EXTREMISMWhat Prevention and Treatment of Substance Dependence Can Tell Us About Addressing Violent Extremism
Hate, violence, and their co-occurrence—violent extremism—represent increasing threats to society. Experts say that in order to deal effectively with extremism, there is a need for new approaches and frameworks that go beyond the counterterrorism approach that has dominated the battle against global jihadism. They suggest is applying a public health model to understand and counter violent extremism. Specifically, research shows that there is a striking resemblance between attachment to violent extremism and addiction.
Editor’s Note: RAND has just released an important examination of the similarities between substance dependence and violent extremism. Here are two sections from the study, the opening section and the Implications and Conclusions.
Hate, violence, and their co-occurrence—violent extremism—represent increasing threats to society. After decades of combating global jihadism, the United States increasingly is confronting domestic extremism, much of it from those identifying with far-right political movements. The prevalence and nature of this threat have prompted a focus on new approaches and frameworks that go beyond the counterterrorism approach that has dominated the battle against global jihadism.
One approach that has gained increasing attention is applying a public health model to understand and counter violent extremism and its downstream effects.(1) This approach seeks to understand the demographic, community, and psychological drivers of violent extremism to help drive prevention and intervention efforts. Many researchers have called for such an approach.(2)
In our 2021 research study, Violent Extremism in America: Interviews with Former Extremists and Their Families on Radicalization and Deradicalization,(3) we were struck by how many of the former extremists with whom we spoke felt drawn back to radical ideological thoughts and longed for reengagement with the movements that they left. This is despite their knowing that such thoughts and behaviors are harmful to themselves and others, and despite their wanting to separate themselves from their former activities and social attachments with radical extremist groups.
We were not the first to make this observation. In 2017, Simi and colleagues analyzed a data set of 89 former U.S. white supremacists and observed “lingering” white supremacist identity and ideology that persisted long after disengagement from extremist groups.(4) The researchers observed that this persistent identity and associated ideology can be described as an addiction and can be manifested in unwanted and situationally induced extremist thoughts, emotions, and physical reactions and, for some, can include relapse to extremist behavior.
As researchers who spent our graduate training studying substance use and other self-destructive behaviors (and who have since shifted our focus to studying extremism), we find merit in this hypothesis and see an uncanny parallel between hate and addiction. In our view, the parallels go beyond the return of unwanted thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. In this Perspective, we review evidence from psychology, neuroscience, sociology, and public health that suggests similarities between extremism and substance misuse.(5)
