State terrorism research and critical terrorism studies: an assessment†

This article explores the value of scholarship on state terrorism for the critical study of terrorist violences. The article begins by identifying four primary contributions of this scholarship: first, a rethinking of the status and significance of terrorism; second, an unsettling of broader assumptions within International Relations (IR) and terrorism research; third, an ability to locate state violences within pertinent, but potentially camouflaged, contexts; and, fourth, a prioritisation of critique as a responsibility of scholarship. The article’s second section then argues that the purchase of this work could be further extended by greater conceptual engagement with the state itself. In particular, we point to the value of contemporary approaches to the state as a terrain and outcome of social and political struggle, rather than as a singular actor of unitary purpose. Rethinking the state in this way has value, we argue, first, for moving research beyond the identification and typologising of state terrorisms; and, second, for circumventing the perennial problem of identifying intentionality in efforts to designate violences as (state) terrorism.     

Cancer,HIV, and terrorism: translating public health models for prevention and control to counter-terrorism

What can cancer and HIV tell us about terrorism? How would we proceed if terrorism were a disease? A comparison of cancer and HIV can suggest alternative ways of conceptualizing terrorism and counter-terrorism using contrasting disease models that emphasize differing connections between etiology and prevention and control. A public health model also can help us think about terrorism as a basic research problem to be translated into therapeutic and preventive applications rather than primarily as a policy or political problem that makes only selective use of research studies. Through this re-conceptualization of terrorism as a basic and translational research challenge, we can draw upon the examples of the U.S. ‘War on Cancer’ and response to the ‘Aids Epidemic’ to help identify gaps in organizing academic and other resources to wage the ‘War on Terrorism.’ Recognizing and addressing these gaps could ultimately pave the way for more effective strategies in understanding and responding to the significant threats posed by terrorism, from the identification of factors that produce terrorist acts to the implementation of informed measures for the prevention and control of terrorist, and even proto-terrorist, activity.     

The Homegrown Threat: State Strength,Grievance, and Domestic Terrorism

Scholars maintain that, similar to insurgency, terrorist violence is precipitated by both relative deprivation and state weakness. Yet aggrieved minority groups within a country should turn to terrorism when they are weak relative to the state rather than strong. Empirical evidence shows minority group discrimination and fragile political institutions to independently increase domestic terror attacks. But it remains unclear whether grievances drive domestic terrorism in both strong and weak states. Using data from 172 countries between 1998 and 2007, we find that for strong states the presence of minority discrimination leads to increased domestic terrorism, while for weak states the presence of minority discrimination actually leads to less domestic terrorism. Consequently, increasing state capacity may not be a panacea for antistate violence, as nonstate actors may simply change their strategy from insurgency or guerrilla warfare to terrorism. Efforts to reduce terrorist violence must focus on reducing grievance by eliminating discriminatory policies at the same time that measures to improve state capacity are enacted.     

Six Rather Unusual Propositions about Terrorism

The costs of terrorism very often come mostly from the fear and consequent reaction (or overreaction) it characteristically inspires (qualities stoked by the terrorism industry), not from its direct effects which are usually comparatively limited. Therefore, policies designed to deal with terrorism should focus more on reducing fear and anxiety as inexpensively as possible than on objectively reducing the rather limited dangers terrorism is likely actually to pose. Doing nothing (or at least refraining from overreacting) after a terrorist attack is not necessarily unacceptable, and, despite U. S. overreaction, the campaign against terror is generally going rather well because, no matter how much they might disagree on other issues (most notably on war in Iraq), there is a compelling incentive for states to cooperate to deal with a common problem.     

