Reading I NEED HELP ON MY HOMEWORK

Management Communication Quarterly 2015, Vol. 29(4) 512 –538

© The Author(s) 2015 Reprints and permissions:

sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0893318915597300

mcq.sagepub.com

Article

Deconstituting al-Qa’ida: CCO Theory and the Decline and Dissolution of Hidden Organizations

Hamilton Bean1 and Ronald J. Buikema2

Abstract This study reconceptualizes the decline and dissolution of hidden organizations using the four flows model of constitutive communication. Analyzing internal al-Qa’ida documents captured during the 2011 U.S. raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, that killed Osama Bin Laden, this study explains how losses of control over the flows of membership negotiation, self-structuring, activity coordination, and institutional positioning have both reflected and reinforced al-Qa’ida’s decline. Interventions inspired by a communicative constitution of organization (CCO) perspective are proposed as a way to accelerate al-Qa’ida’s dissolution. The implications of the four flows model for both counterterrorism strategy and theorizing hidden organizations are discussed.

Keywords hidden organizations, al-Qa’ida, communicative constitution of organization, counterterrorism, organizational decline

1University of Colorado Denver, Denver, USA 2The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD, USA

Corresponding Author: Hamilton Bean, University of Colorado Denver, Campus Box 176, P.O. Box 173364, Denver, CO 80217-3364, USA. Email: [email protected]

597300 MCQXXX10.1177/0893318915597300Management Communication QuarterlyBean and Buikema research-article2015

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 513

Hidden organizations often tilt toward socially undesirable forms and can include entities such as terrorist groups, crime syndicates, gangs, hate groups, and cults. These types of hidden organizations can cause immense harm to people and property. As a result, many government authorities, citizens, and scholars share an interest in understanding how specific hidden organizations can be dismantled. The causes and processes of organizational decline and dissolution nevertheless remain obscure (Cameron, Kim, & Whetten, 1987; Serra, Ferreira, & de Almeida, 2013; Trahms, Ndofor, & Sirmon, 2013). In studying nonhidden/transparent organizations, management scholars usually describe decline and dissolution as attributable to the inability of organiza- tional leaders to (a) recognize internal and external threats and pressures in a timely way (Gopinath, 2005; Lorange & Nelson, 1987), (b) reshape organi- zational culture and processes in response to changing conditions (Schein & Kampas, 2004), or (c) ameliorate their own counterproductive psychological traits that hasten failure (Carmeli & Sheaffer, 2009). In studying the decline of terrorist organizations, scholars usually focus on “desistance” from violent attacks (e.g., a transition to legitimate political processes; Cronin, 2006; Miller, 2012); the influence of regional, socioeconomic, and political factors (Blomberg, Engel, & Sawyer, 2010); or police and counterterrorism mea- sures (Jones & Libicki, 2008).

These dominant perspectives do not well account for the role of communi- cation. Scholars know surprisingly little about the kinds of communication that stakeholders can use to accelerate organizational decline and dissolution (Manheim, 2000). This study advances a perspective on organizing, commu- nicative constitution of organization (CCO; Putnam & Nicotera, 2009) as a theoretical intervention that can enable stakeholders to use communication to better understand and accelerate the decline and dissolution of hidden organi- zations. By communication, we refer to “the process in which contextualized actors use symbols and make interpretations to coordinate and control both their own and others’ activity and knowledge, which are simultaneously medi- ated by, and productive of, ‘texts’” (Kuhn, 2008, p. 1232). As Weick (2013) explained, texts and conversations transform ambiguous activities and vague understandings into situations that are comprehensible and can, in turn, serve as a springboard for future action and knowledge. Taylor and Van Every (2000) similarly claimed that texts and conversations served as the “site and surface” of organizing. It follows that texts and conversations must also be the site and surface of disorganizing. Drawing upon this premise, Schoeneborn and Scherer (2010) theorized that the destabilization of terrorist organizations could be accomplished by creating ambiguity around mass media reports of terrorism. Scholars affiliated with Arizona State University’s Consortium for Strategic Communication (CSC) have also made significant contributions to

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

514 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

combating violent extremism using narrative approaches (Corman, Trethewey, & Goodall, 2008). These scholars have explored the constitutive functions of mass media and strategic communication. However, several important ques- tions remain unanswered, including (a) what kinds of communication actually constitute terrorist organizations such as al-Qa’ida? (b) what are the theoreti- cal possibilities for communicatively deconstituting terrorist organizations? and (c) how can authorities use knowledge of (a) and (b) to inform and develop counterterrorism strategy? We turn to CCO as a theoretical perspective because it helps to simultaneously answer all three questions.

In this study, we analyze the Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) at West Point’s 2012 report, “Letters From Abbottabad: Bin Laden Sidelined?” (Lahoud et al., 2012) and translations of the 17 declassified al-Qa’ida docu- ments that serve as the basis of that report. These 17 documents were publicly released in 2012 from the trove captured during the 2011 U.S. raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, that killed Osama Bin Laden. In February 2014, al- Qa’ida officially renounced connection with the Islamic State of Iraq and al- Sham (ISIS), which has risen to prominence. However, according to a joint U.S. National Science Foundation and Department of Defense project admin- istered by Stanford University (“Mapping Militant Organizations”), there are still 21 active organizations linked to al-Qa’ida. The global threat of terrorism in general, and al-Qa’ida-linked groups in particular, has reshaped the politi- cal and economic contexts of many commercial, government, and nonprofit enterprises (Horgan & Braddock, 2012). Such conditions make the decline and deconstitution of terrorist organizations an appropriate subject of inquiry for organizational communication scholars.

Our research contributes to scholarship regarding hidden organizations by responding to Scott’s (2013) call to investigate how “revealing and conceal- ing of information are related to organizational performance and even sur- vival” (p. 215). Two areas of literature provide the conceptual foundation for this investigation: the organization of al-Qa’ida and CCO theory. After syn- thesizing this literature, we describe our methods. We then present an analy- sis of the Abbottabad documents and a reinterpretation of portions of the CTC’s report to identify CCO’s potential for understanding al-Qa’ida’s decline as a communicative phenomenon. We then describe the implications of this perspective for hastening the dissolution of al-Qa’ida, as well as deconstituting other types of hidden organizations.

Organizing al-Qa’ida and CCO Theory

Scott’s (2013) transparent, shaded, shadowed, dark continuum established that terrorist organizations are often categorized as “dark” in that they tend to

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 515

cultivate anonymity, their members tend to conceal their affiliation, and their leaders tend to communicate with a limited audience. However, “mostly shadowed” terrorist organizations, such as al-Qa’ida, seek to influence nonlo- cal audiences. Although terrorist organizations desire publicity for their acts of violence, they usually attempt to conceal their members’ identity from law enforcement and the general public. Scott (2013) also noted that although terrorist organizations may strive for public recognition and legitimacy, they usually operate in “clandestine ways” (p. 38). Stohl and Stohl (2011) defined clandestine organizations as collectives whose members keep their affilia- tions secret, whose internal activities and governance structures operate out- side of public view, and where traces of the existence of the organization eventually become publicly known or rumored. The authors acknowledged that al-Qa’ida has been “constituted in a variety of ways, embodying multiple organizational types with varying degrees of specificity,” yet they concluded that al-Qa’ida was a political, institutional, and economic entity grounded in historical processes (p. 1206). Nevertheless, Osama Bin Laden himself once denied organizing al-Qa’ida, claiming that the “organization” moniker was a Western imputation (Allouni, 2014). As a result, ontological clarification is warranted.

The work of Ahrne and Brunsson (2011) supports the categorization of al-Qa’ida as an organization. The authors define organization as a decided order that includes one or more of the elements of membership, hierarchy, rules, monitoring, and sanctions. For Ahrne and Brunsson, “formal” organi- zations evidence all five elements. The presence of just one element, how- ever, constitutes a “partial” organization, which is conceptually distinct from a “network.” A network, the authors state, is often “defined in terms of its informality, lack of boundaries and hierarchical relations, and is ascribed with qualities such as spontaneity and flexibility” (p. 88). In its past and pres- ent, al-Qa’ida has evidenced one or more of the organizational elements of membership, hierarchy, rules, monitoring, and sanctions. To produce suc- cessful, high-impact attacks, even “partial” terrorist organizations need to coordinate activity (Acharya & Marwah, 2010). al-Qa’ida’s ambiguous onto- logical status can therefore be explained by fluctuations in its relative partial- ness at any given point in time.

Complicating matters, external stakeholders may seek to organize elements of al-Qa’ida. For example, as Ahrne and Brunsson (2011) explained, “If some- one wants to break with the embeddedness and secrecy of a network, one method is to make a list of members, thereby making a network visible” (p. 98). In other words, to effectively counter al-Qa’ida, opponents might “demand that it introduce some elements of organization—at least membership” (p. 98). Because membership in al-Qa’ida or other terrorist organizations is seldom

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

516 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

avowed, U.S. intelligence agencies have developed the practice of “identity intelligence” to identify members of a group or organization by fusing biologi- cal, biographical, behavioral, and reputational information related to individu- als (U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2014a). Through connecting individuals to “other persons, places, events, or materials, [and] analyzing patterns of life,” U.S. authorities claim that they are able to characterize an individual’s level of potential threat to U.S. interests (p. 73).

Although it is useful for establishing the partialness of an organization, Ahrne and Brunsson’s model does not help stakeholders understand how to undermine or obstruct organizational membership, hierarchy, rules, monitor- ing, and sanctions. To do that, stakeholders need guidance on what specific kinds of communication can be influenced. We therefore turn to CCO.

CCO and the Four Flows Model

This study draws upon McPhee’s four flows model (for a discussion of the commonalities and differences among the three major “schools” of CCO theorizing, see Schoeneborn et al., 2014). The Montreal and Luhmannian schools of CCO have been used to study terrorist organizations (Schoeneborn & Scherer, 2010, 2012; Stohl & Stohl, 2011), but the contributions of the four flows model have heretofore not been explored. The model maintains that organizations are constituted within and through four types of distinct yet interdependent message flows or interaction processes related to four audi- ences. Specifically, organizations must maintain relations with (a) their mem- bers through membership negotiation, (b) themselves through self-structuring, (c) their internal subgroups through activity coordination, and (d) outside stakeholders through institutional positioning. For example, in negotiating members and nonmembers, an organization is simultaneously framed as hav- ing prior existence. Organizations engage in self-structuring when members communicate about and perform internal relations and organizing processes. Organizations engage in activity coordination as internal subgroups decide on how to perform various tasks. Finally, organizations communicate with outside entities, such as funders, suppliers, collaborators, and the media (McPhee & Zaug, 2000).

Criticisms of the four flows model center on its imprecision concerning when, exactly, an organization has been constituted in communication (Brummans, Cooren, Robichaud, & Taylor, 2013). Koschmann (2012) has noted that empirical investigations using the four flows model are rare. We nevertheless argue that the model is useful for studying organizational decline and dissolution because it identifies communicative phenomena that are cen- tral to organizational existence. In a comparative analysis of CCO theories,

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 517

McPhee stated that “structuration rests on the activity of organizational mem- bers,” a claim that appears to privilege membership negotiation as the critical flow (Schoeneborn et al., 2014, p. 297). McPhee and Zaug (2000) and McPhee and Iverson (2009) have emphasized, however, that organizational constitu- tion requires all four flows to be interrelated and mutually influential. We demonstrate in this study that al-Qa’ida has constituted itself using all four flows, and simultaneously occluding them all is necessary for organizational dissolution. Yet, each of the four flows may not possess the same influence in its association with decline at a given point in time. In some situations thwart- ing one flow may be quicker or easier than another but that does not necessar- ily make it the most effective means of deconstituting an organization.

