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An Exploratory Analysis of an Interdisciplinary Theory of Terrorism

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An Exploratory Analysis of an Interdisciplinary Theory of Terrorism AN EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS OF AN INTERDISCIPLINARY THEORY OF TERRORISM By ADAM L. SILVERMAN A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2002 Copyright 2002 by Adam L. Silverman ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to express my gratitude to a number of people for their assistance in both getting me to the dissertation stage and getting me through the dissertation itself Rabbi Theodore Brod started me on a life of scholarship when I was six years old and he was sixty-six for the first time. I would also like to thank Nathan Katz, Christine Gudorf, Lesley Northup, and Steve Heinz, the supervisors of my master’s degree in religious studies, as well as the other faculty and staff of the Religious Studies Department at Florida International University. I wish to thank Gary Feinberg, Joe Albini, and Harvey Kushner for taking the time to provide mentoring for someone who was not their student. I would also like to thank John K. Cochrane for reading portions of the manuscript, mentoring, and methodological help. I would also like to thank David B. Conklin for methodological assistance. 1 owe an enormous debt of gratitude to the faculty and staff, as well as my fellow graduate students in the Department of Political Science at the University of Florida. Special thanks go to the office staff trio of Debbie Wallen, Marty Swilley, and Hazel Phillips for answering every question and assisting with every problem. Thanks are also due to Dennis Galvan for three years worth of advice and mentoring and Peter Malanchuk for finding data above and beyond the call of duty. I would especially like to thank all of the departmental members of my dissertation committee: Philip J.Williams, M. Leanne Brown, and Aida A. Hozic. I would also like to express my gratitude and thanks to Ronald L. Akers, the external member of my committee for helping to bring me to the Department of Political Science at the University of Florida and for treating me like one of his own students. Words are inadequate to express my thanks to Kenneth D. Wald, my dissertation supervisor, mentor, and advisor. I only hope that I have the chance to do for someone else what he has done for me. I would finally like to thank my family: all three of the dogs - Taffy, Jenni, and Early, my brother Noah and his wife Beth, my mother Cyndi for always listening, and my father Mitchell, who was the first to show me how to be a good teacher, researcher, and scholar. This dissertation is dedicated to the memory of our colleague and friend Barbara Roth, who was taken from us much too soon. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Hi ABSTRACT vii CHAPTERS 1 INTRODUCTION 1 A BriefHistoryofthe Pro-Life Movement 4 Pro-Life Grievances 10 2 TOWARDS AN INTERDISCIPLINARY THEORY OF TERRORISM 17 Definitions and Theory 17 Towards an Interdisciplinary Theory of Terrorism 25 Conflict Theory 30 Subculture 32 Wald’s Crime Novel Framework 39 Aker’s Learning Theory 45 Agnew’s General Theory of Strain 4g 3 AN EVOLUTIONARY AND CROSS-SECTIONAL ANALYSIS OF ANTI- ABORTION TERRORISM 51 The Evolutionary Model: A Time Series Analysis of Anti-Abortion Terrorism 52 Data Methods and Operations 52 The Dependent Variable 52 Hypotheses and the Independent Variables 57 Findings from the Evolutionary Model 63 The Cross-Sectional Model; An Extension of Nice’s “Abortion Clinic Bombings as Political Violence 68 Nice’s Theoretical Argument 69 Analysis 7I Findings from the Cross-Sectional Model 74 4 LEADERLESS RESISTANCE, SIX DEGREES OF SHELLEY SHANNON 78 AND THE ARMY OF G-D Leaderless Resistance 79 V The Six Degrees of Shelley Shannon 82 Eric Robert Rudolph and The Army of G-d 87 5 WHOEVER SHEDS MAN’S BLOOD, BY MAN SHALL HIS BLOOD BE SHED 92 Introduction 92 Ideas, Definitions, and the Battle Over Abortion 93 Methods 97 The Normative Pro-Life Message 99 The Deviant Pro-Life Message 103 Discussion 121 6 CONCLUSIONS AND FINDINGS 105 Directions for Future Research 121 APPENDICES A DATA SOURCES AND OPERATIONS FOR THE NICE REPLICATION ... 125 B SELECTED DEVIANT PRO-LIFE IDEATIONAL MATERIALS 127 WORKS CITED I47 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 157 vi Abstract of Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy AN EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS OF AN INTERDISCIPLINARY THEORY OF TERRORISM By Adam L. Silverman May 2002 Chair: Kenneth D. Wald, PhD Department: Political Science The literature on terrorism makes many references to the identity and states of mind of the terrorist, his ability to adaptively choose from among a limited range of tactics, her and willingness to make strategic choices that form the basis of political violence as a wholly instrumental act. The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the socially constructed identity basis of terrorism. 