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Chapter 2: Not Senseless Violence: The Social Underpinnings of Terrorism. Terrorism as a Social Process: Two Frameworks. Approaches to the study of social explanations of group behavior tend to focus on: Meaning of activity Structure of actions Social scientists:
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Chapter 2:Not Senseless Violence: The Social Underpinnings of Terrorism
Terrorism as a Social Process: Two Frameworks • Approaches to the study of social explanations of group behavior tend to focus on: • Meaning of activity • Structure of actions • Social scientists: • Use to examine terrorism from meaning and structural frameworks • Meaning framework: • The way we interpret the world motivates the action we take. • Structural framework: • A group’s structure and purpose cause it to act and groups are created for specific functions.
Meaning framework: • Meaning Framework: • Subjective interpretations that people give to events, physical objects or actions of others as well as themselves. • Meanings are developed by individuals and groups. • Huntington: • Future conflicts will take place between world’s major civilizations . • World is divided into 3 economic groupings and conflicts will be based on the distribution of wealth. • Social action is based on social meaning. Terrorist organizations are the result of subjective meanings that need to be aggressively confronted if the alternative meaning should be introduced.
Meaning Framework • Juergensmeyer: • The clash between modern values and traditional culture as one of the reasons for terrorism. • Lewis: • Trouble between Islam and Western modernity can be attributed to the reasons for terrorism. • Nance: • Terrorists take action based on an ideological desire for social change. • Terrorism results from the meanings applied to the modern world by terrorists. • Counterterrorism involves specific steps to prevent violence and deconstruct terrorist groups.
Structural Framework • Attempts to understand terrorist behavior by looking at the way terrorists organizations function is called a structural framework. • Black: • Terrorist organization take an action because they belong to a structure that operates for a special purpose. • The structure and movement of groups can explain terrorism. • Terrorism develops when an inferior group moves against a superior group, inducing mass casualties.
Structural Framework • Latora and Marchiori: • Terrorist organizations: • Are structured in the same manner as communication and transportation systems. • Are composed of networks moving in patterns. • Criminal, terrorist, or revolutionary groups organize themselves in a network of smaller logistical structures. • Any point where information, weapons, or personnel are gathered is called a node. • The node being the critical target for counterterrorist operations. • If the node is destroyed, the network is disrupted.
Terrorism as a Religious Process • Ellingsen reports two primary reasons for continued influence of religion: • Religion has always been an important factor in the history of humanity. • Modernization tends to breakdown communities, families, and social orientation – people seek a deeper meaning to their lives. • The impact of religion on terrorism, according to Ellingsen, is more important than political and economic factors.
Terrorism as a Religious Process • Stern: • People around the world are returning to their religious roots as a means to escape the complexity of modern life. • When mythological truths compete, violence often results. • Stories change the nature of terrorist organizations and aid in producing a number of different group organizations and styles. • Individuals join a group because they believe they are joining a holy cause, they are usually motivated by the organization’s sacred story. • To maintain the power formally given by the sacred story, leaders develop internal enforcement mechanisms – rewards system. • Religion may also produce the “lone wolf avenger.” • A person striking out with an ideology but no group.
Terrorism as a Religious Process • Juergensmeyer: • Violence is a call to purify the world from the nonbeliever and the incorrect interpretations in a holy war. • Believers are participating in a struggle (a cosmic struggle) to change history. • The holy terrorist is victorious either by killing the enemy or by dying in the struggle.
Terrorism as a Religious Process • Berman: • Economic factors influence religious terrorism. • Religious terrorism is deadlier than any other form of terrorism. • Statistic: there are 20 active religious terrorist organizations – 18 based on Islam. • Rather than attempting to counter a religious ideology, counterterrorism must be aimed at studying the internal ability of the group to operate effectively.
Clash of Civilization • Huntington: • Cultural conflicts among world’s dominant civilizations constitute a clash of civilization. • Regions in which more than one civilization exist threaten international peace, and the USA should avoid intervening in such areas. • Esposito: • Culture is defined by more than religion and there is no monolithic Islamic civilization. • Pipes: • The major conflicts will occur within Islam religion. • Chomsky: • The world is too complicated to be explained by one big idea.
Terrorism as Practical Criminology • Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) created localized terrorism task forces around the country. • Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) • Allows the FBI to coordinate law enforcement resources in the face of domestic terrorism and to expand investigations. • The FBI also provides investigative resources when Americans are victimized by terrorism in other countries.
Terrorists Find strength in a cause and the ideology behind the cause Focused Dedicated to a particular cause Disciplined, trained, targets have symbolic value Criminals Usually uncommitted, crime is a method for obtaining goods Opportunistic Undedicated to a cause Undisciplined, untrained, self-centered Terrorists v Criminals Bodrero:
Group Reinforcement and Moral Justification • Terrorists must feel they are justified in their behavior. • Terrorists must look outside normative social channels to gain approval. • Terrorist group becomes primary source of social reality. • Terrorist group provides social recognition and reinforcement. • Terrorist group reshapes identities and provides a ticket to social acceptance. • Terrorist group must be isolated from mainstream society.
