On July 10, the Brussels International Center for Research and Human Rights (BIC) attended the conference entitled ‘The Different Roles of Women in the Radicalization Process of Men’, promoted by the ‘Académie Diplomatique Internationale’, in partnership with the Institute for Research and Education on Negotiation (IRENE) in Paris.
The debate included notable experts in the field of Countering Violent Extremism as well as gender analysts and EU policy makers. Among the panelists, French Journalist Nicolas Henin exposed the complexity of defining the term ‘radicalization’, as it involves an array of different meanings that can lead to different interpretation. One common factor he associated with the term is violence.
According to Henin, the process of radicalization inevitably involves violence and methods of intimidation for achieving changes in society. Within this process, women have always been involved in acts of violence, even though their roles have been long neglected. Further on, Henin gave a historical perspective on the process of violent extremism, breaking it down in five phases.
Firstly, the journalist argued that the first phase of violent extremism started in the 1880, during the resurgence of anarchist ideas, further materializing in the anti-colonialism period, which he considers to be the second phase. As for the third and fourth, Henin points out that during the ‘new left’ movement in the 60s and 70s, extremist ideas and values were enhanced. When vanished, this broad political movement opened the path to the fourth era of violent extremism, which is faith-based. As per Henin, we are currently in the fifth phase which is characterized by the jihads, an avatar of the fourth wave – the religious one.
According to him, women played an important role during the first, third and the last wave of violence and radicalization processes. Likewise, more recently women have been playing a key role in perpetuating violent acts in Nigeria and Chad. Some armed groups, such as Al Qaida and Boko Haram, are recruiting women (forcibly or voluntarily) to be part or their terrorist strategies.
Moving on the debate, Béatrice Brugère, a judge who has dealt with many terrorist cases, elucidated that the process of radicalization and violent extremism goes hand-in-hand with the conception of territory. The idea of territory, according to her, lies in the heart of the majority of armed groups’ objectives. The acquisition or control of territory is not at all irrelevant but is a tactical option rather than a strategic necessity.
According to Brugère, territory is one of the main pushing factors that originated violence. In this aspect, women have the same capability of being as violent as men. Saying the contrary would be feeding stereotypical assumptions and limiting both roles.
Put differently, since recognizing women as also violent beings is a taboo, the subject remains neglected. As per Brugère, if today we are starting to talk about the role of women in terrorism, it is not because their roles have increased. Rather, we are staring to recognize the extent to which this phenomenon has been present in our history.
Dr. Carole André-Dessornes, who is a consultant in geopolitics and specialist in the field of gender and violence, highlighted that every aspect of terrorism need to be context-specific and mainstreaming conceptions of this phenomenon tends to be generalized and biased, which hampers a thorough understanding of the issue. For instance, according to Ms.
Dessornes, the first suicide bombing operation that occurred in Lebanon happened in a context of ‘foreign occupation’. All movements against this fact were considered ‘terrorist’ by the foreign eyes, whereas the locals were seeing these violent acts as a response to paralyze the enemy and a means in which to achieve their goals. As for the women’s agency in these actions, a number aspects needs to be considered.
First, this subject has been a taboo for most of conservative societies in the Middle-East and Africa, but also in the western countries. Where there is a strengthened patriarchal structure, the roles attributed to women in acts of violence or their participation thereof are minimized, neglected and very entrenched to stereotypes. In some cases, women’s participation in CVE was an act of breaking with these stereotypes and confronting the very patriarchal structures that undermined their roles.
Secondly, the ambivalence in recognizing women’s roles in violent extremism have been used for Al Qaeda and other armed groups as a means to recruit new soldiers and achieve their operations effectively world-wide. Put differently, because women were not considered as a real threat, female combatants could easily be used as spies, messengers and circulate in public spaces without being noticed, thus enhancing the chances of an operation effectiveness.
Following the presentations, representatives from a variety of organizations raised questions, which were followed by a networking event.