Published in January 2009, the Dialogue Society policy reflection paper entitled Deradicalisation by Default: The 'Dialogue' Approach to Rooting out Violent Extremism has been received with great interest by policy-makers, parliamentarians and senior academics.

The paper has become all the more relevant given recent developments. Only recently the Home Office launched its revised counter-terrorism strategy known as CONTEST 2. As its predecessor, the new strategy maintains the four main workstreams of Prevent, Pursue, Protect and Prepare. The first strand, Prevent, aims to stop people becoming or supporting violent extremists. The first objective of Prevent is to “[c]hallenge the violent extremist ideology and support mainstream voices.” While relevant to the wider issue of tackling violent extremism generally, this paper is most closely tied in with this first objective of Prevent.

The government faces two challenges in achieving this objective. Firstly, it is not clear how best to support mainstream Muslim voices so that extremist ideology can be stifled. Secondly, any government attempt at supporting mainstream Muslims and challenging extremist interpretations faces the risk of being perceived as reactive, thereby undermining its effectiveness.

Through the ‘dialogue’ approach, this paper explains how best to achieve this first objective of Prevent while avoiding the risk of being perceived as reactive. While setting out the definition and general characteristics of this approach, the paper also offers eight specific recommendations towards its implementation.

The Dialogue Society is committed to not only researching, developing and offering new ideas and recommendations but also to delivering and implementing those ideas and recommendations. In fact, grass root practice precedes and guides ideas developed by the Dialogue Society. Also the case with this publication, the paper concludes by summarising ongoing and future projects delivered by the Dialogue Society in this vein.