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Leader Type And Responses To State-Sponsored Terrorism, Arjun Banerjee

Doctoral Dissertations

State-sponsored terrorism (SST) has for long been used as a tool by countries to inflict costs on rival states without direct confrontation, as the latter risks inviting limited to full-scale war. The literature on SST has so far focused primarily on the motivations, facilitating factors, and the timing of state sponsorship. What has been insufficiently studied, however, are the responses of victim states to SST. Why does state response to SST vary spatio-temporally in different countries, under different governments, and even under different leaders of the same ruling political dispensation in a country? Under what conditions does a state respond …

The International Perception Of The Irish Republican Army And Chechen Insurgency, Henry Forteith

International and Global Studies Undergraduate Honors Theses

This purpose of this project is to examine how the labels used to describe the Irish Republican Army and Chechen insurgency changed after certain acts of violence. This paper begins by describing the history of imperial subjugation of Ireland and Chechnya, as well as examining the similarities between the actions and motivations of the IRA and Chechen insurgency. Then, to study the change in language to describe these groups, two searches were conducted into the New York Times and International Newsstream databases. The first search examined articles about the IRA and Chechen insurgency published between 1998 and 2009, while the …

Terrorism And Right-Wing Extremism: History And Comparative Definitions, Kwame B. Antwi-Boasiako, Caleb Grant Hill

Faculty Publications

Recent narratives on terrorism have focused on the definitions. Terrorism is not a new phenomenon, but the problem resides in its definition and who is defining it. Conceptualizing terrorism depends on which framework one utilizes. The use of different lenses to define the term has contributed to the lack of global acceptance of what constitutes terrorism, hence the difficulty of gathering data for analysis. It is also a conundrum when powerful nations legitimize their terrorist activities against weaker ones. This, unfortunately, has led to the subjectiveness of every attempt in the literature to objectively provide a globally acceptable definition. Using …

Staying Engaged In Terrorism: Narrative Accounts Of Sustaining Participation In Violent Extremism, Neil Ferguson, James W. Mcauley

Security Research Hub Reports

Research exploring radicalization pathways and how and why people become involved in terrorism has expanded since the 9/11 attacks. Likewise, over the last decade research exploring de-radicalization and desistence from terrorism has grown and expanded in an attempt to promote exit from extremist or terror groups. However, research studies on how individuals sustain engagement in terrorism and their involvement with extremist organizations, often in the face of great adversity, are absent from the body of research. To address this scarcity of research this study analyzed accounts of engagement in violent extremism produced by Northern Irish loyalist and republican paramilitaries in …

Othering Terrorism: A Rhetorical Strategy Of Strategic Labeling, Michael Loadenthal

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

The term terrorism is as value-laden a descriptor as one will encounter in the contemporary period. Though it evokes a strong image of an Orientalist, colonized, brown body enacting brutal, theatrical violence from behind a balaclava, the term itself describes very little. The decision to label a particular act, individual, or movement as terroristic is more a discursive question of politics than means. In the post-9/11 era, state-level rhetoricians describe their ideological enemies that can be “othered” as terrorists, while some are considered extremists. In doing so, Muslim, Arab, Asian, African, and foreign-born advocates and practitioners of political violence are …

Poetry In A Troubling Time: Analyzing Several Poems Inspired By The Troubles In Northern Ireland, Michael Mccarthy

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

Most of the news about Northern Ireland for the past year has been about what effect Brexit will have on the North’s relationship with the Republic of Ireland. The discussion of eliminating the “soft-border,” and replacing it with a “hard- border,” which would see the reinstitution of checkpoints along the 500-kilometer border, continues to dominate international headlines. The EU has been attempting to allay concerns, and in March, President of the European Council Donald Tusk, traveled to Dublin and reaffirmed the EU’s commitment to avoiding a hard border and maintaining the peace process in the region (Stone, 2018). At the …

Are Illegal Direct Actions By Animal Rights Activists Ethically Vigilante?, Michael P. Allen, Erica Von Essen

Between the Species

Constructed as terrorist, illegal direct actions by animal rights activists have become the subject of draconian law enforcement measures in the US and UK. Some scholars respond to this phenomenon by interpreting such actions to protect vulnerable animals not as terrorist but civilly disobedient. This approach highlights their ethical character, as a normatively relevant consideration in the state’s law enforcement response. Consistent with this approach, we argue that illegal direct actions by animal rights activists are not terrorist, although their motivations are sometimes anti-statist and anarchist. However, we also argue that civil disobedience is an awkward fit for many such …

