On the front page of this morning's Guardian are the details of an MI5 document about the background factors leading individuals into involvement in terrorist activity. It is based on case studies of several hundred people and it concludes that there is no typical profile of the British terrorist. Those who become involved have different attitudes to religion and are ethnically diverse; they are mostly male and in their 20s, but women and people over 30 are also drawn in; there are different familial circumstances and different levels of educational achievement amongst those covered by the study. In sum:
[T]he research has revealed that those who become terrorists "are a diverse collection of individuals, fitting no single demographic profile, nor do they all follow a typical pathway to violent extremism".
A somewhat improbable comparison suggests itself to me. I'm thinking of the research that has been done on rescuers in Nazi Europe. Of course, that research was looking for common factors that might have influenced people to put themselves at risk to save the lives of others, whereas the MI5 research is into those willing to contemplate murder for political ends. But bear with me.
There was no typical pathway to rescue, no typical rescuer profile. The research on this subject indicates that class, gender, political affiliation, religious affiliation, family background and situational factors were only weakly correlated with rescue activity, if at all. Rescuers came from all sectors of the population. The one, the only, really strong correlation was with the moral beliefs held by rescuers and cited by them as their reason for having acted as they did: these were universalist beliefs in the value of human life and in the prohibition against killing the innocent. Some rescuers articulated such beliefs in religious terms, others in secular humanist ones. But it is a common thread running throughout rescuer testimony. Obvious enough, one might think. Here were people acting in dangerous circumstances, people of strong moral commitment and character. They made a choice in the light of their most important beliefs - rather than merely acting on an impulsion supplied by one background sociological factor or another.
From what the Guardian provides of the material in the MI5 document, it seems evident that something similar applies in the case of terrorist involvement, the very different purposes (intended murder as opposed to a will to save people) notwithstanding. Thus: 'the most pressing current threat is from Islamist extremist groups who justify the use of violence' (my emphasis). Thus also: '[e]xposure to extremist ideology, whether in the form of online communities, books, or DVDs' is judged to be 'crucial'. Again, even if there are pointers to what might make individuals vulnerable to extremist ideology ('facing marginalisation and racism; the failure of those with degrees to achieve anything but low-grade jobs; a serious criminal past; travel abroad for up to six months at a time and contact with extremist networks overseas'), we are told that...
... it is important not to commit the "logical fallacy" of assuming that all those who share a common experience of dislocating episodes will become terrorists. "What is different about those who ended up involved in terrorism is that they came into contact with existing extremists who recognised their vulnerabilities (and their usefulness to the extremist group)."
The MI5 report is also quoted as saying: 'individuals in fact make active choices to become [sic] and remain in extremist activity.'
There are, then, many social factors with no bearing on this issue, and there are some pointers to individual vulnerability; but at the centre of it there are extremist beliefs - that is, the justification of political murder - the activities of the groups that propagate these beliefs, and the choices made by individuals coming under the influence of them. The balance both of explanation and assignment of moral responsibility ought to be clear enough.
Now look at how the Guardian editorializes about this MI5 report. I think you'll find the balance is rather different. As to explanation, it's just 'the complex causes and textures of violent political extremism' (textures, already); it's no easy answers. And as to the rest, it's the danger of a King Herod approach to threat prevention, and it's this:
MI5 is right too to highlight the importance of politicians and the media. If they - we - had played a less provocative role on many occasions in the past then MI5's job would not be as difficult as it now is.
The only responsibility assigned: our provocation. The main responsibility: unspoken. You might say that that is because the latter is taken for granted. Perhaps so. But there are interesting contrasts in this matter at the Guardian.
For one of them, just look at the leader from April of this year on extraordinary rendition and torture. Here there is no sociological or political background story. Only the brutalities of torture and their harrowing representation; and then a ban (on torture) that is absolute and human rights that must not be wished away. Some causal story could have been put together or alluded to: about governments provoked by terrorist outrages and the threat of further terrorism; about MPs calculating what the public might be willing to wear in the climate induced by that threat; about the public itself, provoked by murder in London; and so forth. But in condemning extraordinary rendition and torture the Guardian breathes not a word of this. And quite rightly. Background factors these may be but they neither adequately explain nor at all exonerate the resort, or the turning a blind eye, to torture.
Just so with regard to terrorism. In both, there's a main story and a background one. It's a matter of what you choose to emphasize and what you leave unsaid.