The Boko Haram conflict in northern Nigeria has generated immense scholarly interest since it began in 2010. Much of this interest has centred on advancing counterinsurgency policy prescriptions. There are two dominant approaches in the generic counterinsurgency literature: enemy-centric counterinsurgency, which involves the use of brute force to eliminate insurgents and population-centric counterinsurgency, which entails the use of persuasive means to end an insurgency. The counterinsurgency scholarship on Boko Haram is dominated by scholars that advance the latter approach. These scholars argue that the Boko Haram insurgency is a result of the socio-economic challenges that beset northern Nigeria, hence the government should adopt a policy of dialogue with the group and implement socio-economic reforms. However, there is a disjuncture between this policy prescription and Boko Haram’s Salafi-driven objective of establishing an Islamic Caliphate. Thus, this thesis answers the following question: given the Salafi ideology of BH, can population-centric counterinsurgency be an effective state response? I explored this question based on the theories of Weinstein (2007) and Ugarriza & Craig (2013): the notion that the factors that influence the emergence of an insurgent group continues to shape the group’s attitudes, emotions and dispositions. In answering my question, I explored the history of Islamic fundamentalism in northern Nigeria in order to ascertain the outcome of the government’s accommodation of Islamist demands in the past. Using textual analysis, I also examined the speeches of Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, in order to identify the group’s specific objectives and understand its disposition to dialogue. Based on the historical exploration and analysis of Shekau’s speeches, I argued that whereas the implementation of socio-economic reforms can win over potential Boko Haram recruits, neither dialogue nor socio-economic reforms can convince the existing Boko Haram members and leaders to stop fighting. / Graduate

This study deals with the relationship between religious fundamentalism and the internet. It aims to be a critique of the conception that religion and modernization are inherently incompatible; that modernization leads to the death of religion, as advocated the secularization theorists. It argues that the notion is an inaccurate characterization and understanding of the interplay between the forces of religion and modernization; rather, both co-exist and mutually reinforce one another. It also argues that it is inappropriate to label religious fundamentalism as an anti-modern movement; it might be true that it is ideologically ultra-orthodox, but it is technologically a modern movement. The value of this study lies in its findings that the most conservative religious groups like the Salafi community not only persist in the face of modernization, but also transform realities of modernity like the internet into a new form of modern product that serves well their religious needs and interests. To support this, I analysed Salafism, a transnational Islamic fundamentalist movement, and its use of the internet within the Indonesian context to uncover how they employ the technology. I examined the ways the Salafis use the internet in accordance with their ideological purposes in the frameworks of ‘cultured technology’, localization process of global force of information technology, appropriation of global media, and spiritualizing technology. Textual analysis was mainly employed as a method to understand the Salafi web contents and uncover the ways the Salafi use the internet.

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The master thesis is focused on media campaign of Salafi militant organizations. These organizations organize their own campaigns to promote their objectives and formulate their own opinions, which they often spread through the Internet. This medium allows the organizations to fully customize their campaign's content, because it is not censored. The 21st century information environment has contributed significantly to making Salafi militant organizations international actors that should be taken into account. In addition, they are able to publish the content of their ideas in different languages while spreading them through several media to reach the widest possible audience. The main purpose of this diploma thesis is to determine whether the objectives of the organizations are reflected in their English-written magazines, namely Gaidi Mtaani and Dabiq, published by Al-Shabaab and Daesh respectively. The objectives of both organizations are divided into four categories, specifically, strategic religious objectives, strategic political objectives, fundamental objectives and intermediated objectives. Since the two organizations are dissimilar and their objections are distinct and therefore incomparable, each organization and its magazine are analyzed separately. The thesis does not seek to generalize...

The aim of this thesis is to examine how the central pillars of Salafi-Jihadism are discussed in ISIS’s own magazines and how the pillars are related to Juergensmeyer’s concepts of cosmic war, satanization, and theater of terror. The material in this thesis has been sourced from the magazines Dabiq and Rumiyah, which were published by ISIS in the period 2014-2017. The magazines are initially aimed at an English-speaking audience, and it is intended for ISIS’ followers, but also for their enemies. A thematic analysis approach with a deductive orientation was employed and preconceived themes from what Shiraz Maher describes as the five pillars of Salafi-Jihadism, tawḥīd, jihad, takfīr, al-walā’ wa-l-barā’, and ḥākimiyya were used. The analysis shows that the magazines place a strong emphasize on the Salafi-jihadist pillars, and ISIS can therefore be placed within the Salafi-Jihadi tradition.

The aim of this study is to examine how two Sunni Muslim social media influencers depict and represent Shia Islam through their YouTube videos. To aid the research two questions were formulated:  1. How are Shia Islam and Shia Muslims represented by Imran Ibn Mansur and Mohammed Hijab? 2. How can these representations be interpreted according to the theory of Othering? To answer the questions and the purpose of this study a qualitative method of argumentative analysis was used. Their display of Shia Islam is examined according to Edward Said’s theory of Othering together with discourse analysis. A table was also used to organize the statements and arguments that were used by the influencers. The interpretations of the influencers’ discourse also studied how it can affect young Muslims’ views on Shia Islam. Their YouTube comments are used to back up the influencers’ claims and argument about Shia Islam. The study shows that Ibn Mansur’s view of Shia Islam is based on the Salafist school of thought, where he believes Shia Muslims are non-Muslims and apostates. Hijab’s view of Shia Islam differs in the sense it is not as extreme as Ibn Mansur but still amplifies the general and questionable view of Shias as being the “Other” foreign and deviant followers of Islam. Their respective view of Shia Islam was widely supported by their viewers, who were sharing strong opinionated statements about the Shias. This study shows that Ibn Mansur’s and Hijab’s views and presentations of Shia Islam and Shia Muslims are very critical, even hostile, which could enhance young Muslims’ view of Shia Islam as an inadequate and unreliable branch of Islam, and in some cases a religion separate from Islam.

