Towards “Policed Multiculturalism”? Counter-radicalisation in France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom - Ragazzi (2014)

The French government recently announced a plan to “combat radicalization” and a series of measures to prevent recourse to violence. Although the term is not entirely new in the French political parlance, it marks a departure from a counterterrorism policy justified mainly by a judicial approach and enforced in great part through administrative measures. France is thus moving closer to the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, which both began to develop such policies in the mid-2000s.

Yet what exactly does it mean to “combat radicalization”? What explains the French government’s change of approach? And what can be learned from a decade of experience in these two European countries?

This study shows that the concept of radicalization serves as an effective discourse to legitimise the extension of police action beyond its usual purview, by becoming involved in areas of diversity management such as education, religion, and social policy. The study traces the dissemination of the discourse through European institutions and, using the notion of “policed multiculturalism,” analyses the effects of its legal, administrative and preventive forms.