British Journal of Criminology 50(4)

Introduction to the BJC Special Issue on Terrorism
Michael Levi, Susanne Karstedt, and Vincenzo Ruggiero

Global Perspectives

Cross-National Patterns of Terrorism: Comparing Trajectories for Total, Attributed and Fatal Attacks, 1970–2006
Gary LaFree, Nancy A. Morris, and Laura Dugan

Despite growing international concern about terrorism, until recently, very little was known about worldwide risk patterns for terrorist attacks. In this paper, we are especially interested in determining the extent to which terrorism is concentrated at the country level over time and whether different measures of terrorism (total, attributed and fatal attacks) yield similar results. Traditional sources of crime data—official police records and victimization and self-report crime surveys—typically exclude terrorism. In response, there has been growing interest in terrorist event databases. In this research, we report on the most comprehensive of these databases to date, formed by merging the Global Terrorism Database maintained by the START Center with the RAND-MIPT database. We use a statistical method called semi-parametric group-based trajectory analysis to examine 73,961 attacks in 206 countries and territories from 1970 to 2006. Our results confirm that terrorist attacks, like more common crimes, are highly concentrated across specific countries and these concentrations are fairly stable over time. Ten countries account for 38 per cent of all terrorist attacks in our data since 1970; 32 countries account for more than three-quarters of all attacks. The trajectory analysis also reveals a rapidly rising new terrorist threat concentrated especially among countries in South and Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

Combating the Financing of Terrorism: A History and Assessment of the Control of ‘Threat Finance’
Michael Levi

The history of international efforts to control the flow of funds to designated ‘terrorist groups’ via the formal financial system is examined. The work shows that—despite the high motivation of some governments and international banks to reduce terrorist attacks, which harm their citizens, customers, staff and profits—it remains difficult to determine how this private–public policing interface can rationally target ‘risky capital’. Financial intelligence efforts have had little externally discernible impact on reducing levels of terrorism or on criminal convictions. It reviews evaluation problems in knowing whether the apparent lack of effects is due to measurement failure (estimating how much terrorist harm might have occurred had the controls not been imposed), theory failure or implementation failure. It argues for a more modest assessment of the likely impact of measures against financing terrorism and nuclear proliferation.

Motivations, Strategies and Pathways

Gender, Crime and Terrorism: The Case of Arab/Palestinian Women in Israel
Anat Berko, Edna Erez, and Julie L. Globokar

This article compares the background, motivation, pathways and prison experiences of Arab/Palestinian women who were imprisoned for conventional crimes with those who were incarcerated for security-related or terrorism offences. In-depth interviews of the two groups were conducted in the Israeli prisons in which they served their sentences. Prison personnel were also interviewed and court and prison files examined to validate the women's background and criminal history. Although both groups transgressed gender expectations by venturing into male-dominated worlds (crime and terrorism), the data point to differences between the groups regarding their personal background and the manner in which their violations were influenced by gender and the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The implications of the findings for differences between crime and terrorism as related to gender and Palestinian terrorism are discussed.

A Behavioural Analysis of Terrorist Action: The Assassination and Bombing Campaigns of ETA between 1980 and 2007
Margaret A. Wilson, Angela Scholes, and Elizabeth Brocklehurst

This study examines the range of terrorist action employed by ETA and the underlying psychological dimensions that distinguish between the conduct of their two main forms: assassinations and bombings. Descriptive accounts of incidents occurring between 1980 and 2007 are analysed for content and for the similarities and differences between the incidents represented, using Multidimensional Scalogram Analysis. The results show that incidents vary according to dimensions of victim targeting. For assassinations, these dimensions are proximity and specificity, whilst bombings vary in the level of ‘intent to harm’ and the type of victim. Correlational analysis reveals that the group goes through periods of increased and decreased activity involving all forms of action, rather than displaying a substitution effect between different methods. The implications are discussed.

Armed Struggle in Italy: The Limits to Criminology in the Analysis of Political Violence
Vincenzo Ruggiero

Repeated calls to criminologists to engage in the analysis of violent political conflict have been followed by an abundant production of literature within the discipline. This article examines such production and attempts to delineate the limits to criminology in the analysis of political violence. By presenting interview extracts from a case study centred on violent political conflict in Italy during the 1970s and 1980s, I demonstrate why criminology should seek supplementary explanatory categories within the broader realm of social theory, rather than rely exclusively on the theories and assumptions of traditional criminology.

Policing and Peacemaking in Conflict Zones

Terrorist Threats and Police Performance: A Study of Israeli Communities
David Weisburd, Badi Hasisi, Tal Jonathan, and Gali Aviv

In recent years, scholars and police practitioners have become increasingly concerned with the possible impacts of terrorism on police performance. Some scholars have argued that increased terrorist threats will reduce resources that are devoted to ordinary policing functions such as solving crimes, and that anti-terrorism functions may overshadow traditional police activities. Others have suggested that heightened surveillance due to terrorist threats could have unintended crime prevention benefits. In this study, we examine the impacts of terrorist threats on one aspect of police performance—the clearance of police files. Using Israel during the Second Intifada (2000–04) as a case study, we analyse the impact of level of terrorist threat, while controlling for other possible confounding factors, separating out communities that are primarily Jewish or Arab. Our analyses suggest that terrorist threats have a significant impact upon police performance, though that impact varies strongly by type of community. Higher levels of threat are associated with lower proportions of cleared cases in the majority Jewish communities, and higher proportions in the majority Arab communities.

Police Involvement in Counter-Terrorism and Public Attitudes Towards the Police in Israel—1998–2007
Tal Jonathan

Public attitudes towards the police are considered one of the important outcomes of policing in democratic countries. However, it is not clear how policing terrorism may affect these evaluations. The ‘Rally Effect’ provides a context for examining this question, and suggests that when faced with severe terrorism threats, public perceptions of the police will rise in the short term but decline over time. Utilizing this framework, this article examines fluctuations in attitudes of Jewish adults in Israel towards the police over the past decade, within the context of legitimacy and procedural justice. The results lend support for the hypothesized model, and suggest that in addition to police conduct, public attitudes toward the police may be influenced by larger social forces.

Identity, International Terrorism and Negotiating Peace: Hamas and Ethics-Based Considerations from Critical Restorative Justice
Bruce A. Arrigo

This paper conceptually examines one specific case of international terrorism, including the emergence and maintenance of membership-allegiance in its militant extremist group. This is the case of the Islamic Resistance Movement (or Hamas) and the manifestation of its corresponding Palestinian identity. Although the social person is constituted by symbols and objects, acts and social acts, meanings, and role-taking and role-making, questions persist about how best to promote peaceful coexistence, advance the interests of non-violence and ensure the protection of basic human rights. These practices constitute an ethic grounded in Aristotelian virtue. The delineation of key principles emanating from critical restorative justice helps to specify this brand of moral reasoning. The integration of these principles with the proposed symbolic interactionist framework demonstrates how extremist violence can be mediated. Suggestive examples of the same involving Hamas and those with whom it struggles (Palestine, Israel and the United States) are used to guide the analysis. The proposed conceptual framework is then briefly assessed for its overall explanatory capabilities, especially in relation to furthering terrorism studies.

British Journal of Criminology, July 2010: Volume 50, Issue 4