Prevention of Radicalization as an Emergent Field of Plural Policing in Norway: The Accelerating Role of Militant Islamists

This article provides a brief history of the policing of militant Islamism in Norway between 2009 and 2019. The numerous counter-responses to militant Islamism that have taken place in this decade, I argue, were a primary factor in accelerating the emergence of the prevention of radicalization and violent extremism (PRVE) as a new field of policy and plural policing in Norway. The emergence of this field in Norway is set against similar fields internationally and related to the evolution of the global Salafist-jihadist movement. Based on interviews with practitioners involved in PRVE and other types of qualitative data, my analysis traces the evolution of this field of policing and identifies five phases that follow the arc of conflict escalation–de-escalation between militant Islamists and those tasked to police them. The article also discusses critical aspects of this emergent field, particularly the role of police and intelligence in the policing of radicalization. security threat associated with MI. The purpose of attending to Norway’s massive counter-responses to MI mobilizations during this period is to better understand what led to and accelerated the prevention of radicalization and violent extremism (PRVE) as a new field of policy and plural policing in Norway. This article demonstrates the influence of global jihadist terrorism on national security policy and on the emergence of a new field of plural policing of radicalization in Norway. Its origin in European counter-terrorism policy has been described, along with the rela-tionship of the Norwegian version to its counterparts across Europe and in other Western democracies. The analysis of the decade-long contentious episode has pointed out a considerable shift in the societal response towards persons associated with RVE in Norway. Several changes occurred across the five phases of the episode, in national policies, legislation, criminal justice responses, state resource allocation, collaborative structures, multi-agency measures and local initiatives. A work logic has been established through policy that grants new responsibilities to myriad actors collaborating across sectors and across local, regional and national levels. The implementation of these new responsibilities, collaborative practices and preemptive logics has been crucial in creating the basis for what is now a loose nation-wide structure and apparatus for PRVE in Norway. This has involved attempts to establish a society-wide system for detecting and reporting signs of radicalization, and collaborative structures for assessing and handling individuals thought to be at-risk or posing a risk. This way of attempting to foresee “future terrorists” by seeking out signs of radicalization is now a responsibility assigned to first-line practitioners across much of the Western world (Sjøen 2020, p. 221). By the of events that the article dem-onstrated what the and prevention as a field plural analysis how responses growing militant fundamental