Thread by @JamesKhalil1

Understanding Preventing / Countering Violent Extremism (PCVE) through the public health model lens.

A thread
1/

PCVE tends to be interpreted in many ways, so attempts to define it often lead to rabbit-holes. Framing PCVE through public health models (partly) alleviates this issue. This involves breaking it down into Primary, Secondary and Tertiary PCVE, as I will discuss in turn.

2/

Primary PCVE refers to interventions aimed at preventing broad communities from sympathizing with violent extremism, with these including broad communications campaigns, community debates, interfaith dialogues, cultural events with a message of peace and tolerance, and so on.

3/

While efforts to directly prevent involvement in violent extremism may seem more relevant, interventions aiming to prevent sympathy for it are also of key importance. At the very least, this is because sympathizers are more likely to become involved in its creation.

4/

Secondary PCVE refers to interventions with individuals who have specifically been deemed ‘at risk’ / ‘vulnerable’ to direct involvement in violent extremism (according to age, gender, affiliation, behaviours, etc.), and that attempt to channel them in alternative directions.

5/

This is often attempted through mentorship, vocational training and other tailored interventions for those 'at risk'. Well-known examples of Secondary PCVE include the mentorship element of the EU-funded STRIVE program in the Horn of Africa, and the UK Channel programme.

6/

Despite the potential of Secondary PCVE, its Achilles heel is often its ability to meaningfully identify those genuinely ‘at risk’, which can boil down to educated guesswork. The potential for beneficiaries to be stigmatized is also a problem.

7/

Tertiary PCVE refers to interventions that aim to positively influence the attitudes and/or behaviours of individuals with existing links to violent extremism. This incorporates ‘disengagement’, ‘desistance’ and ‘deradicalisation’ programmes.

8/

E.g., prison programmes have recently become much more common, and these tend to include packages of vocational training, religious education, psychosocial support, family support, etc. These have occurred in locations such as Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Spain and the UK.

9/

Tertiary PCVE has a huge bang-per-buck potential. While Primary and Secondary PCVE can waste resources by targeting beneficiaries too broadly, Tertiary PCVE is much more precise in this sense - i.e. it is much easier to determine who the beneficiaries should be.

10/

To be clear, the evidence to show that Tertiary PCVE actually works (as with all forms of PCVE) is still very thin as the implimenters often do not have adequate monitoring and evaluation systems in place, or they are unable to release their findings to help others learn.

11/

I am often asked to evaluate PCVE programmes, and one of my key findings almost inevitably boils down to “I actually really do not know if you have achieved success because you have not established a monitoring and evaluation system worthy of the name.”

12/

We have been saying this for a long time, but funders need to insist on adequate M&E as a priority, otherwise there is a very good chance that they continue to fund programmes that do not achieve their intended objectives, or perhaps that even make the situation worse.

13/ End