IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/diw/diweos/diweos30.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Technology of Terror: Accounting for the Strategic Use of Terrorism

Author

Listed:
  • Christopher K. Butler
  • Scott Gates

Abstract

To comprehend why a group would intentionally target civilians, we need to understand why other groups do not. In this chapter, we argue that disgruntled groups face three main choices when addressing their dissatisfaction: suffering a disadvantageous peace, engaging in unconventional warfare, or engaging in conventional warfare. We further disaggregate the choice of unconventional warfare into terrorism and guerrilla warfare. By focusing on asymmetrical aspects of the problem and the strategic interactions between the insurgent group, its complicit public, and the superior force of the state, we disentangle the technology of terror.

Suggested Citation

  • Christopher K. Butler & Scott Gates, 2010. "The Technology of Terror: Accounting for the Strategic Use of Terrorism," Economics of Security Working Paper Series 30, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:diw:diweos:diweos30
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.diw.de/documents/publikationen/73/diw_01.c.354175.de/diw_econsec0030.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Slantchev, Branislav L., 2003. "The Power to Hurt: Costly Conflict with Completely Informed States," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 97(1), pages 123-133, February.
    2. Ralph Rotte & Christoph Schmidt, 2003. "On the production of victory: Empirical determinants of battlefield success in modern war," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(3), pages 175-192.
    3. Fearon, James D., 1995. "Rationalist explanations for war," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(3), pages 379-414, July.
    4. S. Mansoob Murshed & Scott Gates, 2005. "Spatial–Horizontal Inequality and the Maoist Insurgency in Nepal," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 121-134, February.
    5. J. Paul Dunne & María D.C. García-Alonso & Paul Levine & Ron P. Smith, 2006. "Managing asymmetric conflict," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 58(2), pages 183-208, April.
    6. Scott Sigmund Gartner & Patrick M. Regan, 1996. "Threat and Repression: The Non-Linear Relationship between Government and Opposition Violence," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 33(3), pages 273-287, August.
    7. Grossman, Herschel I & Kim, Minseong, 1995. "Swords or Plowshares? A Theory of the Security of Claims to Property," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(6), pages 1275-1288, December.
    8. Sandler, Todd & Enders, Walter, 2004. "An economic perspective on transnational terrorism," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 301-316, June.
    9. Michelle R. Garfinkel & Stergios Skaperdas, 2000. "Conflict without Misperceptions or Incomplete Information," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 44(6), pages 793-807, December.
    10. Garfinkel, M.R. & Skaperdas, S., 2000. "Conflict without Misperceptions or Incomplete Information: how the Future Matters," Papers 99-00-11, California Irvine - School of Social Sciences.
    11. Christopher K. Butler, 2007. "Prospect Theory and Coercive Bargaining," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 51(2), pages 227-250, April.
    12. Reed, William, 2003. "Information, Power, and War," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 97(4), pages 633-641, November.
    13. Fearon, James D. & Laitin, David D., 1996. "Explaining Interethnic Cooperation," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 90(4), pages 715-735, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michael Brzoska & Raphael Bossong & Eric van Um, 2011. "Security Economics in the European Context: Implications of the EUSECON Project," Economics of Security Working Paper Series 58, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    2. Eric van Um, 2012. "Why Militant Groups Fight Each Other: The Role of Support, Political Objectives and Revenge," Economics of Security Working Paper Series 64, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Anderton,Charles H. & Carter,John R., 2009. "Principles of Conflict Economics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521875578, December.
    2. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    3. Christopher Blattman, 2009. "Civil War: A Review of Fifty Years of Research," Working Papers id:2231, eSocialSciences.
    4. Chang, Yang-Ming & Sanders, Shane & Walia, Bhavneet, 2015. "The costs of conflict: A choice-theoretic, equilibrium analysis," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 62-65.
    5. Michelle R. Garfinkel & Constantinos Syropoulos, 2019. "Problems of commitment in arming and war: how insecurity and destruction matter," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 178(3), pages 349-369, March.
    6. Nicholas Sambanis, 2002. "A Review of Recent Advances and Future Directions in the Quantitative Literature on Civil War," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(3), pages 215-243.
    7. Konrad, Kai A. & Kovenock, Dan, 2009. "Multi-battle contests," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 256-274, May.
    8. Gries, Thomas & Haake, Claus-Jochen, 2016. "An Economic Theory of 'Destabilization War' '- Compromise for Peace versus Conventional, Guerilla, or Terrorist Warfare," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145617, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    9. Garfinkel, Michelle R. & Skaperdas, Stergios, 2007. "Economics of Conflict: An Overview," Handbook of Defense Economics, in: Keith Hartley & Todd Sandler (ed.), Handbook of Defense Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 22, pages 649-709, Elsevier.
    10. Smith, Adam C. & Houser, Daniel & Leeson, Peter T. & Ostad, Ramin, 2014. "The costs of conflict," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 61-71.
    11. Yang-Ming Chang & Zijun Luo, 2017. "Endogenous Destruction In Conflict: Theory And Extensions," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(1), pages 479-500, January.
    12. Helmut Bester & Kai A. Konrad, 2005. "Easy Targets and the Timing of Conflict," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 17(2), pages 199-215, April.
    13. Herschel Grossman, 2003. "Fifty-four Forty or Fight," Working Papers 2003-10, Brown University, Department of Economics.
    14. Long, Iain W., 2015. "Better feared than loved: Reputations and the motives for conflict," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 46-61.
    15. Herschel I. Grossman, 2013. "Choosing Between Peace and War," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 14(2), pages 765-783, November.
    16. Pelosse, Yohan, 2009. "Mediated Contests and Strategic Foundations for Contest Success Functions," MPRA Paper 18664, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. repec:got:cegedp:21 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Antoine Pietri, 2017. "Les modèles de « rivalité coercitive » dans l’analyse économique des conflits," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 127(3), pages 307-352.
    19. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2012. "Political Economy of Conflict Foreword," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 122(2), pages 153-169.
    20. Coyne,Christopher J., 2020. "Defense, Peace, and War Economics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108724036, September.
    21. Maxime Menuet & Petros G. Sekeris, 2021. "Overconfidence and conflict," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 59(4), pages 1483-1499, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:diw:diweos:diweos30. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Bibliothek (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/diwbede.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.