Crimmigration-Counterterrorism, Margaret Hu

Scholarly Articles

The discriminatory effects that may stem from biometric ID cybersurveillance and other algorithmically driven screening technologies can be better understood through the analytical prism of “crimmigration-counterterrorism”: the conflation of crime, immigration, and counterterrorism policy. The historical genesis for this phenomenon can be traced back to multiple migration law developments, including the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. To implement stricter immigration controls at the border and interior, both the federal and state governments developed immigration enforcement schemes that depended upon both biometric identification documents and immigration screening protocols. This Article uses contemporary attempts to implement an expanded regime of “extreme vetting” …

The Longevity Of Religious Terrorist Organizations, William John Hughes

Senior Projects Spring 2017

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

The Nonexceptionalism Thesis: How Post-9/11 Criminal Justice Measures Fit In Broader Criminal Justice, Francesca Laguardia

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Contrary to the assumption that ‘‘9/11 changed everything,’’ post-2001 criminal justice practices in the area of terrorism show a surprising consistency with pre-2001 criminal justice practices. This article relies on an analysis of over 300 terrorism prosecutions between 2001 and 2010, as well as twenty full trial transcripts, content-coding, and traditional legal analysis, to show the continuity of criminal justice over this time in regard to some of the most controversial supposed developments. This continuity belies the common assumption that current extreme policies and limitations on the due process are a panicked response to the terror attacks of 2001. On …

The Nonexceptionalism Thesis: How Post-9/11 Criminal Justice Measures Fit In Broader Criminal Justice, Francesca Laguardia

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Contrary to the assumption that ‘‘9/11 changed everything,’’ post-2001 criminal justice practices in the area of terrorism show a surprising consistency with pre-2001 criminal justice practices. This article relies on an analysis of over 300 terrorism prosecutions between 2001 and 2010, as well as twenty full trial transcripts, content coding, and traditional legal analysis, to show the continuity of criminal justice over this time in regard to some of the most controversial supposed developments. This continuity belies the common assumption that current extreme policies and limitations on due process are a panicked response to the terror attacks of 2001. To …

The Terror Exception: The Impact Of The 2001 Authorization For Use Of Military Force On United States Counterterrorism Policy In The Middle East Under The Obama Administration, Benjamin Collinger

Undergraduate Student Research Awards

In the traumatic and somber aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the U.S. Congress passed a critical piece of legislation to provide the president authority to defend the United States and its interests abroad. The Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), which responded to the horrors of 9/11, began the United States’ longest war—the global war on terror— and serves as its legal basis today. President George W. Bush signed the AUMF into law on September 18, 2001, only a week after the attacks. Congress agreed with the proposition:

That the President is authorized to use all …

In Defense Of The Nigerian Homeland, Ihekwoaba D. Onwudiwe, Lucy Tsado, Kingsley U. Ejiogu, Rochelle E. Mcgee-Cobbs, Ifeoma Okoye

African Social Science Review

Recently, Nigeria has experienced various acts of domestic terrorism and kidnapping that may be rooted in many forms of motivations and agitations. These aggressions have resulted in homegrown bloodshed, émigré aggression, or even organized international network assaults against the population. The scourge of these terrorist activities has continued to weaken the Nigerian character or moral fiber. While the government is trying to combat these offenses caused by extremist activities, there are still remedies that have not been implemented prudently or applied properly. In this article, we propose various forms of the repertoire of actions which the government can use to …

Applying Situational Crime Prevention To Terrorism Against Airports And Aircrafts., Molly Mae Block

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation identifies the characteristics of terrorism against airports and aircrafts and the appropriate measures to prevent or reduce the damage of this crime. The situational crime prevention framework, incorporating routine activity theory, rational choice theory, and crime pattern theory, is used to identify techniques to reduce the opportunity for terrorism targeting airports and aircrafts. This study is a first attempt to determine which situational characteristics may be relevant in attacks specifically targeting airports or aircrafts. Data for this dissertation comes from the Global Terrorism Database and covers terrorist attacks targeting airports or aircrafts from 2002 to 2014. The sample …

Settling The Long War: Alternative Dispute Resolution And The War On Terror, Matthew P. Chiarello

William & Mary Law Review

No abstract provided.

