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Why and How Some People Become Terrorists 95

Figure 3.1

Hypothesized Relationships Among Factors Implicated in Radicalization

Individual willingness

to engage in terrorism

Radicalizing

social groups

Real and perceived

rewards

Felt need to respond to

grievances

Passion for change

Collective grievance

and duty to defend

Personal grievance

and desire for revenge

t

Personal attacks on

self or loved ones

Effects of post-traumatic

stress disorder

...

Religious

change

tCaliphate

t.JMMFOJBMJTN

Political change

tIndependence

of state

tAnarchy...

Single-issue

change

tEnvironment

tAbortion

tAnimal rights...

Alienation

Recruitment

Bottom-up

peer groups

tPrisons

t3BEJDBMGBNJMJFT

t3FMJHJPVTTFUUJOHT

advocating violence

t*OUFSOFUTJUFT

ands

ors

Financial

Excitement

Social

Religious

or ideological

ors

Sense of identity

tied to collective

Attack

on collective

and

RAND MG849-3.1

Social, economic, and political discrimination;

other broad contextual factors

Charismatic, entrepreneurial leadership

96 Social Science for Counterterrorism: Putting the Pieces Together

necessary for the radicalization process. ese necessary and unneces-

sary conditions combine to make and/or distinctions that are enumer-

ated in detail below.

e ﬁrst-order factors in the ﬁgure are Group Socialization Pro-

cesses, Expected Rewards, Passion for Change (even a “felt need for

change”), and Felt Need to Respond to Grievance. Abundant evidence

suggests that socialization processes are a necessary precondition for radical-

ization. Few individuals radicalize in social isolation. Group processes

assure individuals that their chosen path is a correct one and provide

the socially motivated courage to carry out attacks and the means by

which to dehumanize selected targets. Group processes also stir and

solidify ideologically based motivations for action and, as such, are

interlinked to motivational desires for change and a desire to respond

to grievances. Another factor that is probably necessary is the presence

of perceived or real rewards for terror participation. Friendships solidi-

ﬁed in the terror cell or organization, the social status that is derived

from membership, and the heavenly gains of martyrdom are three

such rewards. Group processes and rewards ultimately combine with

one of two key motivational factors: a passion for change or felt need

to respond to grievance. ese two factors form the ideological basis

for terrorism and constitute overt reasons for terror action. Neither is

in itself a necessary factor, but at least one is likely required. Conse-

quently, individuals may become radicalized when the following con-

ditions exist: group processes and expected/real rewards and (passion

for change or felt need to respond to grievance).

Group processes ultimately take place in one of two ways. ey

are either implemented through top-down recruitment strategies ini-

tiated by a terror organization or cell, or they result from bottom-up

processes, whereby peer bonds and other social inﬂuences spiral indi-

viduals toward radicalization. Within the bottom-up trajectory, groups

of individuals meet and interact in many diﬀerent settings to include

prisons, radical families, religious settings advocating violence, and the

Internet. Groups within both the top-down and bottom-up settings

may hold particularly strong sway because of widespread perceptions of

social and religious alienation. Feelings of alienation commonly attrib-

uted to Muslim communities throughout Europe and the Middle East

Why and How Some People Become Terrorists 97

may draw individuals to settings where they can meet and identify

with like-minded individuals and groups. is alienation is likely fed

by perceptions of social, economic, and political discrimination. e

relationships between these diﬀerent factors can be summarized in the

following way: alienation and (recruitment or bottom-up peer groups);

prisons or radical families or religious settings advocating violence or

the Internet.

e desire to implement change may be an ideologically based

motivating factor for terrorism. ree broad-based motivational inﬂu-

ences feed into this: political change or religious change or single-issue

change. Politically motivated change may be related to a desire for

political independence or an eﬀort to sow anarchy. Religious change

can include a desire to bring about a Muslim caliphate/Sharia law or

millennialist-related change. Examples of single-issue changes relate to

environmental rights and abortion. It is also important to note that

although these motivations are listed separately, they likely cross-feed

each other. For example, religion-motivated changes can feed into

politically motivated conﬂicts. is is the case in the Palestinian ter-

ritories, where religious motivations have intermixed with nationalist

ones.

e desire to respond to perceived grievances constitutes another

motivational set. Grievances perceived by a collective and fostered

through identiﬁcation with that collective are a likely driving force for

initiating a collective defense. Alternatively, a desire for revenge is fre-

quently the result of personal attacks directed at individuals and their

friends and families. Some evidence suggests that the personal trauma-

tization, which is often manifested in PTSD, helps facilitate motiva-

tions for revenge.

Perceived rewards (which may or may not be real) that stem from

terrorist involvement are a presumed motivating factor. Five sepa-

rate rewards have been illustrated in this paper: ﬁnancial, excitement,

friendship, religious, and social status. It is diﬃcult to summarize these

factors with an and/or discussion. ese rewards can operate with dif-

fering degrees of intensity (for example, close and personal relation-

ships engendered in a terrorist group will prove more rewarding than

relatively weak relationships), and they can combine in numbers to

98 Social Science for Counterterrorism: Putting the Pieces Together

increase the reward value (for example, terrorist involvement that is

rewarded by friendships, social status, and perceived martyrdom may

prove more inﬂuential than any single reward).

Finally, note at the bottom of Figure 3.1 that some factors may

inﬂuence a number of items in the tree. ese include contextual fac-

tors, such as discrimination and the inﬂuence of a terrorist organi-

zation’s leaders, who may be quite charismatic and entrepreneurial

(Gupta, 2008).

Possible Implications for Policy

Although this is not a policy paper, its review of the steps toward indi-

vidual radicalization suggests some implications for U.S. and interna-

tional policy options. Perhaps they merely reinforce familiar points,

but collecting them may be useful:

Since organizational recruitment and bottom-up socialization •

processes are critical to the radicalization process, they merit

attention from international police and intelligence agencies. is

can include monitoring of Islamic mosques supportive of militant

ideology, as well as stronger steps against troublesome imams.

Since social relationships not only help drive the radicalization •

process but can also reward participation in radical organiza-

tions, attacking the social bonds within terrorist organizations

may prove to be an important counterterrorism tactic (Abrahms,

2008, p. 104).

Since alienation helps feed collective grievances and enhances the •

lure of radical milieus, and for other reasons, strides should be

taken to integrate Muslim populations who otherwise reside in

separated diaspora communities. Limiting Muslim-directed hos-

tility from host populations will play a key role in these eﬀorts.

Increasing Muslim participation in governance may also have

beneﬁts.

Since Muslim perceptions of both collective and personal attack •

appear to be key drivers of radicalization, the United States and its

Why and How Some People Become Terrorists 99

allies should be cautious about military interventions and, when

those are necessary, they should take considerable pains to limit

civilian casualties and the human rights abuses that war often

entails.

Since militants use a sophisticated propaganda campaign that •

increasingly exploits the World Wide Web, a systematic coun-

tercampaign is needed on the Web. However, since tainted U.S.

credibility among disaﬀected Muslims will limit the eﬀectiveness

of a U.S.-based message campaign, other mechanisms are needed.

Success will likely depend on the Web-based activities of moder-

ate Muslims.

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