About

From the beginning of the 21st century, “terrorism has been almost continually front-page news and the subject of much discussion on the airwaves and amongst politicians in the UK” (Hewitt 2008:1). Over the past decade or so, with the development of CONTEST (Counter-Terrorism strategy) and its PREVENT programme, the concepts ‘radical’ and ‘radicalisation’ have become central to Terrorism Studies and Counter-terrorism policy-making as well as its widespread use in media and cultural discourses. Many scholars have noticed that terrorism in the UK has shifted from being conceived as a problem of criminality and criminal justice to being cast as a problem of “proactive policing and the management of risk”. In Lister’s words (2015:33), this “has involved formal changes to the UK legal systems, with serious implications for the rights and lived experiences of citizens”. These changes affect individuals and communities differently since they are shaped by conceptions of age, gender, religion, ideology, cultural background and notions of national identity. At the same time, counter-terrorism strategies have extended the surveillance of the entire UK population through mass surveillance technologies (Heath-Kelly 2016), there has been a drive to actively involve the public in the management of terrorism (Walklate & Mythen 2014). New security discourses make multiple demands of civilian participation, engaging the population in public vigilance and assigning them new duties of reporting ‘radicalised’ individuals. Hence, this research will have a dual focus. First it will analyse the emergence of the discourses of radicalisation from 2004 in counter-terrorism, academia and media. The focus on media is important because, as a number of scholars have argued, rather than mediate events, the media has entered into the production of events, having a great influence on people’s views and perceptions. Second, the research will carry out interviews and focus groups with individuals living in the UK to map how these new security discourses have influenced and shaped mentalities and imaginaries of ‘risk’ and ‘suspect individuals/behaviours’ as well as participated in processes of identity formation.