Vita

Holger Marcks is a non-resident fellow at the IFSH, where he researched from 2018 to 2020 processes of far-right and Islamist radicalization in the virtual world as part of PANDORA project. From 2013 to 2018, he was a research associate at Goethe University in Frankfurt, where he worked on a project that was dedicated to the dynamics of transnational cooperation between terrorist actors. He studied Islamic Science, Sociology and Modern History at the Free University of Berlin, where he graduated in 2011 with a thesis on Islamic economics in Germany. He is also a PhD candidate at Goethe University in Frankfurt, writing on phenomena of lone wolf terrorism and their transnational dynamics.

Research Profile | Current Projects

At the center of Holger Marcks’ academic work are processes of political violence and forms of terrorism. In this context, he studies (de)radicalizing influences in social movements from a comparative and transnational perspective. One focus is on the virtual alliances that form when organized actors’ ideologies and narratives inform individual violence. Recently of particular interest for him is how far-right and Islamist world views spread through social media and translate into violent action. Here, one focus is on lone wolves that radicalize in virtual spaces.

Selected Publications

  • Marcks, Holger, Maik Fielitz. 2020.
    Die offene Gesellschaft und ihre virtuellen Feinde. Über digitalen Faschismus.
    Berliner Debatte Initial 31 (1): 124-135.
  • Marcks, Holger. 2019.
    Radikalismus und Extremismus als konträre Rationalitäten. Eine Radikalisierung des Radikalisierungsbegriffs.
    Behemoth - A Journal on Civilisation 12 (2): 24-34. DOI: 10.6094/behemoth.2019.12.2.1024.
  • Marcks, Holger, Janusz Biene, Daniel Kaiser, Christopher Daase. 2019.
    Escalation through Cooperation: How Transnational Relations Affect Violent Resistance.
    In: Rule and Resistance Beyond the Nation State. Contestation, Escalation, Exit, edited by Felix Anderl, Christopher Daase, Nicole Deitelhoff, Victor Kempf, Jannik Pfister, Philip Wallmeier, 179-200. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield International.
  • Ahmed, Reem, Stephen Albrecht, Marc von Boemcken, Maik Fielitz, Julian Junk, Martin Kahl, Holger Marcks, Manjana Sold. 2019.
    Transnationale Sicherheitsrisiken / Manipulation und Mobilisierung im Netz.
    In: Friedensgutachten 2019, edited by Bonn International Center for Conversion, Leibniz Institut Hessische Stiftung Friedens- und Konfliktforschung, Institut für Friedensforschung und Sicherheitspolitik an der Universität Hamburg (IFSH), Institut für Entwicklung und Frieden, 137-157. Berlin: LIT.
  • Marcks, Holger. 2019.
    Who’s the Criminal? Anarchist Assassinations and the Normative Conflict about Legitimate Violence.
    In: The Transnationalisation of Criminal Law in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century. Political Crime, Police Cooperation, Security Regimes and Normative Orders, edited by Karl Härter, Tina Hannappel, Jean Conrad Tyrichter, 99-132. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann.