AHT022 Terrorism, International Crime and Global Security

Research Question:

Is religion the main reason of terrorism?

Research Plan:

There are various reasons of terrorism that have dominated the pages of history for times. There are some societies that are more threatened by terrorism in comparison to the other. The discussion of the reasons for terrorism are controversial because the violence caused by terrorism is terrifying and shake the world to find out different underlying causes. Some of the critics have hold religious sentiments to be the main reason of terrorism as the largest terrorist groups around the world have more or less similar origin and have been following similar path to reach their goals. However, no religion teaches people to create terror among others if there is no concept of self-interest. These self-interestedness create various perceptions, establish political legitimacy and contribute in anti-systematic terrorism in certain places.

Some of the reasons of the terrorist attacks around the world revels that the perceptions of the inequality and deprivation among the culturally defined groups ca lead to civil violence and gradually become terrorism activities. This lack of social and political legitimacy, continuity and integration for political fringes, the idea of terrorism gets introduced. These get exacerbated if there is cultural and ethnic diversity issue among the community members. Sudden surge of realization regarding exploitation and discrimination get distinction and they gather under one religious or cultural umbrella for empowerment.

In most of the cases, the people suffering from depravation, uneducated background, poverty and exploitation, gather to seek support from religion therefore most of the terrorist groups monitor the socioeconomic situation of the countries and collect their targeted stakeholders. The political leaders in the welfare states accept these demands from the citizens in positive ways but in the other states which themselves are corrupt with many causes do not show any gesture to solve these issues. Constant deprivation and exploitation make people rebellious and this are converted into political groups backed by religious institutions. Here the mentioned can be made about fundamentalist laws and orthodox authorities to promise for solving these social issues r thee basic demands through religious sentiments. The people who ask for basic needs can easily manipulated of which these religious groups take advantage of and jihadists ideologically gets imbibed.

Therefore, terrorism mainly takes place in the poor societies which have weak state structure and the government does not have economic or political capability to solve these basic problems. The people rise with arms and the situations like Syria and Afghanistan take place. In these places, the terrorist activities are related to religion but those of power and politics having more conspiracy in it. The ideology of terrorism therefore does not have religion but religion is giving birth to terrorism around the world by exploiting poor and subjugated and leading them to celebrate anarchy.

Literature Review:

Introduction:

This review paper aims to discuss religion to be the most important factor related to terrorism. From the analysis from different literature, there is a tendency to labelling a particular religion to be the main cause of terrorist activities in the world. After the violence of 9/11 in the Twin Towers of the USA, social fear and racial subjugation are taking place continuously. This is irrespective of the developed Nations or the underdeveloped because the super powers have strong political hold upon the weaker states to follow what they believe.

Discussion:

In every part of the world subtle propaganda is taking place where religion is being labelled as the root cause of terrorism. It is campaigned that all the terrorist groups follow a certain religion therefore the word jihadists have become a terrorizing term for each and every state. It is understood that there are political reasons to invest in such psychological impression about the terrorist groups but it is found from various interviews and researches that terrorists do not have any religion to follow. They are reckless and only focus upon their goal to achieve in self-interested ways.
The literature review from different scholar articles and texts has revealed that it is under the veil of political reasons behind terrorism that there are numerous socio-economic causes hidden. There are issues like political aggression upon a particular weak state or region. Similarly there can be lack of opportunities for economic growth. The reasons also include social exploitation and depravity for centuries. It can also be possible that the political leaders of that particular state engage in corruption and injustice, leading the people of that place to feel the deprived, exploited, and helpless. In these cases, initiatives are taken by the educated people as the leaders to solve these problems in constitutional ways. To Möller-Leimkühler (2018), these problems can either get solved if the government has a positive outlook. Now if the tendency of the government remains to suppress these issues, the disturbances increase. In the weaker section of society, in such a situation will be critical and they will be desperately requiring support from a bigger organization that will intentionally take the initiative on their behalf. This is where the religious terrorist groups come into action.

