Objectives:
Undertaking to determine scientifically substantiated conditions for the functioning of destabilising forces and methods for countering them in contemporary operations fits in the broad scope of security.

Methods:
This paper reports the results of the study that employed survey methodology to investigate the matter of destabilising forces in order to provide the contribution to the current body of literature in the field.

Results:
Recently published scientific and non-scientific studies in Polish and English on destabilising forces, despite the semantic differences, refer to a large extent to the problem of acting and combating such groups. The paper puts forward a series of conclusions and proposals with the intention of inspiring the critical evaluation and to encourage substantive polemics in the pages of specialist scientific periodicals.

Conclusions:
This material may serve as the basis for further detailed research into destabilising forces – the subject that is not only a pressing current issue, but above all a prospective area for research as part of the security sciences.