To be classified as terrorism, actions must be designed to have far-reaching psychological repercussions beyond the immediate victim or target. Additionally, targetting noncombatant, neutral, or randomly chosen people — generally, people not engaged in hostilities — is a necessary but not sufficient condition to constitute terrorism.
Finally, the action must be perpetrated by a subnational group or non-state entity. Based on the criteria above, we can begin to separate terrorism from other types of violence based on some very simplified distinctions:. But even with these distinctions in mind, there is not always a clear-cut boundary between terrorism and other forms of conflict like civil war and violence targeting civilians.
Given the difficulty of excluding such cases in a systematic way, this database includes them wherever they meet the basic criteria that form the definition of terrorism.
You can explore this by downloading the full GTD dataset at their website. As such, there is a partial overlap between common definitions of terrorism and certain other types of conflict. Another way in which conflict researchers distinguish between different types of violent acts is in terms of the number of victims.
Therefore many, but not all, of the events recorded in GTD will also be counted in the UCDP data, which are the basis of our charts of non-state and one-sided violence. As an example, the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York City are included as both a terrorist attack in the GTD , and an episode of one-sided violence in the UCDP data, because the perpetrators were members of the organised group Al-Qaida, and it resulted in more than 25 deaths.
However, the Norway attacks on 22 July , in which a right-wing extremist killed or injured more than people, is included in GTD as a terror attack, but is not present in UCDP data, since the attacker was acting independently, and did not represent the government of a state. We are therefore aware that there can be overlap between the data we present on terrorism and that which we present on conflict.
This fact is a crucial point in understanding the definition of terrorism and what the term means to people. Many of the terrorist attacks that take place today are events which many people would think of as a different form of violence or conflict. In fact, most terrorism actually happens in countries of high internal conflict, because ultimately terrorism is another form of conflict.
In , an estimated 26, people died from terrorism globally. Over the previous decade the average number of annual deaths was 21, However, there can be significant year-to-year variability. Over this decade the global death toll ranged from its lowest of 7, in to the highest year of 44, in Terrorism often dominates media coverage. We are informed about attacks as soon as they happen and many attacks claim the headlines.
Whilst our attention is drawn to these events — just as the terrorists intend — such intense coverage can make it difficult to contextualize the true extent of terrorism. This is because the availability heuristic : our perceptions are heavily influenced by the most recent examples of it. In this chart we see global terrorism deaths in the context of deaths from all causes.
The size of the big rectangle corresponds to the number of deaths in The share of deaths from terrorism are shown in red. A very small fraction. Close to 56 million people died in ; just over 26, of them from terrorism. But terrorist activity can vary a lot from year-to-year. Maybe was a particularly low or high year. When we look at the trend — also shown in chart form — over the past few decades we see it hovered from 0.
It was therefore a relatively high year for terrorist deaths, but not the peak. Globally, over 26, people died in terrorist attacks in Where in the world did terrorists kill most people?
In this chart we see the number of deaths from terrorism by region in This is also true when we look at the number of incidents , rather than the number of deaths. As we will see in the following section, not only is there a strong regional focus but this is also heavily concentrated in only a few countries within these regions. Guerrilla movements in Central and South America, for example, dominated terrorism in the s. Terrorism is often regionally-focused.
The Middle East and North Africa had by far the largest number of deaths in ; but not all countries were affected. We see the number of terrorism deaths by country in this map. This was one-in-four terrorism deaths globally. But some countries in the region — such as Nepal — had almost none.
Looking at the where in the world terrorism happens highlights an important point: it tends to be in countries with high levels of internal conflict. Here we discuss in detail the challenges of separating terrorism from other forms of conflict such as civil war or homicide. This proves difficult because often there is a strong overlap. If we look at a recent list of terrorist incidents across the world — take June as an example — we see the majority are events that most people would understand to be terrorism: roadside bombings; car detonations; attacks on religious or political institutions.
Although usually performed by one or a small group of individuals, most are affiliated with well-known terrorist groups, such as Islamic State, Taliban, Boko Haram, and Al-Shabaab. Again, most people would clearly associate these with terrorism violence. But where the lines become blurred is that many of these groups are rebel or insurgency groups in various domestic conflicts.
Islamic State, for example, is a key instigator in the Syrian civil war; Al-Shabaab in internal Somalian conflict.
This means that most terrorism occurs in countries of high conflict because the internal conflict is — to a certain extent — terrorism. The map below which shows terrorism as a share of total deaths for each country. In most countries — particularly across Europe, the Americas and Oceania — deaths from terrorism accounted for less than 0.
They are rare in most countries of the world today. This is not true everywhere. In a number of countries across the Middle East and Africa, terrorist deaths reach up to several percent. Iraq was the most affected 4. These are countries where overall conflict — of which terrorist activity is a part — is high. In fact, as we discuss here , the boundary between terrorism, conflict, one-sided violence or civil war is not always clear-cut.
This map shows an overview for The extent of terrorism in most countries is very low. But — as we mentioned in the global-level data — this can change from year to year [you can see this on the map above using the timeline on the bottom of the chart]. Attacks can be non-existent for many years before an unexpected rise or spike. What effect does this have? The United States provides an important example. Terrorism deaths in most years are very few: typically below 0. It claimed lives, accounting for 0.
