(This is an archived page, from the Patterns of Power Edition 3 book. Current versions are at book contents).
Terrorism is defined here simply as the use of violence by a few people to frighten many others, in pursuit of a political objective. This distinguishes it from (a) military confrontations between States and (b) violence used directly in non-political crime. In his book, Terrorism: How to Respond, Richard English devotes the whole of chapter 1 to defining it unambiguously.
A small number of terrorists can intimidate a much larger population – so it is an effective technique for a minority to attempt to gain sway over the rest of the population.
Terrorist organisations appear to have a ready supply of recruits, even though it can involve violence so unspeakable that most people would be unable to bring themselves to commit it. John Gray’s article, Excitement, hatred and belonging: why terrorists do it, offers an explanation of what attracts individuals to terrorism: they gain “adventure, excitement, celebrity in local communities… belonging… and comradeship”. This is appealing to disempowered people with a strong sense of grievance. And death in action can be seen as a badge of honour, so terrorists tend to be unafraid of law-enforcement (5.2.5.1).
Terrorism has been used within a State – as with the Basque separatist organisation, ETA, and the IRA in Northern Ireland. Both of these were described in David English's 2016 book, Does Terrorism Work? A History (which was reviewed in the John Gray article referred to above).
In recent years, Islamic terrorism has been more in the news – as described later (7.3.3).