Group Reinforcement and Moral Justification • Group reinforcement and isolation • Wilkinson: • Terrorist groups reinforce individual loyalty through justification process. • Constant reinforcement of antisocial behavior in terrorist groups produces conforming behavior inside the organization. • Post: • Terrorist’s group becomes the only source of social reward because of its member’s isolation. • Terrorists reinforce one another. • The rejection of external authority results in the acceptance of internal authority because behavior must be reinforced somewhere.
Group Reinforcement and Moral Justification • Borum: • Researchers have come to the conclusion that there is no standard rational for justifying behavior. • Three different phases of self-justification: • Reasons for joining • Reasons for remaining • Reasons for leaving
Group Reinforcement and Moral Justification • Victoroff: • There is a multiplicity of factors (social and psychological) used to justify violence. • Terrorists operate and justify violence because they emotionally attach themselves to an ideology. • They will not tolerate moral ambiguity, and have the capacity to suppress instinctive and learned moral limitations on behavior. • There is a need to study the impact of leadership on group behavior. • Cooper: • Terrorist would justify more destruction because it is required for televised drama.
Group Reinforcement and Moral Justification • Blomberg, Hess, and Weerapana: • Economic factors play a role in justifying terrorist violence. • Terrorist groups are not happy with the economic status quo. • Terrorist see denial of economic opportunity as a justification for their action. • Stern: • Several factors must be in place for group cohesion: • Group must identify an enemy. • Group must have a story. • Group needs its own language or symbolic words to demonize the enemy.
Can the Terrorist Personality be Profiled? • FBI Behavioral Science Unit has attempted to develop profiles of terrorists based on individual psychological characteristics. • Rejecting Terrorist Profiles • Laqueur: no one can develop a composite picture of a terrorist: • Terrorist behavior fluctuates with historical, political, and social circumstances. • Individual and group profiles are the result of political and social conditions. • Borum: there is no single terrorist personality
Profiling Terrorist Behavior • Ross: • It may be possible to conceptualize terrorism in a model combining social structure with group psychology. • There are five interconnected processes involved in terrorism: • Joining the group • Forming the activity • Remaining in the campaign • Leading the organization • Engaging in acts of terrorism
Profiling Terrorist Behavior • Two factors are involved in the rise of terrorism at any point in history: • Social structure • Structural conditions • Ross identified five psychological factors involved in the development of terrorism: • Facilitating traits • Frustration/narcissism-aggression • Associated drives • Learning opportunities • Cost benefit calculations
Profiling Terrorist Behavior • Marc Segeman: • “Most people think that terrorism comes from poverty, broken families, ignorance, immaturity, lack of family or occupational responsibilities, weak minds susceptible to brainwashing – the sociopath, the criminals, the religious fanatic, or, in this country, some believe they’re just plain evil.” • Taking these perceived root causes in turn, three quarters of his sample came from the upper or middle class. • The vast majority – 90 percent – came from caring, intact families. • Sixty-three percent had gone to college, as compared with the 5-6 percent that’s usual for the third world. • These are the best and brightest of their societies in many ways.
Profiling Terrorist Behavior • Marc Segeman: • Al Qaeda’s members are not the Palestinian fourteen-year- olds we see on the news, but join the jihad at the average age of 26. • Three-quarters were professionals or semi-professionals. • They are engineers, architects, and civil engineers, mostly scientists. Very few humanities are represented. • Quite surprisingly, very few had any background in religion. • “Bin Laden himself is a civil engineer, Zawahiri is a physician, Mohammed Atta was, of course, an architect; and a few members are military, such as Mohammed Ibrahim Makawi, who is supposedly the head of the military committee.” (Sageman, M. (November 1, 2004) Understanding Terror Networks. Retrieved from http://www.fpri.org/enotes/20041101.middleeast.sageman.understandingterrornetworks)
Routes to Terrorism and Paths to Radicalization • Psychological and social factors motivate people to join and remain in terrorist groups. • Segeman: • Process of among man: • Alienated man find one another • Discover religion • Terrorism enters the equation if the newfound religious orientation turns toward violence
Groups in Prison and Radicalization • Internal and external process: • Internal: charismatic prison leader gathers an entourage • External: through visiting chaplains • Patterns of conversion: • Crisis • Protection seekers • Religious searcher • Manipulation for personal gain • Free world recruitment throughout outsiders
Radicalization • Individual radicalization: • When a relatively weak group feels that its existence is threatened by superior group • This may be enhanced when the superior group is seen to be morally depraved • Commonalities in radicalization: • Literalist interpretations of religion • Trust only to selected sources • No toleration for deviation • Acceptation of the idea of the clash of civilization • Selective interpretation of government policy