This study aims to contribute to the scholarly literature on terrorism and negotiations by contributing to the debate on the relationship between ideology and organizational factors in explaining armed groups behavior. It is argued organizational factors influence the lethality of terrorist groups, more than ideology does. This study extends this debate to the realm of negotiations and the specific Salafi-Jihadism ideology. Over the past 20 years, a handful of Salafi-Jihadist groups have expressed readiness to negotiate. Yet, this puzzling outcome has been under investigated so far. However, the role of ideology has been appointed as influencing groups behavior in general, as well as organizational factors. This argument is tested in a structured focused comparison of four Salafi-Jihadist groups, with two positive cases. The analysis shows evidence for the influence of ideology and its implementation, between less radical and more radical groups, on the expression of readiness to negotiate across Salafi-Jihadist groups. It also highlights the need to consider ideology and organizational factors together.

This thesis is an analytical exploration of the influence of medieval theology on contemporary scholastic traditionalist polemics within Sunni Islam. Intra-Sunni sectarian polemics as an emerging area of study is relatively untouched as opposed to sectarian violence. A detailed mapping of the theological terrain from the genesis of Sunni ‘orthodoxy’ and the perennial tensions within the classical theological tradition and how they have manifested parochially into the contemporary scholastic traditionalist trends of the Barelwi, Deobandi, Ahl-i-Ḥadīth and Wahhābī within the backdrop of the Sufi-Salafi contestation of Sunni authenticity is timely. Concern regarding growing extremism prompted Muslim Ulama, academics and political leaders to create unity initiatives such as the Amman Message and the Sunni Pledge in dealing with this problem and also delineating ‘orthodoxy’. The theological basis for these neo-credos can be explained as doctrinal ‘minimalism’. Minimalism is a growing social construction of scholastic traditionalists through which the warring factions are attempting to salvage the historical continuity with ‘orthodoxy’ and placate Sunni infighting. The thesis aims to examine the theological veracity of the minimalism project and explore its doctrinal, methodological and ethical facets. Polemicism and excommunication is the current state of affairs within Sunni theological discourse. Minimalism is deemed as the antidote to this problem.

The diploma thesis is focused on the issue of radicalization of young people, who join terrorist organizations inspired by the ideology of Salafi Jihadism. Terrorist groups are one of the greatest global threats of the 21st century, and the recruitment of new fighters is their basic factor of success and growth. Therefore, the aim of the thesis is to compare the methods and techniques of recruitment used by Salafi Jihadist groups and to identify successful strategies of terrorist groups, leading to the radicalization of certain populations. The work deals with two concrete terrorist groups - the "Islamic State" and Al-Qaeda, because these groups operate globally, have sympathizers around the world, and attract different people to join them. The basis of the research is an application of different radicalization models that have been developed up to now on the observed methods and strategies of terrorist recruiters. The result of this research is a revealing of the most used methods of recruitment, the reasons of successful recruitment cases and a summarizing of the qualities of potential recruits and the factors facilitating radicalization of these persons.

This study investigates the use of violence by Salafi-Oriented Movement Organisations. Drawing mostly from Social Movement Theory’s “political opportunity” and “resource mobilisation” thesis, it uses the Northern Nigerian-born Boko Haram (BH) to study how such organisation evolved and used different forms of violent activisms for goal attainment. On that basis, three main research questions were formulated: (1) What socio-political structures enabled the evolution of the organisation in Northern Nigeria? (2) Under what conditions did BH begin to use armed violence against the Nigerian State? (3) What specific forms of armed violence did BH use and how were such forms of strategy sustained within the organisation? In answering these questions, the study relied on data collected through one-on-one semi-structured interviews from religious leaders in Northern Nigeria (particularly those within the Salafi networks); selected politicians in the areas where the group operates; some Nigerian security personnel, and on focus group interviews from victims of BH violence. In addition, the study also drew from other documentary sources (videos and audio recordings from different leaders in the group), and from internal correspondence between BH leaders and those of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Along the primary data, these documentary sources showed a striking historical continuity about the emergence and activities of BH from inception, up until they began using violence as a means for goal attainment. The data showed that while the emergence of the group was dependent on specific Northern Nigerian socio-political and mobilisatory structures, the adoption and sustenance of different forms of violence in the group were re-enforced by the interactions between the group’s leadership and the Borno state government; the violent response of the Nigerian government to the group's initial anti-state rhetoric; the mobilisation of different material resources (accruing from the organisation’s interactions and collaborations with similar international Salafi networks) and the internal dynamics in the group (competition between the different factions in the organisation). These inter-related conditions provided the windows of opportunity upon which both the establishment of the group, as well as the internal logic for the development and justification of different forms of violence were sustained within the organisation. / Religious Studies and Arabic / D. Litt. et Phil. (Religious Studies)