MEASURING AND UNDERSTANDING THE IMPACT OF TERRORISM

MIGRATION, VIOLENT EXTREMISM AND TERRORISM:
MYTHS AND REALITIES
Dr Khalid Koser, Executive Director; and Amy E. Cunningham, Advisor,
the Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund (GCERF)
As evidenced by the findings and analysis of
the 2015 Global Terrorism Index, violent
extremism has become a universal crisis. This
year, the publication of the index coincides
with another ongoing emergency, that of
refugees and migration. The Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) reports the highest
number of displaced persons ever recorded.
The statistics are sobering: one in three
Syrians has been forced to abandon their
home, Europe is facing unprecedented
arrivals of asylum seekers and refugees, and
thousands of migrants have lost their lives in
the Mediterranean alone.
Inevitably, linkages are being drawn between
these two crises. For a start, the rise in
terrorism is one reason why more people are
leaving their homes. What is more, experts
suggest that displaced populations,
especially those in a protracted situation, may
be especially susceptible to radicalization to
violent extremist agendas. More
controversially, it has been suggested by
some leading politicians and commentators
across a range of European countries that
violent extremist and terrorist groups may be
infiltrating migrant and asylum flows.
Extreme caution is required in drawing these
correlations. It is always an analytical
challenge to discern individual motivations
for migration and displacement. It is
important to guard against generalizations —
refugee camps can be sites of innovation and
enterprise, not just hopelessness and despair.
Anecdote is no replacement for evidence. In
particular, there is a risk of fueling antiimmigration
sentiment when unsubstantiated
assertions are made about migration as a
threat to national security. 1
This short contribution reviews what is known
about the linkages between migrants and
migration, and violent extremism and
terrorism, fully cognizant of the reservations
above. It is intended to begin to provide an
evidence-base to correct some of the
misperceptions that abound, as well as to
sharpen the focus where there are
connections to be made. It identifies
significant research gaps, and suggests initial
policy directions. Most importantly of all, the
purpose of this contribution is to promote an
objective debate, something which we
believe is all too often absent in discussion on
migration and radicalization to violent
extremism.
IS VIOLENT EXTREMISM A DRIVER
OF DISPLACEMENT?
The first intersection to examine is the extent
to which violent extremism or terrorism can
be blamed for the explosion in the number of
people displaced in the past year. Certainly
we know that countries and regions where
violent extremism is rife — Syria, Iraq,
Afghanistan, northern Nigeria, Mali, Yemen, to
name a few– are among the top countries
displacing significant numbers of people.
A conceptual challenge is that it is becoming
increasingly difficult to discern individual
motivations, or the relative weighting of
combined motivations, in explaining
displacement. Even people fleeing conflict
usually factor in economic and social
variables when weighing their decision; it is
not uncommon that they consider the
availability of work and future opportunities,
along with factors such as access to
education and healthcare. As such, it is
important to distinguish underlying causes for
displacement — such as conflict, state
collapse, or persecution — from proximate
factors such as loss of access to housing,
employment, food, or welfare. Often it is the
latter, not the former which triggers
displacement.
The same conceptual challenge applies to
differentiating terrorism from the wider
environmental context in which it flourishes
as a driver for displacement. Some people,
especially religious minorities in the Levant
— including Christians and Yazidis– are
fleeing Syria and Iraq because of direct
persecution by ISIL (also referred to as
Daesh). Equally as troublesome, if they are not
fleeing because of the immediate threat of
persecution, they are leaving because of their
state’s failure in will or capacity to protect
them. Others who are not directly affected are
also fleeing conflict. They may be leaving not
for the sake of their lives, but for the sake of
their futures. A related question is the
direction of the causal chain between
conflict, state collapse, and violent extremism
or terrorism. In the case of Syria and Iraq,
therefore, it may be fair to conclude that
some people are explicitly fleeing the terrorist
group ISIL, while others are fleeing the
conditions in which ISIL has emerged.
The limited evidence on displacement caused
directly by terrorist groups indicates that
often displacement is a deliberate objective,
and not merely a consequence. In northern
Nigeria, for example, Boko Haram has
kidnapped women, forcibly recruited children
and men, and besieged entire villages, forcing
immediate evacuation. Sadly, this strategy is
not new; the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA)
used similar tactics when they terrorized
northern Uganda from the late 1980s through
the early 2000s. 2
ARE THE DISPLACED VULNERABLE
TO RECRUITMENT TO VIOLENT
EXTREMISM?
The clearest example of displaced people
becoming vulnerable to terrorist groups is the
recent siege of Syria’s Yarmouk refugee camp,
situated mere kilometers from Damascus,
which housed some 18,000 Palestinian
refugees and Syrian internally displaced
persons (IDPs). The consequences of the April
2015 takeover by ISIL and other violent
extremist militants were felt immediately.
Despite warnings of a potential massacre, it
was days before humanitarian actors were
granted sufficient access to the camp. As the
emergency unfolded, UN Secretary General
Ban Ki-moon implored the international
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