STRATEGIC ANALYSIS
Terrorism: Patterns of Internationalisation by Jaideep Saikia and Ekaterina Stepanova (eds.)
Volume:
33
Issue:
5
Book Review
September 2009
The book under review is a rare book that begins by
attempting an unambiguous definition of the complex phenomenon of terrorism.
The editors in a jointly written ‘Introduction’ bring definitional and
conceptual clarity to their effort of bringing into one set of covers patterns
of internationalization attending domestic, regional, and global instances of
terrorism. Saikia and Stepanova have utilized their academic linkages to
commission an international set of contributors enabling readers to engage with
authors from nine countries writing of the experience of six countries, three
regions, and of global transnational terrorism.
The editors define terrorism as ‘politically
motivated violence against civilians carried out or threatened in an asymmetrical
manner, that is, in order to create a disproportionately high political effect
to exercise pressure on a more powerful opponent that is usually the state’.
This helps dispel the subjectivity and political interpretations that attend
the term serving to obfuscate it and commandeer it to motivated purposes of the
user. Clarifying typology, they go beyond the well-worn distinction between
domestic and international terrorism. Into the volume, their contributors bring
out the internationalization that attends even domestic terrorism in terms of
bases, funding, arms supplies, neighbouring state intervention in the form of
proxy war, and political linkages. Interest in the aspect of
internationalization, despite the higher incidence and human costs of domestic
terrorism, owes much to the manner in which the global media enhances the
intended destabilizing effect; internationalization is an increasing activity;
and lastly the distinction between the two – domestic and international – is
becoming blurred. Any strict demarcation no longer possible, the book attempts
to offer a solution by ‘testing it against a wide range of empirical cases
culled from different political contexts and regions’. The additional methods
of classification of terrorism discussed in the book include motivation
(socio-political; nationalist; religious) and functional factors as integration
of terrorist group goals, interests, and agendas. Summation is in favour of
local/regional terrorism internationalized to an extent and truly transnational
terrorism with unlimited goals in the global context. Consequently, in the
judgement of the editors, the ‘complex, elusive, and increasingly disturbing’
inter-relationship between the two otherwise autonomous levels of terror makes
for ‘a far more difficult challenge’ for the ‘international community and
nations’. The book is organized into two parts. The first deals with the more
traditional cases of internationalization in which goals do not go beyond local
or national contexts. This part comprises chapters on the sub-nationalist
conflicts involving the Irish Republican Army and Liberation Tigers of Tamil
Eelam (LTTE), left wing insurgencies in Latin America and Nepal, Islamist
terror groups in Bangladesh and Kashmir. The second part is on the advanced
stage of internationalization and transnationalization. This includes chapters
on India’s Northeast, the role of the Jemaah Islamiyah in Southeast Asia, the
Hamas, and lastly the epitome of a transnational organization, the Al Qaida.
The book further carries a short brief on Mumbai 26/11 prepared by Saikia and
another knowledgeable Northeast hand, Subir Bhaumik; a consolidated
bibliography running into 21 pages; information on contributors; and a useful
index. The font size and production values being adequate, the book is a
recommended read, more for the cognoscenti than a lay reader. This reviewer has
two observations on the direction of analysis. The first is at the global level
relating to the transnationalization of Islamism incorporated in the book on
its discussion on the contribution of the ongoing global war on terror on
internationalization of local armed conflicts. The analysis, however, can be
developed further in case the locus of the Al Qaida is recognized as lying in
the Arab post-colonial experience. The energy security-related domination of
the West amounting to a neocolonial embrace of the region is the primary
motivation for the Islamist counter. The term ‘terror’ for their action is part
of the battle for control of the information domain between the two
contestants. The anti-state ideology of the movement – described as a quest for
Caliphate – owes much to the need to meld the region across artificial
boundaries presently dissecting the region into weak states run by manipulable
regimes. The political element that informs the Al Qaida carries legitimacy in
the post-colonial discourse. Since energy security is taken as a vital national
interest by the US-led West, there is no alternative to violence to counter the
same. The Bush years, in which the neo-con agenda was military imposed, has
helped further transnationalization. The manner in which the global war on
terror, initially begun with the promise of ‘infinite justice’, has unfolded,
provides the rationale and legitimacy that the means and methods of terror may
lack. The second observation is with respect to the South Asian region.
Saikia’s chapter is of interest for bringing to the fore the complexity to the
Northeast problem lent by the changing demographic profile of parts of the region.
That the author makes the phenomenon appear to be a strategic act on the part
of Bangladesh makes the issue more compelling. As the editors point out, ‘poor
and politically speculative analysis . . . leads to inaccurate threat
assessment, misguided policy decisions and public perception’, so gaining the
correct perspective on this aspect would be necessary to tackling it
appropriately. Likewise the linkages with Pakistan of the home-grown urban
terror witnessed across India, averred to in the book, require tempering in
light of the increasing, if currently insufficient, knowledge on the terror
attacks being a form of ‘black propaganda’ – terror implicating some other
groups, in this case a Muslim terror group, the Indian Mujahideen – by Hindutva
groups. The editors need to be congratulated for presenting readers with a
perspective, even if one that is contested here, on an important dimension of a
complex subject. The collaboration across continents of the editors – Saikia, a
terrorism and security analyst, and Stepanova of Stockholm International Peace
Research Institute – is a continuation of their earlier engagement over a UN
University project. Such transcontinental networking would help keep the centre
of gravity of international relations and strategic theory in sync with the
global shift of power to Asia.
