The threat posed by groupe like ISIS and al-Qaeda has evolved fast over the past year. ISIS has lost much of its self-proclaimed caliphate. The appeal of its brand, always rooted in its territorial control, appears diminished. But many of the conditions behind its rise in Iraq and Syria remain, new challenges will follow its retreat and it could regroup, whether as ISIS or in another guise. Al-Qaeda remains a menace: its core is weakened but its affiliates fight across numerous warzones, where their growing potency complicates efforts to end violence. Other movements, with fluid and often overlapping memberships, operate elsewhere, with new arenas from the Sahel to South East Asia affected. ISIS is on the back foot, but jihadism remains a persistent threat, particularly for communities across the Muslim world.
While such groupe pose grave challenges for States and societies alike, their role, and the views of their adherents are neither uniform nor static. Individuals- and factions within groupe- hold diverse and often shifting agendas.
Given their often fast evolution, better understanding such groupe is critical to developing policies to respond both to the immediate threat they pose and to address the underlying conditions that allow them to recruit and expand.
In 2016, Crisis Group detaiied lessons from its decades-long coverage of war and jihadism in a landmark 2016 report Exploiting Disorder; al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. That report and ICG’s work since has shown how the dramatic expansion of both movements after 2011 owes more to their local roots than their transnational ties. Both have exploited new wars, collapsed States and escalating geopolitical rivalries to expand. Their intolerance and violence threaten communities and States in the Muslim world and beyond, but often measures taken in response make things worse, by ignoring the local political and socioeconomic conditions that give rise to such groups and relying too heavily on coercion.
Over 2017/18, Crisis Group will continue this work with a dedicated workstream biending its deep local knowledge with cross-regional expertise. This interaction of geographie and thematic enriches its coverage of crises; it enables Crisis Group develop innovative policies that both are tailored to context and draw from lessons elsewhere; and it can inform wider debates on counter-terrorism, stabilisation and preventing violent extremism (PVE).
Altogether, the goal of this project is to shed light on the drivers and nature of non-state armed groups; and offer tailored, practical prescriptions for key policymakers to help better manage the threat.