We should therefore be aware of this volatility: having few deaths from terrorism in one year is not a predictor for the next. Overall we see that terrorism deaths globally — and in most parts of the world — are relatively rare. Much more common risks — often ones that we can influence — kill many more people. An estimated 7 million deaths each year result from smoking; 4.
The dominance of terrorism in the daily news cycle can mean that we lose perspective of this. But is this really true? In this visualization we shown terrorism deaths in Western Europe since Another useful resource which cross-references well with this database for Western Europe is the Wikipedia entry : you can find further context of particular events there. Here we see annual deaths from terrorism in the order of hundreds, and reaching over deaths in some years. The United Kingdom was home to the largest share of deaths for much of the 70s, 80s, and 90s.
We see quite a marked decline post with the Good Friday Agreement between British and Irish governments. Since the Millennium the annual death toll has been below 50 deaths in most years, and often below For context, compare that to how many people die on the roads : in around 70 people died every day in road incidents.
The year to year changes are nonetheless volatile. Large terrorist attacks — such as the Madrid train bombings in ; London bombings; Norway attacks; Paris attacks; the truck attacks in Nice and the Berlin Christmas market attack in ; and the Manchester and Barcelona attacks in — have occurred since the turn of the century. This trend is also reflected when we look at the number of terrorist attacks. With exception of the s, terrorism data in Western Europe can be hard to see when bundled with other regions.
This in itself is an important point: terrorist deaths in Western Europe are very low within the global context. This has changed dramatically since then. In , only 0. Between and — over almost two decades — there were just under deaths in Western Europe from terrorism. This is equal to the death toll of only two to three years during the s.
The Global Terrorism Database GTD — the most comprehensive database of terrorist incidents to date — was founded and is currently maintained from programmes in the United States. This, combined with the fact that terrorist incidents would have been covered extensively in the US media dating back to the s makes it likely that it has the most complete record of terrorist attacks in recent decades.
In this visualization we show the annual death toll from terrorism in the US since The September 11 attacks in New York stand out as the most fatal terrorist event in the world in recent history.
In fact, claiming the lives of nearly people, the death toll in was almost four times higher than the combined deaths from terrorism in the US since Over the last five years there has been a small but steady increase in terrorist deaths in the US. In most years terror attacks caused fewer than 50 deaths per year, and in many years no one died from attacks.
With exception of , terrorism accounted for less than 0. For comparison, around people die in road accidents in the United States every day. When we look at the number of terrorist attacks we see a marked decline since the early s. Airline hijackings are a very visible form of terrorism.
But whilst hijackings can seem like a modern form of terrorism, they have a long history: in fact, hijackings today are very rare and much less frequent than the past. Most commonly, hijackers would demand the pilot fly to a specific location, or sometimes hijackers would attempt to fly the aircraft themselves. Incidents of hijacking have been around almost as long as human flight itself with suspected hijacks dating as far back as , and the first recorded hijacking in But they were still relatively rare until the s.
In this chart we see the annual number of hijacking incidents and fatalities globally from onwards. This data is sourced from the Aviation Safety Network , which provides up-to-date and complete information on airliner accidents across the world. Here we see very few incidents in the s, with a small rise through the s and s. Until , there were never more than 10 incidents in a year.
But from to , there was a sharp rise in hijackings — particularly in the United States. Over this 5-year period there were hijackings globally. Most ended in no fatalities: 46 were killed, 25 of which happened in This is a measure we take for granted today. Over the period from until , hijacking incidents across the world were fairly consistent, in the range of around 20 to 40 per year.
In most years there were very few fatalities, although these were interspersed with fatal events which would kill tens of passengers. Four airliners were hijacked, two of which were flown into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. Regulation was quickly tightened.
Cockpit doors on many aircraft are now bulletproof and reinforced; security checks are now standard in most countries, including domestic flights at the time, many countries had no or random checks for domestic travel ; and levels of airport screening have been tightened significantly.
Many people are worried about flying because of the perceived risk of terrorism. Some may avoid flying completely. Aviation, especially commercial air travel, is very safe. If we put it in perspective of the number of the number of people flying, in there were only 0. Terrorism can be motivated by religious extremism, as seen in the rise of Islamist terrorism since the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York in Religiously motivated terrorism has also been carried out in the name of Christianity.
Terrorism can also be motivated by political views, which may overlap with religious reasons. Sometimes we can feel a whole bunch of emotions, including anger, fear and confusion. Allow yourself to feel however you feel. It's not always easy to find the right place to start. Our 'What's on your mind? Why are some societies more exposed to terrorism than others?
What are the common theories and hypotheses concerning the causes of terrorism? Published by the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment, this paper surveys theories on the causes of terrorism, as well as those for explaining terrorism on an international or world system level of analysis.
Discussions about the causes of terrorism are controversial, with many people viewing the focus on underlying causes, motivation and grievance as implicit with justifying violence.
A dispassionate outlook is required to understand the driving forces and devise effective long-term counter measures. However, no comprehensive review of why some countries experience terrorism more than others, exist. Explanations are varied and disagreements occur. For example, psycho-pathological explanations for terrorism tend to divest terrorism of socio-economic and political motivations.
While researchers agree that one of the characteristics of a terrorist is normality, psycho-pathological factors amongst group leadership can play a significant role. Other theories over the causes of terrorism include:. Terrorism can occur in a variety of manners and instances. Terrorists may be deprived, uneducated, affluent and from both sexes. It can occur in developed and undeveloped countries, in a variety of regimes.
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