Legitimate Illegitimacy: Measuring Terrorists' Legitimacy During And After Negotiations, Brenna L. Bridwell

Doctoral Dissertations

Policymakers often refuse negotiations with terrorist groups for fear that those groups will become legitimized in the eyes of the population, and that the state will become the victim of future attacks as other groups attempt to emulate the negotiating group. While scholars have analyzed whether or not negotiations are effective in ending terrorist groups, scholarship is lacking as to whether or not policymakers’ fears regarding legitimization are accurate. In this vein, I analyze the IRA/UK negotiations during the Good Friday Accords using tobit regressions and Critical Discourse Analysis to determine whether the IRA gained political legitimacy via their portrayal …

All Bark And No Bite? Rhetoric And Reality In The War On Terror, Roslyn Fuller

Indonesian Journal of International and Comparative Law

This paper argues that not only has the “war on terror” failed to hinder terrorism, it has also unequivocally failed to have any appreciable impact on the content of international law. The doctrine of the “war on terror” initially combined aspects of human rights and humanitarian legal regimes together with a much broadened definition of the term “conflict” and those who could be viewed as legitimate targets in a conflict. However, this new framework, put forward mainly by the United States failed to gain traction among other States, and even among US agencies. Thirteen years after the War on Terror …

Assessing The Velocity, Scale, Volume, Intensity And “Creedal Congruence” Of Immigrants In Setting A Nation’S Admissions Policy, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

Table of Contents Death of the “Melting Pot” The Rejection of Assimilation and the Rise of “Identity Sects” Western Europe and the US Face Significant Challenges to Their Creeds and Cultures The Radicalizing Search for Identity and Meaning The Velocity, Scale and Difference of Migrant Entry Into Dissimilar Cultures Assimilation Is Not Easy Under the Best of Circumstances ISIS, al-Qaeda and The Old Man of the Mountain What Are the Creedal Values For Which Western Nations Should Expect Commitment from Immigrants and Citizens? “Warning! Do Not Approach!” Beyond Non-Assimilation to Cultural Transformation The Right to Preserve a “Cultural Ecosystem” The …

The Factors Which Lead To The Emergence Of Terrorist Groups And Influence Their Structure, Stuart C. Groombridge

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 1954-2016

This thesis examines the factors, which lead to the emergence of terrorist groups and the evolution of their organisational structure. The three case studies used within this thesis examine terrorist groups as complex adaptive systems. Historically, the only group, which has been studied as a complex adaptive system, is Al Qaeda. This study builds on this work by examining three cases of historical terrorist groups: the Provisional Irish Republican Army, Weather Underground Organisation, and Kosovo Liberation Army, in an attempt to ascertain whether the concept of complex adaptive systems can be generalised to a broader range of groups.

The thesis …

Indefinite Detention And Antiterrorism Laws: Balancing Security And Human Rights, Joanne M. Sweeny

Pace Law Review

This article does more than describe British and American anti-terrorism laws; it shows how those laws go through conflicted government branches and the bargains struck to create the anti-terrorism laws that exist today. Instead of taking these laws as given, this Article explains why they exist. More specifically, this article focuses on the path anti-terrorism legislation followed in the United States and the United Kingdom, with particular focus on each country’s ability (or lack thereof) to indefinitely detain suspected non-citizen terrorists. Both countries’ executives sought to have that power and both were limited by the legislatures and courts but in …

International Law And The Nuclear Threat In Kashmir: A Proposal For A U.S.-Led Resolution To The Dispute Under Un Authority, Billy Merck

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

18th Century Anarchism And Its Effect On Modern Day Domestic Terrorism, Mary A. Scott

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Anarchism is a political and socioeconomic force that has driven violent methods of social and political change for centuries. Relating Anarchism to these violent acts demonstrates a deep-seeded link to terrorism. Anarchism is one of the main forces behind modern day terrorism due to its long history alongside the ever evolving term terrorism. By connecting these two concepts, domestic terror groups can be better analyzed and understood, and future attacks from within the United States may be prevented.