Along these lines, Schoeneborn and Scherer (2010) called for a “repara- doxification” of mass media reports about terrorism to create ambiguities that might destabilize terrorist organizations (p. 4). Reparadoxification reintro- duces ambiguity to communicative events. Although the authors did not invoke the four flows model, they encouraged media commentators to under- mine the institutional positioning flow by “referring to single groups or small organizations rather than to label them as all belonging to an overarching orga- nization named al Qaeda” (p. 4). How the concept of reparadoxification might be applied to the other three flows is a question explored in this study. CCO theory is concerned with “how large-scale, purposefully-controlled organiza- tions are constituted” (McPhee & Zaug, 2000, p. 1). We argue that CCO pos- sesses untapped potential for understanding and accelerating the decline and dissolution of terrorist organizations and similar types of hidden collectives. Although conflict or ambiguity might characterize the flows at various times without necessarily obviating organizational existence (McPhee & Iverson, 2009), organizational decline is usefully understood as entailing significant, persistent losses of control over the four flows of communication.

Commentators have long called for al-Qa’ida to be dismantled or destroyed. From a CCO perspective, “organizations cease to exist” only in the absence of communication (Schoeneborn & Scherer, 2012, p. 964). The significance of this study lies in its exploration of whether and how such conditions are possible. Our primary research question is as follows:

Research Question 1: How can the four flows model help stakeholders understand al-Qa’ida’s decline?

Our secondary research question is as follows:

Research Question 2: How can the four flows model help authorities develop communication strategies that accelerate al-Qa’ida’s dissolution?

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

518 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

Answers to these two questions contribute to our understanding of the decline and dissolution of similar types of hidden organizations.

Method

Our method involves examining a collection of al-Qa’ida’s constitutive texts: the 17 Abbottabad documents. The documents are significant in that they provide a rare glimpse of communication among members of a hidden orga- nization. Stohl and Stohl (2011) claimed that there was no consensual co- orientation system within al-Qa’ida, “The conditions of secrecy insure that the constitutive texts, conversation, and metaconversation cannot be primar- ily rooted in local mutual interaction but in macro historical, institutional and political processes” (p. 1204). However, the Abbottabad documents reveal that al-Qa’ida’s communication was in many ways similar to that of formal, transparent organizations. The documents consist of typed letters totaling 197 pages in English translation (175 in the original Arabic) that were saved on thumb drives, memory cards, or a computer hard drive taken from the Abbottabad compound. The quality of the U.S. Special Operations Command’s original English translation is not consistent throughout the cor- pus. The CTC retranslated small portions of the documents that it deemed inadequate, and we draw upon those retranslations whenever possible.

Bin Laden authored six of the letters, and two (perhaps three) were addressed to him. The known authors or addressees of the other letters include high-ranking al-Qa’ida leaders or affiliates: Atiyah Abd al-Rahman (purport- edly al-Qa’ida’s “operations chief”) who was killed in 2011; Nasir al-Wuhay- shi, the leader of al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), who was killed in 2015; al-Qa’ida media advisor and spokesman, Adam Gadahn, who was killed in 2015; Mukhtar Abu al-Zubayr, leader of the Somali terrorist group, al-Shabab, who was killed in 2014; Ayman al-Zawahiri, formerlyal-Qa’ida’s second in command and its current leader; Abu Yahya al-Libi, a high-ranking al-Qa’ida leader who was killed in 2012; and Hakimullah Mahsud, leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, killed in 2013. A few of the letters do not list their author(s) or addressee.

Although a larger corpus of close to 1,000 captured al-Qa’ida documents is available through the CTC’s Harmony database, we limit our analysis to the Abbottabad documents in this study for three reasons: (a) these docu- ments allegedly were in the possession of Bin Laden and therefore potentially possess a high level of significance; (b) the corpus offers documents of suf- ficient quantity and variety to permit exploration of al-Qa’ida’s organiza- tional communication; and (c) the CTC has already performed its own analysis of the documents in the 2012 report “Letters From Abbottabad: Bin

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 519

Laden Sidelined?” allowing us to compare a CCO perspective with a tradi- tional one. The documents available through the CTC’s Harmony database have been collected nonsystematically and cannot be considered representa- tive of al-Qa’ida’s organizational communication as a whole. The documents may be representative only of the “news” that organizational members and leaders would be comfortable communicating.

Studies of organizational decline usually involve retrospective interpreta- tion, that is, they examine an already defunct organization or one already presumed to be in decline to identify the weak signals of trouble that were previously overlooked (Weick, 2013). We assent to the widespread (but not uncontested) premise that al-Qa’ida is currently in decline (Liepman & Mudd, 2014). The study of communicative flows potentially can include “events of organizational disorder or failure” (Putnam, Nicotera, & McPhee, 2009, p. 12), but identifying such events is methodologically challenging in that “any one message or episode can contribute to multiple flows at once, and processes identified as part of one flow can overlap with interactions in other flows” (p. 10). Following case studies that have used the four flows model to interpret organizational documents (Browning, Greene, Sitkin, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2009; Lutgen-Sandvik & McDermott, 2008), we iden- tified passages within the Abbottabad documents that made reference to or performed flows associated with member negotiation (e.g., recruitment, inclusion, commitment, and identification), self-structuring (e.g., communi- cation steering the organization in a particular direction, or policies attempt- ing to change or stabilize organizational structure), activity coordination (e.g., planning and operations), and institutional positioning (interactions with other entities, e.g., partners, affiliates, supporters, or media; Putnam, Nicotera, & McPhee, 2009). Similar to Browning et al. (2009), we selected key examples of these passages to illustrate our contention that degradations in control over the four flows described in the documents have reflected and reinforced al-Qa’ida’s decline.

CCO and al-Qa’ida’s Decline

Organizational decline can be understood as a condition in which contextual- ized actors’ production of texts and mediated use of symbols persistently fail to coordinate and control their own and others’ activity and knowledge (Kuhn, 2008). McPhee (2004) stated, “An enduring inscribed record of orga- nizational arrangements is a necessary medium for stability of membership, relationships, and roles” (p. 365). Therefore, when inscribed records of orga- nizational arrangements—texts—repeatedly fail to coordinate and control people’s activity and knowledge, then organizational instability and decline

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

520 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

may result. We see in the Abbottabad documents Bin Laden and other al- Qa’ida leaders’ struggle to adequately coordinate and control the activity and knowledge of organizational members, affiliates, spokespersons, and com- mentators. The documents show how Bin Laden and other al-Qa’ida leaders attempted to produce texts (letters, directives, policies, memoranda, etc.) to better control the four flows of constitutive communication in order to stabi- lize organizational membership, relationships, and roles.

Complicating Membership Negotiation

Membership negotiation is the communication flow that establishes, main- tains, or transforms the relationship between the organization and its mem- bers. McPhee and Zaug (2000) noted that this flow is constitutive because one must be a member of something. Stohl and Stohl (2011) argued that al- Qa’ida’s recruitment centered upon new members’ silent evocation of past texts and their willingness to risk themselves to demonstrate their commit- ment. Similarly, Schoeneborn and Scherer (2010) argued that terrorist orga- nizations were “able to draw on a latent pool of potential organizational members which do not become actual organizational members until they commit to a communicative act of terrorism” (p. 2). However, the Abbottabad documents indicate that al-Qa’ida’s leadership was actively concerned with membership and struggled to control it.

Leaders could not agree on which individuals and organizations should be granted formal membership status. One leader (likely Ayman al-Zawahiri, according to the CTC) wrote to Bin Laden,

The problem is that al-Qa’ida has become a broad field; each can enter . . . to declare his allegiance, does not wait to see whether he was accepted or not, even though the pledge is a contract between contractors (SOCOM-2012- 0000006, p. 2; all “SOCOM” references denote Special Operations Command documents found as appendices in Lahoud et al., 2012).

The letter writer elaborated,

Anyways, the important thing, honorable sir, is that the issue [of membership] needs to be controlled, to know who is member of al-Qa’ida, what his function is, what side he follows, what is the way to impeach him . . . (SOCOM-2012- 0000006, p. 2)

Bin Laden was vested with the power to attribute or withhold formal membership, but the letter writer sought a more objective system: “Therefore,

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 521

starting from now please think about controlling the matter with a system that deals with people, each according to his religion, piety and contribution” (p. 3). Other al-Qa’ida leaders also displayed concern for stabilizing mem- bership. In one letter, Mahmud al-Hasan and Abu Yahya al-Libi rebuked Hakimullah Mahsud, the leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, for attempting to poach members, “Badr Mansur and other members of our group [al- Qa’ida] are not to be approached to join another organization or to deploy to other locations” (p. 2). In another letter, drafted in 2007, a writer describes to Atiyah Abd al-Rahman the member negotiation practices of the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI; formerly al-Qa’ida in Iraq). Having located a supply of potential members within the ranks of Iraq’s religious students, ISI leaders were warned “to be very wary of newly-joined members” (SOCOM-2012- 0000014-HT, pp. 8-9). The writer elaborated,

No matter their status or capabilities, they must not be placed in leadership positions in the shura council, as there are many dangers lurking. Victory lies ahead, so one must remain on the lookout for penetrations and be extremely wary of newcomers. (p. 9)

Whether and how al-Qa’ida or its affiliates monitored new or potential members for infiltrators is unclear from the documents. Spies aside, non- members have helped to erode al-Qa’ida’s control over membership negotia- tion by imputing al-Qa’ida membership or affiliation to a range of individuals and groups (Stohl & Stohl, 2011). While membership and affiliation are, con- ceptually speaking, different phenomena, they are similar in their constitutive force in evoking organizational existence. CCO’s emphasis on the multisite character of organizational constitution underscores that even if the leaders of al-Qa’ida suppress formal membership, the act of outsiders imputing mem- bership and affiliation to other groups can extend al-Qa’ida to other sites. When individuals and groups declare or are imputed affiliation with al- Qa’ida, that speech act simultaneously affirms the continued existence of al- Qa’ida. Authorities should not inadvertently entrench organizational existence by perpetuating erroneous images of widespread membership or affiliation. There is no indication in the Abbottabad documents that an inscribed record of organizational arrangements adequately stabilized the organization’s membership negotiation flow.

Impeding Self-Structuring

As communicative constructions, organizations are brought into existence as people make decisions about membership, hierarchy, rules, monitoring, and

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

522 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

sanctions (Ahrne & Brunsson, 2011). McPhee and Zaug (2000) state that it is through the process of self-structuring that an organization “takes control of and influences itself” in order to address both routine and unanticipated prob- lems (p. 9). By developing this organizational sense of self, a collective can “avoid problems of over-adaptation, incoherence, and confusion” (p. 9). The authors claim that reflexive self-structuring distinguishes organizations from informal groupings. In transparent organizations, written and verbal interac- tions mediated by relatively stable organizational charts, directives, orders, or authoritative decision-making bodies are primary mechanisms of self-struc- turing. References to similar mechanisms of self-structuring are found in the Abbottabad documents, but some of al-Qa’ida’s leaders lamented that they had failed to adequately control this constitutive flow.

