1. The Faces of Terrorism: Social and Psychological Dimensions
- Author:
- Dylan Kissane
- Publication Date:
- 07-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- The Rest: Journal of Politics and Development
- Institution:
- Centre for Strategic Research and Analysis (CESRAN)
- Abstract:
- In the decade since the 9/11 terrorist attacks there have been countless books and articles published that have sought to explain Islamist terrorism and explore policy responses to terrorism from the Muslim world. A smaller sector of the literature has sought to place Islamist terror in its international political context, drawing parallels with terrorism in the Basque country, Northern Ireland and domestic groups in the United States. A smaller sector again seeks to explore not only to describe such terrorism and explore policy responses to it but also to dig deeper and uncover the motivations that drive terrorists and those that respond to acts of terrorism to. Such works are, by necessity, interdisciplinary, drawing, of course, on political science and international relations but also sociology, psychology, economics and public policy studies, among many other fields. This sub-segment of the much broader field of terrorism studies offers the reader a chance to understand all aspects of terrorism in a variety of contexts, from what motivates a Tamil Tiger suicide bomber in Sri Lanka to what explains Irish Republican Army tactics in the mainland United Kingdom, from how military power is used to counter sub-state terrorist elements to how those terrorist actors are recruited in the first place. Broader in its conception of the notion of terrorism and wise to the complexities that terrorism should engender in policy debates, books that fall into this sub-segment of the field are both the most challenging to read and, when well executed, the most rewarding for the scholar of international politics.
- Topic:
- Economics
- Political Geography:
- United States, United Kingdom, and Sri Lanka