Deadly Premonition: Does Terrorist-Leader Psychology Influence Violence Lethality?, Clayton Besaw

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis seeks to address a theoretical and empirical gap within terrorism studies, and more specially the study of terrorist-group lethality. This research updates a model of terrorist-group lethality by including terrorist-leader psychology as an individual-level variable in predicting terrorist-group lethality. Terrorist-leader statements were analyzed by using two novel coding schemes called Operational Code and Leadership Trait Analysis to create quantified measurements of leader cognitive beliefs and personality traits. The empirical portion of this study utilizes pooled cross-sectional time-series data within the framework of fixed effects and multi-level estimation models. The results find that terrorist-leader psychology, and more specifically Instrumental …

Multicultural Public Policy And Homegrown Terrorism In The European Union, Macklin Keith Everly

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

From the 1970s to the 1990s, Western European democracies embraced multiculturalist public policy (MCPP). This was in an effort to address and accommodate the minority rights of immigrants who found their way to Europe during its post-WWII labor force recovery. By the mid-1990s, there was a backlash against such policy and movement towards integrationist values. This has been exacerbated in the wake of radical Islamist terror attacks like those of 9/11, the London 7/7 bombing, and the Paris Metro Bombings of 1995. Attention has been focused on the threat, incidence, and causal factors of homegrown jihadism within Europe. The research …

Trying Terrorism: Joint Criminal Enterprise, Material Support, And The Paradox Of International Criminal Law, Alexandra Link

Michigan Journal of International Law

This Note will examine theoretical problems in ICL and public international law by evaluating the practical implications of applying ICL sources to find criminal liability outside the narrow confines of the international tribunals. It will examine the problems posed by the conflicting standards of the Rome Statute and ICTY jurisprudence as a matter of customary international law, the failure of U.S. courts to effectively confront the contextual and doctrinal analysis necessary to determine the limitations of these sources, and the proper application of these sources to the issues raised in Hamdan II and Al Bahlul. Viewing ICL through the lens …

Cyberterrorism In The Context Of Contemporary International Law, Yaroslav Shiryaev

San Diego International Law Journal

The present Article addressed the legal issues surrounding cyberterrorism. In the first chapter, the author explains why cyberterrorism should be described as “the use of electronic networks taking the form of a cyber-attack to commit a) a substantive act criminalized by the existing legal instruments prohibiting terrorism, or b) an act of terrorism under international customary law.” Further, with a special emphasis on existing anti-terrorism conventions and customary international law, it was demonstrated which actors are likely to engage in acts of cyberterrorism (non-state actors, corporations and individuals), as well as which targets are protected by law and which aims …

Mission Creep In National Security Law, Fletcher N. Baldwin Jr., Daniel Ryan Kosloskey

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Mission Creep In National Security Law, Fletcher N. Baldwin Jr., Daniel R. Koslosky

UF Law Faculty Publications

Many anti-terrorism measures are enacted with broad public support. There is often a general willingness on the part of the public to accept greater civil liberties deprivations in the face of a specific threat, or otherwise in times of general crisis, than would otherwise be the case. Sweeping anti-terrorism legislation is frequently crafted in reaction to the presence, or perceived presence, of immense, imminent danger. The medium and long-term consequences of the legislation may not fully be comprehended when political leaders and policymakers take swift action in the face strong public pressure in light of a recent terrorist attack or …

The Path To Peace: Conflict Theory And Northern Ireland’S Troubles (1968-1998), Ruairi Wiepking

Master's Theses

This paper is a qualitative historical analysis of Northern Ireland’s Troubles. Over a period of approximately thirty years, sectarian violence in Northern Ireland dominated the headlines of newspapers in both the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom. Despite this violent history, Northern Ireland has enjoyed relative peace and stability since the passage of the Belfast Agreement in 1998. This paper aims to better understand why and how Northern Ireland endured a generation of brutal sectarian violence and emerged into a new era of peace and mutual understanding. In doing so, this paper incorporates theories from peace and conflict studies …

Tactics, Politics, And Propaganda In The Irish War Of Independence, 1917-1921, Mike Rast

History Theses

This thesis examines the influences on and evolution of the Irish Republican Army‘s guerrilla war strategy between 1917 and 1921. Utilizing newspapers, government documents, and memoirs of participants, this study highlights the role of propaganda and political concerns in waging an insurgency. It argues that while tactical innovation took place in the field, IRA General Headquarters imposed policy and directed the conflict with a concern for the political results of military action. While implementing strategies necessary to effective conflict of the war, this Headquarters staff was unable to reconcile a disjointed and overburdened command structure, leading its disintegration after the …