Chapter 6: Recent History: The Roots of Modern Terrorism

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Chapter 6Recent History The Roots of Modern
Terrorism
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Social Revolution and the Enlightenment

• 18th Century considered Age of Reason or the
  Period of Enlightenment.
• Europeans began to question the manner in which
  they were governed during the Enlightenment
• Sought to increase the power of the lower
  classes.
• Forces of change brought a new way of thinking
  about citizenship.
• Enlightenment was an international intellectual
  movement.

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Social Revolution and the Enlightenment

• Philosophers produced a common idea about
  government.
• Governments should exist to protect individual
  rights.
• Best form of government was democracy
• Citizens had rights.
• Governments were created to protect those rights.
• Common people should control the government
  through social contract or constitution.
• Increased demand for democracy
• Tension between ruling class the governed
• Tension spilled into violence

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The American Revolution

• Reasons why the colonist revolted against
  England
• British taxation laws, enforced through
• Sugar Act (1764), Stamp Act (1765), and Townshend
  Act (1767)
• Those acts affected American citizens (merchants
  and consumers), so they boycotted them, and
  British imports to America were cut in a half.
• The famous quote comes from this period No
  taxation without representation.
• Those acts sparked a protest and British answered
  by sending troops.
• Boston Massacre (1770)

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The American Revolution

• Reasons why colonies in North America objected to
  British rule included
• Tea law proclamation that cut off the
  colonies from trade (resulting in the Boston Tea
  Party).
• Lack of American representation in the British
  Parliament.
• After publication of Tom Paines Common Sense
  pamphlet, public opinion swung toward the cause
  of independence (half a million copies sold!)

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The American Revolution

• On July 1776, The Second Continental Congress
  declared independence from Great Britain
• American Revolution transferred power from
  British upper class to American upper class.
• American Revolution represented long-term
  evolutionary process toward democracy.
• Americans created a republic based on a
  representative democracy.

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The French Revolution

• French Revolution (1789-1799) was based on same
  enlightened principles as American Revolution.
• French Revolution different and more deadly in
  tone.
• Extremely bloody Guillotine, genocide of
  Nantes rebels, massacres, slaughter,
  assasinations, revenge killings
• First revolution in the modern sense of the word.
• French Revolution was a transfer of power between
  classes.
• French Revolution represented a radical shift in
  power structures.

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The Reign of Terror

• Term terrorism appeared during the French
  Revolution.
• Burke Referred to Governments violence as
  Reign of Terror, using the word terrorism to
  describe actions of the new government
  (cold-blooded reign of Jacobins).
• As the government consolidate power, the would-be
  democracy gave way to Napoleon Bonaparte and
  military authoritarianism.

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Guerrillas and the Spanish Peninsula

• Meaning of terrorism underwent a subtle change
  during Napoleons invasion of Spain.
• Spanish partisans attacked French troops in
  unconventional manners.
• Spanish called it patriotism.
• French referred to Spanish partisans as
  terrorists.
• Definition shifted away from government
  repression and toward those who resisted
  government.
• Definitional transformation continued throughout
  19th century.

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1848 and the Radical Democrats

• Radical Democrats
• Demanded immediate drastic change
• Democracy should be based on economic equality as
  well as freedom.
• Class revolution.
• Political power should be held in common.
• Interest in developing constitution.
• Distribute wealth created by trade and
  manufacturing evenly.
• Socialists
• Argued for centralized control of the economy.
• Anarchists
• Sought to reduce or to eliminate centralized
  government.
• Capitalists
• Sought to reduce or to eliminate centralized
  government.

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Socialists

• Wanted to completely democratize society.
• Wanted control of industrial production.
• Emphasized the right to form labor unions, to
  bargain work conditions and to strike.
• Emphasized democracy over the centralized power
  of communism.
• Believed that a strong state would ensure profits
  from industry were distributed in an egalitarian
  manner.

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Socialists

• Socialism
• Karl Marx, founder of communism, stated that
• Social structure is arranged by the material
  circumstances surrounding existence.
• Humans shape the environment through work and
  even produce more than they need.
• Communists a form of Socialism
• Advocated strong centralized government.
• Elimination of all classes save the working
  class.
• Complete state monopoly over all forms of
  industrial and agricultural production.

