Intra- and interreligious dialogue in Flemish (Belgian) secondary education as a tool to prevent radicalisation

The attacks in Paris (2015) and Brussels (2016) led to the Action Plan Radicalisation wherein the Islamic Religious teachers are expected to contribute actively to the de-radicalisation processes and counter discourse. To this end, Flemish teacher training university colleges established new ‘Islamic religious education’ (IRE) teacher training programs at a breakneck speed. Additionally, the Minister of Education made interconvictional dialogue lessons mandatory in compulsory education. These lessons aim to stimulate, strengthen and reinforce the dialogue between pupils of different belief system backgrounds. Thus, the interconvinctional competences are seen as a means to prevent radicalisation and polarisation. This article draws an overview of IRE devel-opment since 2015 until now regarding the policy incentives concerning the Flemish IRE, taking into account the separation of Church and State principle. Furthermore, we scrutinize the existing IRE teacher training curricula in regards to the formulated interconvictional competence ele-ments, as these are seen as one of the remedies for radicalisation and polarisation. We observe a clear relationship between the dramatic events and the implementation of new Islamic religious education programs and partnerships. An increasing number of ‘interconvictional’ references is observed in the Islam-related courses included in the IRE teacher training programs. Further in-depth field research is needed to map the IRE teaching practices and experiences regarding the expectations formulated by the policy makers.