Where Have All the Jihadists Gone?

Wolfram Lacher

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Issues and Conclusions

As in other Arab Spring countries, militant Islamist movements flourished in Libya in the first few years following the fall of the regime. After Muammar al‑Gaddafi’s rule ended in 2011, they were popular among many young Libyans and they benefited from an escalation in violent conflicts, which made them allies of other armed groups. But from 2016 onwards, these movements dramatically lost importance and appeal – as occurred in other regional countries at around the same time. There were obvious reasons for this: first and foremost the military defeats of militant Islamist groups and the demonisation of all Islamists by Libyan and regional media.

Nevertheless, the sudden fall of militant Islamists in Libya is puzzling. It is difficult to reconcile with the two leading explanations for jihadist mobilisation. One school of thought emphasises the role of ideological radicalisation in the spread of militant Islamist groups. It sees this radicalisation as the reason for the tenacity of such groups – a tenacity they apparently lacked in Libya. Moreover, the ques­tion arises as to why Islamist ideology suddenly lost its appeal. Another approach stresses that militant Islamists benefit from conflicts and grievances, which help them to gain followers who pursue non-ideo­logical objectives. In Libya, however, political divi­sions and armed conflicts persisted after 2016, even while militant Islamists became increasingly irrel­evant. When a third civil war erupted in 2019, it was widely expected that this would lead to a renewed mobilisation of jihadist groups. Nothing of the sort happened.

This study explores the question of how to explain the abrupt change of fortune of militant Islamists in Libya – and what it teaches us about the driving forces behind Islamist mobilisation. The approach chosen here is based on interviews with members and allies of militant Islamist groups, as well as with actors who observed these groups in their immediate social environment. Recurring patterns in these inter­views reveal three types of mechanisms at work in the rise and fall of militant Islamist movements in Libya.