Grasping at thin air: Countering terrorist narratives online

This chapter outlines the context of online counter narrative work by showing that the online narratives have emerged as an important component of the radical Islamist toolbox. It shows that both the US and the UK have responded to online narratives with the dedicated counter narrative policies and the bureaucratic reorganisations. Briggs and Feve describes the counter narratives as the texts that aim to directly deconstruct, discredit and demystify violent extremist messaging through ideology, logic, fact or humour. US counter-radicalisation policy was formalised in 2011 with the release of two high-level policy documents by the White House. The more comprehensive of these, the Strategic Implementation Plan (SIP), links attention to the Internet specifically to its third key goal: countering violent extremist propaganda whilst promoting our ideals’. In response to the bombings, the UK government introduced a ground-breaking and controversial counter-radicalisation programme known as Prevent’.