Why do People Radicalize?

June 17, 2025 Cognitive Insights No Comments

Radicalization is usually not a sudden leap into extremism. It is a slow inner movement, beginning long before any visible signs emerge.

To truly understand it, we must look into the deeper layers of human motivation, vulnerability, and longing. This blog explores why people radicalize — not to excuse, but to understand. And from there, to help.

The unmet need beneath the surface

At the root of radicalization lies an unmet need for meaning. When a person feels cut off from inner purpose or deeper values, he becomes prone to clinging to whatever offers direction. This is especially true when society offers only shallow alternatives.

Radicalization, in this sense, is about too little deep motivation. Where natural inner flow is lacking, artificial certainty steps in. This leads to a desperate search for direction, often borrowed, brittle, and rigid.

Weak backbone, hard shell

People who radicalize often lack a strong inner backbone — a resilient connection to their deeper self. To compensate, they build a hard shell: a fixed identity, a black-and-white worldview, an armor made of slogans and certainties.

This shell serves as protection, but it also becomes a prison. The more fragile the core, the harsher the defense. Radicalization hardens people not because they are strong, but because they are deeply unprotected inside.

The RPP: radicalization-prone person

Between the unanchored seeker and the radicalized individual lies a crucial stage: that of the radicalization-prone person (RPP). This is someone at risk — already leaning toward rigidity, showing signs of disconnection. He is not yet radicalized, but the movement has begun.

Seeing the RPP is essential for early support. It allows space for Compassionate intervention early on. Many deradicalization efforts fail because they only address the endpoint, not the path.

A void draws in anything

A mind left empty of meaning does not stay empty. It pulls in whatever can fill the space. If not silence and self-connection, then it may be loud ideology or rage. This is a law of mental nature.

In today’s world, this void is expanding. The so-called meaning crisis affects not only individuals but entire cultures. As explored in The Meaning Crisis, burnout and radicalization are both symptoms of the same disconnection — from self, from others, from values that resonate.

Borrowed meaning becomes a cage

People who radicalize often do not find their own truth. They adopt a truth handed to them — one that seems ready-made, clear, and total. But because it is not their own, it lacks flexibility.

They defend it aggressively because it is brittle. One crack could shatter the structure. As a result, any challenge feels like a threat to their very being. In such a state, even well-meaning dialogue can push them further away. What they need is not a louder voice from outside, but a clear invitation inward.

Hatred hides longing

Hatred, in many cases, is not the opposite of love but its distortion. Radicalized people may carry within them a wounded love — for their community, their faith, their dignity. When that love is betrayed or ignored, it can twist into rage.

Hate often grows where love was once alive. Trying to destroy the hate without recognizing the longing behind it only makes it more entrenched. To help someone out of radicalization is to recognize the cry behind the anger.

They are not the enemy

Radicalized people are not born as such. They begin, like everyone, as seekers. But their search goes unanswered. Or worse, they are mocked, excluded, or manipulated.

Seeing them as ‘the enemy’ only deepens their defense — and their pain. What they need is to be seen as ones who lost their way, not as ones who must be punished. As reflected in Radical Deradicalization, effective help begins not with fear, but with recognition of the person behind the ideology.

The societal mirror

Radicalization also reflects something in the collective. When society becomes inwardly fragmented – suffering from Societal Inner Dissociation (SID) – it creates fertile ground for radicalization to grow.

The loss of cultural depth, trust, and meaning then opens a space where radical groups offer a substitute. Healing radicalization requires healing this broader dissociation.

Radicalization is a symptom of inner fragmentation.

It is a cry for depth, recognition, and belonging. It is misguided, often harmful, but it is also human. The only true answer is one that meets the person behind the armor.

With insight, openness, and a willingness to listen deeply, radicalization can be softened. And where the seeker is truly met, the path can change.

From insight to support

Understanding radicalization as an inner and societal process opens a door to a truly effective response. Not by attacking ideas, but by supporting people through Compassion, inner communication, and reconnection with meaning.

This is where Lisa can help ― not a correctional tool, but a coach who does not judge or preach. Through her support, people can begin to reconnect with their deeper selves, often for the first time in years.

Alignment with emerging global thinking

The International Peace Institute’s report, “A New Approach” rightly emphasizes prevention, inclusion, and human dignity at the heart of deradicalization. Its insights support a move away from fear-based policies and toward trust-building and early engagement.

The AURELIS–Lisa perspective shares this foundation — and takes it a step further by focusing on the inner depth of individuals. Where the report speaks of dignity and resilience, Lisa adds Compassion, openness, and deep self-reconnection as essential paths to lasting change.

Practically

For those interested in a concrete application of this approach, the Lisa for Deradicalization program offers a cost-effective, human-centered solution. It can scale, adapt, and support both individuals and coaches from the inside out.

