"Why Is It so Easy to Seduce Us?" Young Female Students' Narratives of Extremist Online Recruitment

Abstract

The article analyzes the rhetoric of third-year female students of Chechen State University related to the online recruitment of women into extremist organizations. The author analyzes the attitudes of the young women, the levels of their fear/anxiety about online recruitment, and documents the main discourses and rhetoric regarding female departures to Syria and Iraq. Focus groups showed that the rhetoric of unreasonableness is the dominant way that female departures to the Middle East are perceived. "Weak" and "easily manipulatable", women who are "crushed by housework and domestic violence" are contrasted to "experienced and smart" manipulators-recruiters who pull them into terrorist networks. Given that the problem of radicalization in Chechnya remains acute, the author advocates for greater contributions from gender psychologists and discourse analysis professionals to research the phenomenon of female online recruitment in the North Caucasus context.