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The Root Causes of Terrorism 65
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Endnotes
1
Many other factors contributing to terrorism are described in the companion
papers of the larger volume of which this is part (Davis and Cragin, 2009).
2
e arguments are that terrorism has not resulted in massive social change and
that many theories about revolution are based on socioeconomic and political con-
texts of a sort much less common in the current day (for example, agricultural
revolutions).
3
Simon (1994, pp. 4–5) posits a related wave theory—that terrorism can by classi-
fied in terms of cycles of tactics. e 1970s cycle emphasized hijackings and attacks
on foreign embassies; the 1980s emphasized hostage-taking, suicide truck bomb-
ings, and bombs on airplanes. He suggests that the 1990s may be categorized by
the use of more sophisticated weapons, such as chemical and biological weapons
The Root Causes of Terrorism 69
and shoulder-fired missiles. Fortunately, that did not come to pass, but his concerns
apply today.
4
e Karstedt-Henke citation is in German; her work is also cited in Koopmans
(1993, p. 641).
5
eda Skocpol draws on both Marx and Moore (1966).
6
Karstedt-Henke (1980) refers to this as a “tit-for-tat of violence and countervio-
lence, which produces terrorist groups” (pp. 213–217).
7
Real-world examples (such as the Weathermen) suggest that repression is not a
necessary condition. But the idea that persecution from outside the group has sig-
nificant effects on the organizational behavior of the group is important, because it
often seems to result in an increased tolerance for behaviors that the larger society
is more likely to reject. Isolation through persecution is considered a key factor in
explaining the likelihood of violent behavior in a cult or sect as negative feedback
is removed from the system. See Robbins and Anthony (2004, pp. 354–357) and
Galantar (1989).
8
For access to, or information about, the database, see the “RAND Worldwide
Terrorism Incident Database,” undated.
9
For information about the dataset or access to the dataset, see “e ITERATE
Data” (undated), contact Vinyard Software at 2305 Sandburg Street, Dunn Loring,
VA 22027, or email Edward W. Mickolus at edwardmickolus@hotmail.com.
10
Cited in Zavis (2008, p. 3); and Quinn (2008).
11
e study is classified but e Guardian has reported on it extensively. See Travis
(2008a).
12
For a review of the political opportunity literature, see Meyer (2004).
13
See also Varshney (2003, pp. 85–100) for a critique of traditional rational choice
theory and a discussion of creative ways to apply rationality to both individual and
group actions within the context of ethnic conflict (with its obvious parallels to ter-
rorist group activity).
14
is is particularly true in the social movement literature that focuses on “pro-
test waves.” Admittedly, violence is a continuum that runs from destroying private
property to taking human life, and, presumably, one end of the continuum is less
problematic than the other. Certainly, the punishments for different types of “vio-
lent” offenses are distinct.
15
For competing hypotheses on predispositions to violent behavior see Pinker
(2002) and Science (2000) (for and against).
16
Cited in “Pope: Islamic ‘Holy War’ Against God’s Nature” (2006).
70 Social Science for Counterterrorism: Putting the Pieces Together
17
Although the classified 2008 MI-5 study is not publicly available, e Guardian
newspaper covered its findings in detail. See Travis (2008b).
18
e Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee was one of the primary coor-
dinating organizations of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.
19
Watters (1971), cited in McAdam (1999).
20
e American political-science tradition also has a small “culture of violence” lit-
erature, which explores why the southern and western regions of the United States,
initially settled by southerners, are more violent than the rest of the country, mea-
sured primarily in terms of homicide rates. Nisbett (1993) and Cohen and Nisbett
(1994) argue that southern white males are more violent partly because of a regional
ideology that justifies violence to maintain or defend a man’s honor. ey hypoth-
esize that although the conditions that gave rise to this ideology have dissipated,
the culture of violence is sustained “through collective representations emphasizing
the importance of honor and through violent self-fulfilling prophecies centering on
hypersensitivity to affronts” (p. 566).