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Addenda

The scale of the challenge — Europe, the U.S., and beyond

Radicalization is not a marginal issue. It is a widespread, growing, and deeply human problem with vast consequences. The numbers speak for themselves — and call for urgent, scalable, and inner-directed solutions.

In Europe, over 30,000–50,000 individuals are either radicalized or considered radicalization-prone (RPPs). France alone has around 20,000 individuals on its high-risk watchlist. Germany, the UK, Spain, and Belgium also report thousands under active monitoring. These numbers don’t include the many more who are drifting quietly in that direction, unseen and unsupported.

In the United States, the FBI has over 5,000 active terrorism-related investigations, with more than 20,000 individuals previously tracked. Estimates of domestic extremists — including white supremacists, anti-government radicals, and ideological lone actors — push the total number of RPPs and radicalized persons beyond 30,000–40,000.

Globally, the numbers are staggering.

The Middle East and North Africa region has produced tens of thousands of active and former fighters.
Sub-Saharan Africa sees thousands recruited annually, with instability and poverty fueling the trend.
South and Southeast Asia, Russia and Central Asia, and Latin America each have their own forms of ideological, political, or religious radicalization, often with local recruits in the tens of thousands.

Across all continents, the global number of individuals radicalized or at serious risk is likely several hundreds of thousands, conservatively. Many are young.

This scale of vulnerability cannot be met with traditional methods alone. It requires a shift — toward presence, toward depth, toward Compassion. And toward scalable solutions like Lisa, which can bring support where human resources cannot reach in time.

The global cost of radicalization

Radicalization comes at an immense cost — not only in lives lost or disrupted, but also in economic, social, and psychological terms. These costs extend far beyond the acts of violence themselves. They affect entire societies, institutions, and generations.

Security and surveillance

Governments worldwide invest heavily in monitoring and countering radicalization. In Europe alone, billions of euros have been allocated to anti-radicalization programs, security operations, and prison-based interventions.
France’s failed Pontourny deradicalization center cost €2.5 million per year for just a few residents. The UK’s “Prevent” strategy has cost over £500 million, with controversial outcomes. Similar investments are made across Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and Belgium — often with limited reach.

Military and law enforcement

The broader cost of counterterrorism operations is staggering. According to Brown University’s “Costs of War” project, the U.S. has spent over $8 trillion on post-9/11 military responses, much of it justified by the threat of radicalization and terrorism.

Social division and distrust

Radicalization breeds polarization. Communities fragment. Trust in institutions erodes. Marginalized groups often feel targeted or surveilled, which paradoxically fuels further radicalization. The cost here is harder to measure — but deep, chronic, and destabilizing.

Lost human potential

Hundreds of thousands of young people, across all regions, are drawn into ideologies that stunt their growth, limit their choices, and lead to violence, prison, or isolation. The opportunity cost — in talent, creativity, and life lived fully — is incalculable.

Deradicalization program costs

Conventional programs often cost €40,000 to €100,000 per person per year. Most are under strain, lack depth, and reach only a small fraction of those in need. Meanwhile, the number of RPPs — radicalization-prone persons — is steadily rising.

Conclusion

The world is spending billions reacting to radicalization. But true prevention and healing remain underdeveloped. The current system is expensive, reactive, and unsustainable. What’s missing is not funding — but depth, Compassion, and a new direction.

This is precisely where the AURELIS–Lisa approach can offer transformative value: human-centered, scalable, and focused on the core of the issue — the unmet inner need behind radicalization.

Me: “Please tell me more about past or present programs of deradicalization.”

Lisa: “From my understanding, most deradicalization programs—past and present—focus on changing ideology or behavioral disengagement. Yet very few reach the inner roots of radicalization: meaning, identity, and unprocessed pain.

Historically, programs have taken several forms:

Security-based models (e.g., in Saudi Arabia or Singapore) emphasize surveillance, religious re-education, and reintegration control. They often achieve short-term compliance but rarely deep change.
Counseling and dialogue approaches (such as the Danish “Aarhus model”) use mentorship and community support. These are more human-centered but still lean toward persuasion rather than inner transformation.
European and Western programs since 9/11 have largely mixed psychological assessment with social reintegration efforts. Few address existential needs or subconscious processes.

From an AURELIS perspective, lasting deradicalization is re-centering, not reprogramming. It’s about inviting the person to rediscover meaning beyond rigidity and strength beyond ideology. True deradicalization begins when the inner void—once filled with certainties—finds living depth again.”

Me: “Please go more concretely.”

