UMD Theses and Dissertations
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Item ARE SUICIDE BOMBINGS REALLY UNIQUE? A MULTI-LEVEL ANALYSIS OF WORLDWIDE TERRORIST INCIDENTS, 1980-2015(2017) Distler, Michael Robert; LaFree, Gary; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Suicide bombing is a lethal terrorism tactic that kills over 8 people per attack and injures 21 other people, on average. Suicide bombings have also been used more frequently in 2015 than they have in any one year since the tactic was first introduced in Iraq in 1981 and they were also used in more countries and by more groups than ever before. Even though the tactic is continuing to grow around the globe, there have been few studies seeking to understand in what ways the tactic is unique from other forms of terrorism. While theorists have attempted to explain the initiation and use of the tactic across various conflicts, there has been no previous study, of which I am aware, that compares suicide bombings to other relevant tactics, such as vehicle bombings, as well as to all other terrorist attacks in a multilevel framework. With this in mind, the current dissertation seeks to create a profile of suicide bombing by including a number of attack- and country-level variables in a multilevel model. Using data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) from 1980 through 2015, this dissertation compares 4,737 suicide bombings with 142,195 other terrorist attacks along a number of theoretically and empirically relevant variables. The attack, country-year, and country-level variables are used to test 5 hypotheses. Separate models were also run that included 7,130 vehicle bombings as a tactic separate from suicide bombings and all other terrorist attacks. Suicide bombings were also split into two categories, vehicle and non-vehicle. Using three-level HGLM analytical techniques, this dissertation found that only one of the five hypotheses received support across all 17 model specifications. Looking at the significance of variables across model specifications, a profile of suicide bombings was developed. Suicide bombings were more likely to: target security forces; be used in complex attacks; be carried out by known organizations; cause a greater number of fatalities; be used since 9/11; be used in international attacks; be used in more lethal conflicts; and be used in Muslim majority countries. Conversely, suicide bombings were less likely to: target civilians; be used in assassinations; and be successful. These findings call into question some of the main theories of suicide bombings, including those put forth by Pape and Bloom. However, this research does serve as a useful starting point for policy makers and practitioners in terms of understanding when, where, and how suicide bombings are used by different individuals and organizations around the world.Item Patterns of Collective Desistance from Terrorism(2015) Miller, Erin Elizabeth; LaFree, Gary; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)To better understand why perpetrator organizations desist from terrorist violence, we must first understand how perpetrator organizations desist from terrorist violence. With this research I aim to improve our empirical understanding of patterns of collective desistance from terrorism in support of a robust research agenda to advance theory and policy on this topic. First, I review the existing scholarly literature on collective desistance to identify conceptual and practical limitations. Second, I describe several key challenges for empirical analysis of collective desistance from terrorism. Third, I leverage more than 40 years of event data from the Global Terrorism Database to analyze patterns of desistance among 632 organizations that carried out terrorist attacks between 1970 and 2013. In doing so, I use descriptive statistics and brief qualitative case studies to critically evaluate the results of this relatively large-N analysis and illustrate its strengths and limitations. Fourth, I expand the analysis to consider how characteristics of perpetrator organizations’ terrorist activity relate to patterns of desistance. Finally, I conclude with a discussion of the implications of this study for research, theory, and policy, as well as the limitations and opportunities for improvement and expansion upon the current research.Item The utility of NGO interventions: Influences on terrorist activity.(2015) Hodwitz, Omi; Dugan, Laura; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Terrorism studies have increased following the attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001. While a great deal of research has focused on the influence of state-sponsored counterterrorism strategies on terrorist activities, limited attention has been directed towards examining the influence of non-state actors on terrorist organizations (TOs). This dissertation seeks to assess the role that an influential but often overlooked player may have on terrorist activity: the non-governmental organization (NGO). Many TOs and NGOs engage in similar campaigns, primarily providing services or advocating for a shared constituency or minority that experiences suffering at the hands of a majority, usually the state. Both TOs and NGOs require the support of the constituents in order to maintain group legitimacy, fundraise, and recruit. In addition, both vie for media attention in order to publicize the issue, radicalize the larger community, and exert pressure on the state. Public support and attention is limited and difficult to acquire, placing TOs and NGOs in competition. As such, within the rational choice and game theoretic frameworks, when faced with an NGO competitor, TOs are hypothesized to adjust their activities in order to gain constituent support, media attention, and to eliminate the competition. Using data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD), this dissertation assesses the influence that Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, International Committee of the Red Cross, and local NGOs have on TOs in Algeria, Lebanon, and Turkey between 1987 and 2011. Results from autoregressive Poisson and negative binomial models demonstrate limited support for the hypothesized relationships. NGOs appear to have a marginal influence on TO activities in Algeria, an extremely limited impact in Lebanon, and no relationship in Turkey. Overall findings suggest two conclusions: NGO activities, in general, do not appear to escalate TO violence and NGO campaign activities specifically focused on de-escalating TO violence appear to be ineffective in these three