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Anarchists

• Shared ideas about egalitarian nature of society
  with socialists disagreed on function of the
  state.
• All forms of governmental domination are harmful
  and unnecessary.
• Proudhon
• Extension of the democracy to all classes should
  be accomplished through the elimination of
  property and government.
• Anarchy would develop peacefully as people
  learned about the structure of governments and
  the capitalist economy.
• Anarchism is believed to be an inspiration for a
  terrorism.

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Violent Anarchism

• Violent anarchism propaganda No industrialist is
  safe and capitalist order would crumble.
• Jensen
• Several factors merged to create a culture of
  terrorism among members of the anarchists
  movement
• Growing number of people attracted to the
  movement
• Economic change
• Economic consolidation accompanied with the
  social stress
• Nationalistic factors
• Invention of dynamite (Nobel) fostered the
  philosophy of bombs and influenced the adoption
  of violence.

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Rhetoric, Internal Debates, Action

• Prokoptin
• Humanity existed between two competing
  tendencies cooperation and authoritarianism.
• Call for non-violent revolution.
• Bakunin
• Revolutionaries could not use the state as an
  instrument of emancipation because it was
  inherently oppressive.
• Bombings and individual assassinations as a means
  of awakening the masses to reality.
• Heinzen
• Advocated political murder.
• Most
• did not believe capitalistic societies would
  change peacefully and called for violent action.

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Modern Terrorists and Their Historical
Counterparts

• Laqueur Modern terrorists are more ruthless
  than their historical counterparts.
• Terrorism of historical terrorists was mainly
  rhetorical.
• Anarchists were selective about their targets.
• Modern terrorism has been typified by
  indiscriminate violence and intentional targeting
  of civilian population.
• Modern terrorist strike at governments by killing
  citizens.

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Anarchism and Nationalism

• Nationalists under foreign control adopted
  tactics of anarchists to fight foreign powers
  occupying their lands.
• Nationalists believed they were fighting
  patriotic wars not that they were anarchists
  (IRA).
• Groups throughout Europe turned to the philosophy
  of the bomb.
• Nationalistic terrorists followed patterns set by
  violent anarchists.
• The moral justification for anarchists and
  nationalists is essentially the same.

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A Contemporary Analogy

• Woodcock Anarchism was not revolutionary.
• Reaction to economic consolidation and
  centralized state.
• Strongest where industrialization was weakest.
• Early 1900s witnessed events culminating in
  measures that resulted in a violation of the
  civil liberties of several Americans.
• Assassination of President McKinley.
• Red Scare of 1919.
• Could the reactive measures of 9-11 be considered
  parallel to the over-reactive measures taken in
  the early 1900s?

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Terrorism and Revolution in Russia

• Russia in the 19th century differed significantly
  from the other great powers of Europe (class
  distinction was greater and peasants lived in
  poverty).
• The Peoples Will (Narodnaya Voyla) represented
  violent socialist revolution.
• Members believed it was necessary to terrorize
  subversive organizations into submission.
• Peoples Will evolved from Russian revolutionary
  thought.
• Bakunin
• Nechaev

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Terrorism and Revolution in Russia

• Three approaches of how to modernize the Russian
  state
• From the top down Tsar Alexander II
• Creation of modern Russia as a liberal Western
  Democracy The Intellectuals
• Revolution Violent Anarchists
• The Peoples Will propaganda won sympathy among
  the peasantry.
• The People's Will Campaign
• Bombings, assassinations and murders
• 1881 murder of Tsar Alexander II

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Terrorism and Revolution in Russia

• National Disasters that created atmosphere for
  1914 Revolution in Russia
• Loosing the war to Japan
• Economic problems
• Bureaucratic inefficiency
• 1905 Revolution
• Entering I World War
• After 1914 revolution new Russian Government was
  formed by Mensheviks.

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Terrorism and Revolution in Russia

• Russian revolution utilized terrorism in a new
  manner.
• Created an impact on peoples view of terrorism
  in the 20th century.
• Lenin and Trotsky believed terrorism should be
  used as an instrument for overthrowing the
  bourgeois governments.
• Advocated terrorism as a means of controlling
  internal enemies and as a method for coping with
  internal strife.
• By threatening to export terror, Lenin and
  Trotsky effectively placed fear of communism in
  the minds of many in the West.
• Lenins victory and subsequent writings have
  inspired terrorists from 1917 to the present.