presumably to boost their own celebrity status. The findings from this study provide insight into commonalities among mass shooters in terms of their social media usage, which could lead to new pathways for prevention and intervention.

United States, Social Media + Society. 2023

By Michele St-Amant, David Jones, Michael King, & John McCoy

There have been significant changes in the three years since the Organization for the Prevention of Violence (OPV) published its first report about hate-motivated violence, extremism and terrorism in Alberta, Building Awareness, Seeking Solutions. The Covid-19 pandemic, protests against public health measures, tense elections in the United States, and the backlash to racial justice movements, among other events, have had broad social repercussions. Some of which have changed the composition and scale of the threat of extremism and terrorism – which has become more diffuse and comprised of a broader set of grievances and ideologies.

This report is organized using the nomenclature developed by the Government of Canada to categorize different forms of extremist ideologies. As such, the findings related to ideologically motivated violent extremism and religiously motivated violent extremism are summarized first.i Next, we summarize our findings about conspiracy theories and hate incidents, including crimes, within Alberta and across Canada.

Alberta: Organization for the Prevention of Violence, 2022. 115p.

By Brent L. Smith, David A. Snow, Kevin Fitzpatrick, Kelly R. Damphousse, Paxton Roberts, Anna Tan, Andy Brooks and Brent Klein

Research on terrorism prior to 2010 had been described as too descriptive and atheoretical. To partially address this deficiency, the current project is anchored theoretically and empirically in two of the most widely cited perspectives on social movements and the process of radicalization: role identity theory and framing theory (Snow and Machalek, 1983; Snow and McAdam, 2000; Snow, 2004; Stryker 1980). Drawing on these two overlapping perspectives, we contend that radicalization towards violence can be theorized as a process which entails a journey. Typically, this journey begins with a non- or less-radical identity and corresponding orientation, and moves toward a more radical identity and corresponding orientation…. Five types of identity work have been identified: (1) Engagement in group relevant demonstration acts or events, such as engaging in activities preparatory for the commission of violence; (2) arrangement and display of physical settings and props, such as flying or posting the confederate flag; (3) arrangement of appearance, such as engagement in cosmetic face work or body work; (4) selective association with other individuals and groups; and (5) identity talk, which involves not only the avowal and/or attribution of identities, but also talk relevant to framing. The two key framing concepts – diagnostic and prognostic framing – direct attention to the ways in which some issue or grievance is problematized and blame is attributed and to the call or plan for dealing with the problem.

Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2016. 24p.

By Mitchell D. Silber; Arvin Bhatt

This report instructs policymakers and law enforcement officials, both in Washington and throughout the Nation, regarding the threat of and countermeasures for U.S. residents/citizens becoming radical jihadists intent on committing violent attacks in the United States.

In order to test whether the same framework for understanding the radicalization of individuals into jihadists abroad applies within the United States, the authors of this paper analyzed three post-9/11 U.S. "homegrown" terrorism cases and two cases based in New York City. The study found that although Al-Qaeda and its jihadist radicalism have provided the inspiration and ideology for some terrorist activity of U.S. residents, the direct command and control of these "homegrown" terrorists by al-Qaeda has been the exception. Regardless of where and with whom radicalization occurs, this study identified four stages of the radicalization process, each with its distinct set of indicators. The four stages are pre-radicalization, self-identification, indoctrination, and "jihadization." In the pre-radicalization stage, the majority of the individuals who become radicalized have lived ordinary lives without any criminal history. Self-identification is the phase in which individuals, influenced by both internal and external factors, begin to explore Salafi Islam, which gradually draws them away from their old identity as they bond with like-minded individuals. This reinforces their new identity as a follower of Salafi Islam. Indoctrination is the phase in which an individual progressively intensifies his/her beliefs. "Jihadization" is the phase in which members of a cell commit to their primary duty to be "holy warriors" against all viewed as enemies of Salafi Islam. Considering the sequencing of these behaviors and the need to identify those entering this process at the earliest possible stage, this makes intelligence the critical tool in thwarting an attack or preventing the planning of attacks.

New York: New York City Police Department, 2007. 90p.

By Alex P. Schmid

In this Research Paper, Research Fellow Dr. Alex P. Schmid seeks to clarify some conceptual issues that tend to obscure the debate about how best to counter violent extremism. The main focus of this Research Paper is on obtaining a clearer understanding of what “Islamist extremism” entails in the context of the ongoing debate on allegedly “acceptable” non-violent extremists and “unacceptable” violent extremists. The author discusses a number of conceptualisations of religious extremism in the context of liberal democracies and also distinguishes, inter alia, between merely “not (yet) violent” militancy and principled non-violent political activism in the Gandhian tradition. The author argues that the distinction between “non-violent extremism” and “violent extremism” is not a valid one. The paper provides a set of twenty indicators of extremism that can be used as an instrument for monitoring extremist statements and actions, with an eye to challenging and countering such non-democratic manifestations.

The Hague: The International Centre for Counter-Terrorism, 2014. 31p.

By Sam Jackson

Over the past two years, and in the wake of deadly attacks in Charlottesville and Pittsburgh, attention paid to right-wing extremism in the United States has grown. Most of this attention focuses on racist extremism, overlooking other forms of right-wing extremism. This article presents a schema of three main forms of right-wing extremism in the United States in order to more clearly understand the landscape: racist extremism, nativist extremism, and anti-government extremism. Additionally, it describes the two primary subcategories of anti-government extremism: the patriot/militia movement and sovereign citizens. Finally, it discusses whether this schema can be applied to right-wing extremism in non-U.S. contexts.

The Hague: International Centre for Counter-Terrorism, 2019. 26p.

By Minerva Nasser-Eddine, Bridget Garnham, Katerina Agostino and Gilbert Caluya

This report consists of a literature review and analysis of the existing research concerning ‘countering violent extremism’. This multifaceted report demonstrates the complexity of understanding Violent Extremism and best strategies to Countering Violent Extremism. This has been undertaken with the broader analysis of radicalisation and social cohesion theories, models and government policies and how they may impact on or contribute to best practice and policy in countering violent extremism.

Edinburgh, South Australia: Counter Terrorism and Security Technology Centre DSTO Defence Science and Technology Organisation, 2011. 105p.

Edited by Mark Maguire, Catarina Frois, and Nils Zurawski.

Perspectives from the Frontline of Policing, Counter-terrorism and Border Control. Anthropology is a discipline based upon in-depth ethnographic works that deal with wider theoretical issues in the context of particular, local conditions – to paraphrase an important volume from the series: large issues explored in small places. This series has a particular mission: to publish work that moves away from an old-style descriptive ethnography that is strongly area-studies oriented, and offer genuine theoretical arguments that are of interest to a much wider readership, but which are nevertheless located and grounded in solid ethnographic research. If anthropology is to argue itself a place in the contemporary intellectual world, then it must surely be through such research. We start from the question: ‘What can this ethnographic material tell us about the bigger theoretical issues that concern the social sciences?’ rather than ‘What can these theoretical ideas tell us about the ethnographic context?’ Put this way round, such work becomes about large issues, set in a (relatively) small place, rather than detailed description of a small place for its own sake. As Clifford Geertz once said, ‘Anthropologists don’t study villages; they study in villages.

London: Pluto Press, 2014. 225p.