Women and Support for Terrorism in Pakistan

ABSTRACT

While there have been many scholarly inquiries about the sources of support for terrorism among Muslim publics, to date, scholars have generally not asked whether or not gender predicts support for Islamist militancy. Instead, most scholars and officials assume that “men of military age” are the most important segment of interest. Instead, gender is usually treated as a “control variable” rather than a “study variable,” reflecting the paucity of interest in this subject. This is likely an important scholarly and policy-analytic oversight. Many terrorist groups have women’s wings and women-oriented publications and other outreach programs because they understand the important role that mothers, wives, and sisters play in a male family member’s decision to take up arms with a terrorist group. In some conflicts, women also join as combatants. In this paper, we seek to address these scholarly lacunae by examining gender-wise support for two militant groups based in and operating from Pakistan: the Afghan Taliban, which has no female outreach program, and the sectarian Sipha-e-Sahaba-e-Pakistan, which does. We leverage a dataset drawn from a relatively large national survey of Pakistanis collected in 2011 to model support for these groups using gender as an independent variable along with other demographic and control variables. We find that females are significantly more likely to support the sectarian group with a women’s outreach-wing. In contrast, there is no significant gender effect on support for the Afghan Taliban. We argue, from these results, that gender deserves more attention in understanding who supports and participates in Islamist militancy.     

An epistemic break from “expertise”: Misunderstanding Terrorism by Marc Sageman

ABSTRACT

Professor Marc Sageman’s latest contribution to terrorism “studies” builds on an ever-increasing critique of a field in which “expertise” is something that is largely taken for granted, rather than empirically “known”. His book Misunderstanding Terrorism seeks to refocus our attention towards what is knowable through a Bayesian analysis based on his unique access to acts of terrorism within the Western world. Key, however, is his framing of what terrorism “is”, and to that effect, this review article first assesses the work of two individuals writing on terrorism, Rafaello Pantucci and Shiraz Maher, to place Sageman’s significant book within a wider context of terrorism literature.     

On the victims of terrorism and their innocence

Contrary to common usage, neither ‘victims’ nor their ‘innocence’ are necessary to the definition of the term ‘terrorism’. Though the primary targets ‐ as distinguished from audiences ‐ of most terrorist actions are people, and if the aim of the terrorists is to sow unreasoning fear, then symbolically important non‐human targets such as unmanned power sources, unoccupied government buildings and the like may serve the same purpose. Moreover, given that ‘victims’ are chosen for the shock value their death or injury may have, their ‘innocence’ (or even ‘guilt') may be incidental or even irrelevant to the violence visited upon them. A definition of ‘terrorism’ that focuses, generically, on its targets rather than on their qualities offers a more normatively neutral approach to the problem.     

Terrorism Research: The Record

Looking back at the beginnings of academic research on terrorism just over 40 years ago, it is extraordinary to see that what was once a marginal subject for social science has developed into a full-fledged program of “terrorism studies.” In fact, recently a sociologist considered the subject of sufficient importance to write a doctoral dissertation and then a book on the “social construction” of the field (Stampnitzky 2013). This essay highlights some examples of the contributions scholars from different disciplines have made to understanding terrorism. There is no consensus on any general theoretical laws of terrorism (there is no equivalent of a democratic peace theory, for example), but researchers have defined key concepts and deepened explanations of cause, effect, and process.What follows identifies four interrelated areas of explanatory inquiry into terrorism that have emerged over years of research: the effectiveness of terrorism as a strategy of opposition, the determinants and consequences of counterterrorism policies, how campaigns or waves of terrorism end, and how analysis of terrorism can be situated in a broader theoretical framework rather than treated as a phenomenon sui generis. Particular emphasis is placed on studies that are comparative and/or that situate the specific case of terrorism in a general theoretical perspective.     

Female suicide bombers – Male suicide bombing? looking for Gender in reporting the suicide bombings of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict

The primary aim of this article is to bring together questions of both the gender representation (notions of femininity and masculinity) and the gender order (existing social relations and power structures) of Palestinian suicide bombing, and thereby to offer a rather unusual perspective on a sensitive topic within what is generally an overanalysed conflict. It is based on the way female suicide bombers have been represented in the media in the first half of 2002, supplemented by publications in 2003 and January 2004. Print and online articles constitute the main basis of interpretation that aims to bring gender as an analytical tool into the continuing debate on suicide bombing.     

Was Idi Amin's Government a Terrorist Regime?

