Dialogue: the real solution to prevent extremism

Last night I was one of the guest speakers at the Dialogue Society's event: Prevent & Deradicalisation Default Strategy. This was a joint event held in conjunction with Islington Liberal Democrats, and the Liberal Democrats Friends of Turkey, ably chaired by
Bridget Fox, PPC for Islington South. The Dialogue Society is based in Islington and its objectives are 'to promote intercultural dialogue, greater understanding and community cohesion in the UK'. The organisation was founded by second generation British Muslims of Turkish background. The Dialogue Society's Director, Ozcan Keles presented his recently published
'Deradicalisation by Default' paper.
Jonathan Fryer , Liberal Democrat Euro candidate for London, was also on the panel, speaking on the European perspective.
It was a timely event, with the government tying itself in knots in a row with the Muslim Council of Britain, in the week it launched its new strategy to combat extremism: the Contest 2 counter-terror strategy which Ministers hope will challenge radical views that fall short of support for violence but reject and undermine "our shared values".
There is no checklist of what these views that might constitute extremism will be. Instead, the Home Office strategy document sets out a low-key commitment to challenge those who "reject parliamentary democracy, dismiss the rule of law and promote intolerance and discrimination on the basis of race, faith, ethnicity, gender or sexuality"
The failure with the governments strategy to date, despite throwing millions of pounds at local councils to spend, has been to engage with mainstream Muslims from the wide spectrum of cultures and communities, preferring to talk to the few 'chosen favourites' (or sons) who presumably will agree with everything the government says. There is no single 'Muslim community' in the UK. There are many Muslim communities, with different religious traditions, cultures and geographic roots.
So this top down approach deployed in 'engaging with Muslims' was doomed to fail.
Organisations like the Dialogue Society, are not even on the government's radar, which is a shame because it is precisely these kinds of diverse organisations that need to be engaged and heard to spread more understanding, and yes, dialogue and mutual respect, if we are to address the radicalisation of young Muslims in the UK. I said clearly last night that the governments foreign policies must also be radically overhauled, and they must take responsibility for the key role they have played in the radicalisation of a whole new generation. President Obama has already moved in this direction, and it is a radical and refreshing move.
We need a new kind of dialogue and strategy, a more mainstream approach, and not the so called four P's:
pursuing, protecting, preparing, preventing, which as Jonathan commented sounds like an SAS motto. We need to talk about more engagement and dialogue.
And as David Shariatmadari suggests in todays Guardian: time for the cultural Muslims to come out. Many of us are out and about and just getting on with our lives. I don't do halal and only go to mosque for funerals, so perhaps the silent majority who are like me simply don't count?