Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN)

From the COVID-19 pandemic to the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, the energy crisis, spiralling living costs, soaring heatwaves and environmental disasters, it might appear that we live in a continual state of crisis – all of which has had an impact on people’s mental health, exacerbating underlying concerns, fears, anxieties and anger. The nexus between mental health and violent extremism, and the importance of mental health as a contributing or driving factor in radicalisation and recruitment, is now increasingly being understood. In this edition of the RAN Practitioners Update we take a brief look at some of these challenges. To do this, the Update features the latest issue of the RAN Practitioners Spotlight magazine and the latest RAN Practitioners film, and highlights some of the key publications on the topic. The Update also features information on four training events on ‘digital skills’ for practitioners.

RAN Practitioners will be delivering a series of training events in four locations across Europe, in October and November 2023, for practitioners who want to ‘get online’. The training on ‘digital skills’ will give participants the opportunity to learn about the latest digital technologies and innovations (such as AI), to learn how to use a range of digital platforms and social media channels, and examine ways of adopting such technologies and platforms (for P/CVE).

We are looking for members of the RAN expert pool to review a number of practices from the RAN Collection of Inspiring Practices – a valuable source of information and inspiration for practitioners, policymakers and researchers. The purpose of the ‘expert peer review’ is to provide advice to practice owners on how to improve the quality and impact of their projects, and to raise awareness about the need to evaluate P/CVE interventions.

A RAN Practitioners toolkit provides practitioners with practical insights and suggestions on how to potentially work with a person who believes in conspiracy narratives. The aim of this toolkit is to explain what a conspiracy narrative exactly is, what a conspiracy narrative may offer to someone and how to help them reconsider their beliefs.

A RAN PRISONS paper explores the various tools, methods and experiences related to information exchange between the 4 Ps: police, prosecution, prison and probation. The paper provides an overview of the key tools and methods which are being used, the preconditions for the implementation of good information exchange practices and recommendations for successful collaborations.

A RAN YOUNG paper provides recommendations for the organisation of peer-to-peer exchange in P/CVE. The paper also summarises the feedback and recommendations provided by practitioners from within the RAN YOUNG network for how to improve a number of P/CVE projects and incorporate a youth perspective.