Martha Crenshaw

The Psychology of Terrorism: An Agenda for the 21st Century

Research on political terrorism, which began in the early 1970s, faces some persistent problems. These involve defining the concept, collecting empirical data, building integrative theory, and avoiding the attribution of terrorism to personality disorders or “irrationality.” Furthermore, analysis risks being driven by events or the concerns of policymakers. Nevertheless, it is generally accepted that psychological explanations of terrorism must take multiple levels of analysis into account, linking the individual to the group and to society. Future research should critically examine the assumption that a “new terrorism” has appeared at the end of the 20th century. Analysts should also take advantage of 30 years of history to develop comparisons and developmental studies that look not only at the causes of terrorism but at changes in terrorist strategy, the termination of terrorist campaigns, government decision-making, and policy effectiveness.

Why Violence Spreads: The Contagion of International Terrorism

This study examines the spread of international terrorism from 1968 to 1974. Using Poisson and negative binomial probability models, a diffusion of international terrorism was found in the first segment of the time period (1968–1971) and contagion as a direct modeling process in the second (1973–1974). Accordingly, the theory of hierarchies in which the diplomatic status of a country predicts its degree of imitability was found to operate among Latin American countries during the second portion of the overall period, but not during the first. An inverse hierarchy is suggested as an explanation for the contagion of violence from Latin America and other third world countries to Western Europe. Autocorrelation functions were used to assess which forms of terrorism were most contagious in which regions.

Theories of terrorism: Instrumental and organizational approaches

(1987). Theories of terrorism: Instrumental and organizational approaches. Journal of Strategic Studies: Vol. 10, Inside Terrorist Organizations, pp. 13-31.

How terrorism declines

The decline of oppositional terrorism is a critical question for both scholars and policy‐makers. The former have neglected the issue, while the latter have tended to assume that government policies of prevention and deterrence are the key determinants of outcomes. This analysis suggests that government actions must be seen in the context of the internal organizational dynamics and strategy of the opposition groups using terrorism. In some cases, terrorism is self‐defeating.

“Explaining Suicide Terrorism: A Review Essay”

Mia Bloom, Dying to Kill: The Allure of Suicide Terror (New York: Columbia University Press, 2005). Joyce M. Davis, Martyrs: Innocence, Vengeance and Despair in the Middle East (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). Diego Gambetta, ed., Making Sense of Suicide Missions (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005). Mohammed M. Hafez, Manufacturing Human Bombs: The Making of Palestinian Suicide Bombers (Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2006). Raphael Israeli, Islamikaze: Manifestations of Islamic Martyrology (London: Frank Cass, 2003). Farhad Khosrokhavar, Suicide Bombers: Allah’s New Martyrs, translated from the French by David Macey (London: Pluto Press, 2005). Anne Marie Oliver and Paul F. Steinberg, The Road to Martyrs’ Square: A Journey into the World of the Suicide Bomber (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005). Robert A. Pape, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism (New York: Random House, 2005). Ami Pedahzur, Suicide Terrorism (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005). Ami Pedahzur, ed., Root Causes of Suicide Terrorism: The Globalization of Martyrdom (London and New York: Routledge, 2006). Christoph Reuter, My Life is a Weapon: A Modern History of Suicide Bombing, translated from the German by Helena Ragg-Kirkby (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004). Shaul Shay, The Shahids: Islam and Suicide Attacks (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2004).

Current research on terrorism: The academic perspective

Abstract Most definitions of terrorism, however divided on other points, agree that it is a form of political violence. Unfortunately, this rare unanimity has only infrequently served as a foundation for research on political terrorism, which is typically isolated from the broader field. There are advantages to be gained from integrating research on terrorism into the analysis of political violence. The study of terrorism, which is widely recognized as theoretically impoverished, stands to gain in theoretical scope, precision, and cumulativeness of findings. Situating the study of terrorism in the broader field could point analysts toward problems of significance to a larger community of scholars. Moreover, the phenomenon of terrorism might serve as a useful test‐case for general theories of violence, which are rarely applied to terrorism by their authors. This essay first identifies common problems for research. It turns, next, to a discussion of the relationship between the phenomenon of terrorism and o...

