Terrorism and Political Legitimacy

About

Speaker: Anina Schwarzenbach, Postdoctoral Fellow, International Security Program

Nowadays, the availability of large databases on terrorist events allows researchers to shed light on patterns of terrorist activities and provides for new insights on how and where terrorism proliferates. Still, scholars and policymakers know little as to why in some countries, and periods in time, terrorist activities are much more frequent than in others. As for now, popular explanations on the root causes of terrorism, such as poverty, have resulted in inconsistent empirical evidence. Other concepts widely applied in political science and criminology, such as approaches drawn from political legitimacy, have been neglected in the study of terrorism.

Results from a longitudinal analysis of terrorist activities covering 132 countries from 1970–2017 suggest that political legitimacy impacts terrorism. Political legitimacy is, however, a multi-dimensional concept, and its components ("accountability," "efficiency," and "fairness") relate differently to terrorist activities. Implications of these results for the study of terrorism are discussed.

Everyone is welcome to join us online via Zoom! Please register in advance for this seminar: https://harvard.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUqcuGsrTwrH9fnixp6gfngWf4DMq5itcO4

Contact

For more information, email the International Security Program Assistant at susan_lynch@harvard.edu.