Introduction

In January and November 2015, Paris was shaken by a series of coordinated bombing attacks. In 2016, Brussels experienced a similar fate. In the aftermath of these terrible events, new collaborations and partnerships were forged. On 17 March 2015, the ‘Paris Declaration’ was launched: a call for action, at all levels, to strengthen the role of education in ‘promoting citizenship and the common values of freedom, tolerance and non-discrimination, strengthening social cohesion, and helping young people become responsible, open-minded and active members of our diverse and inclusive society’. In 2015, the Council of Europe described radicalisation as ‘an individual or collective recruitment into violent extremism or terrorism’. In a similar vein, the Council of Europe also launched a new initiative titled ‘Democratic Schools: Safe Spaces for All’, which aims to assist education professionals and school communities as a whole. The main idea of both initiatives is to contribute to an open, inclusive and safe environment in education across member states. In 2018, a Council of Europe report posed the following questions regarding education policy: do counter-terrorism policies give rise to contradictory demands on educators, asking them to build social cohesion and resilience while at the same time requiring them to employ a logic of suspicion in spotting potential radicals, i.e. towards their Muslim pupils? Could national policies designed to identify and prevent radicalisation inadvertently undermine the very social cohesion they aim to preserve (Ragazzi 2018)? Ragazzi reports that counter-radicalisation policies might come into conflict with some key principles promoted by the Council of Europe including: education is a transformative process; schools should be safe and free learning environments; education should be based on diversity; and teachers are seen as role models (Ragazzi 2018: 11).

In Belgium an Action Plan for the Prevention of Radicalisation Leading to Extremism and Terrorism (hereafter ‘Action Plan Radicalisation’) was launched on 3 April 2015 by the Flemish government (Vlaamse Regering (hereafter Vl. Reg.) 2015). This Action Plan Radicalisation set out a strategic framework which included eleven domains of action. The document did not include a definition of the concepts of radicalisation, extremism or terrorism.