Bin Laden generally did not seek to formally unify various jihadi groups under al-Qa’ida’s umbrella. As a result, Saudi militants unilaterally adopted the name “al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula” in 2003, but Abu Mus’ab al- Zarqawi’s “al-Qa’ida in Mesopotamia” (or “al-Qa’ida in Iraq”) was the only affiliate that Bin Laden publicly acknowledged as formally united with al- Qa’ida (this group later broke with al-Qa’ida to form “ISIS” or the so-called “Islamic State”). Bin Laden’s reluctance to inscribe a formal record of orga- nizational arrangements is understandable because self-structuring relies upon an illocutionary act of declaration. The flow is a double-edged sword for hidden organizations. On one hand, a declaration, “We are al-Qa’ida,” performs a constitutive function. Indeed, one al-Qa’ida leader (probably al- Zawahiri, according to the CTC) encouraged accession of affiliates into al- Qa’ida despite Bin Laden’s misgivings, “I see it to be very essential for al-Qa’ida to confirm and declare its linkage with its branches, in order to become a reported fact, there is no use in denying it” (SOCOM-2012- 0000006, p. 1). On the other hand, any public declaration is potentially sui- cidal. Bin Laden understood this situation, and in a letter to al-Shabab’s leader, Mukhtar Abu al-Zubayr, who sought formal union with al-Qa’ida, Bin Laden stated, “It would be better for them [Somali jihadists] to say that there is a relationship with al-Qa’ida which is simply a brotherly Islamic connec- tion and nothing more, which would neither deny nor prove” (SOCOM- 2012-0000005, p. 2).

al-Qa’ida’s ambiguous self-structuring can also be seen in al-Qa’ida spokesman Adam Gadahn’s reference to an internal debate about whether or not al-Qa’ida should establish an Islamic state, “I would like to emphasize that I was at ease with declaring the State for a long time . . . ” (SOCOM- 2012-0000004-HT, p. 6). Gadahn indicated that other leaders, however, pre- ferred a different arrangement, “My stand is not a new one, but I followed the official stand of the organization, being afraid not to create a seduction . . .”

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 523

(p. 6). Gadahn also advised Bin Laden that al-Qa’ida should take public mea- sures to dissociate itself from “criminal” jihadi groups that routinely slaugh- tered Muslims (p. 23). While some of the affiliates sought to acquire the al-Qa’ida brand, operationally, the affiliates did not regularly consult with al-Qa’ida’s leaders nor follow their directives regarding the killing of inno- cents. This situation complicated self-structuring. Gadahn claimed that al- Qa’ida in Iraq’s “improvised decision has caused a split in the Mujahidin ranks and their supporters inside and outside Iraq” (p. 11). Other letter writ- ers, including Bin Laden, express similar sentiments regarding the activities of affiliates.

Given this situation, the CTC argues that “the framing of an ‘AQC’ [al- Qa’ida Central] as an organization in control of regional ‘affiliates’ reflects a conceptual construction by outsiders rather than the messy reality of insid- ers” (Lahoud et al., 2012, p. 12). Illustrating how outsiders can influence self-structuring, Bin Laden appropriated the expression al-Qa’ida Central (“AQC”) from the media, “This term [AQC] was coined in the media to dis- tinguish between al-Qa’ida in Afghanistan and Pakistan and al-Qa’ida in the other territories. In my opinion, there is no problem with using this term in principle in order to clarify the intended meaning” (SOCOM-2012- 0000019-HT, 2012, p. 13). In an effort to control self-structuring processes, Bin Laden asked al-Zawahiri to prepare a memorandum of understanding that would require regional jihadi groups to consult with “AQC” before act- ing. The symbiotic nature of self-structuring thus rendered outside descrip- tions of al-Qa’ida’s organizational structure as influential as members’ independent constructions. McPhee and Iverson (2009) anticipated this situ- ation, claiming that organizational members initiate, but do not wholly con- trol, the process of self-structuring. In the context of terrorism, law enforcement organizations, intelligence services, defense institutions, media organizations, and a myriad of other stakeholders can impute structure to otherwise ambiguous self-structuring phenomena associated with hidden organizations.

al-Qa’ida’s self-structuring created asymmetrical power relations. Through self-structuring, some organizational members became responsible for scrutinizing the actions of other members to ensure the latter’s commit- ment to organizational rules. McPhee and Iverson (2009) pointed out that such surveillance activities are also a form of constitutive self-structuring. The Abbottabad documents show that Bin Laden was concerned about the loss of control over al-Qa’ida’s structure, and he spent much time in his let- ters fretting over possible leaders within al-Qa’ida and the affiliates, as well as asking for reports from the field about activities and individuals, instruct- ing subordinates to try to influence organizational processes.

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

524 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

Obstructing Activity Coordination

Activity coordination coincides with self-structuring and can include the processes of task representation, focusing group attention, and negotiating the division of labor. McPhee and Zaug (2000) stated that activity coordina- tion is the process of adjusting work processes and solving immediate prac- tical problems. CCO views activity coordination as derivative of self-structuring, yet reinforcing of self-structuring via routine and repeti- tion. Activity coordination’s main constitutive contribution is to allow prac- tices to simultaneously endure and adapt to contingencies. In the Abbottabad documents, activity coordination revolved primarily around the planning and execution of terrorist attacks and the generating of publicity in support of al-Qa’ida’s stated goals, namely, the driving of Western influence from Muslim nations, the eventual creation of an Islamic state, and the strict imposition of Sharia law.

al-Qa’ida’s leaders struggled to control the activity coordination flow. Leaders’ isolation and the infrequency of communication hindered opera- tions. In one letter, Bin Laden stated,

Also, I hope that he [Anwar al-Awlaqi] be informed of us still needing more information from the battlefield in Yemen, so that it is feasible for us, with the help of God, to make the most appropriate decision to either escalate or calm down. (SOCOM-2012-0000003-HT, p. 2)

In another letter, Bin Laden urged Atiyah Abd al-Rahman:

Pay attention to explaining the importance of coordination, as well as the dangers of neglecting it, to all the brothers in all the regions. In general, it would be good to clarify the wisdom or the reason behind this in most of what we ask the brothers for, unless it exposes operational secrets. (SOCOM-2012- 0000019-HT, p. 26)

In late 2010, Bin Laden believed that the organization’s decline could best be forestalled by having affiliates pledge commitment to policies and strategies outlined in a memorandum. Bin Laden wrote:

Once the memorandum is prepared, we shall discuss it and send it to all the regions, along with sending the general policy in the military work. We shall then inform you of he committee that we are in the process of forming … that committee will have the privilege of reviewing and postponing any publications assessed to be outside the general policy…. (SOCOM-2012-0000019-HT, 2012, p. 7)

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 525

Importantly, organizational leaders from outside the local context usually impose the shape of activity coordination. The Abbottabad documents illus- trate that Bin Laden and other leaders repeatedly urged affiliates to abort domestic attacks and instead focus on the United States. One unknown writer implored Bin Laden, “Issue a clear and unequivocal statement to anyone who listens to you and accepts your opinion to direct the work and focus it on the head of the snake [the United States]” (SOCOM-2012-0000018-HT, p. 11). Gadahn even went as far as to draft text that could be disseminated to Islamic scholars, urging them to condemn domestic attacks to influence the activities of regional jihadists. Gadahn wrote,

What we need is direct speeches, defined and specialized on that subject [the objectionableness of domestic attacks]. This is the suggested text: Acquittal and Warning[:] In the name of God the merciful the compassionate God almighty has stated: “And fight those who are fighting you and do not be aggressive as God does not like the aggressors.” Qa’ida al-Jihad Organization has denounced, more than once, and on the tongue of its Emirs and scholars and symbols and those who speak in favor, any armed operation that targets the Muslims in the places of their gathering, and any operation that does not account for the sanctity of their blood, souls, bodies, belongings or money . . . (SOCOM-2012-0000004-HT, p. 22).

Gadahn’s statement, with its “suggested text,” illustrates how textual con- trol was a central issue for al-Qa’ida. Although texts (letters) attempted to control activity coordination, counterterrorism authorities have instead focused on the disruption of plots through surveillance and killing the pur- ported leaders of al-Qa’ida through “decapitation” strikes. al-Qa’ida’s lead- ers obviously recognized the danger and therefore attempted to control the movement of personnel. Bin Laden wrote in one letter,

Regarding the brothers in Waziristan in general . . . I am leaning toward getting most of the brothers out of the area . . . The brothers who can keep a low profile and take the necessary precautions should stay, but move to new houses on a cloudy day [due to the possibility of lethal drone strikes]. (SOCOM-2012- 0000015-HT, 2012, p. 1)

Bin Laden warned, “Remind your deputies that all communication with oth- ers should be done through letters” (p. 2). From attempting to coordinate and control activities ranging from financial matters, to media relations, to move- ments of personnel, Bin Laden sought a span of control that was remarkable for any organization with complicated managerial, financial, and interna- tional activities. However, because activity coordination can never be

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

526 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

completely managed from afar, it is open to manipulation—the implications of which we explore later in this study.

Undermining Institutional Positioning

McPhee and Zaug (2000) explain that institutional positioning involves com- munication outside the organization. Key to institutional positioning is what the authors refer to as face presentation, giving external parties a sense of the nature of the organization, what it is trying to accomplish, and its character. Organizational leaders try to coordinate and control the self-representations of the organization because they are vital for helping to secure resources and legitimacy. The Abbottabad documents show that al-Qa’ida’s leaders were frustrated by their inability to control the institutional positioning flow, espe- cially among international audiences. In one letter, Gadahn expressed his dis- may, “To rely only on Al Jazeera and the Jihadi forums on the internet is not useful [for communicating with international audiences]” (SOCOM-2012- 0000004-HT, p. 5). Gadahn thus proposed an experiment. He wrote that in the lead up to the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, al-Qa’ida should send publicity materials to a group of 30 writers and independent journalists “who have shown interest in al-Qa’ida issues, from different [Western] countries” (p. 4). Gadahn elaborated,

Suppose that one-third of those corresponded with are interested, then we would have 10 international journalists that will display our mission in the newspapers and channels. If the experiment works, then I suggest to repeat it on every important occasion, and any instant we want to increase the number of those informed about some message or statement. (p. 4)

Most of the institutional positioning discourse in the Abbottabad docu- ments concerns al-Qa’ida’s inability to coordinate and control interactions with international media. For example, in one letter, Bin Laden declared to a colleague:

I hope that brother Basir be informed that the media appearance is his task [not subordinates’], and in general, they should reduce the appearance during this period unless necessary, and if necessity calls for one of the brothers to issue a speech, thus Basir should review it before it’s broadcasted in the media. (SOCOM-2012-0000003-HT, pp. 2-3)

Bin Laden sought better management of media activities. In another letter, he stated,

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 527

It seems that there is a misunderstanding regarding the issue of Jihadi media. It is a main piece of the war and I did not mean that it should be abandoned. I just wanted to point out that the level of interviews did not reach the desired level and I called on you to do better. (SOCOM-2012-0000015-HT, p. 3)

The Abbottabad documents are striking in that al-Qa’ida’s concern for con- trol over institutional positioning would be familiar to any student of public relations. Gadahn even evaluated major media outlets in terms of al-Qa’ida’s ability to control its message. For example, he wrote,

As for the neutrality of CNN in English, it seems to be in cooperation with the government more than the others (except Fox News of course). Its Arabic version brings good and detailed reports about al-Sahab releases, with a lot of quotations from the original text. That means they copy directly from the releases or its gist. (SOCOM-2012-0000004-HT, p. 3)

Nevertheless, Gadahn noted the inability of al-Qa’ida to adequately control positioning among U.S. audiences:

In conclusion, we can say that there is no single [television] channel that we could rely on for our messages … and even the channel that broadcast them, probably it would distort them somehow. This is accomplished by bringing analysts and experts that would interpret its meaning in the way they want it to be. Or they may ignore the message and conduct a smearing of the individuals, to the end of the list of what you know about their cunning methods. (SOCOM- 2012-0000004-HT, pp. 3-4)

As McPhee and Zaug (2000) note, any relationship requires a flow of communication—even a relationship based on enmity. To the extent that authorities elide recognition of al-Qa’ida as an organization, it undermines the constitutive flow of institutional positioning. Of course, al-Qa’ida could potentially sustain its institutional positioning flow via other interlocutors, but authorities should not inadvertently facilitate this constitutive relationship.

