Motivation for Countering an Extremist Social Movement: The Case of British Muslims' Activism Against Islamist Extremists

British Muslims have led a number of activities with the purpose of countering Islamist extremism. These activities represent a relatively rare instance of mobilisation and activism against what can be termed an extremist social movement. However, the social and political context, in which this activism takes place, is complex and arguably not conducive to counter-extremism mobilisation. To name but a few factors, British Muslims feel little efficacy and their primary grievances are less connected to Islamist extremism than to the reaction to it by the state, the media and some segments of the non-Muslim population. In this context of many factors speaking against "community-based" counter-extremism, why would many British Muslims still engage in countering Islamist extremists? This paper investigates the individual motivations of British Muslims for activism aimed at countering Islamist extremists. As the point of departure, it uses the theories developed in the collective action, social movement and social psychology literature and it extends them to the understudied case of activism against an extremist movement or groups, as the classical literature is overwhelmingly focused on the collective action against the state, authorities or another non-violent movement. The paper primarily draws on data collected in 20-30 semi-structured interviews with British Muslim counter-extremism activists and a survey of 800 British Muslims (both being conducted at the time of writing this abstract).