Killing Abroad: Organizational Characteristics and International Terrorism

• In Event: Terrorism

Abstract

Groups that engage in foreign terrorism can expect significant benefits after an attack including publicity and inflicting short-term damage to national or global economies. Yet despite the advantages of attacking abroad, international terrorism occurs infrequently. In addition, some groups participate more frequently in international terrorism than others groups, suggesting this form of terrorism is a particularly attractive strategy for only certain organizations. Why do certain terrorist groups engage in frequent international attacks while other groups engage in few or no attacks abroad? To answer this question, this paper incorporates insights from the social movements literature on resource mobilization theory, collective identity, and framing to explore how organizational and communal characteristics affect the rate at which groups go abroad. Results from negative binomial regressions show that groups that are larger in size, ally with a higher number of terrorist groups, and are religiously motivated conduct a greater number of attacks than smaller, more isolated and non-religious groups. In addition, terrorist groups that develop out of minority communities that are discriminated against politically and economically, as well as groups that have international kindred group support, also conduct the greatest number of international attacks.

Author

• Crystal E. Shelton, Christopher Newport University