In sum, the Abbottabad documents provide a unique view of al-Qa’ida’s decline. The Director of the CIA, John Brennan, has stated, “We’re on a path to al Qaeda’s destruction, and the president has committed that we’re not going to rest until al Qaeda is destroyed as an organization . . .” (CNN Wire Staff, 2012, para. 2). A CCO perspective maintains that organizational destruction occurs when the communication that constitutes organizing ceases (Schoeneborn & Scherer, 2012). Our analysis of al-Qa’ida’s four flows underscores, however, that communicative processes of organizational

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

528 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

decline and dissolution are neither simple nor straightforward because both organizational members and nonmembers generate, control, or thwart consti- tutive communication in complex ways. We next discuss the implications of this condition.

Implications

The Abbottabad documents reveal how al-Qa’ida’s leaders attempted to use texts to coordinate and control the communicative flows of membership negotiation, self-structuring, activity coordination, and institutional position- ing. Al-Qa’ida’s inability to effectively control these flows both reflected and contributed to the organization’s decline. However, the possibilities for com- pletely de-constituting al-Qa’ida remain slim given that unclear, conflict- laden, or contradictory flows, as well as the communication of non-members, can perform constitutive functions (McPhee & Iverson, 2009; Schoeneborn & Scherer, 2010). The Abbottabad documents also illustrate that organiza- tional decline is a phenomenon that can be exacerbated and/or resisted by both organizational members and nonmembers alike. Our analysis should therefore help shield CCO against criticisms that it is blind to how “local construction is necessarily dependent on nonlocal relationships, resources, and practices” (Reed, 2009, p. 154).

Similar to previous applications of Montreal School and Luhmannian perspectives to the case of al-Qa’ida, our analysis may not fully realize CCO’s potential in shattering the container metaphor that continues to but- tress organizational theorizing. Among CCO’s three schools, the four flows model tends to portray organizations as containers for communication. The model usually depicts self-structuring and activity coordination as occurring inside organizational boundaries, with member negotiation and institutional positioning occurring in relation to outside entities. However, the Abbottabad documents indicate that the image of certain flows circulating primarily internally or externally should be reconsidered. The flows meander over each other’s territory and, in the process, dissolve illusory and arbitrary internal and external boundaries. Despite CCO’s radical potential for rethinking organizations in this way, persuading counterterrorism authori- ties to reject the container metaphor remains only on the horizon of possibil- ity. Yet, one implication of our analysis is that it may be possible to shift the emphasis from “destroying” the containers of terrorist organizations to dam- ming, diverting, diluting, flooding, or rechanneling the communicative flows that constitute them.

Specifically, Mellahi and Wilkinson (2004) found that research concern- ing organizational decline and dissolution has lacked an integrative

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 529

framework. The authors proposed an approach that focused on the interplay between contextual forces and organizational dynamics. Our analysis illus- trates how communication can be seen as the conceptual bridge between those two phenomena. From a CCO perspective, it is unsurprising that in the midst of numerous assassinations of al-Qa’ida members in 2010 (including Shaikh Sa’id al-Masri, purportedly the organization’s third most important figure) some of al-Qa’ida’s leaders, including Bin Laden, believed that the organization’s decline could best be averted by having affiliates pledge com- mitment to policies and strategies outlined in a memorandum. Although Bin Laden’s confidence in the ability of a single memorandum to adequately coordinate and control the tactical activities and institutional positioning of the organization may seem naïve, it nonetheless demonstrates that within al- Qa’ida, texts have been a fundamental link between contextual forces and organizational dynamics.CCO helps explain, at a granular level, how failures to coordinate and control internal and external stakeholders are bound up with the specific texts and flows that constitute organization. In contrast to scholarship that emphasizes the enigmatic qualities of hidden organizations, the Abbottabad documents reveal that al-Qa’ida has attempted to constitute itself through stunningly mundane forms of organizational communication, for example, letters, statements, memoranda, orders, directives, reports, and media releases. The Abbottabad documents are thus striking in their revela- tion of the mimetic character of al-Qa’ida, that is, its imitative qualities (Der Derian, 2005). Like a corporation, al-Qa’ida’s leadership attempted to main- tain coordination and control through centralized practices, but as the organi- zation expanded, operational leaders from affiliated organizations began to exert their own authority. The rise of the affiliates caused significant chal- lenges related to the control of membership, hierarchy, rules, monitoring, and sanctions. These challenges provide opportunities for reconsidering counter- terrorism strategy and informing the study of hidden organizations more broadly.

Implications for Counterterrorism Strategy

Our analysis indicates that undermining a terrorist organization’s control of the flows of membership negotiation, self-structuring, activity coordination, and institutional positioning might be accomplished through what the Schoeneborn and Scherer call reparadoxification, that is, reintroducing ambi- guity to communicative events. The Abbottabad documents confirm that cre- ating ambiguity around al-Qa’ida’s mass media messages has been an effective strategy for degrading the organization’s institutional positioning flow, and it is a strategy that should continue. Extending Schoeneborn and

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

530 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

Scherer’s concept of reparadoxification beyond mass media and institutional positioning, however, there are several types of communication that might encourage the destabilization of the other three flows of membership negotia- tion, self-structuring, and activity coordination. Because the Abbottabad documents show that vague and contradictory communication both reflected and exacerbated al-Qa’ida’s decline, we advance obstruction, deception, fal- sification, and fabrication as communicative interventions that might inten- sify and accelerate decline to the point of organizational dissolution. Authorities could use these interventions against other terrorist organizations that resemble al-Qa’ida in terms of their communicative flows—especially those that seek centralized command and control. While these kinds of inter- ventions could be anticipated from CCO theory alone, our analysis reveals the crucial role that certain types of texts have played in al-Qa’ida’s constitu- tion, thus offering specific guidance for counterterrorism authorities.

Thwarting al-Qa’ida’s membership negotiation flow could take multiple forms because, as the Abbottabad documents indicate, organizational bound- aries, members, and recruiting processes are often unclear. Stohl and Stohl (2011) stated, “clandestinity creates a situation where many people can posi- tion themselves as speaking for this organization . . .” (p. 1207). Given this dynamic, to further undermine coordination and control, authorities could masquerade as al-Qa’ida leaders, members, or neutral commentators and saturate communication channels, especially online media and jihadi mes- sage boards, with “false” messages regarding the membership status of vari- ous figures or groups. For example, Gadahn noted that jihadi message boards created problems by “distort[ing] the face of al-Qa’ida, due to what you know of bigotry, the sharp tone that characterizes most of the participants in these forums” (SOCOM-2012-0000004-HT, p. 5). Authorities could use message boards to further distort and undermine al-Qa’ida’s image and allure, as well as generate online articles and statements to complicate the recruitment of new members by providing misleading information about membership prac- tices and procedures. Identifying certain behaviors or utterances as denoting membership could generate confusion among potential recruits, forcing orga- nizational members to expend resources clarifying genuine recruitment pro- cesses or correcting false information about boundaries. False declarations of membership revocation could also generate disorder.

However, McPhee and Iverson (2009) described new member negotiation as a process of crossing organizational boundaries, and communication that invokes these boundaries simultaneously constitutes the organization. As illustrated in our analysis, speaking in the organization’s name still estab- lishes the organization as an absent third party. It therefore may be productive to disseminate narratives that obfuscate or deny organizational boundaries

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 531

and identities. For example, in 2011, authorities and commentators could have referenced the Abbottabad documents to assert that formal membership in al-Qa’ida required the approval of its founder, Bin Laden. With the lead- er’s death, formal membership was no longer technically possible. Under Islamic law, renewed pledges of bayat or fealty to a new leader are required, so that leader could not realistically claim organizational continuity.

al-Qa’ida’s self-structuring and activity coordination are also open to mul- tiple interventions that can facilitate decline. The Abbottabad documents demonstrate that contestation over organizational relationships hindered al- Qa’ida’s planning and operations. Authorities could therefore disseminate to would-be or existing members misleading organizational directives, orders, or decisions. Once assented to or legitimated by members, nonmembers, or commentators, misleading directives could complicate organizational lead- ers’ control over self-structuring processes. Although there may be unin- tended consequences associated with such a strategy, authorities could, at a minimum, better account for the constitutive force of their public declara- tions regarding organizational relationships. Declarations that intensify decline by destabilizing control may be more valuable in comparison with those that simply report facts. Interventions targeting activity coordination could be similar to those designed to stymie self-structuring: dissemination of misleading organizational objectives, plans, procedures, directives, orders, or decisions. Flooding known and suspected al-Qa’ida members and affili- ates with falsified messages related to financial requests, personnel matters, and operational planning (all of which are instances of organizational com- munication evident in the Abbottabad documents) could potentially consume the time and resources of al-Qa’ida leadership in clarifying genuine communication.

The clearest illustration of our argument comes from Bin Laden’s own hand. In one letter, Bin Laden tells Atiyah Abd al-Rahman that it is not per- mitted for al-Qa’ida operatives to break the oath of U.S. citizenship (SOCOM-2012-0000015-HT), and in another letter, Bin Laden calls for operatives “to conduct operations inside America as long as they have not given their promises not to harm America” (SOCOM-2012-0000016-HT, p. 2). Bin Laden’s specific guidance shows how texts can promote or impede activity coordination in ways that significantly influence the ability of al- Qa’ida to meet its objectives. In this case, Bin Laden’s instructions, if fol- lowed, constrain who is permitted to carry out terrorism operations within the United States. Bin Laden’s instructions thus indicate that specific texts (letters, statements, directives, etc.) could be fabricated and attributed to a terrorist organization, its affiliates and supporters, leaders, or neutral com- mentators in ways that limit or redirect activities, blur boundaries, contradict

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

532 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

public pronouncements, sow confusion, and thwart control. These fabricated texts could hinder membership negotiation (through false recruitment prac- tices), self-structuring (through the dissemination of misleading organiza- tional arrangements), activity coordination (through distorted directives), and institutional positioning (through fictitious public declarations). The point is to imitate organizational communication flows in ways that lead to different forms of knowledge and action that radically undermine coordina- tion and control, thereby contributing to organizational decline and eventual dissolution. However, using CCO flows to dissolve terrorist organizations still requires knowledge of how organizational decisions are made and how those decisions are communicated—no easy task. While forms of repara- doxification might be useful across multiple flows, the practical challenges associated with intercepting and thwarting a given flow may make some interventions more viable than others at any given time.

The U.S. government relies on its own hidden organizations (e.g., clandes- tine agencies and counterterrorism units) to defeat terrorist organizations. The U.S. military’s principal counterterrorism policy document, “Joint Publication 3-26, Counterterrorism” (U.S. Chiefs of Staff, 2014b), makes two unelaborated references to the use of military deception, but references to the other strategies described herein (or similar strategies) are only vaguely alluded to or absent. Although the document does not explicitly address con- stitutive phenomena in the ways we have described, it is unclear how and/or to what extent covert counterterrorism campaigns directed at al-Qa’ida already target the four flows in the ways that we have suggested. However, it is unlikely that constitutive processes are an explicit focus of authorities’ attention due to the U.S. government’s overwhelming reliance on the mes- sage influence model of communication, which generally takes organiza- tional existence and boundaries for granted (Corman, Trethewey, & Goodall, 2008). We have argued that a CCO-informed strategy would instead leverage the metaphor of fluidity inherent in the idea of “flows” to engage in forms of mimesis that promote organizational decline and dissolution. In other words, our analysis demonstrates how CCO provides a framework for developing specific communicative interventions that use imitation and subterfuge to complicate organizing processes.

