The US National Strategy on Countering Domestic Terrorism as a Model for the EU

The United States National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism is built on a comprehensive threat assessment of domestic terrorism as ordered by President Biden, and prioritises far-right extremism. Although the conceptualisation contains certain flaws, the strategy acknowledges this rising threat in a comprehensive and evidence-based assessment.

In this Policy Brief, we highlight the US Strategy as a blueprint for improving the EU counter-terrorism model and identify four shared areas in these frameworks: 1) Information gathering, 2) Prevention, 3) Enforcement, and 4) Building resilience. We recommend that the US and EU could mutually learn from one another’s approaches on issues such as multi-agency cooperation, regulation of technology companies, and countering dis/misinformation. Both the US and the EU counter-terrorism agendas should furthermore apply a gender lens throughout their respective strategies in order to ensure more nuanced and accurate programming.