Sociology of Terrorism

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Defining a terrorist or terrorism is not just a theoretical issue.  Terrorism is no longer a local problem of specific countries. It is an issue involving a number of international implicatons. An effective strategy requires a proper definition of a terrorist or terrorism. 

Terrorist Group and Group Dynamics

“In brief, the psychology behind terrorist violence is normal psychology, abnormal only in the intensity of the group dynamics that link causes with comrades.” - Clark R. McCauley.

The passion with which even socially advantaged group of young people who identify with oppressed groups and the willingness of some fighters to commit suicidal acts in pursuit of a distant goal is mysterious.

Group dynamics explains the reason-result relations within a group and the formation and the functioning of them. Terrorism involves attempts by relatively small groups with claims of mass representation to vindicate those claims by resorting to exemplary violent action.

According to noted terrorism scholar Martha Crenshaw, for the majority of terrorists who are followers, to become a member of the group is a dominant motive. Involvement in terrorist organizations may be further reinforced by powerful group dynamics such as groupthink, the subordination of the self before the group, and personality cults. Consequently, terrorist groups, which are highly centralized, insular, and cohesive units by nature, develop and enforce their own values systems, often evolving their own subculture similar to many religious cults. For the terrorist, .The powerful psychological forces of conversion in the group are sufficient to offset traditional social sanctions against violence.To the terrorists their acts may have the moral status of religious warfare or political liberation.

Social scientists have tried to apply their knowledge of the typical small-group behavior to terrorist groups. Certain features of terrorist groups, such as pressures toward conformity and consensus, are characteristic of all small groups, but there is a unique agenda that creates and binds the terrorist group.

The transformation of individuals into terrorists with a political or religious agenda takes place as a result of blind unquestioned faith among the members of the terrorist group in that agenda.

There is a belief that their political or religious agenda is of utmost importance and is a morally acceptable final solution. Final is the key word here and the privilege of being part of the final solution provides a sense of belonging within the terrorist group.

The belief that they are the chosen agents to carry out the imperative act gives the terrorist a feeling of self-importance and there is also honour at stake.

The view that membership in a terrorist group often provides a solution to the pressing personal needs and the inability to achieve a desired niche in traditional society, is no longer valid. Highly educated and successful individuals commanding great respect in the society have been found to be members of terrorist groups.

Terrorist identity does provide free passage and escape to an individual without a role, or very limited role in society. The group members feel a sense of power and experience an intense and close interpersonal environment and social status. To some in the group there is hope of potential access to wealth and a share in the glory and power that may follow.

The terrorist group members believe that their acts have the moral status of religious warfare or political liberation. Such psychological forces of conversion in the group are sufficient to offset general social disapproval of violence.

Terrorist groups are similar to religious sects or cults who require total commitment and promise an ultimate reward.

According to Post, "Terrorists whose only sense of significance comes from being terrorists cannot be forced to give up terrorism, for to do so would be to lose their very reason for being."

One generally accepted principle, as demonstrated by W. Bion (1961), is that individual judgment and behavior are strongly influenced by the powerful forces of group dynamics. Every group, according to Bion, has two opposing forces--a rare tendency to act in a fully cooperative, goal-directed, conflict-free manner to accomplish its stated purposes, and a stronger tendency to sabotage the stated goals. The latter tendency results in a group that defines itself in relation to the outside world and acts as if the only way it can survive is by fighting against or fleeing from the perceived enemy; a group that looks for direction to an omnipotent leader, to whom they subordinate their own independent judgment and act as if they do not have minds of their own; and a group that acts as if the group will bring forth a messiah who will rescue them and create a better world. Post believes that the terrorist group is the apotheosis of the sabotage tendency, regularly exhibiting all three of these symptoms.

Both structure and social origin need to be examined in any assessment of terrorist group dynamics. In Post's (1987) view, structural analysis in particular requires identification of the locus of power. In the autonomous terrorist action cell, the cell leader is within the cell, a situation that tends to promote tension. In contrast, the action cells of a terrorist group with a well-differentiated structure are organized within columns, thereby allowing policy decisions to be developed outside the cells.

Post found that group psychology provides more insights into the ways of terrorists than individual psychology does. After concluding, unconvincingly, that there is no terrorist mindset, he turned his attention to studying the family backgrounds of terrorists. He found that the group dynamics of nationalist-separatist groups and anarchic-ideological groups differ significantly.
Members of nationalist-separatist groups are often known in their communities and maintain relationships with friends and family outside the terrorist group, moving into and out of the community with relative ease. In contrast, members of anarchic-ideological groups have irrevocably severed ties with family and community and lack their support. As a result, the terrorist group is the only source of information and security, a situation that produces pressure to conform and to commit acts of terrorism.