What does state terrorism look like? How do we distinguish it from other forms of mass state violence, such as repression or genocide? Based on the developing literature on state terrorism, this study presents three expectations that violence perpetrated by the state should meet if it is to be classified as state terrorism: these are (a) that the violence is perpetrated by agents of the state, (b) that the violence is visible, and (c) that state terrorism focused against a state's own citizens will be carried out by an autocratic, personalistic regime. Drawing substantially on a series of primary sources, this study demonstrates that Idi Amin's regime in Uganda from 1971 to 1979 did engage in state terrorism against its own citizens.     

Defining international terrorism: A pragmatic approach

One of the fundamental problems in addressing the phenomenon of international terrorism is that despite a plethora of scholarly work and more than thirty years of inter‐governmental discourse there is still no commonly accepted definition of international terrorism. Existing definitions tend to fall into two broad categories academic and political. Contemporary academic definitions of international terrorism are primarily designed to fit incidents into various statistical models. They are often lengthy, over‐complicated and defy common usage. Governmental definitions of international terrorism tend to be ambiguous to allow the most politically convenient interpretation of events. This paper takes a pragmatic look at the ongoing definitional dilemma in the study of international terrorism. Drawing upon both sides of the definitional spectrum, it charts a middle course arguing for a more lucid and functional definition of terrorism based on primary characteristics which distinguish international terrorism from other types of violence.     

What's Special about Female Suicide Terrorism?

This study analyzes the interaction between the motivations of individual attackers and terrorist group strategies. To do so, I combine a quantitative analysis of all known suicide terrorist attacks between 1981 and July 2008 with a strategic account of why terrorist organizations employ female suicide terrorism (fst) and case studies of individual female attackers. I advance five central claims. First, I reveal the superior effectiveness of fst from the perspective of the groups that employ women. Second, I explain that terrorist groups increasingly enlist women as suicide attackers because of their higher effectiveness. Third, I demonstrate that terrorist groups adapt their discourse, catering to the specific individual motives of potential female suicide attackers in order to recruit them. Fourth, I show that female attackers are driven by the same general motives and circumstances that drive men. Furthermore, and in contrast to the existing literature, women attackers uphold, rather than eschew, their societies' norms for gender behavior. Attempts to transform these societies into gender-neutral polities are therefore destined to increase fst. Finally, I conclude that, unless target states adapt their defensive strategies, we should expect an increase in fst.     

FIGHTING FOR GOD: MOTIVATIONS AND AIMS OF RELIGIOUS TERRORISTS

This research note focuses on the spread of terrorism publications from 1988 to 1995 compared to their frequency of appearance from 1996 to 1998. It also identifies the core journals of this research field.     

Terrorism as Cancer: How to Combat an Incurable Disease

ABSTRACT

This paper provides an alternative framework that conceptualizes the threat posed by terrorism based on an epidemiological approach that views it as a chronic disease like cancer rather than as a military, ideological, or socio-economic problem. After highlighting the similarities in the causes, behavior, treatments, and challenges of combating terrorism and cancer, this paper presents a staging system policymakers can use to educate the public and allocate counterterrorism resources more efficiently. This approach encourages policymakers to see terrorism for what it is (an all but inevitable facet of modern life that can be managed but never fully eliminated), and not what they wish terrorism to be (a national security problem that can be solved, defeated, or vanquished). It provides policymakers with a useful model to conceptualize the threat and treat terrorism in a comprehensive manner, from preventing future attacks to effectively responding to them when they will inevitably occur.     

Restorative justice in the aftermath of politically-motivated violence: the Basque experience

ABSTRACT

An emerging body of literature discusses how restorative justice can contribute to the response to terrorism. This paper expresses concerns about the uncritical acceptance of many orthodox assumptions about terrorism inherent in the search for a “restorative response” to terrorism. When restorative justice embraces the label “terrorism” in what appears to be a politically neutral sense, rather than opening up a critical discussion of realities of political violence and the factors that had propelled it, it may form part of the efforts designed to inculcate “truths” that help control political dissent. With its key aspiration being to restore a presumed healthy order disrupted by terrorist offences, restorative justice may be enlisted to help entrench social relations that led to the violence in the first place. The paper illustrates this danger by examining attempts to use restorative justice techniques by Spanish authorities in the aftermath of ETA or Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (“Basque Homeland and Freedom”) violence. It is argued that rather than searching for a “restorative response” to terrorism, a more adequate framework for restorative justice in the aftermath of politically motivated violence may be found within broader projects of reparation for historical injustices, remembering and political reconciliation.     