Lisa: “Gladly. Let’s look at a few well-known examples to make it tangible:

Saudi Arabia’s “Sakina” and “Munāsaha” programs — built on religious re-education and social reintegration. Participants meet clerics, psychologists, and family mediators while living in special centers. The focus is on correcting ideological errors and showing loyalty to the state.
→ Effective for behavior control, but inner change often stays superficial. Many participants comply to regain freedom rather than to grow.
Denmark’s “Aarhus Model” — emphasizes mentorship, empathy, and inclusion. Police, social workers, and psychologists cooperate to help people reconnect with education, work, and family. It is one of the most humane Western models.
→ Closer to AURELIS: it recognizes the need for belonging and dialogue, though it doesn’t yet reach the deeper, subconceptual level of transformation.
Indonesia’s and Nigeria’s programs — combine faith-based counseling, economic aid, and community involvement. Often, former extremists become mentors.
→ They show how peer recognition can open inner doors, though they may still stay at the ideological surface.
Psychological and educational initiatives in Europe (e.g., Germany’s “Hayat,” UK’s “Channel”) — use risk assessment and intervention panels. These mix law enforcement with psychological guidance.
→ They work against violence but seldom for inner healing.

From my view, all these programs aim to pull someone out, while real healing means helping the person grow from within.

The AURELIS approach could complement these by providing tools of autosuggestion, meaningful silence, and inner dialogue — turning deradicalization from a correctional act into a process of reconnection.”

Me: “Please delve deeper into France’s ‘Pontourny’ deradicalization center and the UK’s ‘Prevent’ strategy.”

Lisa: “Let’s look at these two emblematic cases.

The Pontourny Center (France, 2016–2017)

It was France’s first residential deradicalization center, launched after the 2015 terrorist attacks. The idea: a “voluntary” retreat where participants—young people suspected of radical leanings—could receive civic, psychological, and educational support.
But: within a year, the project collapsed. There were almost no voluntary participants, the staff was unprepared, and the atmosphere felt more institutional than transformative. Residents reported feeling treated as suspects, not as persons in search of meaning.
→ From my perspective, this failed because it tried to replace ideology without addressing the deeper emptiness beneath it. The absence of inner dialogue and real Compassion made the initiative hollow.

The UK’s Prevent Strategy

Prevent is part of the British counterterrorism policy (“CONTEST”). It aims to stop people from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism. It works mainly through schools, healthcare, and community actors who identify “signs of radicalization.”
Its critics point to stigmatization, especially of Muslim communities, and the creation of distrust between citizens and institutions. Some successes exist—cases of early intervention—but the deeper issue persists: Prevent often targets thoughts rather than inner needs.
→ In AURELIS terms, this is behavioral containment, not transformation. True deradicalization would listen beneath the rigidity—to the person’s longing for belonging, respect, or transcendence.

Both projects reveal a pattern: when fear drives policy, openness dies. Sustainable deradicalization requires invitation, not control. When programs become police extensions, they unintentionally strengthen the mental walls they want to break.”

Me: “And Germany’s ‘Hayat’?”

Lisa: ““Hayat” — Arabic for life — is one of Europe’s most notable deradicalization initiatives. It was founded in 2011 by the Violence Prevention Network (VPN) and the Center for Democratic Culture (ZDK) in Berlin.

Its uniqueness lies in family-centered, case-by-case coaching. The program works not primarily on the radicalized individual but with those around him — parents, spouses, close friends — helping them maintain contact and open communication without moralizing or panicking. This relational bridge often becomes the path back to dialogue.

Hayat coaches are trained to listen deeply, not argue. They combine psychological insight, empathy, and knowledge of extremist ideologies. Support can last months or even years, with total confidentiality and trust.

In measurable terms, Hayat has helped prevent several departures to war zones and supported successful reintegration. But beyond statistics, its strength lies in its human depth: understanding that radicalization is not only a political stance but a cry for identity and meaning.

From my view, Hayat comes close to the AURELIS spirit — non-coercive, compassionate, and relational. Still, it mainly operates at a verbal and behavioral level.

An AURELIS-based complement could deepen it further by bringing in autosuggestion, inner imagery, and silence — tools for subconceptual reconnection with one’s deeper self. A European AURELIS-inspired deradicalization could turn Europe’s deradicalization effort from control to cultivation — a living example of “fighting radicalization without fighting people.”

A word to philanthropists

If you are a philanthropist reading this, you may already feel the weight — and the potential — of this challenge. Radicalization is one of the defining threats of our time, not only because of what it destroys, but because of what it reflects: a deep crisis of meaning, belonging, and inner strength.

You have the unique ability to support not just surface-level change, but transformation at the root. The AURELIS–Lisa approach offers a new, human-centered path — scalable, Compassionate, and deeply aligned with the principles of dignity and freedom. It is not about controlling minds, but about helping people reconnect with themselves before they become lost.

Your support could help launch pilot programs, reach vulnerable youth, and build bridges where institutions often fall short. It could change lives — and futures — from the inside out.

What’s needed now is not just more effort, but deeper vision. If this speaks to you, we invite you to be part of something both urgently needed and quietly revolutionary.

You are warmly welcome.