Rethinking Terrorism

When you think of terrorism as an idea, what comes to mind? Does it conjure the Twin Towers, or the war in Iraq and Syria against the would-be Islamic State? Mail bombs sent to lobbying firms or Chechen rebels allegedly blowing up city blocks in Moscow? While one’s understanding of terrorism might remain grounded in concrete ideas, our shared understanding as a society is very different and rests on perspective. A historian might see the plight of Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Cong or Sun Yat-sen, Chiang-Kai Shek and the Kuomintang as more valid than that of a war veteran. A suburban mom might not have the same grasp of the political economy of Egypt than Boutros Boutrous-Ghali. A diverse and coinciding range of factors like age, socio-economic status, geographical region, social atmosphere and so on affect our perspective in how we approach daily life – we bring these biases everywhere wego and apply them to our daily life. They comprise an ideological framework by which almost everyone sees the world.

While that’s all very abstract, I want to use this idea of perspective, and more specifically, who controls these perspectives, and how we collectively agree to these as societies to explore their greater consequences. To be more concise, I want to make to you, the reader, consider: who holds the power to determine what perspectives are correct and which are incorrect, and why we might want to redefine or at least introduce newperspectives.

Terrorism as an idea has its roots in the French revolution, but a more modern understanding can be summarized by any political textbook as “the unofficial or unauthorized use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims.” However, this broad definition leads many to question whether or not this is rooted in fact, or merely an overgeneralization that is a by-product of hindsight. As noted prior, our understanding of the noble Chechen freedom fighter or the malicious Viet-Cong is built on biases.Very few people in hindsight support the American intervention in Vietnam after all. Alan Greene, a Professor of Law at Durham Law School, raised this in a paper, combating the sweeping definition and questioning “the violent methods of various anti-colonialist groups'' being branded as “freedom fighters.”The distinction between revolutionaries and terrorism is a deceptively simple and arbitrarily complex topic. Moreover, it breaches to the collective ‘national security’ and reactionary responses to said breaches by constructions of terrorism through invasivesecurity measures and interventionist foreign policy culminated in events like the Snowden affair or the Nisour Square Massacre. These are Western instances of overreach and imperialism, but abroad outside the liberal democratic sphere, regimesuse the national interest as excuses for overreach of the security forces more regularly. But, with the designation of newgroups like the Proud Boys as terrorist groups, concerns have been raised once more. So, rather than seek to make a definition and repeat the multiplicititous critiques of the Bush, Obama, and Trump-era surveillance state, I would like to ask whether or not we should abandon concepts of terror altogether and address the underlying causes of these movements.

Referring back to the original definition, the primary active phrase is unofficial or unauthorised, because the State as an abstract entity holds the monopoly on the legitimate use of power and retains the right to delegate power. However, what if the authority being exercised were oppressive? Some democratic theorists claim it legitimises various rights to be civilly disobedient, but I have my doubts that the IRA had John Rawls as a required reading. The reality is that it is difficult to deny the lived and learned experience of freedom fighters fighting for independence, especially if that group numbers greatly in size and strength. Moreover, any fan of Rawls knows that his theory is premised on a mostly just society and doesn’t really account for the violence of the modern state. To my understanding and the primary assertion in this article, is that the driving factor of terrorism as is well understood is the material conditions of marginalized communities cutting across class, race, gender, religion and so on.

The material conditions to which I refer don’t always equal in size and scale of oppression, but nonetheless reveal the ignorance of lived-in experience of peoples. It often takes the form of the denial of democratic institutions: suppression of the Arab Spring Protests in 2011; a coupd’état in Myanmar; the jailing of an opposition leader in Moscow. However, the political repression comes with the economic marginalisation of communities. The lack of access to political institutions has causal effects: little or no advocacy or political organisations with legitimacy and little social mobility. It leaves communities vulnerable. Such is the case of the Kurdish peoples, of the Sahrawis, of the Irish and the Scottish, of numerous Black Nationalist and Liberationist movements and many more. Each of these has been branded “terrorists” by governments, so rather than try and expand the definition to include those very governments, why don’t we elect to change the underlying material conditions and dismantle the oppressive regime.

Now let me conclude by saying this article is in no way meant to advocate for violence or any single group or movement or be partisan in anyway. Rather, it is meant to approach the very idea of the authority derived from our military and how our government is allowed to apply it. It has implications on how we decide whether or not we should continuously export arms to Saudi Arabia or maintain our military presence in the Middle East. Moreover, I am not defending the Proud Boys or saying they are not at their core, founded on ideas of white supremacy and violence. They are unequivocally a hate group. However, that belies the greater issue at hand: that their material conditions remain unaddressed. They still desire stable employment, leisure, housing and food security, a healthy work environment, strong unions (if you’re into that), and the benefit of society. The very thing which divides, the material conditions from which everyone suffers, can also be what unites and allows for greater resolution within the public sphere. While designations of terrorism are not only gratifying but somewhat necessary in the face of the events like January 6th, we cannot allow the most marginalised sections of society to go unheard.

You do not have to agree with every conclusion I drew. However, the underlying idea I present in my eyes is nonetheless important.So long as we allow terrorism to continue to holdpoliticalcurrency within the international political economy, it permits for regimes to use that currency for both positive and negative influence. Whether or not you believe we should dismantle, that is a matter of debate.

Greene, Alan. “Defining Terrorism: One Size Fits All?” International and Comparative Law

Quarterly 66, no. 2 (2017): 411–40.doi:10.1017/S0020589317000070.

Nicholas Donaldson is a student at Queens University, studying Political Economy and History.