Terrorism and the marxist left: Peru's struggle against Sendero Luminoso

Abstract

The political balance in Peru since the return of democratic government in 1980 has shifted to the left, and the United Left (Izquierda Unida or IU) is considered a serious contender in the 1990 elections. This paper investigates IU's prospects for success in presenting a clear alternative within the country's Marxist coalition and in undermining support for the armed revolutionary group Sendero Luminoso. The origins of IU are traced from the 1978 constituent assembly elections, and its organization, structure, and tactics are evaluated in terms of its effectiveness. If it achieves power, it will face its greatest challenge from Sendero Luminoso, the militant Maoist group that has been responsible for much of the terrorism that has gripped Peru in this decade. The authors describe Sendero's strategy and tactics and those of its chief rival, the MRTA. Finally the paper explores IU's alternatives for dealing with these radical leftist groups and the political violence they espouse.     

Peace at Daggers Drawn? Boko Haram and the State of Emergency in Nigeria

More than 3,500 people have died in Nigeria since 2009 when Boko Haram, a radical Islamist group from northeastern Nigeria, launched its violent campaign to wrest power from the Nigerian government and foist an Islamic state under the supreme law of Sharia. Attempts at negotiating with the group, including the recent amnesty offer extended to its members by the Nigerian government, have stalled due to distrust on both sides and the factionalized leadership of the group's different cells. This article provides a systematic account of Boko Haram's emergence, demands, and modus operandi. It also evaluates how the Nigerian government has responded to the group's threat and how they should respond. The socioeconomic approach of this article helps to explain the Boko Haram problem beyond a usual religious agenda and to evaluate the development of the group in the context of Nigeria's checkered political history and local economic grievances.     

State Power and Its Implications for Civil War Colombia

The following article examines the relationship between state power and civil war in Colombia. It presents three key findings. First, state weakness has provided armed groups with the political opportunity for rebellion. In this respect, most rebel consolidation takes place in areas of Colombia that lack a strong state presence. Second, the growth and evolution of Colombia's armed groups are directly related to their ability to loot exportable natural resource commodities. In stateless areas of Colombia, rebel consolidation tends to take place in areas where the drug trade is also present. Third, the conditions of civil war have led insurgent groups to mimic some of the basic functions and attributes of statehood. Colombia's conflict is more than just a manifestation of popular frustration; indeed, this article shows that civil war is also a form of state-building.     

A Basic Model Explaining Terrorist Group Organizational Structure

Terrorist groups strive to balance efficiency with their need for security. This article examines the factors that affect a group's choice of organizational structure. I classify 254 groups from the Global Terrorism Database into one of four basic structures: market, all-channel, hub-spoke, or bureaucracy. The results of a multinomial logistic regression reveal that as secret organizations, terrorist groups are not just driven by achieving efficiencies in their organization but rather by protecting against infiltration and threats. Internal factors such as target selection, operational pace, ideology, and stated goals shape a group's structure. External environmental factors such as political rights, civil liberties, polity durability, and state wealth also help shape a group's structure.     

Is Catalonia Immune to Racism? An Analysis of Intolerant Political Discourses of Mainstream Party Representatives (2010–2011)

Despite the reduced presence of the far-right in Catalonia, anti-immigrant stances and discourses have occupied a central position during political campaigns for local, autonomous, and national elections in 2010–2011. The Catalan case is based on the analysis of three case studies: the local exclusion from the census of undocumented immigrants by the city of Vic, the campaign of the People's Party candidate in Badalona containing hate speech against Roma, and the burqa bans issued by the city of Lleida. Representatives of mainstream political parties, mainly right wing, became the main exponents of intolerance in Catalonia by putting forward that cultural pluralism and diversity challenge the possibility of living together in society.     

A Deeper Look at the Relationship between Political Knowledge and Political Participation: Evidence from Presidential and Legislative Elections in Taiwan

This study examines the effects of political knowledge on various types of political participation by focusing on five recent presidential and legislative elections in Taiwan. The empirical findings indicate that political knowledge has positive effects on some types of political participation but the effects of political knowledge on different types of political participation vary by the types of electoral systems and elections. Besides, although the interviewer's assessment of the respondent's level of information has been widely used as an effective indicator of political knowledge, this study shows that the interviewers tend to rate men and partisans as politically knowledgeable, which might lead to a biased estimate of political knowledge. Overall, this study provides insight into the relationship between political knowledge and political participation in Taiwan.     

