Retaliation in Rebellion: The Missing Link to Explaining Insurgent Violence in Dagestan

This article posits that the remnants of archaic sociocultural norms, particularly the honour-imposed custom of retaliation, play a crucial role in the process of insurgent engagement in Russia's autonomous republic of Dagestan. Through a series of interviews with former insurgents, this study outlines two retaliation-centred mechanisms: “individual retaliation” and “spiritual retaliation” in order to explain the microcosm of motives behind insurgent activity in Dagestan. In doing so, this study problematizes the role of Salafi/Jihadist ideology as the main impetus for insurgent violence. Reversing the traditional causal link between violence and religion, this study also demonstrates that the development of Jihadist ideology is a by-product of insurgent mobilization rather than its cause.     

The Increasing Role of Religion in State Failure: 1960 to 2004

This study examines the extent of religious conflict between 1960 and 2004 in the context of all domestic conflicts in that era based on data from the State Failure dataset. The findings show that until 2002 religious conflicts were a minority of all conflicts, but from 2002 to 2004 they were a majority of all conflicts. This study also examines the extent to which groups belonging to different religious traditions (i.e., Christianity, Islam, etc.) participate in conflict. The specific results on the relative participation in conflict by Christian and Muslim groups depend on the method used to measure conflict. However, no matter how conflict is measured, the results consistently show a rise in Islamic participation in conflict since the late 1970s. Also, for nearly the entire period covered by this study, the majority of religious conflicts involved Muslims. All of this supports contentions that rather than causing religion's demise, modernity has caused a resurgence of religion.     

International news as a reflection of cosmopolitan ideology: Coverage of the Ivorian crisis by CNN and the BBC

Abstract

International news discourse is often framed with ideological underpinnings. Ideology as a system of ideas or beliefs or ways of thinking not only helps, defines and explains, but also makes value judgements about that world (Croteau 2012; Van Dijk 1995). The author 's aim was to find out to what extent international news discourse reflects a cosmopolitanist ideology. The article looks at the extent to which the discourse of international news meets Tomlinson's (1999) postulation that cosmopolitanism should involve an intellectual and aesthetic stance of ‘openness’ towards people, places and different cultures – especially those from different ‘nations’. Using framing theory and critical discourse analysis as the theoretical basis for examining international news, the aim is to determine whether international news encourages or discourages a cosmopolitanist outlook during periods of political crisis. The author argues that Western media reportage on events in Ivory Coast to a large extent reflected a cosmopolitanist outlook.     

Guns,roses and democratization: Huntington's secret admirer in the Caucasus

Georgia is the most democratic country in the Caucasus, but arguably its democratization has also been riddled by Huntingtonian developmental crises, resulting in ethnic conflicts and civil wars. We argue that variation in the type of political instability is best understood by focusing on the interaction between nationalism and political institutionalization rather than on their independent effects. We show that Gamsakhurdia's “state-breaking nationalism”, coupled with political deinstitutionalization, produced separatist and centrist civil wars. When Saakashvili's “state-making nationalism” enhanced state capacity, it marginalized the opposition and rekindled frozen separatist conflicts, but stronger administrative institutions enabled the government to avert another revolutionary regime change.     

Armies of God,Armies of Men: A Global Comparison of Secular and Religious Terror Organizations

This article compares the violent activity of secular and religious terror organizations. Utilizing data compiled by the Global Terrorism Database cross-referenced with secondary and primary sources regarding the degree of religious components embedded in organizations’ ideologies, it tests the violent patterns of activity carried out by organizations guided by predominantly secular, secular/religious, and religious ideologies, between the years 1970 and 2012. The findings confirm that a) religious ideology correlates with specific, more deadly, attack tactics and violent patterns; and b) the degree of religious components within terror organizational ideology should be tested along a spectrum: the more religious an organization is, the more attacks it tends to carry out, and the deadlier its attacks become.     