Implications for the Study of Hidden Organizations

CCO also holds implications for the study of hidden organizations in general. The four flows model helps to account for why and how instances of rela- tively visible communication occur within otherwise “dark” or “shadowed” organizations. In Scott’s (2013) typology, al-Qa’ida and similar terrorist

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 533

organizations are positioned as “mostly shadowed” in that their visibility is described as relatively anonymous, their members relatively silent, and their audience relatively mass/public. Scott argued that organizational visibility was the most critical dimension in establishing the hiddenness of an organi- zation. However, the Abbottabad documents indicate that al-Qa’ida sought to display many visibility elements that, theoretically speaking, it should have kept anonymous as a “mostly shadowed” organization. These visibility ele- ments included the use of media spokespersons, a demonstrated concern for organizational image, a seeking of name recognition, and the distribution of press releases and talking points, among others. al-Qa’ida’s categorization as a mostly shadowed entity could therefore be reconsidered based on our anal- ysis. However, because Scott’s model allowed for substantial variation within categories, we propose that a more precise examination of the communica- tive flows of an organization can help to explain why a particular mix of anonymous and recognizable activities is in evidence at any given time, thereby enabling more specific comparisons of hidden organizations. In al- Qa’ida’s case, focusing on its institutional positioning helps to explain why it promoted certain visibility activities. Similar visibility activities should be in evidence in dark or shadowed organizations that have comparable institu- tional positioning objectives (e.g., Anonymous) but less likely to occur in dark or shadowed organizations whose institutional positioning goals are more modest (e.g., the Continuity Irish Republican Army, New York City men’s bathhouses, or U.S. Special Operations units). A focus on communica- tive flows may help analysts understand why and how dark and shadowed organizations attempt to enact various configurations of organizational visibility.

A lack of control over the four flows certainly could affect transparent organization as well; however, the strategies of reparadoxification that we suggest might accelerate al-Qa’ida’s dissolution would not be well suited to organizations that do not share similar characteristics in terms of the com- municative flows related to their visibility, member identification, and audi- ence. Nevertheless, to the extent that one or more of the communicative flows that help to constitute various “shadowed” and “shaded” organizations share similarities with their “dark” cousins, those flows would be candidates for the types of interventions that we have described. Transparent organizations are not as easily susceptible to obstruction, deception, falsification, and fabrica- tion because those organizations usually have recourse to multiple communi- cation channels and legal protections. Lawful, transparent organizations are by no means completely immune to such interventions, however, as recent high-profile cases of phishing scams that involve deception indicate (e.g., hacks of Apple and Twitter). Opportunities for de-constituting organizations

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

534 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

are therefore facilitated or constrained by the relative hiddenness of their communicative flows.

Future Directions

The Abbottabad documents revealed a puzzling irony: Terrorist organizations are often portrayed as exemplars of the trend of organizations moving “away from fixed hierarchies and toward decentralized networks, away from con- trolling leaders and toward multiple, loosely linked, dispersed agents and cells” (Stohl & Stohl, 2011, p. 1198). However, the Abbottabad documents clearly show that Bin Laden and other al-Qa’ida leaders sought to move in the opposite direction: more centralization, increased hierarchical ordering, and tighter coordination. That impulse appears to have significantly contrib- uted to al-Qa’ida’s decline because it required a level of control over the four flows that was impossible given the circumstances. That impulse also seems counter to al-Qa’ida’s other strategies to remain hidden, such as communicat- ing by courier and eliding questions of membership (Scott, 2013). A logical next step would be to further evaluate these dynamics in light of the larger corpus of al-Qa’ida leadership discourse available through the CTC’s Harmony database. Additionally, it could be hypothesized that the same deg- radations of the four flows that have contributed to al-Qa’ida’s decline would have comparable effects within similar hidden organizations. It may be the case that hidden organizations of a certain type both manifest decline and attempt to counteract decline in unique ways. A comparative study of the communicative dimensions of decline among hidden organizations (espe- cially terrorist organizations) would also be a logical next step in this research project.

Our exploration of CCO raises complex questions about the appropriate uses of theory, the role of academics in supporting or impeding state policy, rights to organizational existence, and the use of deceptive forms of commu- nication to defend cherished values (e.g., life and liberty) that may conflict with other cherished values (e.g., honesty). The exploration of such tensions should be at the forefront of future investigations of hidden organizations. Because some of the interventions that we have described could potentially be used to undermine socially beneficial hidden organizations, some scholars may question the appropriateness of the instrumental use of CCO explored herein. However, our approach is warranted by Corman et al.’s (2008) obser- vation of “the vast gap between academic critiques of the global war on terror and the practical considerations concerning communication practices of those charged with waging it” (p. viii). At a minimum, more attention to the shape and influence of the four flows of communication would help

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 535

authorities, citizens, and scholars enhance their understanding of the consti- tution, maintenance, and deconstitution of hidden organizations.

Conclusion

Like all organizations, hidden organizations are dependent upon flows of communication for their existence. While U.S. counterterrorism strategy has focused on the killing or incarceration of those who have declared themselves to be (or are presumed to be) al-Qa’ida members or affiliates, a CCO perspec- tive, combined with our analysis of (previously) hidden organizational texts, underscores Schoeneborn and Scherer’s (2010, 2012) claim that such a strat- egy is insufficient for achieving the objective of organizational dissolution. Nearly all of the Abbottabad letter writers have been killed, yet al-Qa’ida endures. We have indicated how CCO helps to explain the decline of al- Qa’ida and described how some constitutive processes might be mimicked or thwarted in order to further reduce the organization’s ability to adequately coordinate and control its own members and others’ knowledge and activity. Illegal hidden organizations of the dark, shadowed, and shaded variety are particularly susceptible to such interventions because they operate outside of laws and institutions designed to protect organizational communication. In drawing upon CCO theory, this study has indicated how al-Qa’ida’s tenure as the world’s most dangerous hidden organization could come to an end and how other concealed collectives might suffer a similar fate.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Craig R. Scott and the anonymous reviewers, as well as Timothy Kuhn and Matt Koschmann for their guidance in the development of this essay.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publi- cation of this article.

References

Acharya, A., & Marwah, S. (2010). Nizam, la tanzim (system, not organization): Do organizations matter in terrorism today? A study of the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 34, 1-16. doi:10.1080/10576 10X.2011.531455

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

536 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

Ahrne, G., & Brunsson, N. (2011). Organization outside organizations: The sig- nificance of partial organization. Organization, 18, 83-104. doi:10.1177/ 1350508410376256

Allouni, T. (Interviewer) & Bin Laden, U. (Interviewee). (2014). A discussion on the New Crusader Wars [Interview transcript]. Retrieved from www.islamicawakening. com/viewarticle.php?articleID=977&

Blomberg, S. B., Engel, R. C., & Sawyer, R. (2010). On the duration and sustain- ability of transnational terrorist organizations. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 54, 303-330. doi:10.1177/0022002709355431

Browning, L. D., Greene, R. W., Sitkin, S. B., Sutcliffe, K. M., & Obstfeld, D. (2009). Constitutive complexity: Military entrepreneurs and the synthetic character of communication flows. In L.L. Putnam & A. M. Nicotera (Eds.), Building theories of organization: The constitutive role of communication (pp. 89-116). New York, NY: Routledge.

Brummans, B., Cooren, F., Robichaud, D., & Taylor, J. R. (2013). Approaches to research on the communicative constitution of organizations. In L. L. Putnam & D. K. Mumby (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of organizational communication (3rd ed., pp. 173-194). Los Angeles, CA: SAGE.

Cameron, K. S., Kim, M. U., & Whetten, D. A. (1987). Organizational effects of decline and turbulence. Administrative Science Quarterly, 32, 222-240. doi:10.2307/2393127

Carmeli, A., & Sheaffer, Z. (2009). How leadership characteristics affect orga- nizational decline and downsizing. Journal of Business Ethics, 86, 363-378. doi:10.1007/s10551-008-9852-7

CNN Wire Staff. (2012, April 29). “We’re on a path to al Qaeda’s destruction,” U.S. counterterrorism adviser says. CNN. Retrieved from http://www.cnn. com/2012/04/29/us/sotu-brennan-qaeda/

Corman, S. R., Trethewey, A., & Goodall, H. L. (Eds.). (2008). Weapons of mass persuasion: Strategic communication to combat violent extremism. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

Cronin, A. K. (2006). How al-Qaida ends: The decline and demise of terrorist groups. International Security, 31, 7-48. doi:10.1162/isec.2006.31.1.7

Der Derian, J. (2005). Imaging terror: Logos, pathos and ethos. Third World Quarterly, 26, 23-37. doi:10.1080/0143659042000322883

Gopinath, C. (2005). Recognizing decline: The role of triggers. American Journal of Business, 20, 21-27. doi:10.1108/19355181200500002

Horgan, J., & Braddock, K. (Eds.). (2012). Terrorism studies: A reader. New York, NY: Routledge.

Jones, S. G., & Libicki, M. C. (2008). How terrorist groups end: Lessons for counter- ing al Qa’ida. Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation. Retrieved from http://www. rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG741-1.html

Koschmann, M. A. (2012). Developing a communicative theory of the non- profit. Management Communication Quarterly, 26, 139-146. doi:10.1177/ 0893318911423640

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Bean and Buikema 537

Kuhn, T. (2008). A communicative theory of the firm: Developing an alterna- tive perspective on intra-organizational power and stakeholder relationships. Organization Studies, 29, 1227-1254. doi:10.1177/0170840608094778

Lahoud, N., Caudill, S., Collins, L., Koehler-Derrick, G., Rassler, D., & al-‘Ubaydi, M. (2012). Letters from Abbottabad: Bin Laden sidelined? West Point, NY: Combating Terrorism Center.

Liepman, A., & Mudd, P. (2014, January 6). Al Qaeda is down. Al Qaedism isn’t [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/01/06/ al-qaeda-is-down-al-qaedism-isnt/

Lorange, P., & Nelson, R. T. (1987). How to recognize and avoid organizational decline. Sloan Management Review, 28, 41-48.

Lutgen-Sandvik, P., & McDermott, V. (2008). The constitution of employee-abu- sive organizations: A communication flows theory. Communication Theory, 18, 304-333. 10.1111/j.1468-2885.2008.00324.x

Manheim, J. B. (2000). The death of a thousand cuts: Corporate campaigns and the attack on the corporation. New York, NY: Routledge.

McPhee, R. D. (2004). Text, agency, and organization in the light of structuration theory. Organization, 11, 355-371. doi:10.1177/1350508404041997

McPhee, R. D., & Iverson, J. (2009). Agents of constitution in communidad: Constitutive processes of communication in organizations. In L. L. Putnam & A. M. Nicotera (Eds.), Building theories of organization: The constitutive role of communication (pp. 49-87). New York, NY: Routledge.

McPhee, R. D., & Zaug, P. (2000). The communicative constitution of organization: A framework for explanation. Electronic Journal of Communication/La Revue Electronique de Communication, 10, 1-16. Retrieved from http://www.cios.org/ EJCPUBLIC/010/1/01017.html

Mellahi, K., & Wilkinson, A. (2004). Organizational failure: A critique of recent research and a proposed integrative framework. International Journal of Management Reviews, 5, 21-41. doi:10.1111/j.1460-8545.2004.00095.x

Miller, E. (2012). Patterns of onset and decline among terrorist organizations. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 28, 77-101. doi:10.1007/s10940-011-9154-6

Putnam, L. L., & Nicotera, A. M. (Eds.). (2009). Building theories of organization: The constitutive role of communication. New York, NY: Routledge.

