PREVENT Policing in Practice—The Need for Evidenced-Based Research

This article examines the PREVENT agenda, part of the UK government’s counter-terrorism strategy, CONTEST. Informed by semi-structured interviews conducted with a Special Branch PREVENT team, as well as individuals drawn from various security disciplines, this article highlights several practical barriers to realizing collaborative counter-radicalization. This is important given the third objective of PREVENT: to work with a wide range of institutions where there are risks of radicalization. This article departs from analyses that have examined PREVENT in the context of suspect profiling; rather, the focus is on illuminating the implementation, (re)configuration and performance of PREVENT policing. The article concludes by advocating the necessity for evidence-based research—this proffers pragmatic implications for the governance of counter-terrorism.