1 define terrorism and then examine the relationship between identity, and its sources, social learning, resource mobilization, opportunity, and strain, as causes of terrorism. In this dissertation I am using anti- abortion terrorism as a proxy for terrorism in general. After integrating the different identity approaches I derive six hypotheses and subject them to evolutionary and cross- sectional empirical analysis. The empirical analysis is followed by four case studies and a content analysis of pro-life ideational material and definitions. The results of all three forms of analysis suggest preliminary support for an identity-based theory of terrorism. vii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION With the recent terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington, DC, as well as the series of anthrax laced and anthrax hoax letters, an inquiry into the correlates, reasons and causes of terrorism has taken on added urgency. One of the most important issues is how terrorists forge an identity that promotes violent political crime and deviance. By “identity,” I am not referring to the terrorists’ names or where they may live, but rather to their socially constructed worldviews. The social construction of identity comprises an individual’s primary association and the norms and definitions for behavior that he or she learns from them. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of identity, and its sources (social learning, resource mobilization, opportimity, and strain) as causes of terrorism. During a National Public Radio interview (NPR) one week after the incidents of 1^’’, September 1 2001, three highly respected specialists on terrorism and security, Brian Jenkins, Clinton Van Zandt, and William Daly, all indicated that the identity of the nineteen hijackers played an important role in the attacks (Bradley 9/1 8/0 1 ). Moreover, Jenkins indicated that American security experts, analysts, and policy makers seem to have been caught so offguard because they failed to understand the terrorists’ identity and its importance (Bradley 9/1 8/01). The nineteen men who willingly went to their own deaths were not, as previous research might have predicted, young, psychologically damaged men with poor societal connections. Rather they were in their late twenties and 2 early thirties, educated, reasonably well off, and had strong societal ties. Understanding the identity of these men, just as understanding the identity of any terrorist, is very important to understanding past incidents of terrorism and formulating security policies that have a greater chance of preventing future incidents. It is important to focus on identity in relation to terrorism because terrorism is a moralistic crime (Black 1976, Cooney 1998, Senechal de la Roche 1996) - a type of crime that seeks violently to redress the grievances of the terrorists and the groups and movements with which they identify. Terrorist acts are attempts to forcibly apply the norms of the terrorist to individuals and groups that are perceived to have violated them. As a result, terrorism is a contextually bound form of behavior. The terrorist chooses means and methods that are contextually appropriate. It is necessary to formulate a theory that can deal with both of these concerns. Moreover, it will be necessary to test it systematically, both quantitatively and qualitatively, in an empirical setting. If the initial testing is successful then the theory can be applied to other forms of terrorism. The interdisciplinary theory that 1 am proposing is derived from four sources: Wald’s (1992) framework for understanding religiously motivated political behavior based on social movement theory, Akers’ (1985) theory of social learning, Agnew’s (1992) general theory of strain, and Black’s (1976) theory of conflict structure and social control. This dissertation focuses on abortion clinic violence — the terrorism that arises out of the pro-life identity. There are several reasons for applying an identity-based theory of terrorism to abortion clinic violence. The first of these reasons is a practical one; there is a reliable chronological listing of abortion clinic violence incidents that can be used as the basis for quantitative analysis. Moreover, there are a large number ofjournalistic and 3 academic works dealing with the pro-life movement, the pro-life identity, pro-life politics, and pro-life violence. ’ As a result there is enough data to proceed. The availability of data alone, however, is not a good enough reeison to engage in inquiry. Pro-life violence directed at abortion clinics is a very good model for terrorism in general. Research into abortion related terrorism indicates that more than fifty percent of all terrorist incidents are bombings, firebombings, or arsons with the remainder being made up of other forms of violence: shootings, murders, kidnappings, hijackings, vandalism. This conforms to other types of terrorism that have been studied (Combs 1997).
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