The EU in the South Caucasus and the Impact of the Russia-Ukraine War

Despite hopes that it would act as a transformative tool in the South Caucasus to strengthen democracy, stability, security and regional cooperation, the Eastern Partnership (EaP) has produced limited results, with the region more fragmented today than it was five years ago. Russia’s war against Ukraine has further exacerbated the situation, raising concerns over the extent to which South Caucasus countries can genuinely rely on the West. Today, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan have different geostrategic trajectories. While Georgia has stuck to the Euro-Atlantic track, Armenia joined the Russian-led Eurasian Union in January 2015. Meanwhile Azerbaijan has the luxury of choosing not to choose. Developments in the region have demonstrated that a ‘one size fits all’ approach does not work and a more differentiated policy is required.     

Lost in Transition: The Liberal International Order in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus

Abstract

While espoused by the newly independent states after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the liberal order has not taken root in interstate relations and is now openly contested in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus. However, the challenges presented (primarily by Russia) to the international order also trigger growing contestation, in several Eastern European and South Caucasus countries, of an existing regional order premised on Russian hegemony. Therefore, the picture that emerges from these multiple contestations is not an alternative regional order, but rather overlapping orders in a fragmented region.     

From Cottage Industry to International Organisation: The Evolution of Salafi-Jihadism and the Emergence of the Al Qaeda Ideology

Al Qaeda after the invasion of Afghanistan can now be understood as not only an international terror organisation but an ideology which inspires groups with similar goals of a supranational caliphate. The Al Qaeda ideology draws from long standing historical Islamic concepts that date to the time of Muhammad. The ideologues of the organisation, most notably Ayman al Zawahiri, have cleverly used these ideas and the works of other Islamists to create not just a terror organisation but an ideology designed to unite disparate groups of Islamic radicals around the world.     

Polarization Between Occupier and Occupied in Post-Saddam Iraq: Colonial Humiliation and the Formation of Political Violence

This article analyses the mechanisms of colonial humiliation in post-Saddam Iraq. A case study of the city of Fallujah, where participant observation was carried out on two occasions, provides an account for the polarization between its population and occupation forces, which culminated in the partial destruction of the city in November 2004.     

The Logic of Terrorism: Existential Anxiety,the Search for Meaning,and Terrorist Ideologies

Drawing from the work of political theorists, theologians, anthropologists, journalists, philosophers, and contemporary psychologists studying Terror Management Theory (TMT), it becomes possible to see that the concepts of existentialism and ideology may be useful for modern thinkers attempting to understand a problem such as terrorism. Integrating work from these fields makes it possible to see that terrorism may be driven by an existential-terroristic feedback loop: a cycle in which people support or engage in terrorism to alleviate existential anxiety but ultimately find this anxiety exacerbated in the wake of the violence they create or sanction. The loop is closed when this exacerbated anxiety compels them to reaffirm their support of, or participation in, terrorist violence. If this model is valid, then effectively addressing the problem of terrorism requires joining existing U.S. policies with policies that address ideologies. Specifically, policies must aspire to a) mitigate existential anxiety, b) provide a compelling counter-narrative, c) address environmental factors conducive to radicalization, d) prevent the formation of radicalized groups, and e) deradicalize existing ideologues.     

Preparing for armageddon: Citizen militias,the patriot movement and the Oklahoma city bombing

The devastating explosion in Oklahoma City on 19 April 1995 has drawn attention to the existence of citizen militias and the Patriot movement of which they are part. Opposed to gun control and taxation and strongly influenced by claims of concealed foreign troops, concentration camps and plans to impose a New World order, Patriots are the inheritors of a radical rightist conspiratorialism dating back to the 1960s. Believing American liberties to be as threatened by Oliver North as by President Clinton, the movement is a diffuse subculture which encompasses both racist adherents of what is termed Christian Identity and more traditional Christian fundamentalists (and even includes some members of ethnic minorities). The Oklahoma bombing, it believes, was the work of forces seeking to demonize the movement but while it argues that the creation of militias is purely defensive, there is a constant danger of confrontation with the state in the rhetoric of a second American Revolution.     

