Violence and Exiting Violence Platform

Understanding and overcoming contemporary violence

Violence in all its forms has always been an object of study in the humanities and social sciences, but emergence from violence has not, despite the abundance of the literature. Both of these phenomena, which are distinct and yet tightly linked, are given a fresh look under the Violence and Exiting Violence platform.

The platform connects and places in perspective the various stages of violence, from entry (radicalization, arming, training, first violent action, etc.) to exit (transitional justice, demobilization, memory, traumatism, prevention, etc.), as well as its metamorphoses (mafia, organized crime, digital radicalization, etc.).

The platform consists of the Observatory of Radicalization and the Observatory of Exiting Violence. It connects some 300 researchers in an international and pluridisciplinary perspective.

The projects undertaken produce analyses for an academic readership and reports addressed to politicians, civil society stakeholders, the media and the general public, in order to link knowledge production more closely to action.

Michel Wieviorka is the General Director of this Platform, and Jean-Pierre Dozon is its Scientific Director. The Platform is coordinated by Estelle Lorans.

Observatory on Radicalisation

The Observatory of Radicalization studies the drivers of radicalization and extreme violence in various contexts (in Latin America, Africa and Asia), in their various forms and in their political and religious aspects, in order to make an eminently complex phenomenon intelligible without reducing it to radical Islamism.

International Observatory on Exiting Violence

The International Observatory of Exiting Violence seeks to structure a new field of research to produce both empirical and theoretical knowledge and to take a firmly comparative approach to studies and reports that are too often mismatched. It is also intended to host internationally recognized foreign scholars in order to set up a network and strengthen academic cooperation through research agreements.

Research Activities

Seminar: Violence and Exiting Violence

The annual seminar Violence and Exiting Violence, led by Michel Wieviorka, Jean-Pierre Dozon, Farhad Khosrokhavar and Yvon Le Bot, brings together every year 15-odd researchers working on topics relating to entry and emergence from violence.

ANR SoV - Sortir de la violence

The SoV - Exiting Violence ANR is part of the Challenge 9 "Freedom and security of Europe and its residents" and in Axis 3 "Safety of individuals and collectives; fight against crime, terrorism and violent radicalization ". The project starts from the work on radicalization and extreme violence to lead to the analysis of the exit and the prevention of violence. Comparative and transversal perspective considers several terrains in Latin America (Colombia, Mexico), Africa (Côte d'Ivoire), the Near and Middle East (Lebanon, Syria, Iraq) and Europe (Toulouse region, Spanish Basque country) .

Social and political impact of terrorist attacks in France

The Open Society Foundations commissioned a study on the social and political impact of terrorist attacks in France. With a duration of one and a half years from July 2017, this project is based on about fifty interviews and ethnographic surveys in several cities in France.

Violence. An International Journal

This journal aims to enhance the knowledge produced since 2015 within the Violence and Exiting Violence Platform. It aims at consolidating the analysis of violence, in its various expressions and metamorphoses, and that of the prevention and the exit of violence, to structure them in true field of research, with their contributions and their debates. Particular attention will be given to the articulation of research in the human and social sciences with other fields of knowledge and reflection, as well as with the artistic and literary circles.

Media Ressources

Watch the events organised by the Platform on Canal-U.

The Conversation, in collaboration with the Platform members has published a range of articles on the processes of entering and exiting violence. The last publications: