Understanding Domestic Terrorism

This assignment delves into the multifaceted issue of domestic terrorism. It requires students to analyze the various factors contributing to radicalization and violent extremism within a nation's borders. The readings provide insights into psychological profiles of domestic terrorists, the role of social and political grievances, and the influence of online platforms in promoting extremist ideologies. Students are expected to synthesize information from the provided texts to develop a comprehensive understanding of domestic terrorism and its implications.

Running head: TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
Terrorism as a politically motivated violence
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

1TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
The essay contains the aspects of terrorism and the violence. The terrorism includes
both factors that are terror as well as violence. The aim of the essay is to analyze the ways
different aspects that are related to terrorism. The essay includes the reason of the influence
of politics in terrorism. The political scenario is undergoing a massive change in the present
day and this is the reason it is important to study the changes made in the politics. It has
undoubtedly played a heavy role on the violence that has been remained an influencing factor
for the violence that is created in the present world. Terrorism is the outcome of unaware
hatred towards the person who is the victim of the hatred. The reason of terrorism is ultimate
hatred and in maximum times it is because of the desire of the attainment of the political
powers. The use of force in an illegal manner or the execution of force against the individuals
or any kinds of property in order to intimidate a government in furtherance of the political
objectives is the actual reason of terrorism (Reid Meloy and Yakeley 2014).
According to Schuurman and Horgan (2016), Terrorism is the use of the intentional
indiscriminate violence as a means of creating terror or fear in order to achieve certain goal
which is political in many cases. The terms like `Terror` and `Terrorism` originated during
the French Revolution during the late 18th century. In the last years there has been no specific
definition of terrorism. This is roughly defined as an activity that is morally wrong. Terrorism
is sometimes defined by many people as a religion. It is believed by many people that
terrorism is spread by those people who believe in a particular religion. This is a wrong
concept that is believed by many people. Terrorism itself is a wrong belief. Terrorism is
practiced by those people who belief in violence. The terrorists who created by the terrorists
and they believe in spreading violence. The creation of the violence is sometimes the
politically motivated. In most of the times it is politically motivated. In maximum times it has
been noticed that the political attack is the result of certain political issues. It is the attainment
of the powers related to the rule of the government in any region. In many cases it has been

2TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
observed that the terrorist acts has been occurred due to the desire of conquering an entire
region. According to a renowned political philosopher Michael Walzer, terrorism has been
described as the purposeful assassination of the innocent people randomly in order to spread
serious threat across the entire population. It included forcing alliances with the political
leaders. Many critics argued that terrorism is an act that intends to cause death and it ends up
in serious bodily harm to civilians. The concept has lead to controversial definitions and
meanings (Sidanius et al. 2016). The term has political and emotional aspects related to it.
Though it has been sometimes argued that terrorist and criminals are the same concept. This
has been refuted by many critics. Terrorism is thought to be ineluctably political in arms and
motives. It is usually violent and it includes threatening. It includes the far-reaching
psychological repercussions which are beyond the interest of the victim. It has been found
that it is conducted by many organizations with an identifiable chain of the authoritative
command. It is sometimes the result of the conspiration. The terrorist’s attacks are the
outcome of the conspiracy of the conspirators (Pauwels and Schils 2016.).
However there are varied views of the concept of terrorism. The above discussions are
some aspects of terrorism but there are other concept as well that explores the idea of
terrorism. It is different angles. It has various viewpoints in different regions. The concept of
terrorism is viewed as political violence by many critics. Terrorism has certain purpose. The
major intention of terrorism is to enslave the medium in order to achieve maximum attainable
publicity which is a powerful in order to justify their action and convince the audiences. The
major reason of spreading the terrorism is to affect larger number of people. The main
objective of terrorism is to affect the political purpose. The picture of political influence
comes into the scenario when the terrorism is related to religion. It has found that in case of
certain official governmental definitions of terrorism uses the criteria of illegitimate and
unlawful act. It has been mentioned by the U.S president Barack Obama, commented that the

3TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
bomb blasts which are the activity of a terrorist attack intends to drop bombs in the place
where the innocent civilians are targeted. The bombs are used to target the innocent people.
This is where the concept of international terrorism creeps in. It implies the violent acts and
dangerous acts. It appeared to be intends towards the coercion of the civilian population. The
actions include the influence of any particular government by the destruction of the mass
which includes the assassination of the innocent people and sometimes kidnapping of the
mass people which is put into action by hijacking a plane and similar actions. The act of
terrorism occurs usually outside the territorial jurisdiction of any region (Pauwels and De
Waele 2014).
The above views are critical and they are judged from the point of view of the normal
individuals. On the contrary the terrorists have different view point and their actions are
justified according to them. The terrorist argue that they express their wants through the
terrorist acts. The terrorist does not think their want is unjustified. There are specific reasons
for which the terrorists claim that their actions are the outcome of the unjust they received.
The government is seen in many cases to join hands with the terrorists secretly applying the
policy of give and take (Valentino 2014). The claims of the terrorists are in maximum times
motivated by the political aspects. The political terrorism includes the harsh and violent
criminal acts that includes primarily of generating the fear in the community for certain
political purpose. The apolitical terrorism implies, it is not aimed at the political purpose
rather it certainly exhibits the intended structure to continue to a huge degree of fear for the
forceful purposes. In spite of that in the end there is the gain and interest of every individual
or collective profit rather than the achievement of the political purpose (Nacos 2016).
There have been many instances of such terrorist attacks where the influence of the
politics has been huge. Politics had remained a great reason for many terrorist attacks. The
best example of this was the September 11th Attacks on the United States in the year 2001.

4TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
This resulted in the destruction of the World Trade Centre in the city of New York. In such
cases terrorism was used to achieve the political goals. This was executed by the use of terror
and violence. The target of the terrorist in this case was the government officials, the
identified group of individuals and specific groups and some innocent bystanders. In most
cases it has been identified that terrorists aims at seeking and overthrowing an established and
existing political regime. This view can be contracted as well as in many cases it has been
found that the dictatorial governments sometimes use the method of terror in order to
maintain their own power (Nacos 2016).
According to Pain (2014), there has been another instance like the Oklahoma City
Bombing incident. He argued that poverty played a major role in the spread of terrorism. In
the year 1997, the murder and the trial of Trimothy J.Mc. Veigh were found ended in the
death sentence. In the incident the 29-year-old former Army sergeant was found guilty of
dropping bomb at the Federal building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. The incident
took away the lives of 168 people. It has been documented as the worst terrorist act that ever
happened in the soil of US. The attack of September 11, 2011 is the most severe act that has
been recorded in the past years. This was definitely not the first terrorist attack that occurred
in US. Despite this fact it was one of the most disastrous events that were witnessed by the
United States. The attack took place in the World Trade Centre. The dropping of the bomb
left a deep crater of 200 by 1000 feet wide and five stories deep. The attacks included the
damage of the government facilities. This is basically termed as the domestic terrorism. There
was political motif behind this (Mills, Freilich and Chermak 2017). The motif includes the
damage of the government in order to get their rights and fulfill their demands. The attack of
September 11 the attacks have been found to be the continuation process of a series of events
of the deadly terrorist activities that had occurred in many places. It was considered as an
effective medium of the political groups in many continents like Asia, Middle East and

5TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
Europe. The international terrorism gradually experienced a growth which included the act of
kidnapping, Hijack of many airplanes, bombing of the airplanes and the attacks with the arms
on the facilities of public by the government. The main leader and the responsible person
behind the attack was Bin Laden and he revealed a religious edict that was known as fatwah
and he therefore called for the attacks on the troops of U.S and the U.S civilians. The U.S
government has shown certain response to the international terrorist organizations and the
nations that had lend their support to the terrorist act (Martin 2017). The other countries
supported them by lending them the military support and the government supported them
entirely. Even during the attacks and revolutions during the French and the industrial
revolution the government of certain countries did lend support to the other countries. This
was the reason terrorism gained motivation from the political affairs. The political system
was in many cases corrupt and they were the real reason behind the spread of the terrorism
(Marsden 2017).
In the case of the use of the right of power of the resistance and the political offence
in case of the purpose of the clarification of the moral, political justification over certain
violent acts, terrorism is usually defined with the contradictory effect, known as the mark of
disgrace through any process which can provide any kind of clarification for a certain violent
denial of act (Lupu and Peisakhin 2017). It is in favor of appearance that while terrorism is
defined by the requirement of the concurrent existence of few factors that includes in it any
reservation that is related to the right of the resistance or the crimes that are political in
nature. The legitimizing functions are inclusive of the notions that would in any situation not
extend the ability to the violent acts that meet all the circumstances (Juergensmeyer 2017).
The effects of the terrorism had a social and a political impact. The political impact of
terrorism included the political effect of the same. The social pattern and the social order, the
governance power of the society and the politics of a region completely rely on good

6TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
communication. The act of terrorism has a dramatic influence in the entire world. It was
evident in the attacks of the September, 11 attack of the year 2001 (Jongman 2017). The
concept of terrorism is predicted to cause harm to the communication and the responsive
behavior to the issues as well as to have the consequences for the society and the politics
(Jasko, LaFree and Kruglanski 2017). The reason for stating terrorism as a universal act is it
can be performed in any region and in any country. The command of the leaders and the
control of the terrorist groups, the recruitment, the training, and the active operations and the
target victims can be located in many other different countries. The political and the
governmental organization need to define and justify the ways definition of terrorism (Spalek
2016). It is used for the reason of public relation or spin in order to influence their elective to
proof the fact that they are taking effective initiative to counter terrorism and gain acceptance
of laws or measures which are harder to accept for any other purpose. President Bush
categorized terrorists as a conventional military enemy and it legitimizes the conventional
military action rather than the measures of the counter-terrorist which is able to interpret by
the US electorate as being extremely soft. The administration of Obama has shifted from the
military to counter-terrorism and since then has actually been accused of being extremely soft
(Heger 2015).
The most important political effect is the opportunity that the government has while
introducing the laws that are harsher than it is usually the case. The laws are usually intended
towards the act of terrorism instead of that it frequently acts as sufficient extensive or
intrusive in order to increase the government power in general. The aim of the terrorist act is
to provoke the inappropriate reaction of the governments. However it is important that the
politicians come up with the truthful definitions and meanings of terrorism (Freilich and
LaFree 2015.). It would help the public to receive education and reassurance in order to
preserve their civil rights. It can sometimes be seen that the government and the politicians

7TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
define the act of terrorism as the act of repression, victimization, as the act of demonizing
their opponents, civilians and the act of act of repression of their political bodies and
religions. The authoritarian states witnesses this much than the democratic ones. The term has
been misused by many politicians and many governmental organizations. The misuse of the
meaning and definition of the terrorism sometimes have far reaching after effects of social
and political aspects. The person who is found guilty of the same is found to be guilt of
performing terrorism is found to lose all civil rights (Ferguson, Burgess and Hollywood
2015.).
It has been argued by Eager (2016), that the terrorists has different concept of the
activity of terrorism. Their views are different from those of the view of the society. They
believe that they are freedom fighters, revolutionary figures and insurgents. The terrorists
termed the act of terrorism as the good and the bad terrorism. Terrifying an innocent person is
an injustice act. The act of unjustly terrorizing people is not an ethical thing. On the other
hand terrorizing the oppressors and the criminals is of extreme importance for the safety and
the security of the people and it includes the protection of their property. The terrorizing and
the punishing process of the criminals are necessary steps to straighten the facts and to make
them correct. After this there is a continuation of the process of social and political impacts. It
is however a matter of fact that terrorism will remain to continue in order to define the acts of
the terrorism to justify themselves. The act of terrorism will definitely exist; the major reason
behind this is that there will always be individuals and groups that get the assurance and
motivation from this type of self-justification (Cottam et al. 2015).
Media has a large role to play in this. The acts of terrorism are brought out to the
entire world through the coverage of the media. Media has a different concept for the concept
of terrorism. For media it is the concept that would influence the audience to read the
newspapers and the news articles. Media targets the audience to watch more news channels

8TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
and to watch more television programs. The terrorism is used by them as a word to capture
the attention of the audience. The audience receives the education of terrorism through
media. Media therefore plays a major role in this. The wrong interpretation of the term could
end up in delivering wrong meaning of the term (Combs 2015). The term should be used and
interpreted by the media rightfully. More than the term the events needs to be portrayed in an
authentic manner. In many cases it has been seen that the terrorist’s events has been portrayed
in a wrongful manner. In many cases it has been seen that the telecast of the events has been
done in an exaggerated manner. This gave a wrong message to the audience. This gave a
wrong message to the audience. However there is a wrong concept of national crime and
terrorist attacks. The national crime includes the crime committed by any individual but for
his own purpose and it does not have any international appeal. It does not have any political
influence. The act of terrorism includes the suffering of the innocent people and that which
has a universal appeal. It has political goals (Antonello 2017).
Therefore, while concluding this can be mentioned that the terrorism is a crime that
can be termed as a crime under international law. Terrorism is basically a psychological act
that can be communicated through the violence and sometimes there has been a threat to
violence. There have been a lot of motivations of terrorism which includes separatism,
ethnocentrisms, revolution and nationalism. The ideological categories have been created by
the political, religious and the social purpose. The ideologies are basically framed by the
political purpose. The indigenous terrorists are grown in the home country itself. They are
naturalized citizen of the nation. In such cases the political background plays a major role in
motivating the terrorists. The international terrorists include the group of individuals that can
be visualized as operating primarily between two nations and in other geographic regions.
The terrorism is becoming violent than before and even in the present ages. The international
group of terrorists operates in multiple places. Terrorism has remained a politically as well as

9TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
a socially motivated activity. It can be stopped only by imparting proper education to the
individuals and to make efforts to eradicate poverty which serves as a major factor of
terrorism. Terrorism leads to the destruction of not only a place but an entire community. It is
the ultimate spread of extreme violence. The political factors add as a fuel to the fire in this
case.

10TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
References
Antonello, P., 2017. Imagining terrorism: the rhetoric and representation of political violence
in Italy 1969-2009. Routledge.
Combs, C.C., 2015. Terrorism in the twenty-first century. Routledge.
Cottam, M.L., Mastors, E., Preston, T. and Dietz, B., 2015. Introduction to political
psychology. Routledge.
Eager, P.W., 2016. From freedom fighters to terrorists: women and political violence.
Routledge.
Ferguson, N., Burgess, M. and Hollywood, I., 2015. Leaving violence behind: Disengaging
from politically motivated violence in Northern Ireland. Political Psychology, 36(2), pp.199-
214.
Freilich, J.D. and LaFree, G., 2015. Criminology theory and terrorism: Introduction to the
special issue.
Heger, L.L., 2015. Votes and violence: Pursuing terrorism while navigating politics. Journal
of Peace Research, 52(1), pp.32-45.
Jasko, K., LaFree, G. and Kruglanski, A., 2017. Quest for significance and violent
extremism: The case of domestic radicalization. Political Psychology, 38(5), pp.815-831.
Jongman, A.J., 2017. Political terrorism: A new guide to actors, authors, concepts, data bases,
theories, and literature. Routledge.
Juergensmeyer, M., 2017. Terror in the mind of God: The global rise of religious
violence (Vol. 13). Univ of California Press.

11TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
Lupu, N. and Peisakhin, L., 2017. The legacy of political violence across
generations. American Journal of Political Science, 61(4), pp.836-851.
Marsden, S.V., 2017. Introduction. In Reintegrating Extremists (pp. 1-20). Palgrave
Macmillan UK.
Martin, G., 2017. Understanding terrorism: Challenges, perspectives, and issues. SAGE
publications.
Mills, C.E., Freilich, J.D. and Chermak, S.M., 2017. Extreme hatred: Revisiting the hate
crime and terrorism relationship to determine whether they are “Close Cousins” or “Distant
Relatives”. Crime & Delinquency, 63(10), pp.1191-1223.
Nacos, B., 2016. Mass-mediated terrorism: Mainstream and digital media in terrorism and
counterterrorism. Rowman & Littlefield.
Nacos, B.L., 2016. Terrorism and counterterrorism. Routledge.
Pain, R., 2014. Everyday terrorism: Connecting domestic violence and global
terrorism. Progress in Human Geography, 38(4), pp.531-550.
Pauwels, L. and De Waele, M., 2014. Youth involvement in politically motivated violence:
Why do social integration, perceived legitimacy, and perceived discrimination
matter?. International Journal of Conflict and Violence, 8(1), p.134.
Pauwels, L. and Schils, N., 2016. Differential online exposure to extremist content and
political violence: Testing the relative strength of social learning and competing
perspectives. Terrorism and Political Violence, 28(1), pp.1-29.
Reid Meloy, J. and Yakeley, J., 2014. The violent true believer as a “lone wolf”–
psychoanalytic perspectives on terrorism. Behavioral sciences & the law, 32(3), pp.347-365.

12TERRORISM AS A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED VIOLENCE
Schuurman, B. and Horgan, J.G., 2016. Rationales for terrorist violence in homegrown
jihadist groups: A case study from the Netherlands. Aggression and violent behavior, 27,
pp.55-63.
Sidanius, J., Kteily, N., Levin, S., Pratto, F. and Obaidi, M., 2016. Support for asymmetric
violence among Arab populations: The clash of cultures, social identity, or
counterdominance?. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 19(3), pp.343-359.
Spalek, B., 2016. Counter-terrorism. Palgrave Macmillan.
Valentino, B.A., 2014. Why we kill: The political science of political violence against
civilians. Annual Review of Political Science, 17, pp.89-103.