countries. Replication is needed in additional countries to substantiate these findings.Item The Psychological Foundations of Homegrown Radicalization: An Immigrant Acculturation Perspective(2015) Lyons, Sarah Louise; Gelfand, Michele J; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In the post-9/11 era, an increasing number of extremist threats are homegrown. Radical organizations such as the Islamic State are actively targeting Muslim immigrants and nationals of Western countries as recruits. Yet, little research has addressed the factors that drive immigrants to aggress against their country of settlement. We integrate the terrorism and immigrant acculturation literatures to suggest that cultural identification processes play a key role in the radicalization of Muslim immigrant and minority populations. Specifically, we propose that "marginalized" immigrants who do not identify with either their heritage culture or the culture of the larger society (Berry, 1970, 1997) have experienced significance loss (Kruglanski, Chen, Dechesne, Fishman, & Orehek, 2009) and are at the greatest risk for radicalization due to threats to significance. Moreover, we argue that this can be exacerbated by exclusion from others in the larger society. In Study 1, we show in a sample of 198 Muslims in the United States that marginalized individuals experience significance loss, which is exacerbated by exclusion from the larger society, and in turn increases support for radical groups, ideologies and behavior. In Study 2, we find partial replication of this model outside the American context in a sample of 204 Muslims in Germany. In Study 3, we move to the lab and demonstrate in a sample of 145 first- and second-generation immigrants in the United States that marginalization, and to some extent exclusion, are risk factors for significance loss outside of the Muslim population, and that significance loss contributes to support for radicalism. Implications for psychological science and social policy are discussed.Item INCORPORATING IDEAS OF DISPLACEMENT AND DIFFUSION OF BENEFITS INTO EVALUATIONS OF COUNTERTERRORISM POLICY(2015) Safer-Lichtenstein, Aaron; Dugan, Laura; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Criminologists and terrorism specialists alike have conducted research on the deterrent effect of policies; however, to date, only criminologists have thoroughly examined the associated displacement of crime and diffusion of benefits. Using data from the Eco-Incidents Database, this study first examines the deterrent effect of government efforts targeting animal rights and environmental terrorism over several years. Next, it extends this application by examining non-terrorist actions by both terrorist groups and non-terrorist groups to see if deterrent actions have any unintended consequences. Results show no evidence of displacement, but rather that several government actions evidenced a diffusion of benefits. If anti-terrorist laws reduce other types of crime, particularly by non-terrorists, then this has policy implications for law enforcement strategies.Item The Psychology of Martyrdom(2013) Bélanger, Jocelyn; Kruglanski, Arie W; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In recent decades, social scientists' interest for the topic of self-sacrifice has been accentuated by the growing incidence of suicide attacks around the world. The present set of twelve studies aimed to investigate the psychological underpinnings of the readiness to self-sacrifice by (1) creating a new tool to quantitatively assess individuals' propensity toward self-sacrifice (Studies 1-7), (2) investigating the motivational forces potentiating self-sacrifice (Studies 8-10), and (3) finding ways of redirecting these forces in a peaceful direction (Studies 11 and 12). Beyond creating a psychometrically sound measure of self-sacrifice, present research guided by the quest for significance theory (Kruglanski, Chen, Dechesne, Fishman, & Orehek, 2009) indicated that individuals' motivation to self-sacrifice is augmented when their sense of personal worth is lowered. In addition, results indicated that when the quest for personal significance is activated in conjunction with hostile ideologies, individuals are more likely to relinquish their physical and emotional well-being to harm others.Item THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LEGITIMACY, TERRORIST ATTACKS AND POLICE(2011) Gibbs, Jennifer; Dugan, Laura; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Scholars often suggest that terrorism - "the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence to attain a political, economic, religious or social goal through fear, coercion or intimidation" (LaFree & Dugan, 2007, 184) - is a battle of legitimacy. As the most ubiquitous representatives of the government's coercive force, the police should be most susceptible to terrorism stemming from perceptions of illegitimacy. Police are attractive symbolic and strategic targets, and they were victimized in over 12% of terrorist attacks worldwide since 1970. However, empirical research assessing the influence of legitimacy on terrorist attacks, generally, and scholarly attention to terrorist attacks on police are scant. The purpose of this dissertation is to examine the influence of state and police legitimacy and alternative explanations on the proportion of all and only fatal terrorist attacks on police in 82 countries between 1999 and 2008. Data were drawn from several sources, including the Global Terrorism Database and the World Values Survey. Surprisingly, results of Tobit analyses indicate that police legitimacy, measured by the percentage of the population who have at least some confidence in police, is not significantly related to the proportion of all terrorist attacks on police or the proportion of fatal terrorist attacks on police. State legitimacy was measured by four indicators; only the percentage of the population who would never protest reached significance, lending limited support for this hypothesis. Greater societal schism, the presence of a foreign military and greater economic inequality were consistently significant predictors of higher proportions of terrorist attacks on police. Some measures of violence within a country also were influential, but they were not consistent across models or with expectations. The results of the Tobit analyses were confirmed with Negative Binomial Regression Models using the number of all and only fatal terrorist attacks targeting police as the outcome. While these results suggest alternative explanations for terrorist attacks targeting police, discounting