Terrorism and Poverty

Tim56

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An oft repeated cliche, usually by those on the left but not always, is that poverty calls terrorism. Seems not...

Freedom squelches terrorist violence
KSG associate professor researches freedom-terrorism link
By Alvin Powell
Harvard News Office

A John F. Kennedy School of Government researcher has cast doubt on the widely held belief that terrorism stems from poverty, finding instead that terrorist violence is related to a nation's level of political freedom.

Associate Professor of Public Policy Alberto Abadie examined data on terrorism and variables such as wealth, political freedom, geography, and ethnic fractionalization for nations that have been targets of terrorist attacks.

Abadie, whose work was published in the Kennedy School's Faculty Research Working Paper Series, included both acts of international and domestic terrorism in his analysis.

Though after the 9/11 attacks most of the work in this area has focused on international terrorism, Abadie said terrorism originating within the country where the attacks occur actually makes up the bulk of terrorist acts each year. According to statistics from the MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base for 2003, which Abadie cites in his analysis, there were 1,536 reports of domestic terrorism worldwide, compared with just 240 incidents of international terrorism.

Before analyzing the data, Abadie believed it was a reasonable assumption that terrorism has its roots in poverty, especially since studies have linked civil war to economic factors. However, once the data was corrected for the influence of other factors studied, Abadie said he found no significant relationship between a nation's wealth and the level of terrorism it experiences.

"In the past, we heard people refer to the strong link between terrorism and poverty, but in fact when you look at the data, it's not there. This is true not only for events of international terrorism, as previous studies have shown, but perhaps more surprisingly also for the overall level of terrorism, both of domestic and of foreign origin," Abadie said.

Instead, Abadie detected a peculiar relationship between the levels of political freedom a nation affords and the severity of terrorism. Though terrorism declined among nations with high levels of political freedom, it was the intermediate nations that seemed most vulnerable.

Like those with much political freedom, nations at the other extreme - with tightly controlled autocratic governments - also experienced low levels of terrorism.

Though his study didn't explore the reasons behind the trends he researched, Abadie said it could be that autocratic nations' tight control and repressive practices keep terrorist activities in check, while nations making the transition to more open, democratic governments - such as currently taking place in Iraq and Russia - may be politically unstable, which makes them more vulnerable.

"When you go from an autocratic regime and make the transition to democracy, you may expect a temporary increase in terrorism," Abadie said.

Abadie's study also found a strong connection in the data between terrorism and geographic factors, such as elevation or tropical weather.

"Failure to eradicate terrorism in some areas of the world has often been attributed to geographic barriers, like mountainous terrain in Afghanistan or tropical jungle in Colombia. This study provides empirical evidence of the link between terrorism and geography," Abadie said.

In Abadie's opinion, the connection between geography and terrorism is hardly surprising.

"Areas of difficult access offer safe haven to terrorist groups, facilitate training, and provide funding through other illegal activities like the production and trafficking of cocaine and opiates," Abadie wrote in the paper.

A native of Spain's Basque region, Abadie said he has long been interested in terrorism and related issues. His past research has explored the effect of terrorism on economic activity, using the Basque country as a case study.

Abadie is turning his attention to the effect of terrorism on international capital flows. Some analysts have argued that terrorist attacks wouldn't have much of an impact on the economy, since unlike a war's widespread damage, the damage from terrorist attacks tends to be relatively small or confined to a small area.

In an era of open international capital markets, however, Abadie said terrorism may have a greater chilling effect than previously thought, since even a low risk of damage from a terrorist attack may be enough to send investors looking elsewhere.
 

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MightyFighting

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OBL isn't poor, and neither were the September 11 hijackers.

Terrorism, as a form of war, would be no-one's first option, much like guerilla warfare. You'd always rather use brute force if it were an option.

Anyway, people won't fight over wealth if there isn't any. So why would very poor countries with little mineral resources or drug trade experience civil wars?


However, poverty coupled with great wealth in the same area...
 

CharlieG

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Isn't he overlooking the correlation between wealth and freedom? The wealthiest countries are those that have the most freedom (which comes first - the wealth or the freedom - is a different argument that I'm not getting into), while countries where there is a lot of terrorism are mostly poor, with isolated pockets of wealth.
 

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Terrorists might be middle class but most revolutionaries are.

But for them to thrive and survive they need support networks, cash, popular support. In essence they need oxygen to live on and poverty provides that oxygen.

Mao linkened it to fish in the sea with the guerillas being the fish who couldn't survive without the sea. The sea of course were the Chinese peasants who provided logistics and support.
 
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The idea that poverty breeds terrorism is typical of a society which believes that money is god. Perceived injustice breeds discontent which leads to terrorism. It's probably not untrue to say that the really poor are too busy and literally too poor to become terrorists.
 

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Jim Boy said:
The idea that poverty breeds terrorism is typical of a society which believes that money is god. Perceived injustice breeds discontent which leads to terrorism. It's probably not untrue to say that the really poor are too busy and literally too poor to become terrorists.
I would have liked to have seen a study of the known terrorists and their educational standards..Carlos 'the Jackal' Ramirez was educated at Patrice Lumumba University in Russia and I would be surprised if most of the Bader Meinhoff gang werent university educated.

Universities are a hotbed of different political and social ideas and for those disenchanted with their own upbringing radical ideas are quite new.

If poverty and terrorism go hand in hand together why arent there many more? Anarchy would reign if that was true.
 

mulhollanddrive

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I agree that poverty doesnt breed terrorism, as is the perception. It does breed crime, but terrorism requires more cognitive processes to understand the meaning behind the terrorism, while crime is often a means to an end. I would go as far to say that terrorists are far smarter than the average population, thats not to say they are good people.
 

afc9798

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Tim56 said:
An oft repeated cliche, usually by those on the left but not always, is that poverty calls terrorism. Seems not...

