(1) Extrajuridical Repression
Refers to a government using any illegal form of state power, including military or law enforcement repression, to alter the behavior of its citizens.
(1) Academic Consensus Definition
A complex definition based on the work of Alex Schmid. It combines common elements of the definitions used by the leading scholars in the field of terrorism.
(1) Carl Von Clausewitz (1780-1831)
A Prussian field marshal and philosopher of war. His book On War helped to shape military doctrine in the twentieth century.
A term used in guerrilla warfare and terrorism to describe how a small, weak force fights a stronger power. Asymmetrical wars are fought between sides that are grossly unequal. The less powerful side does not fight the more powerful side under the conventional rules of war because it cannot win by using these tactics. The weaker side uses unconventional methods of fighting.
(1) Nidal Malik Hasan (1970-)
an American soldier of Palestinian descent. Hasan was an Army psychiatrist who apparently became self-radicalized, embracing militant Islam. He went on a shooting spree at Fort Hood Texas on November 5, 2009, killing thirteen people and wounding almost three dozen others. He was wounded, arrested, and charged with several counts of murder.
(1) On War
One of the most influential philosophical works on the practice of warfare. Written by Carl von Clausewitz and published posthumously by his wife Maria, it remains standard reading for military officers in the Americas, Europe, and Asia.
(1) Rule Set
A term used by Thomas Barnett to describe the socio-legal norms governing war during any given period in history. Wars are waged within cultural norms. Since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Barnett believes we have entered a new rule set that includes subnational conflict.
(1) Selective Terrorism
A term used by Michael Collins during the Irish War of Independence (1919-1921). Collins did not launch indiscriminate terror attacks. Rather, he selectively targeted the British military, the police force it sponsored, and the people who supported the United Kingdom.
(1) Simple Definition
A definition of terrorism that involves three parts: (1) use of force, (2) against innocent people, (3) for political purposes.
(1) Social Construct
The way people view reality. Groups construct a framework around a concept, defining various aspects of their lives through the meanings they attribute to the construct.
(1) Social Context
The historical, political, and criminological circumstances at a given point in time. The social context affects the way terrorism is defined.
(1) Spectrum Of Conflict
A system developed by the U.S. Army to define low-intensity conflict, midlevel wars, and wars of mass destruction. This text expands the definition to include many levels of social conflict far beneath traditional definitions of war.
(1) Sun Tzu
A Chinese philosopher of war who made little distinction between war and peace. Subtle expressions of power that defeat the enemy are better than war or fighting. Many counterterrorism analysts believe that Sun Tzu's ancient approach to conflict is applicable for fighting modern terrorism.
Classification of an issue by looking at different types. Because this text is designed for those studying criminal justice and related security functions, terrorism will be examined by looking at the different types of tactical behavior.
(1) Violent Eschatology
When a group believes it must wage war to purify the earth before the return of a deity.
(2) Al Shabaab
(also known as the Harakat Shabaab al-Mujahadeen, the Youth, Mujahadeen Youth Movement, and Mujahadeen Al Shabaab Movement) was formed as a militant wing of a federation of Islamic courts in Somalia in 2006. Its senior leadership is affiliated with Al Qaeda.
(2) Alfred Schutz (1899-1959)
was a social scientist and philosopher who examined the meanings attributed to various phenomena. Using phenomenology, his method of analysis continues to have an important impact on the study of meaning in social behavior.
(2) Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794)
was one of the founders of the discipline of criminology. His work Of Crimes and Punishments (1764) is the classic Enlightenment study of the discipline.
(2) Clash Of Civilizations
as used by Huntington, refers to the cultural conflicts among the world's eight dominant civilizations. Civilizations are defined by common mores, values, behaviors, social structures, and economic systems. Religion is a key factor in defining a civilization.
(2) Erving Goffman (1922-1982)
was a sociologist who pioneered the use of meaning as a method of analysis. He was best known for examining actions as if the subjects were acting in a drama. This is known as dramaturgy. His methodology remains influential in social science.
(2) Eschatology (Pronounced Es-Ka-Taw-Low-Gee)
A Greek word used to indicate the theological end of time. In Judaism and Christianity, it refers to God bringing creation to an end. In some Shi'ite Islamic sects and among Christians who literalize biblical eschatological literature, believers contend that Jesus will return to lead a final battle against evil. Other major religions also have end-time theology.
(2) James W. Von Brunn (1920-2010)
was an American white supremacist and anti-Semite. He entered the Holocaust Museum on June 10, 2009, and began shooting. He killed a security officer before he was wounded and subdued. He died in federal custody while awaiting trial.
The subjective interpretation people give to events or physical objects. Meanings are developed by individuals and groups, and different meanings can be attributed to the same event or physical object because the definitions are always influenced by interpretation. Social scientists in this tradition believe that meanings cause actions.
