Terrorist Recruitment and Radicalization in Saudi Arabia

19 February 2020

Details

Author: Hegghammer, Thomas

Date of Publication: 2006

Publication: Middle East Policy Council 13:4 (2006)

Purpose of the study

Key questions

Who joined AQAP and why, and what radicalization and recruitment factors might be specific to Saudi Arabia.

Design

Approach

This study is both empirical and theoretical. Hegghammer analysed 240 biographies of Saudi militants (2002-2004). From primary and secondary sources (in Arabic). Also conducted interviews with former radicals, as well as families and acquaintances of militants.

Where

Saudi Arabia

Type of ‘participant’

AQAP

Topic

Mobilization/recruitment/radicalization to AQAP

Key findings

The militants – almost all males- many of were veterans of al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan and armed jihad in Bosnia. A majority Saudi nationals, but their geographic and tribal distribution was widely distributed throughout the country – not concentrated in particularly conservative or particularly poor regions. Most had a high-school education, and very few had a pre-radicalization criminal record.

Reviewer's Notes

Key words: radicalization, mobilization, recruitment, Al-Qaida

NATO

In 2017, a NATO Research Task Group (HFM-278 RTG) was formed. The RTG, led and Chaired by the UK (Defence Science and Technology Laboratory - Dstl), comprised representatives from 8 countries and various backgrounds (government, academia, police and the intelligence communities). RTG members collaborated to design and develop an ‘Information Repository’ of evidence (literature, data, tools) on violent extremism. The goal was to design a ‘one stop shop’ to enable different end users (including policy makers, frontline CT practitioners, researchers) to quickly and easily access high quality (empirical, scientific, evidence-based) materials to help them to understand specific topic areas and to inform their work: This is the VERE (Violent Extremism Research and Evidence) repository.

VERE is unique in that each document is accompanied by a short overview, written to help the reader understand whether and how the information can be applied in practice. (Some parts of certain overviews include text directly quoting parts of the article that the overview author perceived as important to highlight.) For example, an overview might highlight factors such as the methodological approach taken by researchers, participant demographics and sample size, so that the reader can decide how appropriate it is to apply findings to their own work. In 2020 VERE was taken on by the Centre for Research and Evidence on Security Threats (CREST) and thus amalgamated with the existing Radicalisation Research repository. This repository, alongside the wider Radicalisation Research repository, will be updated regularly to reflect the most up to date literature relating to violent extremism.

2006

External link to article

Journal Article

Thomas Hegghammer

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