21
For a brief discussion of the rule of law and the pros and cons of using the concept
to try and make policy or measure outcomes, see Stephenson (undated).
22
As developed initially by Schmid, Jongman, et al. (1988) and expanded by Post,
Ruby, and Shaw (2002).
23
is distinction is made in the database maintained by the National Consortium
for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) at the Univer-
sity of Maryland, a federally funded Department of Homeland Security Center of
Excellence.
71
CHAPTER THREE
Why and How Some People Become Terrorists
Todd C. Helmus
Introduction
Terrorism and the destruction it unleashes are fed and sustained by
an ever-willing cadre of new recruits. Saudis, Yemenis, and Jordani-
ans continue to flow into Iraq with the express purpose of achieving
martyrdom by participating in operations against coalition forces and
Iraqi citizens (Zavis, 2008). Earlier in the decade, Hamas and Fatah
were inundated with requests from Palestinians seeking their place in
line for suicide operations (Hassan, 2001). Meanwhile, attacks against
targets in the United States, Casablanca, London, and Madrid, along
with thwarted attacks elsewhere, suggest a more than adequate supply
of willing recruits.
Operations designed to kill and capture the leaders and active
members of terror organizations and otherwise disrupt terror activities
play a critical role in today’s fight against terrorism. However, the boun-
tiful number of available new recruits may enable these organizations
to fill or even expand depleted ranks. Absent initiatives that effectively
disable the organizational capacity for operations, policies will need to
also consider approaches that limit the influx of new members.
1
A counter-recruitment strategy may prove meaningful for several
reasons. First, research by Benmelech and Berrebi (2007), which is cited
in Berrebi (2009), demonstrates that older and more highly educated
suicide bombers, in comparison with the young and less educated, are
less likely to be apprehended before detonation, produce more casual-
ties, and are assigned to more important target sets. It is important to
note that the age and education of the 148 suicide bombers in their
72 Social Science for Counterterrorism: Putting the Pieces Together
sample differ considerably: Only 18 percent have academic degrees,
and their mean age is 21 years, with a standard deviation of 4.7 years
(with the most successful bombers averaging close to 26 years). is
variance suggests that educated and experienced recruits are in rela-
tively short supply.
2
Counter-radicalization programs may thus lower
the number of experienced and educated terrorists and so reduce the
success and devastation of suicide attacks.
3
Second, as illustrated by
Paul (2009) in his paper on support for terrorism, many of the same
factors that motivate terrorist recruitment also motivate broad popu-
lar support for terrorists. In theaters of irregular war, these same fac-
tors likely motivate the recruitment of counter-government insurgents.
Consequently, counter-recruitment strategies can achieve synergy and
utility across a broad domain of problem sets that contribute to polit-
ical violence. Finally, counter-recruitment initiatives may have value
in and of themselves. For example, as Berrebi (2009) suggests in his
paper, terrorists are indeed sensitive to cost-benefit considerations.
Understanding these cost-benefit considerations and effectively target-
ing those that are malleable should produce advantageous results. For
these reasons, this paper reviews the social science research underpin-
ning individual radicalization. e goal is to provide the educational
basis on which to derive effective counter-radicalization and counter-
recruitment initiatives.
Different disciplines approach the question of radicalization and
terrorism in significantly different ways. Consider some examples
among many. Psychological approaches examine individual factors that
lead to terrorism participation. ese can include personality charac-
teristics, mental illness, or previous exposure to traumatic experiences.
Social psychology focuses on the motivating role of group dynamics
and peer pressure. Models employing rational-choice paradigms evalu-
ate the influential roles of preferences, rewards, and constraints on ter-
rorist behavior. Sociological perspectives focus on the patterns of social
relationships, social interactions, and culture. ey also support the
systematic study of social movements or group-level actions designed
to push social change. Political-science approaches examine the over-
arching role of political environments on individual behavior and often
address such factors as occupation by a foreign power and the struggle
Why and How Some People Become Terrorists 73
for liberation. Finally, the study of religion seeks to understand the
seemingly influential role of Islam and other religious perspectives as a
motivating force (Kimhi and Even, 2004; Hudson, 1999; Moghadam,
2005).