Putnam, L. L., Nicotera, A. M., & McPhee, R. D. (2009). Introduction: Communication constitutes organization. In L. L. Putnam & A. M. Nicotera (Eds.), Building theo- ries of organization: The constitutive role of communication (pp. 1-20). New York, NY: Routledge.

Reed, M. (2009). Is communication constitutive of organization? Management Communication Quarterly, 24, 151-157. doi:10.1177/0893318909351583

Schein, E. H., & Kampas, P. J. (2004). DEC is dead, long live DEC: The lasting legacy of digital equipment corporation. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler.

Schoeneborn, D., Blaschke, S., Cooren, F., McPhee, R. D., Seidl, D., & Taylor, J. R. (2014). The three schools of CCO thinking: Interactive dialogue and sys- tematic comparison. Management Communication Quarterly, 28, 285-316. doi:10.1177/0893318914527000

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

538 Management Communication Quarterly 29(4)

Schoeneborn, D., & Scherer, A. G. (2010). Communication as constitutive of ter- rorist organizations. Academy of Management Best Paper Proceedings, 57, 1-6. doi:10.2139/ssrn.1437101

Schoeneborn, D., & Scherer, A. G. (2012). Clandestine organizations, al Qaeda, and the paradox of (in)visibility: A response to Stohl and Stohl. Organization Studies, 33, 963-971. doi:10.1177/0170840612448031

Scott, C. R. (2013). Anonymous agencies, backstreet businesses, and covert col- lectives: Rethinking organizations in the 21st Century. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Serra, F. R., Ferreira, M. P., & de Almeida, M. I. R. (2013). Organizational decline: A yet largely neglected topic in organizational studies. Management Research: The Journal of the Iberoamerican Academy of Management, 11, 133-156. doi:10.1108/MRJIAM-Mar-2012-0476

Stohl, C., & Stohl, M. (2011). Secret agencies: The communicative constitu- tion of a clandestine organization. Organization Studies, 32, 1197-1215. doi:10.1177/0170840611410839

Taylor, J. R., & Van Every, E. J. (2000). The emergent organization: Communication as its site and surface. New York, NY: Routledge.

Trahms, C. A., Ndofor, H. A., & Sirmon, D. G. (2013). Organizational decline and turnaround: A review and agenda for future research. Journal of Management, 39, 1277-1307. doi:10.1177/0149206312471390

U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. (2014a). Counterterrorism (Joint Publication 3-26). Retrieved from http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/new_pubs/jp3_26.pdf

U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. (2014b). Special operations (Joint Publication 3-05). Retrieved from http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/new_pubs/jp3_05.pdf

Weick, K. E. (2013). What is the academy reading? One answer. Academy of Management Review, 38, 318-323. doi:10.5465/amr.2012.0313

Author Biographies

Hamilton Bean (Ph.D., University of Colorado at Boulder) is an associate professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Colorado Denver, USA. His main research interests include security and communication, institutional discourse, and strategic communication.

Ronald J. Buikema (D.M., University of Maryland University College) is a member of the Principal Professional Staff, National Security Analysis Department, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, USA. His main research interests include intelligence operations, crisis management, organizational culture, and orga- nizational change.

at UNIV CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA on May 16, 2016mcq.sagepub.comDownloaded from

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=uter20

Studies in Conflict & Terrorism

ISSN: 1057-610X (Print) 1521-0731 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/uter20

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy: An Organizational and Tactical Examination

Victor Asal , Brian Nussbaum & D. William Harrington

To cite this article: Victor Asal , Brian Nussbaum & D. William Harrington (2007) Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy: An Organizational and Tactical Examination, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 30:1, 15-39, DOI: 10.1080/10576100600959713

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10576100600959713

Published online: 21 Dec 2006.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 1929

View related articles

Citing articles: 1 View citing articles

Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 30:15–39, 2007 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN: 1057-610X print / 1521-0731 online DOI: 10.1080/10576100600959713

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy: An Organizational and Tactical Examination

VICTOR ASAL BRIAN NUSSBAUM D. WILLIAM HARRINGTON

SUNY at Albany Rockefeller College Albany, New York, USA

This article attempts to shed light on the dynamics and machinations within terrorist organizations by incorporating a heretofore overlooked literature which is directly applicable, that of transnational advocacy networks (TANs). Terror networks have been described using every possible analogy, from multinational corporations to organized crime to the anthropomorphic classic “cut off the head, and the body will die.” In reality, terrorist organizations function in much the same way, and using many of the same techniques, as transnational advocacy networks concerned with issues like the environment or human rights. By describing these characteristics, and comparing TANs and Terror TANs (TTANs), this article aims to offer insight into the tactics and motivations that define modern, as well as the much heralded post-modern, terrorism.

There has been a growing interest in the role that networks play in facilitating terrorist tactical and strategic behavior (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001, 3; Tucker 2001; Zanini 1999) but the current literature on terror networks is still in its infancy. Although there has been some examination of how and why terror networks operate and adapt, overwhelmingly the literature related to this topic has been of the historical case study and anecdotal variety. Although this creates a vast body of literature from which to cull information for more theoretical studies, it does little to increase understanding beyond individual historical cases. Some important exceptions to this include the work of John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt (2001), Marc Sageman (2004), and some work that has come out of research and policy institutions like the RAND Corporation (Cragin and Daly 2004).

This article is intended to further integrate one theory of social movement networks, transnational activist networks (TANs) (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 1999) into the study of terrorist networks. This is useful for several reasons. First, the theoretical insights provided can help one to understand the advantages that networks provide terrorists and also to better understand why terrorist networks operate the way they do. Second, by adopting a model of TANS a terrorist organization can be placed into a broader framework of groups that use violence and groups that do not use violence, something that is rarely done. Finally by

Received 12 October 2005; accepted 2 January 2006. Address correspondence to Brian Nussbaum, Rockefeller College, 135 Western Avenue, Albany,

NY 12222, USA. E-mail: [email protected]

15

16 V. Asal et al.

examining terrorist networks through the lenses of TANs the authors hope to raise questions about why some activist networks use terror and others do not. This article will first briefly examine the terrorist network literature then provide an overview of the TAN concept. It then provides six mini case studies, illustrating the ways in which terrorist networks share almost all behavioral attributes with nonviolent TANs—except the propensity to use terror. Finally, it addresses some of the issues raised by this comparison and points out key questions that need to be addressed by further research.

Terror Networks

Before 11 September 2001 very little attention was focused on what Arquilla and Ronfeldt called Netwar (1996). The attack on the United States illustrated the dangerous capacity held by tactical and strategic networks exploiting modern technology to use violence destructively (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2002). Arquilla and Ronfeldt were leaders in arguing the advantages that network organization offer violent groups. Arquilla and Ronfeldt identified Netwar as a societal level counterpart to cyberwar, a state of affairs in which combatants rely on networked organization and certain specific techniques and tactics, like swarming. Swarming, or the temporary massing of resources and people for operational purposes, is a new and functional approach to examining terrorist actions (2001, 12). Whereas much of the research has focused on the tactical importance of networks (Krebs 2004) there has also been work illustrating the importance of networks at the strategic level, networks where they allow for the collaboration of different groups for terrorist purposes (Galeotti 2002; Jones, Smith, and Weeding 2003; Sageman 2004). Raab and Milward (2003) have pointed out that “Dark Networks” can solve various management and resiliency problems for illicit groups in the same way that social network theorists have shown they help governments.

One of the most important works looking at terrorist networks is by Marc Sageman (2004) who takes a psychological approach by beginning with the question of why someone would join a terror network; Sageman attempts to reverse engineer the network from the bottom up. His argument is that, contrary to the common conception, terror networks often form in a sort of organic way from friendship and other relationships, rather than as a result of a “top down” and heavily controlled approach (Sageman 2004).

Important work has also been done in the examination and interpretation of terror networks at some of the policy think tanks that examine terrorism. The two-part Aptitude for Destruction series from the RAND Corporation offers a novel approach to examining terrorism, by incorporating the concept of organizational learning (Jackson et al. 2005). By using a number of theoretical approaches brought in from organizational studies and management, the authors were able to illustrate in new ways the adaptability and resilience of terror networks. RAND also provided a unique rubric for examining terror networks in Assessing the Dynamic Terrorist Threat. R. Kim Cragin and Sara Daly (2004), the authors, provide a new way in which to analyze terror networks. The typology they propose places terror networks on two axes, one measuring their operational capabilities and the second their intent or motivation to attack the United States. Although this study is not broadly geographically applicable, and not concerned necessarily with the internal dynamics of these networks, it does offer an interesting approach to dissecting them.

Although some have identified the commonality of terrorist networks and transnational activist networks (Adamson 2005; Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2002) this has been rare. This

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 17

article focuses specifically on the theory of TANs as laid out by Keck and Sikkink (1998, 1999) and shows how the same dynamic can be seen in both nonviolent and terrorist TANS can be observed—and explained.

Transnational Advocacy Networks

Keck and Sikkink (1998) offer up the approach of studying international movements and organizations in terms of Transnational Advocacy Networks. These networks are groups that work across borders to advocate for causes, issues, or people. They tend to be made up of many types of actors, including nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), foundations, political entrepreneurs, and individuals. These networks can also sometimes include sympathetic government officials or agencies. They are networks because they fit the definition of being “characterized by voluntary, reciprocal and horizontal patterns of communication and exchange" (Keck and Sikkink 1999, 91).

The conception of a Transnational Advocacy Group (TAN) is a very useful and tangible one. Useful in that it gives an analytic framework to examine international politics beyond merely state concerns, and tangible in that it offers a more concrete approach than some of the more ethereal conceptions like “global civil society” (Brysk 2005) or “transnational community” (Evangelista 1995).

One unique characteristic of TANs is the coalition of local and national groups to form larger regional or international umbrella organizations. These larger groupings can range from very informal to much more structured. An oft-cited example of this is the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), in which many local groups in countries that had been plagued by conflict and the dispersal of mines came together under the aegis of the ICBL to create international pressure to discontinue the use of landmines (Price 1998, 620).

Several other tactics, approaches, and organizational attributes also distinguish TANs from more abstract descriptions of globalized civil society. One trait that is common to most TANs is the employment of the Boomerang Effect (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 12–13). This is when a domestic challenger uses a TAN in order to influence either other powerful states or International Organizations in an attempt to bring pressure back on their own government. An example would be the 20 December 2000 demonstration in London, in which 45 Kurdish protestors seized the London Eye Ferris Wheel in order to protest the treatment of Kurdish prisoners in Turkey (Peacock 2000). This circular path to domestic reform is a distinctive feature of Transnational Advocacy Networks. Keck and Sikkink call this kind of exercise of influence using outside pressure leverage politics.

They also reference three other types of politics that concern transnational advocacy networks. Information politics involves the exchange of information between nodes within the network, and also from the network to the broader public. This exchange of information, in the form testimonials and facts, allows the TAN to frame issues in the terms that they choose. This is instrumental in their power to persuade both internally and externally.

Symbolic politics is the idea that through the interpretation of symbolic events, TANs can further frame the issues, which they wish to address. By “identifying and providing convincing explanations” for important events, TANs acquire the ability to shape the discussion and debate. Finally, TANs engage in accountability politics. This is when TANs, usually by way of their local and regional affiliates, monitor the situation in a locality and publicize any deviations from what is considered acceptable according to international norms. This publicity is used to shame states into action (Cameron 1999, 92).

