Week 10: Terrorism

# Week 10: Terrorism
## Definitions, again: What is terrorism?
### Danilo Freire
### 12 November 2019

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# Last week we saw that

* Leaders are often resolute in their decisions to attack civilians

* Peace-keeping operations reduce the duration and incidence of mass killings

* But they are deployed only to the worst cases

* Previous conflicts predict both mass killings and PKO deployment
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# Last week we saw that

* Recently, domestic opposition groups and international interventions have succeeded in ending genocide

* PKO used to side with the perpetrators, yet there's evidence that they only work when they support the opposition

* There's no evidence that economic sanctions work in reducing the chances of genocide outbreak or duration
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# A brief history of terrorism
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# Bruce Hoffman and William Shughart

# Uses and abuses of the term

* Most people have an idea of what it is, yet terrorism is not very precisely defined

* The confusion has gotten worse in the last decades

* "[...] virtually any especially abhorrent act of violence perceived as directed against society [...] is often labelled "terrorism"
    - religious terrorism, ecoterrorism, "corporate terrorism", etc
    
* The meaning of what is illegitimate violence has changed over time 
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# Reign of Terror

# Reign of Terror

* Widespread fear of counterrevolution

* Threats of foreign invasion from Austria and Prussia

* _Girondins_: more conservative members of the Assembly

* Restrain popular violence (lynchings were common) and concentrate power in the hands of the revolutionary government
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# The Revolutionary Tribunal

# Committee of Public Safety

# Committee of Public Safety

# Maximilien Robespierre

# Maximilien Robespierre

* Radical member of the Jacobin Club

* Advocated for universal male suffrage, the end of slavery, careers open to talent, right to bear arms

* Coined the revolutionary motto _Liberté, égalité, fraternité_

* Led the referendum that asked for the execution of King Louis XVI

* In about one year, the regime killed 16,594 people in France
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# Maximilien Robespierre

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_If the basis of popular government in peacetime is virtue, the basis of popular government during a revolution is both virtue and terror; virtue, without which terror is baneful; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror is nothing more than speedy, severe and inflexible justice; it is thus an emanation of virtue; it is less a principle in itself, than a consequence of the general principle of democracy, applied to the most pressing needs of the homeland_

Robespierre, February 1794
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# Narodnaya Volya

# Narodnaya Volya

* 19th-century revolutionary organisation established to overthrow the tsarist regime

* Promoted violent tactics, specially the assassination of government officials

* Did not target civilians
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# Death of Tsar Alexander II

# Death of Tsar Alexander II

* The group had "condemned the Tsar to death" for "betraying the Russian people"

* Increase in repression: many activists were arrested and executed

* Former members of the Narodnaya Volya helped found Russia's Socialist Revolutionary Party

* Vladimir Lenin's elder brother, Alexander Ulyanov, was a member of one incarnation of the Narodnaya Volya
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# Irish nationalists in the US

# Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa

# Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa

* Served prison time in England, later deported to the USA

* Organised the first ever bombings by Irish republicans of English cities

* The campaign lasted through the 1880s and made him infamous in Britain

* Bombs exploded in the London Underground, Westminster Palace, and the Tower of London
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# Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa

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* Different from Russian terrorists, the Irish nationalists _intentionally_ attacked civilians

* Attacks targeted crowded places and infrastructure

* They also had a _transnational base_

* Expertly conducted fund-raising campaigns
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# Young Bosnia and Narodna Obrana

# Young Bosnia and Narodna Obrana

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* Nationalist groups that wanted to create a unified Yugoslavia free from the Austro-Hungarian Empire

* Similar to the Russian terrorists, these groups targeted public officials and state representatives

* Support from several secret networks

* In June 1914, a member of the Young Bosnia, Gavrilo Princip, successfully assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria

* This event led to the outbreak of World War I
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# Gavrilo Princip

# Gavrilo Princip

# State terror in the 1930s-1940s

# Terrorism after WWII

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* Following the WWII, terrorist groups regained the revolutionary image we still associate them with

* Three terrorism waves:

* "Liberation movements" in the Third World

* "New Left"

* "Radical Islamists" 
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# Anti-colonial terrorism

# Anti-colonial terrorism

* Strong sense of nationalism

* Used violence to pressure the international community to support decolonisation

* _Largely successful_

* Motivated other groups to use terrorism to achieve political goals
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# New left terrorism

# New left terrorism

# New left terrorism

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# New left terrorism

* Marxism, Leninism, Maoism

* Political assassinations and kidnappings to advance the "anti-imperialistic struggle"

* _Largely unsuccessful_
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# Terrorism in the Middle East

# Palestine Liberation Organisation

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* The Palestine Liberation Organisation is largely considered the most significant terrorist group in the Middle East until the rise of Al Qaeda

* Founded in 1964, perpetrated several attacks against Israeli citizens in Israel and abroad

* They've also collaborated with and trained several other groups, such as Germany's RAF

* It is regarded as the main political authority in Palestine, and has observer status in the UN
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# Palestine Liberation Organisation

*  In 1993, the PLO recognized Israel's right to exist

* Composed by many small nationalist or socialist organisations
    - Fatah, Hamas, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Palestinian Liberation Front, etc
    
* Tensions between more secularist groups (e.g., Fatah) and religious ones (e.g., Hamas)

* Chairman of the PLO Executive Committee: Mahmoud Abbas
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# Palestine Liberation Organisation

# Terrorism in the Middle East

# Hassan Al-Banna

# Muslim Brotherhood

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* Created in 1924 to fight against colonial rule, Western materialism, and secularism in th Egyptian society

* Pan-Islamism: Islam to be a comprehensive system of life, with the Quran as the only acceptable constitution

* Abandoned gradualist approaches and slowly became more militarised

* Instrumental in the training of other Islamist groups

* Suffering a recent crackdown in Egypt and other countries
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# Al Qaeda

# What is terrorism, then?
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# What is terrorism?

* Robespierre, the Narodnaya Volya, both openly said that terror was their main goal

* Later, the term gained a pejorative tone and no organisation today states that they are a terrorist group
    - "Liberation Front", "Popular Liberation Army", "Resistance Movement", etc
    
* _Terrorist is our enemy_
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# Humanitarian law

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* Arafat: "_people who struggle to liberate themselves from foreign oppression and exploitation have the right to use all methods at their disposal, including force._"

* However, there is some order in war, too: humanitarian law

* Terrorists have widely disregarded those rules
    - Attack innocent civilians, torturing POWs, violate neutral territories, etc
    
* Terrorists also attack other countries that have no connection with their goals
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# Definitions

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* Alex Schmid, author of "Political Terrorism: A Research Guide", devotes _more than a hundred pages to examining more than a hundred different definitions of terrorism_

* Walter Laqueur did not even try to define terrorism in his work

* But we need a working definition of terrorism to know our object of study
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# Definitions

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* Contrast terrorism with civil war: guerrillas often control parts of the territory, openly identify themselves, and use propaganda to mobilise supporters, etc. Terrorist groups generally don't

* Contrast terrorism with ordinary criminals: purpose of violence is not the same. Criminals have selfish reasons and do not intent to cause broad consequences

* Contrast terrorism with "lunatic assassins": goals of the assassin are idiosyncratic and deeply personal. Often are apolitical
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# Definitions

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* Few characteristics:
    - ineluctably political in aims and motives;
    - violent—or, equally important, threatens violence;
    - designed to have far-reaching psychological repercussions;
    - conducted either by an organization or by individuals with a clear inspiration from the leaders; and
    - perpetrated by a subnational group or nonstate entity
    
* **Question**: do you agree with all those terms? Why or why not?
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# Alison M. Jaggar (2005)
 
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# Theoretical puzzle

* Police violence or military actions can be classified as terrorism

* Image of "brown-skinned Arab or Muslim looking terrorist"

* This obscures other types of terrorism, such as lynching, crossburnings or gay-bashing

* _We need a more comprehensive understanding of terrorism_
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# Proposed definition of terrorism