(2) Meaning Framework
The definitional boundaries for a particular social meaning. Individuals and groups create boundaries around their experiences and perceptions, and they define issues within them. Meaning frameworks are the social boundaries surrounding those definitions. Juergensmeyer sees the clash between modern values and traditional culture as one of the reasons for terrorism. Religious terrorists look at the modern world and reject it. This world is evil in the meaning framework of religious terrorists, and they refuse to accept the boundaries of the secular modern world.
In counterterrorist or netwar discussions, the points in a system where critical components are stored or transferred. The importance of a node is determined by its relationship to the network.
(2) Omar Hammami (1984- )
is an American leader of Al Shabaab, going under the name of Abu Mansoor al-Amriki.
is a practical criminological process designed to identify the behavioral attributes of certain types of criminals.
as used in this context, refers to the psychological process of adopting extremist positions.
(2) Routes To Terrorism
as used by John Horgan, refers to the psychological and social factors that motivate people to join and remain in terrorist groups.
(2) Social Geometry
As used by Donald Black, the social space occupied by a structure and the direction in which it moves.
(2) Social Process
As used in this discussion, social process is the way individuals and groups structure themselves, interpret reality, and take action, based on those interpretations.
(2) Structural Framework
The idea that social constructs are based on systems that provide order. The systems are social structures that accomplish functions necessary to survive. Human activity occurs to accomplish the functions required to maintain the social structure of the system.
The manner in which a group is organized and its purpose. Social scientists from this tradition feel that a group's structure and purpose cause it to act. They also believe that groups are created for specific functions.
(2) Talcott Parsons (1902-1979)
was a social scientist who argued that it was necessary to examine social structures in order to capture the embedded meanings of actions. His methodology is known as Structural Functionalism.
(2) Theory Of Action
A social science theory that assumes human beings take action based on the subjective meanings they attribute to social settings.
(2) Torn Country
According to Huntington, a torn country is a political entity that contains large populations from differing civilizations. He refers to the points where the cultures join one another as fault lines.
(2) Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab
1986 according to a federal indictment, smuggled a chemical bomb and chemical igniter in a syringe onto a Northwest flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on December 25, 2009. He was born into a family that practiced Islam but became radicalized while attending school in the United Kingdom. He was allegedly trained by terrorists in Yemen, who supplied the explosive compound.
(3) Active Cadre
A military term that describes the people actually carrying out terrorist activity in an organizational hierarchy. The active cadre refers to the small terrorist group at the second level of a pyramid, under the command level.
(3) Capone Discovery
A term used by James Adams to explain the Irish Republican Army's entry into organized crime.
(3) Carlos Marighella (1911-1969)
A Brazilian communist legislator and a revolutionary theorist. Marighella popularized urban terrorism as a method for ending repression and eliminating U.S. domination of Latin America. He was killed in a police ambush in Sño Paulo in 1969.
The basic unit of a traditional terrorist organization. Groups of cells form columns. Members in cells seldom know one another. In more recent terrorist structures, cell describes a tactical group dispatched by the network for selected operations.
(3) Chain Organizations
Temporary associations of diverse groups. Groups in a chain come together for a particular operation and disband after it is over.
(3) Cold War
The Cold War was a standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union from 1945 until 1991. Each nation fought for influence through surrogates around the world, and would not confront each other directly for fear a massive nuclear destruction. It ended with the economic and political collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
(3) Cuban Guerrilla War
A three-step process as described by Che Guevara: (1) revolutionaries join the indigenous population to form guerrilla foco, as Guevara called them, (2) small forces form columns and control rural areas, and (3) columns unite for a conventional offensive to overthrow government.
(3) Cuban Revolution
The guerrilla revolution led by Fidel Castro. Castro initially failed in 1956 and left for Mexico after a brief prison sentence. He returned with a small group of guerrillas and built a large guerrilla army. He overthrew the Cuban government in 1959, embracing communism shortly after taking power.
(3) Ernesto "Che" Guevara (1928-1967)
Fidel Castro's assistant and guerrilla warfare theorist. Guevara advocated guerrilla revolutions throughout Latin America after success in the Cuban Revolution. He was killed in Bolivia in 1967 when trying to form a guerrilla army.
(3) Failed State
An area outside a government's control. Failed states operate under differing warlords, criminal groups, or competing governments.
(3) Forensic Accounting
An investigative tool used to track money used in illegal activities. It can be used in any crime involving the exchange, storage, or conversion of fiscal resources.
(3) Frantz Fanon (1925-1961)
A writer, psychiatrist, and revolutionary theorist. He was also one of the most influential philosophers in the awareness of colonialism. Fanon grew up in the French colony Martinique in the Caribbean, and he became acutely aware of racism and colonialism in experiences there. He joined the French Army in World War II and won one of France's highest military decorations. After the war he studied psychiatry. Believing that mental illness was a result of imperialism, Fanon campaigned against racism and colonialism. He supported Algerian rebels in their struggle with France and advocated for violent revolution. He died of leukemia, but his ideas influenced anticolonial revolutionaries for decades.
