Full Text Available
Note: Clicking the button above will open the full text document at the original institutional repository in a new window.
The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization
Throughout the Syrian conflict, a new extremist organization became increasingly visible to the public due its use of extreme violence and continuous threats to the entire world living outside of it. The self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) attracted the highest number of foreign...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Department of Political Studies
2018
|
| Subjects: | |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1867614220442402816 |
|---|---|
| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Kreifels, Isabel |
| author2 | Lamb, Guy |
| author_browse | Kreifels, Isabel Lamb, Guy |
| author_facet | Lamb, Guy Kreifels, Isabel |
| author_sort | Kreifels, Isabel |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Throughout the Syrian conflict, a new extremist organization became increasingly visible to the public due its use of extreme violence and continuous threats to the entire world living outside of it. The self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) attracted the highest number of foreign fighters in the history of Islamic social movements, and continues to recruit from foreign countries. While the majority of the foreign fighters come from neighbouring countries to the conflict region in Syria and Iraq, it is estimated that around one quarter of the recruits stems from Western countries. Although ISIS managed to attract both men and women to voluntarily join their extremist organization, the vast majority of foreign fighters are men. Due to the recent occurrence of this phenomenon, the motivations of foreign fighters to join ISIS remain greatly under-researched. Taking various attacks and threats towards Western countries into consideration, it might appear paradox that people leave their home countries to fight for ISIS abroad. However, the number of people leaving for this purpose has summed up to around 800 in Germany in 2016. Therefore, this thesis analyses the motifs and causes of German men to travel to the conflict region to become a member of the extremist network. Contrary to the widely-spread assumption that socio-economic circumstances lead young men into violent extremism, this thesis studies their paths to radicalization from a socio-psychological perspective. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/27521 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:48:34.991Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2018 |
| publishDateRange | 2018 |
| publishDateSort | 2018 |
| publisher | Department of Political Studies |
| publisherStr | Department of Political Studies |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/27521 The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization Kreifels, Isabel Lamb, Guy International Relations, Throughout the Syrian conflict, a new extremist organization became increasingly visible to the public due its use of extreme violence and continuous threats to the entire world living outside of it. The self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) attracted the highest number of foreign fighters in the history of Islamic social movements, and continues to recruit from foreign countries. While the majority of the foreign fighters come from neighbouring countries to the conflict region in Syria and Iraq, it is estimated that around one quarter of the recruits stems from Western countries. Although ISIS managed to attract both men and women to voluntarily join their extremist organization, the vast majority of foreign fighters are men. Due to the recent occurrence of this phenomenon, the motivations of foreign fighters to join ISIS remain greatly under-researched. Taking various attacks and threats towards Western countries into consideration, it might appear paradox that people leave their home countries to fight for ISIS abroad. However, the number of people leaving for this purpose has summed up to around 800 in Germany in 2016. Therefore, this thesis analyses the motifs and causes of German men to travel to the conflict region to become a member of the extremist network. Contrary to the widely-spread assumption that socio-economic circumstances lead young men into violent extremism, this thesis studies their paths to radicalization from a socio-psychological perspective. 2018-02-12T08:54:28Z 2018-02-12T08:54:28Z 2017 Master Thesis Masters MSocSc http://hdl.handle.net/11427/27521 eng application/pdf Department of Political Studies Faculty of Humanities University of Cape Town |
| spellingShingle | International Relations, Kreifels, Isabel The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| title_full | The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| title_fullStr | The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| title_full_unstemmed | The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| title_short | The fascination of the 'Islamic State': Perceived iInjustice and crises of identity - why German citizens join the extremist organization |
| title_sort | fascination of the islamic state perceived iinjustice and crises of identity why german citizens join the extremist organization |
| topic | International Relations, |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/27521 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT kreifelsisabel thefascinationoftheislamicstateperceivediinjusticeandcrisesofidentitywhygermancitizensjointheextremistorganization AT kreifelsisabel fascinationoftheislamicstateperceivediinjusticeandcrisesofidentitywhygermancitizensjointheextremistorganization |