Variance of Salafist radicalization processes

Salafist radicalization has long since become a hotly debated topic not only in society, but also in politics and science. At the latest when radicalization processes lead to violence, Salafism becomes relevant to security policy and society. But often the boundaries between the rejection of violence and the legitimation of violence are blurred. It is precisely this thin line that makes Salafist radicalization - as well as other forms of religious and political radicalization - per se a security problem.

The consequence is that both in politics and in society an increasingly narrow understanding of radicalization has established itself, which understands violence as the logical end point of the radicalization process. But empirical evidence shows that Salafi groups also have non-violent radicalization paths. In order to achieve a pronounced understanding of radicalization, non-violent radicalization processes must therefore also be brought into focus.

In her dissertation, Hande Abay Gaspar examines which social and political opportunity structures can favour or slow down violent radicalization and which mechanisms are triggered. The aim is to use a causal process analysis to reconstruct the radicalization process of violent and non-violent Salafist actors at the group level and to identify conditional factors that could possibly favour or inhibit violence.