后"伊斯兰国"时期恐怖意识形态蔓延:一个新的讨论框架

当前,国际联军打击“伊斯兰国”战事已进入尾声,然而,地面战场的失败并不意味着“伊斯兰国”思想的消亡。从萨拉菲-吉哈德主义极端意识形态发展脉络框架下考察,“伊斯兰国”在这一思想脉络中的独特历史地位塑造了它当前与未来的思想发展方式。国际社会需要认识到,当前反恐战争所面对的“战败者”可能并不认为自己已经失败,其意识形态过去近半个世纪危机式发展赋予了“伊斯兰国”面对失败的独特抵抗能力。“基地”组织在2011年被击溃后的历史也证明,在可预见的未来,“伊斯兰国”将很有可能继续在扩大其基本怀旧式叙事、赋予战败以合法性的同时,还将通过“全球恐怖商标”下的“特许经营”模式,将一种“暴力即思想”的恐怖思想内核进一步扩散并升级。国际社会打击“伊斯兰国”战争,可能刚刚到一个需要进行“中期评估”的时候,这场战争远未结束。     

On regional security governance once again: how analysis of the Southern Caucasus can advance the concept

Already introduced to the academic and political debate some years ago, the concept of “security governance” still needs to be clarified. In particular, four main shortcomings need to be overcome to make the concept more useful for an assessment of current security dynamics: in the first place, attention has been devoted more to “governance” than to “security”, while failing to consider the role of the understandings and perceptions of the actors involved in the governance system. Second, the literature on the actors (governmental or not) involved is still fragmented. Third, the literature on security governance has too often been detached from reflections on regionalism, while it would be useful to further explore the relationship between cognitive definitions of regional and security dynamics. Fourth, the literature has predominantly focused on Europe and the transatlantic area, overlooking processes of “region-building” in security terms in other “unexpected” geographical spaces. After proposing avenues to overcome the current gaps in the literature, the Southern Caucasus is chosen as a case study to show the different instances of security governance emerging, thanks to definitions of the region in security terms that have involved regional and external actors, of a state and non-state nature.     

Framing terror: an experimental framing effects study of the perceived threat of terrorism

An exploratory framing effects experiment was conducted to test whether three controversial news portrayals (or frames) of the terrorist threat increase subjects' perceptions of the danger. A total of 176 subjects were exposed to one of eight different article treatments. The subjects reported higher levels of perceived threat when the danger was associated with ‘radical Islamic groups’ (as compared to homegrown terrorists) and ‘nuclear’ technology (as compared to conventional weapons). Contrary to conventional wisdom, however, this study also showed that the term ‘terrorism’ itself did not affect the perceived threat. These results provide support for a theory of framing that explains the precise ways in which a particular set of communicating texts (terrorism news frames) influence human consciousness. Further theoretical details, as well as the social and political implications of this study, are discussed.     

Terrorism,violence against the public,and the media: The Australian approach

This paper examines the balance between the apparently competing objectives of government and the media in the general area of violence against the public and details the Australian model for handling issues associated with terrorism and the media. Australia's counterterrorism strategy may be considered holistic, going beyond the idea of a comprehensive capability for response to an actual public incident to include preventive measures and enhancement of the national security environment, suggesting that all elements of the society, including the media, regard security as a cooperative endeavor. These elements have been developed in the “National Anti‐Terrorist Plan” (NATP), developed by Australia's Standing Advisory Committee on Commonwealth/State Cooperation for Prevention against Violence (SAC‐PAV). For the past several years, the SAC‐PAV has been developing a basic strategic guide to provide structure for its many activities, and the committee has agreed that the NATP requires a fourfold strategy for dealing with the media: (1) public communication policies and guidelines, (2) incorporating media response and incident management strategies, (3) media training, and (4) physical controls. In addition, the SAC‐PAV has formulated a set of guidelines for the media to apply when covering terrorist incidents, indicating clearly what crisis managers and counterterrorism response organizations expect of media handling of public crises.     

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.     