legitimacy as an explanation for such attacks or terrorism, generally, is premature. Policy implications and avenues for future research are discussed.Item MEDIA FRAMING OF TERRORISM: VIEWS OF "FRONT LINES" NATIONAL SECURITY PRESTIGE PRESS(2010) Epkins, Heather Davis; Aldoory, Linda; Communication; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This research investigates a critical tier in the global flow of information about terrorism. This qualitative study employs 35 in-depth interviews with national security journalists in the Washington, D.C. prestige press (Stempel, 1961) to explore their perceptions surrounding the collection, interpretation and dissemination process of terrorism news content. This study includes a review of the recent rhetorical shift from the Bush Adminstration "War on Terrorism" to "Overseas Contingency Operation" attempted by the Obama Administration. Rarely studied, but extremely influential, these particular "front line" reporters offer substantial insider knowledge on evolving trends in the news media production process on terrorism and national security. Their unique geographical position allowing for daily interaction among American governmental leadership, combined with their responsibility to cover what could be argued as one of the most influential topics of our time - terrorism - offers readers an inside view of the daily constraints, strategies and perceptions of this elite group. Data analysis adhered to grounded theory methods. Findings include evidence of new and evolving journalist routines with implications for public policy and the evolving integrity of journalist practices. Moreover, extending the published literature in the mass communication theory and national security realms, this research offers value by analyzing and describing the news production processes and perceptions - for the first time - of the D.C. national security prestige press. Reported results should also offer practitioners new insight into best practices and an opportunity for information users to better understand and evaluate what they are receiving.Item State Instability and Terrorism(2010) Fahey, Susan; LaFree, Gary; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)I explore the relationship between political instability and terrorism in this dissertation, using the Global Terrorism Database (GTD), which contains both domestic and transnational terrorism. I use the Political Instability Task Force data to measure political instability. Breakdown theory suggests that the occurrence of political instability should increase levels of terrorism within a state, because when a rapid social change, such as political instability, occurs, there is a severing of social bonds that tie individuals to society. The effects of the disruption in controls should be to increase levels of non-routine collective action, of which terrorism is a form (Durkheim, 1930 [1951]; Useem, 1998). In addition, different types of instability ought to invite different levels of terrorism based on the degree of disruption to the societal controls. There are four types of political instability: ethnic war, revolutionary war, genocide and adverse regime change. Further, I extrapolate two theoretical extensions from the breakdown model. The first extension is that more instability episodes should produce more terrorism within a state. The second extension is that when two or more instability episodes occur within a year, this increased temporal density should produce more terrorism than when one instability episode occurs within a year. I test the theoretical framework using the negative binomial regression model with country and time fixed effects. The first model contains control variables that measure country demographics, governance and contiguity to an unstable nation with 147 states from 1970-2005. The second model examines the effects of control variables that measure the population age structure and social and economic development in a smaller sample of 116 states and years from 1981-2005. The third model adds ethnic minority group characteristics from the Minorities at Risk (MAR) dataset and contains 82 countries from 1990-2005. This three-sample strategy allows me to speak to the omitted variable and sample selection biases that may impact the results. Empirical results demonstrate that political instability is an important predictor of terrorism incidents. The breakdown model itself is supported, but the extensions are not supported. Further research is needed to delineate the boundaries of the instability-terrorism relationship.Item Terrorism's Communicative Dynamic: Leveraging the Terrorist-Audience Relationship to Assess Evolutionary Trajectories(2009) Gressang, Daniel Seidel; Lalman, David; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Terrorist groups do not operate in isolation. To survive in the face of counter-pressures from their opponents, the group must establish a beneficial relationship with a targeted audience, a presumed constituency, in order to generate the sympathy and support necessary for maintaining operational viability. Existing studies of terrorism, however, offer few insights into how this might be done. The most common approach revolves around assessments of terrorist messages, yet typically treats those messages as self-serving propaganda or media manipulation. This study takes a different approach, suggesting that terrorists use statements and communiqués in an effort to gain and maintain a supportive audience. Further, the intended audience for the messages infer meaning in terrorist violence, thus augmenting or reducing the impact of persuasive messaging by the terrorist. Understanding this process, in turn, may yield new insights into the dynamic processes of terrorism, offering new opportunities to assess a terrorist group's potential for positive evolutionary growth or greater relative fitness. Using Grunig's situational theory of publics, this study creates and evaluates a new metric, called expected affinity, for examining the terrorist group's effort to establish and strengthen bonds between itself and its targeted and presumptively supportive audience. Expected affinity combines sub-measures addressing problem recognition, expected and desired levels of involvement, and constraint recognition, coupled with an inferred meaning in the symbolism of violent acts in order to evaluate terrorist messages and attacks. The results suggest utility in the expected affinity metric and point to opportunities for making the measure more directly applicable to specific cases through incorporation of detailed case study data.