The study by Margariti (2017), reveals that defining International terrorism is difficult. There can be principal driving forces for the International Law development which create scope for aggression and deprivation leading to International crime and terrorism. The study by Dawson (2018), has mentioned about challenging question of religion in terrorism. Here the third has focused on jihadism and tourist motivations in explaining the terrorist activities. A case of jihadist groups have been explained to extend the argument. The influence of normative religious bias and normative secular bias are two different poles to be balanced. Tarlow (2017), in his study, has mention about the interfacing religious ideology leading to terrorism. Seeing religion to be a political motivational ideology can convince that it is instigating the people in power to grab political opportunities. Both the Western politicians and media are actually developing propaganda in order to move towards political violence. Therefore religious reasons become a political interest and religious terrorism is originated.

The emergence of terrorist semi States as found out by Honig and Yahel (2017), can be detailing the actual situation for the terrorist activities around the world, over a long time period. Here the authors have mentioned about four wave thesis of Rapoport that details the growth and development of the terrorist semi states in the 21st century. These terrorist semi-States are seen as the Rebel groups that control the mainly weak states' territory. They manage governance there and launchers different types of terrorist attacks in the neighboring States. It is called the fifth wave of terrorism and this type of small attacks are taking place every day around the world. The reasons of contemporary terrorism is not only related to religion but also include psychological, social, economic and ideological aspects. In discussing the reasons of terrorism in this current situation is critical therefore the correlations between all of these factors are to be acknowledged simultaneously. To Pisoiu and Hain, (2017), the mutual relationship among the source of terrorism and their features actually guide The Scholars to find out organizational factors that culminate these terrorist activities. The reasons like sense of injustice, lack of proper national or regional identity, membership with the terrorist group convert the religious reasons where destruction becomes the only answer.

Dawson (2018) again remarks that religion can be a motivation for terrorism. Besides these the influential options like small group dynamics, social relationship and social identity processes can be more important than any political or religious ideologies that explain why people actually engage in the terrorist violence. However, in real scenario, this study has conducted some interviews with the western foreign fighters placed in Iraq and Syria and their friends and families which indicate religiosity plays far more consequential and motivational role for the jihadists. Hoflinger (2020) on the contrary has machines about strategy consideration of an organization level as well as individual motives that ultimately result in terrorism. Finally, Zuhdi (2019) has mentioned about radicalism and terrorism have same origin that is from injustice and economic drawbacks of a certain social groups. 

There can be ideological or religious differences among the group members but in order to attract the attention of public towards their issues and demonstrating disrespectful manners for the existing social order play vital role for the growth of these terrorist groups. They attempt to coerce the government to act in certain ways and all the activities of this group seems to be revenge against the representatives of the governments. To Mills and Miller (2017) this scenario is also applicable for the Government of other powerful States just like the problem between America and Laden.
To most of the Western Scholars religions play important role in the motivation of terrorism because most of the terrorist groups follow a particular set of religious belief. The religious character of jihadism can easily connect it with the terrorist activities and explain their form. To Dawson (2018), there is a particular conflict between the normative secular belief system with the normative religious belief system that ultimately clash with each other and try to establish their own power in making decisions. In this case the religious bias exploit the issues like exploitation, deprivation, poverty, unawareness and cumulative racism to one particular community and use them for terrorizing the normal life. The religious groups are continuously pressurizing the common people as the victims of deprivation and intoxicated governments so that they can take the arms. These self-interested groups are convincing these helpless people to find only way to solve their problem is through terrorism.

In support of religious sentiment behind terrorism, Tarlow (2017) opens that religion has closed connection with politics of the region there for political motivational ideology gets blend with religious belief. This is the most dangerous threat for human kind where politics mix with religion of a state. this author has ask if terrorism is caused by any lack of political or Economic opportunities then there are certain methods to solve these problems in more constitutional ways. There is no need for extremism cauterizing common citizen who do not have any connection with the problems faced by the community member. The author has also mentioned that the next world oriented religion will have more proximity of political violence because the political leaders are creating scope for blending these two in order to hold the power. To Gallagher (2019), the religious aspects are most pressing in finding out the cause of terrorism around the world but behind it the Sociological, Political and economic reasons are imbibed carefully. Hence religious sentiments ignite the individual background of these underprivileged.  