18 V. Asal et al.

Other traits specifically associated with TANs include rapid and effective transnational information sharing, a focus on symbolic political statements and the presence of conferences, workshops, or other events in which members of various geographically separated organizations come together to meet and create bonds or relationships. Together these characteristics create an organization that is both international in scope and local in operation. This macro/micro dichotomy is perhaps the key element of TANs both in their operations and in their effectiveness.

Although still a relatively new concept, the study of TANs has multiplied quickly. This literature takes several approaches to TANs, all of which lead to a deeper understanding of what they are, and how they operate. Some authors have examined TANs within the broader context of globalization and transnational civil society (Keck and Sikkink 1999; Hudson 2001; Price 2003; Karkkainen 2004). Other authors have decided to focus more narrowly on the mechanisms by which TANs operate (Thomas 2002). Many more have taken the TAN framework and applied it to historical case studies ranging from indigenous rights to sexual harassment (Brysk 1996; Sikkink 1993; Price 1998; Stillerman 2003; Armbruster-Sandoval 2003; Zippel 2004).

Transnational Advocacy Networks (TANs) contributed to a great many positive changes in recent decades including decreasing the use of anti-personnel landmines (Price 1998), the saving of acres upon acres of rainforest (Rodrigues 2005), and serving to monitor human rights violations throughout the globe (Sikkink 1993; Burgerman 1998). They have contributed to all these things by combining international networking with local knowledge, exploiting communication technologies, using international pressure, and focusing on symbolic political action. Nonviolent TANs, however, are not the only political actors who have used these techniques with increasing frequency in recent years. Unfortunately, the same logistical and strategic approaches that have allowed TANs to become increasingly effective, have also allowed terrorist networks to operate with far fewer restrictions. The efficacy of transnational advocacy has risen along the same trajectory as transnational terrorism. This similarity is no coincidence. The reality is that terrorist networks share a great many characteristics with TANs.

It seems that there would be a substantial benefit to addressing at least some terror organizations as violent transnational advocacy networks. This is because the operational logic is so remarkably similar between nonviolent TANs and violent terrorist networks. Terror networks seem to have, in many ways, evolved away from rigid hierarchical structures, making the TAN approach increasingly applicable. Gilles Kepel claims that older terror networks “were well known and each had an understandable structure.” He contrasts this traditional structure with the newer networks which must be understood in different terms. These innovative networks he argues are “new and largely unknown,” characterized by a “loose system” of “cells and networks that are scattered all over the world” (Wright 2004). This description could well have been culled from a description of most any transnational advocacy network.

Like TANs, as they are traditionally conceived, terrorist networks have adopted the embrace of local organizations, information technology, international pressure for political leverage, and symbolic political action. They too have benefited from the on-the-ground knowledge provided by ideologically parallel “franchise” networks. Like TANs, terrorists have embraced information technology, like the Internet, to coordinate action, foster ideological and tactical information exchange, and to serve as a virtual space for the creation of a politically charged community. Like humanitarian or environmental networks, terror groups are increasingly reliant on international public opinion and the use of international political pressure for leverage. Finally, terrorists too have focused on symbolic politics as

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 19

a useful tool for exerting political pressure. It is in these increasingly apparent parallels that the existing study of Transnational Advocacy will offer an important lens for the examination of terrorist phenomena.

Terrorists, organized crime, and violent insurgent movements have all profited from the shift to transnational relations and the logistical advantages that it provides (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001). Increasing technology and communication have enabled new methods for transporting arms (Laurance 2002), laundering money (Basile 2004), setting up covert logistical networks (Cronin 2002/03), and information sharing (Thomas 2002). These changing avenues facilitate new models for violent and criminal organizations. Although international crime and terrorism are not new, they are increasingly common and often harder to combat. There has been much discussion of the changes that globalization has fostered or enabled amongst these violent groups, or what Bartosz Stanislawski calls “Transnational Bads” (Stanislawski 2004). Numerous scholars have explored transnational violent and criminal groups in some depth (Stanislawski 2004; Hudson 2003; Sanderson 2004).

In many ways, the recent literature regarding transnational civil society mirrors the literature regarding transnational crime and terrorism. Increases in technology and communication, and the subsequent ease with which knowledge and goods can be exchanged, are one way in which both the “good” and “bad” sides of globalization seem to have benefited. An increasing reliance on networks for both communication and organizational structure is another way in which changes in civil society are similar to those in the criminal and militant spheres (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001). Despite the clear similarities, few scholars have directly made the connection, or even drawn parallels, between globalizing civil society and violent actors.

Certainly not all aspects of the knowledge base surrounding globalizing civil society will be relevant to the study of terrorism; however, some will offer greater understanding of how terror networks form, adapt, and behave. The attempt to find ways in which the existing literature on civil society can inform the debate on terrorism is a valuable one.

Bringing Together the Study of TANs and Terror Networks

Relatively little work has synthesized the study of transnational advocacy and that of terror networks, which is odd considering how much overlap there appears to be in some of the organizational and technical dynamics (two important exceptions are Adamson 2005; Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001). Most of what has been written has been general, focusing not on TANs per se, but rather on the globalizing or transnational nature of terrorism (Cronin 2002/3; Scruton 2002; Schweitzer and Shay 2003).

One sub-genre of this literature compares global terror networks to another set of transnational actors, criminal syndicates. Some authors take a broad approach, examining how globalization, communications technology, and increased networking affect all illicit or “dark” organizations (Angjeli 2003; Sanderson 2004; Stanislawski 2004). On the other hand, some authors draw specific analogies between terror networks and individual criminal enterprises like the Mafia or drug cartels (Schneider and Schneider 2002; Dishman 2005). As a whole, this literature is useful in examining how various types of networks attempt to avoid detection, transfer funds, and operate in response to law enforcement.

Another important place where the study of terrorism has come close to looking at them as TANs is in the study of how charities and other nongovernmental organizations have

20 V. Asal et al.

supported terrorism. In this case, the NGOs or TANs examined have tended to facilitate terrorism by providing fund raising or other logistical support. Escobar’s study of the Al Rashid Trust Corporation, Anatomy of a Terrorist NGO illustrates the ways in which an NGO can exist almost solely to assist terror networks (Escobar 2001). Attanassoff has argued that the increased level of activity by Islamic TANs in the Balkans has the potential to increase the support base for terrorism (Attanassoff 2005).

Perhaps the most interesting work regarding terror networks and NGOs comes from a small section of Jessica Stern’s Terror in the Name of God (2003). In that book she makes an analogy that terror networks operate in much the same way that nongovernmental organizations or businesses do. She describes today’s terror networks as being similar to many humanitarian groups in their day-to-day operations, which include advertising their mission and successes, meeting with potential donors, and competing for their place in the market (Stern 2003).

The only work that directly compares the ways in which terrorist networks operate to those of TANs is Arquilla and Ronfeldt’s Networks and Netwars. Even then, however, the comparison is oblique, not explicit, and is part of a larger focus on networking and its outcomes for politically motivated groups. Arquilla and Ronfeldt explore Netwar and how the concept applies to both TANs like the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, as well as to terror groups like Al Qaeda.

The TAN concepts allows two usefully theoretical things. First, it will allow the application of the concepts, particularly the boomerang effect, that have been so successful in looking at transnational NGOs to transnational terror networks to help understand them better. Second, it will allow comparison of violent and nonviolent TANs, increasing variance and allowing researchers to ask why some TANs turn to violence and others do not. A comparison of both nonviolent transnational advocacy networks and violent Terrorist Transnational Advocacy Networks (TTANs) across all their constituent characteristics should enable their similarities to show through, while also drawing into relief their differences. In order to synthesize the literature between TANs and Terrorist Networks, it is important to examine them in similar terms. The rest of this article looks at six different transnational movements, three nonviolent and three violent and explores them within the context of TAN theory. The same dynamics that shape the behavior and strategies of nonviolent TANS are doing the same for Terrorist Activist Networks with one critical exception—the Terror TANS kill people. The authors first look at the Human Rights TAN and Al Qaeda, both broad-based TANS with many facets and very varied agendas across a global arena and find that the same techniques used by the components of the Human Rights movement are being used by Al Qaeda. They then look at four more TANS, The Anti-Deforestation Movement, The International Campaign to Ban Landmines, Hezbollah, and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. Strategically these groups use similar means with the exception that the latter two have added violence to their repertoires.

Human Rights Campaigns

There are many facets to the human rights movement in the same way that there are in many transnational movements. Like the environmental movement, the human rights movement is not about a narrowly defined issue but rather a broad and diverse group of individuals and organizations that share certain philosophical and tactical tenets. Using these shared elements, these groups are able to create and maintain an international advocacy community.

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 21

Some groups have local or regional focus, and others focus on specific issues like torture, political freedom, or indigenous rights (Sikkink 1993).

In the case of the anti–capital punishment movement, there was a distinct international approach that incorporated not just traditional human rights NGOs, but also other institutions like the Catholic Church. Human rights advocacy groups such as Amnesty International, The Holy See, the World Council of Churches, and the Mennonite Central Committee utilized the popular international network structure to develop their human rights agenda, rather effectively for the abolition of the death penalty (Ferrari 2003, 29). In an attempt to affect policy change, a network of NGOs in Europe, Australia, and North America have created strong communications channels and information flows to create a viable international community with a united goal to end capital punishment.

This international cooperation is vital to the success of human rights TANs. Documentation and information-gathering skills increased with the new resources the contacts with these international communities provided. In the Mexican case this was achieved by groups like the Americas Watch and Amnesty International (AI), with the cooperation of political opponents of the PRI (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 113).

Others have used this approach, attempting to influence government action through the use of transnational information flows. The Red Cross successfully utilized this tactic with the Chilean government after the military coup through the utilization of strong information politics. With the Red Cross effectively and freely operating in Chile to monitor the detainment of individuals, the world community and the United States became convinced that the government was acting in the interests of Human Rights. Through the influence of the Red Cross and the presence in the country, the human rights situation became improved through indirect action (Forsythe 1976, 618–619).

Using a political approach to frame a specific issue is another tactic of human rights TANs. The primary goal of the abolition of capital punishment movement was to engage policy actors by framing the issue to showing that convicted felons were a vulnerable population under the state, and draw the connection that capital punishment is therefore a violation of basic human rights. Through the utilization of transnational information flows, the movement has had difficulty in reforming policy in nations such as the United States, but has made progress in shifting public attitudes on the issue of the death penalty, a necessary first step in any wide-sweeping policy reform (Ferrari 2003, 30).

By rapidly utilizing transnational information flows AI successfully informed the world community, and brought pressure and eventually a change in policy on the Argentine government. By publishing a regular report AI showed that disappearances had led to interrogations and even killings of political prisoners. Not only did this lead to a Nobel Prize and international recognition, but also to intense pressure for European nations and the Carter administration to change their policy toward the Argentine government (Sikkink 1993, 424).

Boomeranging a targeted entity through the involvement of international organizations or larger powers has proved to be the central tactic of TANs. This combination of leverage and information politics can be very effective in changing policy. This was the case with Argentina in the 1970s. The more intense the pressure from the international community, the more likely the Argentine government was to change its policies. U.S. pressure in the region was vital to eventually ending the human rights violations by the Argentine government; and the primary source of information available to the U.S. was from Amnesty International. The domestic human rights organizations began to swiftly develop external contacts to enhance the dissemination of information. Through these networks, members got information out to

22 V. Asal et al.

the media and partnership organizations in Europe and North America (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 105).

