There have been some strides in enhancing global security in the last five years, but existing and emergent threats still pose many challenges. This was the overall conclusion at the fifth annual Worldwide Security Conference, held earlier this week in Brussels, Belgium. I had the privilege of speaking at the conference, sponsored jointly by the EastWest Institute, a global "think and do" tank, the World Customs Organization and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (disclosure: I'm affiliated with the EastWest Institute), and of listening to the insights of an extraordinary collection of attendees from every continent who are working to solve global security challenges.
Participants at the conference, dedicated this year to the problem of countering violent extremism and radicalization, asked how well efforts to protect people, economies and infrastructure have succeeded in the last several years, and how to counter new threats. While many conclusions were drawn by speakers with wide-ranging views, there were a few issues that bubbled up repeatedly in sessions dedicated to cyber crime, illicit trade, channeling support from extremist groups, building new global architectures to counter violent religious extremism, terrorism and organized crime, and the role of the media and NGOs, among others. These included:
- The problem of language and terminology: Nearly every session contained at least a few halting moments as participants hailing from Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa, the U.S. and New Zealand realized that there is little consensus on what basic terms such as "terrorism" and "extremism" mean, and that the lack of such consensus can bring dialogue to a halt.
- The lack of national and international strategies—as opposed to simply tactics—to confront the threat of terrorism and extremism was stressed by a number of speakers.
- The challenges of international cooperation were evident. To take just one example, some speakers expressed dissatisfaction with a recent decision of the U.S. Congress to mandate 100% scanning of all containers entering U.S. ports. They suggested that this was impractical, expensive and represented unilateralism that doesn't speak well of the U.S. Others said that science, practicality and the threat of illegal cargo—whether fissile material, drugs or people—made this necessary.
- The absolute necessity of international cooperation was also made clear—every issue discussed at the conference had a cross-border component, whether it was the radicalization of youth, cyber crime or infrastructure protection.
- There did appear to be consensus that Al Qaeda and its particular ideology has grown, not diminished, in strength and sympathizers worldwide.
- There was agreement among experts on terrorism and extremism that 'religious extremism' is in large part extremism born of political and economic grievances.