Similarly, Honig and Yahel (2017) have mentioned that the countries are being segregated in terms of religious terrorism. There is a wave of rebellious Outlook which motivate common people to become satisfied if the neighbor countries are not happy. The conflicts in the third party States enhances territorial control and engage the government with a much wider area of governance activities. For example China is gradually prioritizing territorial control in its neighboring country India because India is already in Problem with its neighbors Pakistan and Afghanistan, the root of terrorist activities, hence remains busy in Dealing with them. China therefor is instigating the Indians in borders for terrorist activities at large.

On the contrary to this idea of religious terrorism and pointing out to the Islamic States for contributing in growing such terrorist groups, Zuhdi (2019), mentions that injustice and economic drawbacks are the primary causes of the birth of terrorist groups in the Islamic States. He has focused on the Indonesian landscape where good democratic atmosphere is not available. There have been several mass conflicts as well as terrors about which the government is silent. These are empowering the radical and terrorist groups to find out potential among these deprived citizens and convince them to follow the path of terrorism. All are leading to create disturbances and managing to maintain them worldwide.

References:

Dawson, Lorne L. "Challenging the curious erasure of religion from the study of religious terrorism." Numen 65, no. 2-3 (2018): 141-164. Retrieved from https://brill.com/view/journals/nu/65/2-3/article-p141_141.xml

Dawson, Lorne L. "Debating the role of religion in the motivation of religious terrorism." Nordic Journal of Religion and Society 31, no. 02 (2018): 98-117. Retrieved from https://www.idunn.no/nordic_journal_of_religion_and_society/2018/02/debating_ the_r ole_of_reli gion_i n_the _mot ivatio n_of_religiou

Gallagher, Eugene V. "The Cambridge Companion to Religion and Terrorism ed. by James R. Lewis." Nova Religio 22, no. 4 (2019): 118-119.  Retrieved from https://muse.jhu.edu/article/737641/summary

Höflinger, Tim. "Modern terrorism: motives of individual terrorists or the strategies of terrorist groups?." Global Change, Peace & Security 33, no. 1 (2021): 77-83. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14781158.2021.1827380

Honig, Or, and Ido Yahel. "A fifth wave of terrorism? The emergence of terrorist semi-states." Terrorism and political violence 31, no. 6 (2019): 1210-1228. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09546553.2017.1330201

Margariti, Stella. "State Sovereignty, Cosmopolitanism and the International Criminal Court." In Defining International Terrorism, pp. 27-61. TMC Asser Press, The Hague, 2017. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007%2F978-94-6265-204-0#about.

Mills, Tom, and David Miller. "Religion, radicalization and the causes of terrorism." In The Cambridge companion to religion and terrorism, pp. 46-68. Cambridge University Press, 2017. Retrieved from https://researchportal.bath.ac.uk/en/publications/religion-radicalization-and -th e-ca uses-of-terrorism

Möller-Leimkühler, Anne Maria. "Why is terrorism a man's business?." CNS spectrums 2 (2018): 119-128. Retrieved from https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28766471/

Mukhammadsidiqov, Mukhammadolim. "The importance of regulating the relationship between the state and religion in ensuring the stability of society." The Light of Islam 2020, no. 2 (2020): 12-17. Retrieved from https://uzjournals.edu.uz/iiau/vol2020/iss2/2/

Pisoiu, Daniela, and Sandra Hain. Theories of terrorism: An introduction. Routledge, 2017. Retrieved from https://www.routledge.com/Theories-of-Terrorism-An-Introduction/Pisoiu-Hain/p/book/9780415826082

Tarlow, Peter E. "The interaction of religion and terrorism." IJSSTH 16 (2017): 1-24. Retrieved from https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/articulo?codigo=6669923

Zuhdi, Muhammad Harfin. "Potential Islamic radicalism and terrorism in the province of West Nusa Tenggara." AHKAM: Jurnal Ilmu Syariah 19, no. 1 (2019). Retrieved from http://103.229.202.71/index.php/ahkam/article/view/11632

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