The grievance-identity relationship: understanding the role of identity processes and stigmatisation on Muslims’ perceptions of terrorist grievances

ABSTRACT

Believing that terrorist grievances are valid can strengthen the legitimacy of a terrorist organisation. As countering terrorism is high on political agendas worldwide, understanding the antecedents of such beliefs may spotlight how some terrorist ideals come to be validated. Using survey data from 800 Muslims living in Australia, this study discerns how social-psychological processes may shape beliefs that Islamic terrorist grievances are valid. Specifically, we examine how stigmatisation and social identity are associated with Muslims’ perceptions that Islamic terrorists have valid grievances. We find that social identity can moderate the effect of feeling stigmatised on the belief that terrorist grievances are valid. Theoretical and policy implications of this research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Social identity
• stigmatisation
• Muslims
• politicised grievances
• countering violent extremism

Acknowledgement

This paper was supported by two Australian Research Council grants (Grant Numbers: DP130100392; FT180100139). The authors would like to acknowledge Dr Natasha Madon, Mr Kerry Wimshurst and the anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on previous versions of this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The sympathy for radical action scale included items measuring the extent that participants understood when other people engaged in illegal or violent demonstrations; creating roadblocks; occupying homes or offices; destroying property; graffitiing political slogans; protests that culminated in clashes with police; or vigilantism (Simon et al. 2013).

2 This recruitment method has limitations as it excludes participants without a home telephone or a publicly listed telephone number, or females who have changed their surnames. However, it can produce representative samples of hard to reach groups (Himmelfarb et al. 1983).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Australian Research Council: [Grant Numbers DP130100392, FT180100139].