Explaining Extreme Belief and Behavior: Theoretical, Methodological, and Ethical Challenges - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0197768881 ISBN 13: 9780197768884

Publisher: OUP USA, 2026

Synopsis

Written by global, multidisciplinary experts, Explaining Extreme Belief and Behavior moves beyond definitions of the phenomena of conspiracy theorizing, extremism, fanaticism, fundamentalism, and terrorism and shifts into how we can explain these extreme beliefs and behaviors. The first part of the book examines various fundamental theoretical and contextual issues such as the relationship between understanding and explaining extremism, challenges in explaining extreme beliefs, and pitfalls of current approaches. The second part delves into related methodological issues, including the desiderata for viable explanations--qualitative and quantitative data, macro-, meso-, and microlevels of analysis, first- and third-person accounts, attitudes and behaviors, or beliefs and actions. The third part explores related empirical issues and challenges--how we conceive and integrate insights into such related phenomena as the turn to extremism in particular contexts, the rise of extremist movements, and radicalization. This volume builds upon the first two in the Extreme Belief and Behavior Series by studying the very project of explaining extreme belief and behavior.

About this title

About the Author

Rik Peels holds a university research chair in analytic and interdisciplinary philosophy of religion in the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands. He is also a senior research associate at the African Centre for Epistemology and Philosophy of Science at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa. His research interests are the ethics of belief, ignorance, scientism, replication in the humanities, and the philosophy and theology of fundamentalism and extremism. He leads the Extreme Beliefs research group (<a href="http://www.extrembeliefs.com">www.extremebeliefs.com </a>) and is one of the principal investigators of the Adapt Academy, which studies how societies can better adapt to crises.


Lorne L. Dawson is a distinguished professor emeritus in the Department of Religious Studies and the Department of Sociology and Legal Studies at the University of Waterloo (Canada). He has published three books, five edited books, and ninety-seven academic articles and book chapters. He was the co-founder and codirector of the Canadian Network for Research on Terrorism, Security and Society (2012-2023), and his recent research has focused on such topics as foreign fighters, the role of religion in motivating religious terrorism, and aspects of the social ecology of radicalization.

Edition details

• Publisher: OUP USA
• Publication date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0197768881
• ISBN 13: 9780197768884
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 424
• Editor: Peels Rik, Dawson Lorne L.