Much of the literature deals with single-discipline approaches to
understanding the motivations for terrorism. However, scholars now
agree that multidiscipline approaches are required to understand ter-
rorism (Victoroff, 2005; Moghadam, 2005; Hudson, 1999). e next
section discusses the many factors believed to be at work simultane-
ously, drawing as necessary from the various disciplinary studies.
Research on terrorist radicalization and recruitment suffers from
several methodological shortfalls that should caution us to not accept
and apply the findings with certainty. First, the field of study suffers
from a lack of original research. As Andrew Silke notes, “only about 20
percent of research articles provide substantially new knowledge that
was previously unavailable to the field” (Silke, 2008, p. 101). Second,
much of terrorism research does not use samples of nonterrorist control
groups. Studies that look only at terrorist samples themselves are unable
to shed light on how these samples truly differ from their nonterrorist
counterparts. Other studies evaluate the radicalization phenomenon
by relying heavily on secondary analysis of data, such as that available
in the press and other open-source reports (Sageman, 2004; Bakker,
2006). Compiling fully complete datasets is nearly impossible, and so
missing data points risk skewing study conclusions. Finally, other stud-
ies rely on interviews with known terrorists. A key issue here is that
factors that propel an individual toward terrorist participation may be
fundamentally different from those that maintain that participation.
Individuals may thus be inclined to report current attitudes and expe-
riences rather than those experienced at the time of radicalization. As
John Horgan notes, “the reason given for involvement [in terrorism]
may be a direct reflection of an ideological learning process that comes
from being part of the group” (Horgan, 2008, p. 86). Consequently,
these personal accounts, as with conclusions based on other forms of
research, should be interpreted with caution.
At this point, it should be emphasized that a psychological move-
ment to terrorism is not a discrete choice. In this context, individuals
74 Social Science for Counterterrorism: Putting the Pieces Together
generally do not make a single and conscious decision to “become” a ter-
rorist. Rather, progression toward violent behavior is gradual (Horgan
and Taylor, 2001; Borum, 2004). Radicalization is, in fact, more like
a process, and within this process, individuals are moved forward by a
host of factors that may include socialization, exposure to rewards, and
other environmental influences.
4
Several papers and reports address
different process theories by tabulating the psychological evolution that
results in terrorist behavior and defining the order in which different
factors exert their influence (Moghaddam, 2005; Taylor and Horgan,
2006; Silber and Blatt, 2007). Such process issues are important but
beyond the scope of this paper. Instead, this paper seeks to simply iden-
tify various factors that increase the risk of radicalization.
5
Looking across the discussions in the various disciplines, a long
list of factors are believed to contribute to radicalization. Subsequent
sections describe these factors under the headings of (1) Radicalizing
Social Groups, (2) Desire for Change, (3) Desire to Respond to Griev-
ance, and (4) Perceived Rewards.
Radicalizing Social Groups
General Observations
Social groups play a critical role in the radicalization process. Basic
research in social science amply demonstrates the influential role that
group interactions have on individual attitudes, beliefs, and commit-
ment to action. e social-psychological processes that influence indi-
viduals are many and include processes related to in-group/out-group
biases, conformity, compliance, group think, polarization, and dif-
fusion of responsibility (see Table 3.1 for brief descriptions of these
processes).
Psychiatrist Mark Sageman provides the seminal description
of how these social dynamics influence the radicalization process
(Sageman, 2004). He notes that some Middle Eastern Muslims who
study abroad in Europe become homesick and feel alienated in their
host communities. ey seek companionship at their local mosques
and ultimately form small cliques of peers that are centered, in part,