Pressures to Conform

Peer pressure, group solidarity, and the psychology of group dynamics help to pressure an individual member to remain in the terrorist group. According to Post (1986), terrorists tend to submerge their own identities into the group, resulting in a kind of "group mind" and group moral code that requires unquestioned obedience to the group. As Crenshaw (1985) has observed, "The group, as selector and interpreter of ideology, is central." Group cohesion increases or decreases depending on the degree of outside danger facing the group.

The need to belong to a group motivates most terrorists who are followers to join a terrorist group. Behavior among terrorists is similar, in Post's analysis, because of this need by alienated individuals to belong. For the new recruit, the terrorist group becomes a substitute family, and the group's leaders become substitute parents. An implied corollary of Post's observation that a key motivation for membership in a terrorist group is the sense of belonging and the fraternity of like-minded individuals is the assumption that there must be considerable apprehension among members that the group could be disbanded. As the group comes under attack from security forces, the tendency would be for the group to become more cohesive.

A member with wavering commitment who attempts to question group decisions or ideology or to quit under outside pressure against the group would likely face very serious sanctions. Terrorist groups are known to retaliate violently against members who seek to drop out. In 1972, when half of the 30-member Rengo Sekigun (Red Army) terrorist group, which became known as the JRA, objected to the group's strategy, the dissenters, who included a pregnant woman who was thought to be "too bourgeois," were tied to stakes in the northern mountains of Japan, whipped with wires, and left to die of exposure. By most accounts, the decision to join a terrorist group or, for that matter, a terrorist cult like Aum Shinrikyo, is often an irrevocable one.

Pressures to Commit Acts of Violence

Post (1990:35) argues that "individuals become terrorists in order to join terrorist groups and commit acts of terrorism." Joining a terrorist group gives them a sense of "revolutionary heroism" and self-importance that they previously lacked as individuals.

Consequently, a leader who is action-oriented is likely to have a stronger position within the group than one who advocates prudence and moderation. Thomas Strentz has pointed out that terrorist groups that operate against democracies often have a field commander who he calls an "opportunist," that is, an activist, usually a male, whose criminal activity predates his political involvement. Strentz applies the psychological classification of the antisocial personality, also known as a sociopath or psychopath, to the life-style of this type of action-oriented individual. His examples of this personality type include Andreas Baader and Hans Joachim Klein of the Baader-Meinhof Gang and Akira Nihei of the JRA. Although the opportunist is not mentally ill, Strentz explains, he "is oblivious to the needs of others and unencumbered by the capacity to feel guilt or empathy."

By most accounts, Baader was unpleasant, constantly abusive toward other members of the group, ill-read, and an action-oriented individual with a criminal past. Often recruited by the group's leader, the opportunist may eventually seek to take over the group, giving rise to increasing tensions between him and the leader. Often the leader will manipulate the opportunist by allowing him the fantasy of leading the group.

On the basis of his observation of underground resistance groups during World War II, J.K. Zawodny (1978) concluded that the primary determinant of underground group decision making is not the external reality but the psychological climate within the group. For action-oriented terrorists, inaction is extremely stressful. For action-oriented members, if the group is not taking action then there is no justification for the group. Action relieves stress by reaffirming to these members that they have a purpose. Thus, in Zawodny's analysis, a terrorist group needs to commit acts of terrorism in order to justify its existence.

Other terrorists may feel that their personal honor depends on the degree of violence that they carry out against the enemy. In 1970 Black September's Salah Khalef ("Abu Iyad") was captured by the Jordanians and then released after he appealed to his comrades to stop fighting and to lay down their arms. Dobson (1975:52) reports that, according to the Jordanians, Abu Iyad "was subjected to such ridicule by the guerrillas who had fought on that he reacted by turning from moderation to the utmost violence."

Pearlstein points out that other examples of the political terrorist's self-justification of his or her terrorist actions include the terrorist's taking credit for a given terrorist act and forewarning of terrorist acts to come. By taking credit for an act of terrorism, the terrorist or terrorist group not only advertises the group's cause but also communicates a rhetorical self-justification of the terrorist act and the cause for which it was perpetrated. By threatening future terrorism, the terrorist or terrorist group in effect absolves itself of responsibility for any casualties that may result.

Terrorism or Revolutionary Violence?

