LONDON -- What is it that makes young Muslims in the West susceptible to radicalism? What is it about the experience of the West's rising generation of Muslims that leads a small minority to see violence as a solution to their economic and political dilemmas, and suicide as their reward and salvation?
Britain, which will soon mark the anniversary of last year's bombings in London, provides a test case for seeking answers to these questions. For young British Muslims, our globalized world challenges key beliefs, destabilizing their identity and thus encouraging a defensive response.
British citizenship, of course, guarantees freedom of expression and minority rights, and young Muslims take full advantage of this. Yet they are using this freedom to deepen family and cultural ties to the closed world of their inherited Muslim identity, particularly its politics.