Zambia's 2001 elections: The tyranny of small decisions, 'non-decisions' and 'not decisions'

The course of the 1990s witnessed deterioration in the quality of elections held across sub-Saharan Africa. Zambia's elections for the presidency, parliament and local government held on 27 December 2001 are no exception. They returned the Movement for Multi-Party Democracy (MMD) to power, but with much reduced popular support and leaving doubts about the legitimacy of the result. A 'tyranny of small decisions', 'non-decisions' and 'not decisions' perpetrated over 12 months or more leading up to these elections combined to influence the outcome. The previous MMD government and the formally autonomous Electoral Commission were primarily but not wholly responsible. For independent analysts as well as for the political opposition, who secured a majority of parliamentary seats while narrowly failing to capture the presidency, identifying the relevant category of 'decisions' to which influences belong and comparing their impact is no straightforward matter. Zambia both illustrates the claim that 'administrative problems are typically the basis of the flawed elections' in new democracies and refines it by showing the difficulty of clearly separating the administrative and political factors. In contrast Zimbabwe's presidential election in March 2002, which had the Zambian experience to learn from, appears a more clear-cut case of deliberate political mischief by the ruling party.     

Kim Jong-il's military-first politics and beyond: Military control mechanisms and the problem of power succession

Military-first politics has been at the heart of the unexpected regime stability in North Korea under Kim Jong-il and his son Jong-un. This article analyzes Kim Jong-il’s military-first politics as a strategic choice for regime survival, in which the locus of political power switched from the party to the military. At the same time, Kim Jong-il formulated a complex system of circumventing the possibility of the armed forces' political domination, including personalistic control using sticks and carrots, fortifying security and surveillance institutions, and compartmentalizing the security institutions for intra- and inter-organizational checks and balances to prevent the emergence of organized opposition to the regime. Although an effective short-term solution, military-first politics could never be a long-term strategy for building gangseongdaeguk (a powerful and prosperous nation). The current Kim Jong-un regime needs to conduct sweeping reforms to address dire economic difficulties, which might result in a departure from his father's legacy and downgrade the military's power. In this process, the current regime's (in)stability will depend on how it maintains a balance between revoking military-first politics and preserving the armed forces' allegiance.     

In the Name of the Father? Christian Militantism in Tripura,Northern Uganda,and Ambon

Although armed groups and political violence referring to Islam have attracted increasing attention since the start of the global war against terror, one particular religion can hardly be described as the main source of inspiration of what is commonly referred to as “terrorist acts of violence.” Faith-based violence occurs in different parts of the world and its perpetrators adhere to all major world faiths including Christianity. As such, this article treats three cases of non-state armed actors that explain their actions as being motivated by Christian beliefs and aimed at the creation of a new local society that is guided by religion: the National Liberation Front of Tripura, the Lord's Resistance Army, and the Ambonese Christian militias. It analyzes the way by which they instrumentalized religion against respective backgrounds of conflict rooted in social change, the erosion of traditional identities, imbalances of power, and widening communautarian faultlines.     

“Three disconnects” and China's rural election: A case study of Hailian Village

With the case study of the local elections in a poverty-stricken, largely illiterate and isolated village in the remote and mountainous Yi minority village, this article is intended to address the so-called “three disconnects” phenomenon in the development of China's rural election. They refer to the disconnect between economic development and democratic elections, the disconnect between democratic elections and democratic consciousness, and the disconnect between direct local elections in the rural areas and the higher level elections in urban regions. The article examines the political reasons and institutional logic behind this unique development of rural democracy in China as well as the existential value of the three “disconnects.”     

Towards a new past: Some reflections on nationalism in post-socialist Slovakia

By analysing two commemorative events organized shortly before and after the 2010 parliamentary elections in Slovakia, this article demonstrates how the Prime Minister Robert Fico and his collaborators exploited these ceremonies to promote a more inclusive definition of political community than their right-wing counterparts. Although commentators have interpreted the continuous political success of the political party Smer-SD in terms of negatively connotated nationalism and national populism, Fico's discursive framework allows him to address those who have been stigmatized by post-1989 neoliberalism, especially former communists and people unable or unwilling to adapt to the rapid changes brought about by post-socialist social, economic, political as well as cultural transition(s). Instead of backwardness, Fico's anti-elitist and anti-capitalist rhetoric opened a new symbolic universe to these groups. The history narratives that formed an important part of this universe were not used to exclude the Other, but rather to create a meaningful future for those who have been ignored by (neo-)liberal ideals. This paper argues for an interpretation of post-socialist populist parties that would take into account culturally relevant symbolic structures advanced by these parties.     