Freedom squelches terrorist violence
KSG associate professor researches freedom-terrorism link
By Alvin Powell
Harvard News Office

A John F. Kennedy School of Government researcher has cast doubt on the widely held belief that terrorism stems from poverty, finding instead that terrorist violence is related to a nation's level of political freedom.

Associate Professor of Public Policy Alberto Abadie examined data on terrorism and variables such as wealth, political freedom, geography, and ethnic fractionalization for nations that have been targets of terrorist attacks.

Abadie, whose work was published in the Kennedy School's Faculty Research Working Paper Series, included both acts of international and domestic terrorism in his analysis.

Though after the 9/11 attacks most of the work in this area has focused on international terrorism, Abadie said terrorism originating within the country where the attacks occur actually makes up the bulk of terrorist acts each year. According to statistics from the MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base for 2003, which Abadie cites in his analysis, there were 1,536 reports of domestic terrorism worldwide, compared with just 240 incidents of international terrorism.

Before analyzing the data, Abadie believed it was a reasonable assumption that terrorism has its roots in poverty, especially since studies have linked civil war to economic factors. However, once the data was corrected for the influence of other factors studied, Abadie said he found no significant relationship between a nation's wealth and the level of terrorism it experiences.

"In the past, we heard people refer to the strong link between terrorism and poverty, but in fact when you look at the data, it's not there. This is true not only for events of international terrorism, as previous studies have shown, but perhaps more surprisingly also for the overall level of terrorism, both of domestic and of foreign origin," Abadie said.

Instead, Abadie detected a peculiar relationship between the levels of political freedom a nation affords and the severity of terrorism. Though terrorism declined among nations with high levels of political freedom, it was the intermediate nations that seemed most vulnerable.

Like those with much political freedom, nations at the other extreme - with tightly controlled autocratic governments - also experienced low levels of terrorism.

Though his study didn't explore the reasons behind the trends he researched, Abadie said it could be that autocratic nations' tight control and repressive practices keep terrorist activities in check, while nations making the transition to more open, democratic governments - such as currently taking place in Iraq and Russia - may be politically unstable, which makes them more vulnerable.

"When you go from an autocratic regime and make the transition to democracy, you may expect a temporary increase in terrorism," Abadie said.

Abadie's study also found a strong connection in the data between terrorism and geographic factors, such as elevation or tropical weather.

"Failure to eradicate terrorism in some areas of the world has often been attributed to geographic barriers, like mountainous terrain in Afghanistan or tropical jungle in Colombia. This study provides empirical evidence of the link between terrorism and geography," Abadie said.

In Abadie's opinion, the connection between geography and terrorism is hardly surprising.

"Areas of difficult access offer safe haven to terrorist groups, facilitate training, and provide funding through other illegal activities like the production and trafficking of cocaine and opiates," Abadie wrote in the paper.

A native of Spain's Basque region, Abadie said he has long been interested in terrorism and related issues. His past research has explored the effect of terrorism on economic activity, using the Basque country as a case study.

Abadie is turning his attention to the effect of terrorism on international capital flows. Some analysts have argued that terrorist attacks wouldn't have much of an impact on the economy, since unlike a war's widespread damage, the damage from terrorist attacks tends to be relatively small or confined to a small area.

In an era of open international capital markets, however, Abadie said terrorism may have a greater chilling effect than previously thought, since even a low risk of damage from a terrorist attack may be enough to send investors looking elsewhere.
Well that proves it then. I'm totally changed in opinion now that this ONE study has been released and it TOTALLY refutes everything ever written by countless people who have done more than analysed some data. Seriously Tim, this is done by an economist not a terrorism expert, which means I am inclined to believe him on issues of the economy, but less inclined to give him any credence in matters of international terrorism. As a business graduate, I might go and write a paper on the cause and effect of jet crashes and see how well that gets accepted by the engineering fraternity. Sounds to me like another economist trying to avoid responsibility for the poor of the world-"Oh look terrorism isn't caused by poor people so we can withdraw our scant aid". I was glad that he had "long been interested in terrorism".
 

Tim56

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afc9798 said:
Well that proves it then. I'm totally changed in opinion now that this ONE study has been released and it TOTALLY refutes everything ever written by countless people who have done more than analysed some data. Seriously Tim, this is done by an economist not a terrorism expert, which means I am inclined to believe him on issues of the economy, but less inclined to give him any credence in matters of international terrorism. As a business graduate, I might go and write a paper on the cause and effect of jet crashes and see how well that gets accepted by the engineering fraternity. Sounds to me like another economist trying to avoid responsibility for the poor of the world-"Oh look terrorism isn't caused by poor people so we can withdraw our scant aid". I was glad that he had "long been interested in terrorism".
Could you find me one half decent report which supports your contention?
 

Contra Mundum

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#10
Weaver said:
Terrorists might be middle class but most revolutionaries are.

But for them to thrive and survive they need support networks, cash, popular support. In essence they need oxygen to live on and poverty provides that oxygen.

Mao linkened it to fish in the sea with the guerillas being the fish who couldn't survive without the sea. The sea of course were the Chinese peasants who provided logistics and support.
Beware the bourgious vangard!
 

afc9798

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Tim56

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afc9798 said:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=27120&SelectRegion=Horn_of_Africa&SelectCountry=ETHIOPIA

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/1886617.stm

Here's a couple to start with, plenty more detailed reports available on sites such as WHO etc if you're really interested. Economists struggle enough with their own craft, let alone impinging on other's areas of expertise.
Those 'reports' you posted are statements, not reports or studies with any scientific or economic basis.
 
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