Salah Khalef (Abu Iyad) was Yasser Arafat’s deputy and one of the leaders of Fatah and Black September. He was responsible for a number of lethal attacks, including the killing of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. In order to rationalize such actions, he used the tactic of confounding “terrorism” with “political violence,” stating,

“By nature, and even on ideological grounds, I am firmly opposed to political murder and, more generally, to terrorism. Nevertheless, unlike many others, I do not confuse revolutionary violence with terrorism, or operations that constitute political acts with others that do not.”

Abu Iyad tries to present terrorism and political violence as two different and unconnected phenomena. The implication of this statement is that a political motive makes the activity respectable, and the end justifies the means. I will examine this point below.

Targeting “the innocent”?

One of the prevalent ways of illustrating the cruelty and inhumanity of terrorists is to present them as harming “the innocent.” Thus, in Terrorism: How the West Can Win, Binyamin Netanyahu states that terrorism is “the deliberate and systematic murder, maiming, and menacing of the innocent to inspire fear for political ends.”

This definition was changed in Netanyahu’s third book, Fighting Terrorism, when the phrase “the innocent” was replaced by the term “civilians”: “Terrorism is the deliberate and systematic assault on civilians to inspire fear for political ends.” “Innocent” (as opposed to “civilian”) is a subjective concept, influenced by the definer’s viewpoint, and therefore must not be the basis for a definition of terrorism. The use of the concept “innocent” in defining terrorism makes the definition meaningless and turns it into a tool in the political game. The dilemma entailed by the use of the term “innocent” is amply illustrated in the following statement by Abu Iyad:

As much as we repudiate any activity that endangers innocent lives, that is, against civilians in countries that are not directly involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict, we feel no remorse concerning attacks against Israeli military and political elements who wage war against the Palestinian people . . . Israeli acts of vengeance usually result in high casualties among Palestinian civilians—particularly when the Israeli Air Force blindly and savagely bombs refugee camps—and it is only natural that we should respond in appropriate ways to deter the enemy from continuing its slaughter of innocent victims.”

Abu Iyad here clarifies that innocent victims are civilians in countries that are not directly involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict (implying that civilians in Israel, even children and old people, are not innocent), while he describes Palestinian civilians as innocent victims.

Individual Terrorism, Indiscriminate Terrorism, Rural and Urban Guerrilla Warfare

Rural guerrilla warfare, is “the use of violence against military personnel and security forces in their area of deployment, activity and transport, in order to attain political aims.”

Urban guerrilla warfare involves “targeting a specific urban military facility or attacking a member of the military/security forces, or a political leader at the decision-making level, in order to achieve political aims.”

Indiscriminate terrorism entails “using violence against a civilian target, without regard to the specific identity of the victims, in order to spread fear in a population larger than that actually affected, with the purpose of attaining political aims.”

Individual terrorism entails “using violence against a specific civilian target, or attacking a civilian who embodies a symbol to the public or to the attackers, but who does not function as a political leader at the decision-making level.”

The thorniest issue in defining terrorism and guerrilla activity is the fine line separating urban guerrilla activity from individual terrorism. Both represent the convergence of terrorism with guerrilla warfare, and are sometimes used interchangeably.

Urban guerrilla warfare is often used synonymously with terrorism. Schmidt argues that “the equation ‘terrorism = (urban) guerrilla warfare’ is one which has not only been used for political propaganda or conversely for guilt attribution, but has been employed also by social and political scientists.

The difference between individual terrorism and urban guerrilla warfare again hinges on the identity of the intended target.

An attack against military personnel, or against a leading decision-maker who formulates policy, could be considered, according to the proposed definition, an “urban guerrilla” activity.

If the target is a civilian not acting in a decision-making capacity, but merely someone who is at most a political or social symbol such as a journalist, a past leader, a judge, the head of a community or ethnic group, etc.

Aims of Terrorism and Guerrilla Warfare

The terrorist and the guerrilla fighter may have the exact same aims, but they choose different means to accomplish them.

Political aims that terrorist organizations and guerrilla movements seek are: national liberation, revolution, anarchism and changing the socio-economic system. An organization is defined as “terrorist” because of its mode of operation and its target of attack, whereas calling something a “struggle for liberation” has to do with the aim that the organization seeks to attain.

The end of national liberation may, in some cases, justify recourse to violence, in an attempt to solve the problem that led to the emergence of a particular organization in the first place. Nevertheless, the organization must still act according to the rules of war, directing its activities toward the conquest of military and security targets; in short, it must confine itself to guerrilla activities. When the organization breaks these rules and intentionally targets civilians, it becomes a terrorist organization, according to objective measures, and not according to the subjective perception of the definer.

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