The League of Nations, before World War II, tried to work out an agreement on terrorism prevention and suppression, but could not achieve success because of the lack of agreement between the participating countries. For the same reason, despite the debate which lasted for decades, the United Nations has also failed to give a universally accepted definition.
Russian and Soviet literature gives multiple definitions of terrorism. A. N. Trainin, the first Soviet researcher of international crimes and the one of the authors of the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal, referred to The 1937 Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of Terrorism of the League of Nations, which also did not contain a definition of terrorism.
The Convention on Counter-Terrorism of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in 2009 gives only a brief definition of terrorism as “an ideology of violence and the practice of exerting influence on the decision- making of governments or international organizations by threatening or committing violent and (or) other criminal acts, connected with intimidating the population and aimed at causing injury to private individuals, society, or the state” (2009). This definition is almost identical to the definition in the Russian Federal Law “On Counteraction Against Terrorism” from 2006.
Terrorism takes in a number of international and national factors. Nowadays, all countries are potential targets for a terrorist attack, whether or not they proactively fight the terror organization (Carceles-Poveda and Tauman, 2011)
11. Carceles-Poveda, E. and Y. Tauman, 2011. A strategic analysis of the war against transnational terrorism. Games and Economic Behavior, 71(1): 49-65.
11. The Convention on Counter-Terrorism of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization of 16 June, 2009. Yekaterinburg.
‘While nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer, nothing is more difficult that to understand him.’ (Dostoevsky)
The most important words we use are controversial. Democracy, equality and freedom do not have the one universally accepted definition. Event the concept of freedom means different for different people. The same could be said about terrorism. Roughly speaking, political elites and their decisions form how we understand terrorism and who is a terrorist.
Introduction
There are several problems of defining ‘terrorism’.
First of all, it is recognized as assumptions about savagery, barbarism and evil. But interestingly this negative association was not always the case. For example, Nikolai Morozov, Russian revolutionary, who was a significant member of opposition against Russian Tsarist regime was considered as a terrorist despite his good intentions.
Second point is overuse of the language of terrorism in academic, media and political discourse. Because it attracts attention as something important and dramatic has happened when we hear it. Moreover, politicians use this complex wide term as a tool to maintain public’a attention. Partially, because of this the term has been stretched almost to the pointless level.
Third point is complexity of the use of the term due to the meaning of terrorism. On the one hand it is subject to historical and political trends. While on the other hand, it is beliefs and values. It is as diverse as Greenpeace and al-Qaeda. In other words, ‘one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedoms m fighter’.
Final factor is transformation of the meaning over time. It is important for two reasons. First, by highlighting the connection between meaning and historical context. In this instance, it could be said the terrorism is a social construction. Second reason is correlation between the political labels and the today’s reality, because understanding of terrorism, as history shows, oftentimes can do a inconceivable shift. For example, a positive character, Nelson Mandela who was labeled as terrorist.
If we are serious about establishing mechanism capable of dealing with terrorism, we need to first navigate a route of the definition log-jam: ‘we seek to define terrorism so as to better able to cope with it. We cannot begin to counter effectively that which we are unable to fully comprehend or agree on as to its nature.’
A terrorist act means an action or threat of action where the action causes certain defined forms of harm or interference and the action is done or the threat is made with the intention of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause.( the government of the U.K.)
New anti-terrorism measures affect air travel, he’s y care system, political decision-making, attendance at university, banking and other economic systems, internet usage, immigration, policing practices and great many others areas of social and political life.
Before 11 September 2001, people were concerned more about illegal drug trade, nuclear power and civil war.
In the twenty-first centaurs terrorism seems to be always on the agenda. Frequently, terrorism is a resin of foreign wars and military interventions.
Concept of terrorism
“The systematic use of violence and intimidation to coerce a government of community, especially into acceding to specific political demands” (Pearsall and Trumble, 2006).
The main point of terrorism is to create a climate of fear to intimidate a wider than the direct victims of the terrorist attacks, it could be civilian, symbolic and random target. Terrorism actions are held in order to achieve aim about political change.
Terrorism was found as an instrument of control against enemies of the revolution. In the end of 19th century the concept of terrorism was associated with unjustified mass arrests in the name of the state or anti-state violence. Acts of terrorism were described simply as bombings, kidnappings and hijackings (Zulika and Douglass, 1996). It worth saying that 1880s and 1890s was a crucial moment for the shift in meaning, thanks to French and Russian anarchists. But the study of terrorism began only in the late 1960s. At that date Western countries were taking part in battles against communism and decolonisation, naming them as ‘terrorists’ (Winkler, 2006). For instance, representatives of British military forces preferred to call their enemies or opponents ‘communist terrorists.
The United States legal definition of terrorism excludes acts done by recognized states (Gupta and Dipak, 2008). According to U.S. law terrorism is defined as “premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience” (Sinai and Joshua, 2008) There is no international consensus on a legal or academic definition of terrorism. United Nations conventions have failed to reach consensus on definitions of non-state or state terrorism (Rupérez and Javier, 2006).
To give an example of state terrorism, it is worth mentioning the recent statement given by the president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko. He gave some comments regarding the murder of Denis Voronenkov, a former Communist legislator in Russia’s legislative house, who was shot dead in Kiev on 21 of March, 2017, and called the killing a ‘Russian state terrorist act’ (Fortune, 2017). But in the same time, it is interesting to note that according to orthodox study of terrorism a number of left-wing scholars believe the the term ‘terrorism’ could be understand as an arm of Western state policy, who’s actions are carried out by West and their allies (Burnett and Whyte, 2005)
Terrorism is an activity or a ‘weapon-system’, that has been used by an enormous variety of non-state groups, regimes and governments (Brian Jenkins). In an operative democracy the major threat of terror is posed by non-state government and to impose their own agenda by coercive intimidation.
One of the major reasons why terrorism has become so ubiquitous in the contemporary international system is that it has proven a low-cost, low-risk, potentially high-yield method of struggle for all kinds of groups and regimes. And there is no sign that the ending of the cold war has eradicated the underlying ethnic, religio-political, ideological and strategic causes of conflicts that spawn terrorism.
Very often the military have become perpetrators of mass terror against the civilian population, in total defiance of international humanitarian law. Crimes against humanity could be genocide, ethnic cleansing, massacre, mass rape and torture. For example, even while the Russian Army was planning to intensify its savage bombardment of Grozny, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was meeting to award Russia an $8 billion loan. The Russian authorities were quick to label the Chechens ‘terrorists and bandits’.
- http://fortune.com/2017/03/26/ukraine-russia-viktor-yanukovich/
- Gupta, Dipak K. (2008). Understanding terrorism and political violence: the life cycle of birth, growth, transformation, and demise. Taylor & Francis. p. 8. ISBN 978-0-415-77164-1.
- Sinai, Joshua (2008). “How to Define Terrorism”. Perspectives on Terrorism. Terrorism Research Institute. 2 (4).
- Rupérez, Javier (6 September 2006). “The UN’s fight againstterrorism: five years after 9/11”. U.N. Action to Counter Terrorism. Real Instituto Elcano of Spain. Archived from the original on April 11, 2011.