Worrying Trends Highlight Need for Vigilance Against Homegrown Terrorism
health. Fewer than half of respondents expressed positivity about the future and 28.8% said they had experienced high psychological distress. Nearly three-quarters of those surveyed said that Covid-19 had a negative impact on their education, and 53.7% identified the pandemic as adversely affecting their mental health. These were both increases on the previous year’s findings and these factors are likely to continue exacerbating the rate of youth radicalization.
Still, terrorism has had a relatively small impact in Australia compared with other Western countries. Australia ranks 69th in the 2023 Global Terrorism Index, which uses incidents, fatalities and injuries to assess threat levels, with lower numbers suggesting the success of counterterrorism measures and strategies. However, these figures can be misleading due to selective reporting, as evidenced by the disparity between Victoria Police’s and the Global Terrorism Database’s statistics. They also can’t account for the intentions and capabilities of terrorist groups, and don’t accurately reflect recruitment and radicalization trends. This is why ASIO’s director-general has emphasized that assessing the threat of terrorism and extremist violence must go beyond ‘body count’.
Arrest numbers are better at capturing the pace of recruitment and radicalization. The surge in arrests between 2014 and 2019 can show the influence of Islamic State, while the decline after 2019 can be attributed to the restrictions imposed during Covid-19 lockdowns. The rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas in Palestine could create a similar surge.
Islamic State propaganda had a significant impact in Australia, especially among teenagers, as evidenced by domestic terrorism convictions and high-priority cases involving minors. Terrorist groups exploit online environments to target vulnerable youth, who are susceptible to radicalization for developmental and social reasons. An adolescent’s flexible identity formation, combined with socioeconomic circumstances, targeted online interactions and a feeling of political exclusion, makes them a prime potential victim of radicalization.
The Covid-19 pandemic exacerbated these vulnerabilities. ASIO noted a rise in issue-motivated extremism and anti-authority ideologies that it links with Covid-19 grievances and conspiracy theories spread on social media. The number of minors attracted to extremism is increasing, and offenders are most likely to have been radicalized in their formative years.
Australia may be tempted to perceive its management of domestic terrorism as a success due to its low incidence of attacks and casualties. But recent youth radicalization trends should trigger alarm bells. This type of threat isn’t easily extinguishable, and complacency will only lead to disaster. Terrorists are adapting to avoid detection and promote their ideology, and future attacks in Australia will likely involve lone actors conducting low-cost operations with little planning and simple weapons, making them difficult to predict and prevent.
The prevalence of youth radicalization is escalating the potential for violence in Australia over the next 20 years. Australia is a robust democracy and the government must uphold individuals’ rights to express their beliefs openly, but it must also remain vigilant against incitements to violence. The actions of violent extremists threaten public safety and challenge Australia’s fundamental principles, values and interests. It is imperative for Australia to avoid complacency, which means it must revise its counterterrorism strategy to respond to these evolving trends. Only by adapting to this shifting landscape can it guarantee the safety and prosperity of all its citizens.
William Frangia is a second lieutenant in the US Army and a visiting fellow at ASPI. This article is published courtesy of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).