“Special” Communiqué Issued by the Belgian Marxist Terrorist Group, “Communist Combatant Cells” (CCC)

This section of Studies in Conflict & Terrorism is dedicated to the reprinting of selected, translated terrorist communiqués that provide insights into the mindset, worldview, or operational thinking of a group. In terms of communiqués, this section employs the following typology of terrorist communiqués. There are three types of terrorist communiqués: attack, strategic, and special. Attack communiqués are issued to claim responsibility for an attack, explain the target selected, and provide the political rationale for attacking the target. A strategic communiqué is a longer document that is issued to provide strategic direction or commentary on political events, issues, and developments relevant to the group's cause and constituency. It can be used to explain changes of strategy or reinforce the strategic direction of the group. The special communiqué is similar to the attack communiqué in that it is event-driven but addresses non-attack events like anniversary dates, hunger strikes, elections, deaths of leaders, ceasefires, issuing threats or warnings, annual progress reports, issuing apologies, and so on. All three communiqués are issued publicly and intended to influence various audiences.     

Democratic Consolidation in Timor-Leste: Achievements,Problems and Prospects

Timor-Leste has had three rounds of major elections, all of which have been widely regarded as meeting international criteria for being free and fair. There has also been one change of government on the basis of these elections. On these grounds, some observers have suggested that Timor-Leste has met the benchmark for having consolidated its democracy. Timor-Leste can be said to meet the criteria for an expanded minimalist definition of democracy, holding regular, free and fair elections within an open competitive political environment, with relatively little violence and intimidation and general freedom of expression. This political process has, as defined by the literature, also consolidated. However, Timor-Leste continues to face future economic challenges. The literature indicates that states with high levels of poverty, unemployment and with food shortages are more prone to political instability. Given that Timor-Leste's political party system relies heavily on charismatic individuals and, apart from Fretilin, has poor party structures, loss of current political leaders will add a further destabilising effect. Expected economic problems are likely to manifest around the same time that the current generation of political leaders are no longer active. The question will be, in this increasingly challenging environment, whether Timor-Leste can sustain its democracy.     

Does the International Trafficking of Cultural Heritage Really Fuel Military Conflicts?

General media outlets are increasingly arguing that the looting of cultural heritage artifacts contributes to the funding of terrorist groups such as Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). This article reexamines this claim in light of the political science literature on internal conflicts duration. While we do know that armed conflicts contribute to an increase of looting activities in the territories at war, it is still too early to generalize the ISIS case and conclude that these activities contribute to significantly funding armed non-state actors and to prolonging internal armed conflicts. However, establishing this link may add political weight to archeologists' and art historians' efforts to curb the international trafficking of looted objects.     

Post-Cold War Vietnam: stay low,learn, adapt and try to have fun – but what about the party?†

The paper compares political ideas and acts in the Soviet Union under Gorbachev and in Communist Vietnam. It argues that the Gorbachev group, committed to progressive change, concluded that power granted to them by their position in the Soviet system needed to be eliminated, creating a ‘boot strap’ problem. To secure progressive change they had first to destroy their own power base. By contrast, the ruling Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) attempted, in the two decades after the emergence of a market economy in 1989–1991, to rule an increasingly open society through Soviet political institutions. By the late ‘noughties’ Vietnam faced a crisis of domestic sovereignty, with politics largely a matter of spoils, with policy largely irrelevant and unimplementable, and usually blocked by powerful interests. The paper argues that Hinsley's notion of the sovereignty issue makes this situation far easier to analyse. It argues that the Gorbachev group's analysis would have led to them predicting that the VCP's attempt to use Soviet institutions to rule over a globalising and increasingly open society with a market economy would lead to a crisis of political authority, and that they would have been correct. This leads to the counter-intuitive position that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was a success ? in that it managed to solve a serious political problem, i.e. how to create the preconditions for a political system suited to a market economy in a relatively open society – and the VCP a failure.     