The Debate over “New” vs. “Old” Terrorism

1 Examples include Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998), although Hoffman is sometimes ambivalent; Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, The Age of Sacred Terror: Radical Islam’s War Against America (New York Random House, 2003); Walter Laqueur, The New Terrorism: Fanaticism and the Arms of Mass Destruction (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999); and Ian O. Lesser, et al., Countering the New Terrorism (Santa Monica: The Rand Corporation, 1999). Ambassador L. Paul Bremer contributed “A New Strategy for the New Face of Terrorism” to a special issue of The National Interest (Thanksgiving 2001), pp. 23-30. A recent post 9/11 overview is Matthew J. Morgan, “The Origins of the New Terrorism,” Parameters (the journal of the U.S. Army War College), 34, 1 (Spring 2004), pp. 29-43. However, not all proponents of this point of view are American. See the text of a lecture by (Professor Lord) Anthony Giddens, delivered at the London School of Economics November 10, 2004, “The Future of World Society: The New Terrorism” available at Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO). Farhad Khosrokhavar also refers to “new” terrorism in Les Nouveaux Martyrs d’Allah (Paris: Flammarion, 2003).

Political violence in Algeria

It is estimated that over 20,000 people have died in civil conflict in Algeria since January, 1992, and no resolution is in sight. This article analyzes the current state of civil violence in Algeria in terms of a theory of collective rebellious behaviour stressing falsification of public preferences, adapted from the work of Timur Kuran. The theory links social and psychological factors to explain why the outcome of the political challenge mounted by radical Islamic groups has been stalemate rather than an Islamic revolution or the restoration of stable authoritarianism. It suggests that the outcome of the struggle in Algeria is unpredictable.

Terrorism Research: The Record

Looking back at the beginnings of academic research on terrorism just over 40 years ago, it is extraordinary to see that what was once a marginal subject for social science has developed into a full-fledged program of “terrorism studies.” In fact, recently a sociologist considered the subject of sufficient importance to write a doctoral dissertation and then a book on the “social construction” of the field (Stampnitzky 2013). This essay highlights some examples of the contributions scholars from different disciplines have made to understanding terrorism. There is no consensus on any general theoretical laws of terrorism (there is no equivalent of a democratic peace theory, for example), but researchers have defined key concepts and deepened explanations of cause, effect, and process.What follows identifies four interrelated areas of explanatory inquiry into terrorism that have emerged over years of research: the effectiveness of terrorism as a strategy of opposition, the determinants and consequences of counterterrorism policies, how campaigns or waves of terrorism end, and how analysis of terrorism can be situated in a broader theoretical framework rather than treated as a phenomenon sui generis. Particular emphasis is placed on studies that are comparative and/or that situate the specific case of terrorism in a general theoretical perspective.

A Welcome Antidote

John Mueller’s observations may not be all that unusual, but they are nevertheless a welcome antidote to the seemingly endless speculative scenarios with which we have been regaled since September 11 (and well before). However, experience indicates that such efforts to put the threat of terrorism in perspective are unlikely to have much political impact. Mueller’s conclusion that the war on terrorism is ‘‘nearly over’’ is also open to question. In 1980 an Israeli analyst, Hanan Alon, argued with respect to Israeli counterterrorist policy that, in effect, a life is a life, whether lost to terrorism or to some other cause. According to Alon, the adoption of a preference rule that treated all casualties as equal, regardless of source, would mean that the reward for terrorists would be reduced, because it would thwart their expectations of an intense audience reaction. He recommended that society’s ‘‘subjective probabilities’’ with regard to terrorism be adjusted to objective probabilities and that resources be allocated in proportion to the latter. Countering terrorism should be treated as only one of several casualty-prevention programs, such as reducing road accidents (an even more serious problem in Israel than in the United States). He argued optimistically that such a policy change was feasible because public perceptions and risk assessments could be changed through education and information. As far as I know, his sensible analysis had no policy impact. In fact, only two years later, in 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon in order to defeat the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)—ostensibly in retaliation for the attempted assassination of the Israeli ambassador to London. In the United States, well-regarded analysts have often produced cautious reports about the extreme possibilities that preoccupied policy makers and journalists. Mueller cites a number of examples of what we might call ‘‘putting the threat in proportion’’ analyses since September 11, including various official government reports. Others can be added to this list. For example, the conclusions to a set of case studies of alleged incidents involving terrorist use of chemical and biological weapons found, first, that three of the twelve purported incidents (which were all that researchers could identify, even going back as far as World War II) were apocryphal. Second, the studies found that overall the use of biological and chemical agents (which included such relatively mundane attacks as deliberate food poisoning) was ‘‘strikingly infrequent’’ and that ‘‘the historical record also includes few such incidents in which mass casualties were intended, and none in which they occurred.’’