Framing hostage negotiations: analysing the discourse of the US government and the Islamic State

Since August 2014, there has been a marked increase in the violence perpetrated by the Islamic State against Western hostages. Videos released by the Islamic State depicting the brutal executions of hostages have been circulated widely on social media. This has prompted a dialogue about governments’ policies regarding negotiation with terrorist organisations to secure the release of their citizens held overseas. The United States and Britain, two non-negotiating countries, have faced significant criticism for this policy, which has led to the beheadings of several American and British citizens. This article analyses the discourse of two spokesmen – White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, and British hostage John Cantlie – in framing the issue of hostage negotiations on behalf of their organisations. A grounded theory approach informed by framing analysis is utilised in order to identify dominant discourses employed in White House press briefings and John Cantlie’s videos and articles. This article concludes that, through the deliberate use of discourse, the US government and the Islamic State shape public perception of hostage negotiations in pursuit of distinct policy goals.     

American and foreign terrorists: an analysis of divergent portrayals in US newspaper coverage

American news coverage of terrorist activity consistently portrays the attacker as abnormal, but the mechanics of this othering process are entirely dependent on the nationality of the attacker in question. Coverage of domestic terrorism stresses the attacker’s personal instability and contrasts the perpetrator with his or her victims, painting the terrorist as an anomaly in American society. Foreign attackers, with whom journalists more frequently apply the terrorist label, are othered in US news media through heavy emphasis on their association with distant groups and conflicts. To explore how framing techniques differ throughout coverage of domestic and foreign terrorists, two separate corpora of articles from popular American newspapers were systematically compiled. One corpus contained articles about American attackers, while the other contained articles about foreign terrorists. The corpora were processed using both corpus linguistics software and a comparative analysis of texts. Exploring the American media’s framing choices illuminates how popular biases and perceptions of terrorist violence came to be; framing theory asserts that communicating entities inevitably shape the story they relay, influencing the reactions of those who experience the event second-hand. Not only does news coverage use distinct framing patterns for American and foreign perpetrators, but those patterns foster a populace that conceptualises American and foreign terrorists differently.     

Developing terrorism coverage: variances in news framing of the January 2015 attacks in Paris and Borno

Written news coverage of an event influences public perception and understanding of that event. Through agenda setting and news framing, journalists control the importance and substance of readers’ beliefs about the event. While existing research has been conducted on the relationship between media coverage and the geographic location of the country an event took place in, there is limited understanding of this relationship in terms of terrorist events. Utilising an agenda-setting theory and news framing theory lens to compare news coverage of the January 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, France, and Borno, Nigeria revealed significant variances in the overall coverage, headline style and discourse usage based on the event. In particular, the American news coverage positively framed France through detailed, sympathetic coverage and negatively framed Nigeria by overgeneralising and placing blame. Determining the origin and impacts of these variances is integral to forming a more comprehensive understanding of international terrorism and the most effective ways to combat it.     

The terror experts and the mainstream media: the expert nexus and its dominance in the news media

Academic writing on ‘terrorism’ and the availability to the mainstream media and policy-makers of terror ‘experts’ have increased exponentially since 11 September 2001. This paper examines the rise of terror expertise and its use in one particular public arena – the mainstream news media. Using a combination of citation analysis and media analysis, the paper presents a ranking of the most influential terror experts in the mainstream news media in the Anglophone world. It is shown how what has been called an ‘invisible college’ of experts operates as a nexus of interests connecting academia with military, intelligence and government agencies, with the security industry and the media. The paper then takes a small number of case studies of some of the most prominent experts who exemplify the dominant trend in the field and examines the networks in which they are embedded. The last part of the paper uses the data generated to re-examine theories of ‘terrorism’ and the media, of ‘propaganda’ and ‘terrorism’, and of ‘source–media’ relations. It is suggested that the study of terror experts shows the need to study and theorise the media in a wider context by focusing on the relations between media content and production processes and wider formations of power. In so doing, the paper attempts to connect studies of media and terrorism to wider studies of terror and political violence.