A Crime–Terror Nexus? Thinking on Some of the Links between Terrorism and Criminality 1

Decreasing state sponsorship for terrorism in the post-9/11 environment has pressed terrorist groups to find alternative sources of financial support. Some groups have created their own “in-house” criminal capabilities, for example FARC, the LTTE, and Al Qaeda. Several analysts have argued that this “mutation” in organizational form may lead terrorist groups to ally with organized crime, whereas others have suggested that distinct organizational and ideological differences between the two will preclude cooperation. Drawing on both accounts, it is argued in this article that the degree of a terrorist group's organizational capacity and need are key predictors of the types of crime they will engage in, while ideological (political) distinctiveness will preclude fully symbiotic cooperation between terrorists and organized crime groups.     

Successful and failed democratic transitions from military rule in majority Muslim societies: the cases of Indonesia and Egypt

As majority Muslim societies with significant minorities and dominant militaries, Indonesia and Egypt experienced strikingly similar political trajectories between the early 1950s and the late 1990s. Yet, their respective democratic transitions have seen vastly different outcomes: while Indonesia solidified its democracy by extracting the military from politics, Egypt's democratic experiment ended after only two years with the return of the armed forces to the apex of government. This article highlights the reasons for this divergence. Contrary to existing scholarship that exclusively focuses on different geographical or economic circumstances, this contribution emphasises dissimilarities in the patterns of authoritarian rule, military organisation, intra-civilian conflict and international support. Conceptually, the discussion locates the Indonesian and Egyptian cases within the broader debate on civilian control in post-authoritarian states, arguing that this discourse needs to pay more attention to the creation of intra-civilian agreements on fundamental issues of governance as the best strategy to establish strong democratic oversight over the armed forces.     

Can Leviathan be Democratic? Competitive Elections, Robust Mass Politics, and State Infrastructural Power

Reconciling effective government with accountable government remains an enormous political challenge, especially in the postcolonial world. Can postcolonial states only gain infrastructural power when their rulers enjoy unencumbered despotic power? With their contradictory findings about the influence of democratic parliaments on state autonomy and capacity, the literatures on constitutional states in Western Europe and developmental states in Northeast Asia provide limited guidance on this normatively critical question. As an alternative approach, this essay proposes three causal mechanisms through which competitive national elections can incite the territorial extension of state institutions: (1) catalyzing the construction of mass ruling parties; (2) energizing state registration of marginal populations; and (3) fostering centralized intervention in local authoritarian enclaves. Evidence from Southeast Asia suggests that competitive elections will only have these infrastructural effects when accompanied by robust mass political mobilization. This has intriguing implications for how scholars understand historical patterns of state-building in the West, as well as how policymakers try to build more effective states in the most ungoverned corners of the contemporary world.     

Service-Seeking Behavior,Perceptions of Armed Actors,and Preferences Regarding Governance: Evidence from the Palestinian Territories

Armed non-state actors, such as Hezbollah and Hamas, are visibly engaged in providing social welfare in addition to participating in violence. A number of scholars have suggested that there is a relationship between service provision by terrorist organizations and support from service recipients, and have indicated that terrorist organizations use service provision strategically for this purpose. However, few studies have examined the experiences and opinions of service recipients themselves to understand if services do indeed influence populations' political loyalties and opinions regarding violent activities. Using data from more than 1,000 low to moderate income individuals in Palestine, this study seeks to understand if and how receiving services from a specific organization engenders loyalty to the organization, passive acceptance and/or favorable approval of the organizations' violent activities, and the likelihood of participation in the organization's violent activities. This paper explores if and how provision of aid and “governance” services by armed non-state actors is correlated with various aspects of individuals' experiences of conflict, such as their opinions about the use of violence and various strategies for attaining peace, their fellow community members' likelihood to join armed groups and engage in fighting, and their preferences regarding state structure and legal system.     

The Role of International Clientelism in the National Factionalism of Palestine

In this article I investigate the role of the international community's policy in the national factionalism in Palestine. I attempt to illuminate how international policy has contributed to the sustaining of internecine Palestinian violence as Fatah, which lost the elections in 2005 and 2006, has been motivated not to hand over power. In the process of selecting allies in the fight against Islamist terrorism, the epitomic undemocratic feature of Arab political culture, clientelism, has been promoted over democracy. Hamas seizing power in Gaza in 2007 probably resulted from the need to tame unruly militant groups which were sponsored by leaders of the Palestinian Fatah party, which again were supported by Western powers. To understand the national splitting in Palestine there is a need to analyse the interconnection between warlords, local clientelism and international clientelism.