The Four Horsemen of Terrorism: It's Not Waves,It's Strains

David Rapoport's concept of Four Waves of terrorism, from Anarchist terrorism in the 1880s, through Nationalist and Marxist waves in the early and mid-twentieth century, to the present Religious Wave, is one of the most influential concepts in terrorism studies. However, this article argues that thinking about different types of terrorism as strains rather than waves better reflects both the empirical reality and the idea that terrorists learn from and emulate each other. Whereas the notion of waves suggests distinct iterations of terrorist violence driven by successive broad historical trends, the concept of strains and contagion emphasizes how terrorist groups draw on both contemporary and historical lessons in the development of their tactics, strategies, and goals. The authors identify four distinct strains in total—Socialist, Nationalist, Religious, and Exclusionist—and contend that it is possible to trace each strain back to a “patient zero” active in the 1850s.     

Terrorists,scholars and ordinary people: confronting terrorism studies with field experiences

Fieldwork in the study of terrorism remains the exception, allowing for scores of publications to be produced each year with little or no contact with the perpetrators of terrorist violence and scarce direct observation of the social realities in which it occurs. While examining some of the serious drawbacks and pitfalls such research can entail, this article makes a case for more fieldwork in terrorism studies, arguing that it can bring greater depth to our understanding of terrorist violence. The discussion focuses on a common assumption – the existence of the ‘terrorist’ as subject – and a common practice of terrorism studies – the concentration on extraordinary events at the expense of ‘ordinary life’ and ‘ordinary people’ – and how they are called into question by the material gathered during field research conducted in the Southern Philippine region of Mindanao. The article concludes with a reflection on some of the challenges facing researchers in danger zones, from their dependence on local knowledge for security to the need for methodological flexibility when faced with the complexity of research in conflict areas.     

Understanding the media/terrorism relationship: An analysis of ideology and the news in time magazine

Conservative terrorism scholars have made the claim that the media have become a propaganda tool for terrorists and sympathetically portray terrorist activities. This article provides quantitative and qualitative data from Time magazine in 1986 suggesting that this view is mistaken. News production is treated as a social process that both informs and obscures, rather than as a neutral process that simply provides ‘objective’ facts. The results of the investigation reveal seven ways in which ideology is manifested in the terrorism news: semantics, language, headlines, social and historical context, treatment of objectives, trivialization, and amplification of violence. The ideological uniformity and lack of diversity apparent in terrorism news suggests that this kind of treatment results in a lack of understanding of the media/terrorism relationship and serves to support conservative views about the nature of terrorism and appropriate responses to it.     

Flesh and steel: antithetical figures in the war on terrorism

The ongoing conflict in the war on terrorism puts two emblematic modes of violence into sharp relief: the drone, as an ostensibly rational, clinical and measured weapon of war, and suicide bombings, frequently portrayed as the horrid deeds of fanatics. In this article, I seek to challenge this juxtaposition and instead suggest that both modalities of killing are part of the same technologically-mediated ecology of violence. To do this, I examine the material-semiotic assemblage of the drone and of the suicide bomber, paying attention to the technological production of each mode of violence, as well as the narratives that render each figure intelligible in the war on terrorism. I argue that the strongly divergent narratives found in Western discourse serve as a politically expedient sense–making device, whereby suicide bombing is pathologised, thereby justifying ever more intrusive violent acts with seemingly rational technologies like the drone. Rather than “solving” the problem of terrorism, this creates counter-productive, or iatrogenic, effects, in which technological mediation escalates rather than diminishes cycles of violence. By way of response, I suggest that a better understanding of the relational nature of violence in the war on terrorism might be gained by reading the two not as antithetical figures, but instead as operating in the same technological key.