* Conservative: disturbs existing usage as little as possible

* Consistency and non-arbitrariness: improve consistency

* Precision: help differentiate among phenomena that may otherwise be confused

* Impartiality: resist moral arbitrariness and bias
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# Purposes and goals of terrorism

* Long term: depends
    - right to war (_ius ad bellum_) and _ius in bellum_ (humanitarian law)
    
* Not all terrorist groups have unjust goals

* Also, civilians can cooperate with unjust governments too, so they are not considered innocent 
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# Proposed definition of terrorism:

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_Terrorism is the use of extreme threats or violence designed to intimidate or subjugate governments, groups, or individuals. It is a tactic of coercion intended to promote further ends that in themselves may be good, bad or indifferent. Terrorism may be practiced by governments or international bodies or forces, sub-state groups or even individuals. Its threats or violence are aimed directly or immediately at the bodies or belongings of innocent civilians but these are typically terrorists’ secondary targets; the primary targets of terrorists are the governments, groups or individuals that they wish to intimidate._ (p. 209)
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# Moral dimensions of terrorism

* Terrorists attack those who do not represent a threat to them

* But can it ever be justified?

* **What do you think?**
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# Moral dimensions of terrorism

* However: "_Terrorism is certainly heinous but that something is heinous does not entail that it is prohibited in all circumstances; it merely entails that anyone wishing to argue its moral permissibility bears a heavy burden of proof." (p. 213)

* Extreme circumstances require extreme actions?
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# Moral dimensions of terrorism

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* Seven criteria to justify terrorism:
    - Just cause
    - Competent authority
    -  Right intention
    - Proportionality
    - Last resort
    -  Reasonable hope of success
    - The aim of peace
    
* How would you classify the following groups according to those criteria: Al Qaeda, Russian anarchists, French revolutionaries, Latin American _guerrilleros_? 
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# Questions?
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# How definitions impact research

* But as we've seen, scholars cannot agree on a definition of terrorism

* What is the impact of different definitions on research results?

* They survey 9 political science journals since 1980

* Domestic versus international terrorism should be seen as different processes
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# Defining terrorism

*  Scholars define terrorism to fit the case(s) under study

* **Problem:** what defines terrorism in one country (i.e., fighting colonial powers) may not explain other types of terrorism

* **Solution:** analyse the cases separately, as there is enough variation in the datasets  to explore differences in definitions 
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# Different types of terrorism

* Not all of them useful to predict future cases

* **Problem:**  much attention has been given to the perpetrators and victims of the violence, but much less attention has been given _to the targets_

* **Solution:** differentiate between the country of origin of the terrorists and their target countries. Assume that domestic terrorism have different causes from international attacks
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# Unit of observation

* This does not tell us much about transnational terrorism

* **Problem:**  it is unclear which unit of analysis we should use

* **Solution:** sometimes it is useful to analyse terrorism _in pairs_, that is, ISIS attacks in Pakistan are not the same as ISIS attacks in France
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# Results

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* Their models show a significant relationship between executive constrains and domestic terrorism (tables 1-3, p. 423-4)

* There is, more democratic countries tend to have more terrorist attacks. Why is that the case?

* Also, there is no relationship between executive constrains and _exporting_ terrorism, that is, the country of origin of the terrorists (table 4). Again, why do you think that's the case?

* Lastly, democratic participation in most cases is unrelated to domestic and transnational terrorism, suicide terrorism, and the export of terrorism

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# To sum up

* It has been used by states and non-state actors alike

* After WWII, it became associated with three groups: 1) anti-colonial movements; 2) left-wing organisations; 3) more recently, Middle Eastern groups

* Defining terrorist is hard, but we all agree that they are violent acts designed to inflict terror in order to achieve political goals
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# To sum up

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* Research designs should consider the variety of terrorist definitions and be careful about how these differences may influence results

* Terrorism can be combined with other types of violence

* As we'll see over the next weeks, terrorism can be a rational strategy, but it is not clear whether it works
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# See you next week!
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