Learning from Muslims: A way to defeat the 'Radical Right'

As the Pope travelled back to the Vatican from Lebanon, the President of Bosnia was arriving in the UK to mark the 40th anniversary of the signing of the Dayton Agreement. Dayton marked the final close of the wars of independence in former Yugoslavia and especially a conflict where Bosnian Muslims had been neglected by the West leaving them open to persecution and, indeed, genocide at the hands of extreme Serbian Orthodox 'Christian' Nationalism. Working in that region back then I met Ultra Right Catholics who would drive for a weekend's shooting (of Bosnian Muslims) from their banking jobs in Switzerland. I met militant Right activists coming to the aid of 'Serbia' whose loathing of Muslims intermingled freely with their contempt for European Jews.

Now, in Britain this week, Radical Right agitator Tommy Robinson called for a 'carols gathering' to 'reclaim' our country free of any foreign influences. But as this localised version of long standing international patterns grows something is going wrong in the responses of Church and policy leaders.

Let's be clear the 'British' Radical Right is not isolated or local. It is hyperconnected globally, drawing funding and political cover from sympathetic governments and wealthy donors abroad. Its ecosystem is complex. That eco-system even includes some popular Christian 'spiritual' movements which are so focused on their own 'growth' or other-wordliness that they have welcomed the Radical Right in to our midst often cloaked in unthinking variants of (anti semitic) 'Traditionalism', (head count) 'Revival' or (individualistic) 'Intentionality'. Mapping these connections and the way that they are strategically seeking to capture Christian budgets, assets, symbols and cultural leverage is vital, but the risk is clear: the Radical Right is increasingly organising in and from churches near you.

Faced with this challenge, some Christian leaders have instinctively turned to 'theology', while a few 'Christian' commercial consultancies and institutes with no history in these matters have suddenly (re)invented themselves as 'experts' or 'convenors' in the space. They are running private parliamentary round tables, public seminars, and see themselves as having a 'common sense' response to this moment of need. It is obvious, many suggest, that "moderate theology" can counter "extreme theology" and so what is needed, they say, is a campaign to get Britons to stick to 'good Christianity' rather than its Radical variants. This includes giving platforms to those on the Radical Right and their political out riders to model 'disagreeing well'.

But history shows this approach is inadequate. Theologians and 'common sense believers' usually lack grounding in political science, social policy or the empirical study of Religious Right Radicalism, its gateway spiritualities, or anti-extremist and anti-terror policy histories. Even the most committed soi disant 'political theologians' are in this camp with their work hardly ever citing the most important studies of 'what terrorists want' and how to mitigate the threats that their demonstration going extreme political outriders, and radicalised core, present.

In South Africa, Peru, and Britain's own wider colonial history, governments and churches funded "moderate theology" to counter dissidence. The result was often counterproductive: it deepened support for opponents rather than reducing violence. In what the late Conor Gearty called the colonial 'near abroad' of Ireland such efforts were particularly vigorous again only deepening the well from which political violence could drink. Ideas alone cannot dismantle extremist networks. Civic risk arises not from thoughts of those who are Radical but from actions, from failures in safeguarding, gaps in youth work and weaknesses in accountability. Extremism thrives where systems are weak, procedures are absent and communities feel excluded.

If Christian leaders are serious about resisting the Radical Right, they must shift focus from thinking theological exhortation, analysis or re-presenting theological discourses, to policy. That means investing in youth engagement programmes that give young people a stake in their communities, strengthening local initiatives that build trust across diverse groups, ensuring churches and faith based organisations at last meet the highest standards of child and vulnerable adult protection and governance This will mean new ways of working with police, local authorities and civil society partners to share intelligence, coordinate responses and build resilience. These are not abstract ideas. They are practical steps that can be measured, funded and implemented. They require humility from church leaders, who must recognise that pastoral letters , press releases or short term consultancy projects alone will not protect communities from radicalisation. It likely means that a raft of Christian institutions have to look at the Prevent Duty in a fresh light and say 'well, yes, this really does actually apply to us' because the reality is that most people being referred to schemes that manage extreme Radicals are white.

Here is where British Muslims have vital wisdom to share. For decades, Muslim communities have been at the sharp end of government counterextremism policy. They have navigated Prevent referrals, Channel programmes, and the stigma - never forgotten by many Irish in Britian - of being treated as suspect communities. They have built youth organisations, safeguarding systems and advocacy networks to resist radicalisation and protect civic peace. Muslim leaders know the limits of theological responses. They have seen how government attempts to engineer "moderate Islam" failed to address the social drivers of extremism. Yet Christian leaders have been slow to seek this help. Some still blame Muslims for the rise of the Far Right because of Islam's 'threat to Western civilisation'. There is real opportunity here . British Muslims bring professional skills, community wisdom and lived experience that could help Christian leaders strengthen their response. Partnership across religious communities is not just desirable, it is essential.

Without robust systems, Christian institutions risk becoming unwitting platforms for radicalisation and 'resource churches' for social harm. This 'safeguarding ' gap runs right to the heart of the mainline and wider churches. +Justin Welby had to stand down because of major failures in safeguarding leadership in the Church of England. The Roman Catholic community's outing at IICSA shone bright light on the dark failures in Catholic practice too. Five years later the subsequent promise of the Catholic Bishops of a 'one church' approach is not yet fully in place. In other church networks safeguarding, finance and other institutional weaknesses have often been reported. These are not helped of course by some Christians suggesting that 'institutions' do not matter, but only relationality does.

Defeating the Radical Right and other extreme social forces requires a shared civic strategy. That means acknowledging the threat, rejecting theological self dramatisations or any claim to theology's primacy over the need to address harm, invest in systems, learn across every part of Islam (and Irish experience) and across especially the weakest institutions in Christianity. It means engaging government to treat Christian extremists with the same seriousness as other forms but then not lock that conversation in the advocacy of confected 'new' groups who want to skim consultancies but have no roots in communities. This too was a facet of Muslim experience after 9/11 when so many appeared as if by magic in this field.

Crucially we need to stigmatise no community. It is about recognising that extremism is a civic problem , not a theological debate or internal crisis. It is about building resilience through policy, procedure and partnership. And really good safeguarding.

The Radical Right's mobilisation through "Christianisation" of its message opens new vistas of risk. It is a rallying cry of civic harm from that we heard in Bosnia and from which Pope Leo's visit to Turkey and Lebanon and the marking of the Dayton Agreement should point us away.

It requires humility, the willingness to learn from Muslim communities who have faced similar challenges. If British Christians can find the courage to learn from the Muslim community , from places where at the moment they may not ever have trod let alone taken lessons it will be good for them - and us all.

This blog develops my earlier paper Architecture of the British Christian Right: A case Study in Political Capture' from the University of Southampton Centre on English Identity and Politics at: www.southampton.ac.uk/~assets/doc/fss-international/British%20Christian%20Right%209.10.pdf

Francis Davis is a Visiting Fellow at Kellogg College, University of Oxford and Honorary Professor at Queen Mary, University of London. He was previously a trustee of Portsmouth Catholic Diocese.