A common global economic network ideally uniting the world with production and international trade. Proponents believe it will create wealth. Critics believe it creates corporate wealth and increases distance between the rich and poor.
(3) Hawala System
A system of exchanging money based on trust relationships between money dealers. A chit, or promissory note, is exchanged between two hawaladars, and it is as valuable as cash or other traded commodities because the trust between the two parties guarantees its value.
As used here, refers to various forms of conflict that pit subnational forces or groups of forces against a recognized nation-state or allied states. It incorporates multidimensional guerrilla, terrorist, and political tactics. Insurgencies range from small revolts in a region of a country to international terrorist operations against a group of countries.
(3) Mao Zedong (1893-1976)
Also known as Mao Tse Tung, the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. He seized power in a revolution in 1949 and ruled China until his death in 1976.
A controversial term that links drugs to terrorism in one of two ways. Either drug profits are used to finance terrorism or drug gangs use terrorism to control production and distribution networks.
Organizations of groups, supplies, weapons, and any structure that supports an operation. Much like a traffic system or the World Wide Web, networks do not have central leadership, and they operate under a variety of rules.
(3) New Economy Of Terrorism
A term used by Loretta Napoleoni to describe the evolution of terrorist financing from the beginning strategies of the cold war to the present. Economic support and antiterrorist policies interact to form the new economy.
An illustration of the way terrorists organize themselves into hierarchies. It is an analogy showing a large base of support culminating in a small group of terrorists at the top.
(3) Reference Group
The primary group whose values with which individuals or other groups identify. It is an idealized group of peers that serves as a model for behavior.
(3) Shell State
A political situation where a government nominally controls its own state but where large regions are either anarchic or under the control of others. A government is unable to enforce law or provide for other forms of social order in a shell state.
(3) Tribal Areas
Refers to Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) in Pakistan by the Afghan border. Seven areas of Pashtu tribes have control of the region by agreement with the central government.
(3) Triborder Region
The area where Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina join. The major city is Cuidad del Este.
A group that shelters, supports, and inspires smaller terrorist groups. The RAND Corporation refers to this as a hub.
(3) Urban Terrorism
A fourstage process described by Carlos Marighella: (1) unorganized violence accompanied by passive disruption such as protests and student activism, (2) governmental repression to stop violence, (3) massive uprising in response to repression, and (4) toppling of government.
(3) Virtual Organizations
Associations that develop through communication, financial, and ideological links. Like a network, a virtual organization has no central leadership.
(11) Alberto Fujimori (1938-)
President of Peru from 1990 to 2000. He fled to Japan in 2000 and was extradited to Peru in 2007. He was convicted of human rights violations and sentenced to prison.
(11) Alvaro Uribe (1952- )
The President of Colombia, 2002-2010. He was known for his tough stance against FARC and other revolutionary movements.
(11) American Embassy Takeover - The Iranian Hostage Crisis
Revolutionary students stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran with the support of the Iranian government. They held 54 American hostages from November 1979 to January 1981.
As used by Raul Sendic, the historical point where a series of ideas come together and force change.
(11) Cultural Revolution
A violent movement in China from 1966 to 1976. Its main purpose was to rid China of its middle class and growing capitalist interests. The Cultural Revolution ended with the death of Mao Zedong.
(11) Guzman (1934-)
A philosophy professor who led the Shining Path from 1980 until his arrest in 1992. Guzman is serving a life sentence in Peru.
(11) King Gyanendra (1947-)
The king of Nepal from 2001 to 2008. After the attack and murder of several members of the royal family, Gyanendra became king of Nepal in 2001. Gyanendra took complete power in 2005 to fight the Maoist rebellion. In the spring of 2006 he was forced to return power to parliament, and he was removed from power in 2008.
(11) Margherita Cagol (1945-1975)
Also known as Mara Cagol, the wife of Renato Curcio and a member of the Red Brigades. She was killed in a shoot-out with Italian police a few weeks after freeing her husband from prison.
(11) People Power Revolution
A mass Philippine protest movement that toppled Ferdinand Marcos in 1986. Marcos ruled as a dictator after being elected as president in 1965 and declaring martial law in 1972. When Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (president 2001-2010) assumed the presidency in January 2001, her government proclaimed a second People Power Revolution.
(11) Plan Colombia
A joint effort by the United States and Colombia to reduce violence and illegal drugs. It began in 1999.
(11) Raul Sendic (1926-1989)
A Uruguayan revolutionary leader. Sendic founded the National Liberation Movement (MLN), popularly known as the Tupamaros. Following governmental repression in 1973, he fled the country. Sendic died in Paris in 1989.
(11) Red Corridor
The area of Naxalite violence in India. The length of the corridor runs from Nepal through southern India, and the width extends from India's east coast to the central regions.