The increased awareness of the public at large, and the support in policymaking circles would begin to bring the boomerang effect into effect for the broader international human rights coalition. The transnational efforts came to play a significant role in the 1976 U.S. presidential elections. The Carter campaign quickly seized on the growing popularity of the human rights movement and led to a weakening of the political base of the Ford campaign as it took a more conservative approach to this international movement (Thomas 2002, 32–34).

With the change in stance on human rights with the new administration the network successfully continued its efforts to inform policymakers on the human rights situations throughout the world in an attempt to make human rights a priority policy concern. This brought about U.S. spearheading the engagement of specific human rights issues throughout the world. This included influencing the U.S.’s appointment of its ambassador to different international conferences where human rights would be an issue, and even caused the United States to turn its attention for the first time to human rights violations taking place in Eastern European countries under the influential sphere of the communist bloc (Thomas 2002, 29–31).

Al Qaeda

Al Qaeda has in many ways become the prototypical transnational terrorist organization. Although many terror networks operate regionally or even globally in their logistical and fund-raising efforts, relatively few possess anything approaching a global operational capability. However, in a very real way, Al Qaeda maintains cells and individuals capable of mounting serious and catastrophic terrorist attacks throughout the world. This ability to act globally has stemmed directly from the organization’s unique history and its birth in the late 1980s.

Al Qaeda (translated as “the base”) grew out of the Afghan resistance to Soviet occupation following the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan. The Soviet Union encountered strong opposition to their invasion, much of it in the form of foreign Muslims who came to Afghanistan to be involved in what they saw as the defense of an Islamic country from a godless superpower. Many were in fact also fleeing government persecution in their home countries, because of their involvement in such Muslim fundamentalist groups as the Muslim Brotherhood (Baer 91–105). Originally Al Qaeda’s precursor group was a network designed to help families throughout the Islamic world keep track of their loved ones who had traveled to Afghanistan to participate in the anti-Soviet jihad, or holy war (Smith 2002, 2). It grew into the Makhtab al Khidmat (MAK) or “services office,” a worldwide jihad recruiting and fund-raising organization (Mannes 2004, 33). It is this unique origin that gives Al Qaeda its distinctive international character. Because the mujahideen came from Islamic communities throughout the globe, Al Qaeda was from the very beginning distinctively global.

With the end of the Soviet occupation many of these war-hardened Muslim fundamentalist soldiers were left without a cause for which to fight. Although some stayed in Afghanistan and prospered under the subsequent Taliban regime, many returned to their own nations, creating a Diaspora of trained jihadi warriors.

Under the stewardship of Osama bin Laden, this collection of operatives spread throughout the world was to become what is currently known as Al Qaeda. Beginning

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 23

in the 1990s, Al Qaeda embarked on an increasingly ambitious series of terrorist attacks. These attacks included the U.S. embassy bombings in East Africa, the attack on the U.S.S. Cole, and culminating in the massive logistical and operational undertaking that was the 9/11 attack. Subsequent attacks by Al Qaeda or their affiliated groups included the Bali nightclub bombing, Jakarta Marriott bombing, and Madrid subway attack (Mannes 2004).

Al Qaeda as a Transnational Advocacy Network

Al Qaeda has been described and approached in many ways. Peter Bergen describes it in business terms, comparing Al Qaeda to a multinational corporation of jihad or Holy War Inc. (Bergen 2001). Others have used analogies varying from Al Qaeda being an Afghan resistance alumni association (Engel 2001), to a computer network (Deibert 2002), to the biologically based descriptions of the group as either a living organism (Desker and Ramakrishna 2002) or a virus (Smith 2002). Although each of these comparisons illustrates something about the nature of Al Qaeda, perhaps a more useful framework through which to view Al Qaeda is that of TANs. In fact, Marc Sageman has implicitly suggested as much “Al Qaeda is not a hierarchical organization, and never was. . . . It was always a social movement” (Wright 2004).

Like the human rights movement, Al Qaeda is actually not one cohesive and rigidly hierarchical group, but rather a number of affiliated groups sharing ideological tenets and members to create a highly adaptable and complex network. Its affiliate groups among others include a veritable roll call of Islamist terror groups: Al-Jihad and Gamaah-Islamayyah in Egypt, Jemaah Islamayah in Indonesia, Group Islamique Armée and the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat in Algeria, Abu Sayyaf and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in the Phillipines, as well as numerous groups in the Kashmir region of Pakistan (Mannes 2004, 3–99). All these groups operate with varying degrees of input and coordination from Al Qaeda’s leadership, while maintaining much operational and logistical independence. Al Qaeda has also cooperated with groups that are not constituents, and even have very different aims; for example, the Shi’ite Muslim group Hezbollah (Mannes 2004, 162–163). Finally, Al Qaeda throughout its existence has benefited from the help of governments ranging from the directly supportive, the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Sudan, to more indirect support from sympathetic elements within the Pakistani intelligence service ISI (Bergen 2001, 220).

Al Qaeda, like the human rights movement, is quite sophisticated in its approach, using transnational information flows and financial resources to advance its agenda. Similar to Amnesty International, Al Qaeda has made humanitarian appeals, collecting funds through Islamic charities (Comras 2005). It has in addition collected funds through front businesses, wealthy individuals, and involvement in organized crime (Comras 2005). This money has been covertly collected, distributed, and otherwise manipulated using international banks, precious commodities like diamonds and gold, and exploitation of the Hawala system (Comras 2005). Hawala is an informal fund transferring system, often used by Muslim Diasporas to remit funds, which is based on personal connections and often leaves little paper trail.

Communication technology, allowing for the easy spread of information, has been an undeniable boon to Al Qaeda as it has been for the human rights movement. They have proven very adept at using the Internet and other technological break-throughs to create a virtual space in which they are able to communicate. Al Qaeda members have been in

24 V. Asal et al.

touch using e-mail, chat rooms, websites, satellite phones, and have even used commercially available encryption software to protect their communications (Mannes 2004, 33).

Keck and Sikkink’s different types of politics as used by the human rights movement are also quite evident in Al Qaeda’s operations and rhetoric. Information politics is evident in the widespread use of the Internet to communicate within the group, but also to distribute manifestos and videotapes to the wider public. To this end, Al Qaeda has also used certain news outlets, like the Al-Jazeera television network, in its attempts to spread its ideas.

Symbolic politics is pervasive in the Al Qaeda case. The “symbolic interpretation” that Keck and Sikkink find so important for network formation and cohesiveness is one of bin Laden’s key strategies. Taking several American foreign policies, including the U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia and continued mutual antagonism with Iraq, bin Laden offered the interpretation “these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on Allah, his messenger, and Muslims” (Foundation of American Scientists). This symbolic interpretation is one of the key planks of the Al Qaeda platform as it were.

Leverage politics is another omnipresent tactic employed by Al Qaeda. Ultimately, Al Qaeda has several goals including creating a Pan-Islamic caliphate, over-throwing apostate regimes, and expelling Westerners from Muslim nations (Bergen 2001). Although these goals are rather wide ranging, they are centered in the Muslim world, yet Al Qaeda has carried out deadly operations in North America and Europe. These attacks are aimed at getting Western, specifically American, troops out of the Middle East and lowering the levels of Western support for the indigenous “apostate” regimes (Johnson 2005). This dynamic is often discussed in terms of the concepts of the “near enemy,” or local Islamic governments seen as corrupt, and the “far enemy,” the West in general and America in particular (Johnson 2005; Henzel 2005; Sageman 2005).

The Al Qaeda view of these apostate regimes is seen in bin Laden’s 1996 comments about the Saudi Regime in an interview with Nida’ul Islam magazine “the regime does not cease to cry in the open over the matters effecting the Muslims without making any serious effort to serve the interests of the Muslim community apart from small efforts in order to confuse people and throw some dust into their eyes” (fas.org). He goes on to say that attacks on America serve to illustrate that “people today feel that the Americans have exceeded their limits both politically and economically, the (Saudi) regime now knows that the public are aware that their sovereignty is shared . . .” and that the “most important goal would be to change the current regime, with the permission of Allah” (fas.org).

As with the human rights movement in its targeting of Argentina, Al Qaeda seeks to “influence American and Western opinion to demand abandonment of . . . US/Western support of existing Islamic governments” (Clarke 2004, 11). This use of the boomerang effect is classic leverage politics. Al Qaeda has grievances, real or imagined, against the West; however, it seems that their attacks on Western targets are often in large part meant to change conditions domestically by removing Western troops and as such removing support for the current regimes in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and other nations.

The Anti-Deforestation Movement

The international deforestation movement grew out of activities in response to local situations such as the Rondonia environmental movement in Brazil against the Polonoreste

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 25

development project (Rodrigues 2005), or the local environmental group Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM) in Sarawak, Malaysia in response to industrial lumbering and deforestation activities (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 131). One example was in the Brazilian province of Rondonia, where the massive development project known as Polonoreste began intense lumbering that lead to deforestation. Despite the varied and apolitical nature of the indigenous peoples in the Rondonia region, efforts to halt the Polonoreste lumbering project began to take shape (Rodrigues 2005). Concerned individuals and groups began to form coalitions in an effort to preserve the forests and curtail the massive industrial and political obstacles leading to the degradation of the environment (Keck and Sikkink 1998). The international environmental movement initially interested in supporting these local groups was the environmental nongovernmental organization (ENGO), the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). Along with other ENGOs, EDF began to become involved in the local situation and worked to create a network that what would be termed the Rondonia Forum. This Forum helped to develop the environmental movement as a unique international community through the establishment of flows of information. As the TAN of environmental activists became a cohesive network working together, pressure was applied on banks financing the endeavor and the Brazilian government (Rodrigues 2005).

As the environmental situations in Sarawak Malaysia and Brazil began to gain international attention, the global environmental movement began to emerge. Many groups with different environmental causes joined forces with ENGOs. In a process similar to that of Al Qaeda, environmentalists motivated by the need to confront large corporations and nation-states, these groups shared the commonality of being individually ineffective in making achievements in the face of their much larger opponents. To circumvent this problem these groups came together and established effective flows of information and a global network emerged (Keck and Sikkink 1998, 156–159). By placing the local problems in an international context, essentially re-framing the depletion of the world’s tropical forests, these groups allowed for a more salient message to be brought to world powers and international organizations.

The ENGOs have also engaged the WTO, IMF, and World Bank to develop more environmental friendly procedures in their regular activities. They did this by using leverage and information politics. Due to the weighed voting system of these institutions based on monetary support ENGOs have particularly targeted the states with most influence and funding to these institutions, specifically nations like the U.S. and Germany, who in turn influence the policies of the WTO, IMF, and the World Bank. By influencing these states, and subsequently the larger institutions to develop environmental safeguards the ENGOs are continually utilizing leverage politics to get large international actors to make specific environmental considerations (Mason 2004).

Hezbollah

Since its foundation, Hezbollah, or the “Party of God,” has been closely intertwined institutionally with the leadership of the religious elite of Iran. Hezbollah’s command leadership and the clergy of Iran were natural allies in creation of the Party of God; it was this initial coordination of like-minded entities that would eventually grow to reach global proportions (Ranstorp 1994). Similar to the deforestation movement’s targeting of supportive groups outside of the problem countries, Hezbollah party operatives began to coordinate with sympathetic Lebanese businessmen, who would conduct and coordinate

26 V. Asal et al.

illegal fund-raising activities. These activities quickly found great vitality and success among the strong Lebanese Diasporas sympathetic to the radical positions of Hezbollah. Eventually the movement spread to adopt more fanatical extremist Islamic supporters (Meehan 2004, 10–11).

The primary goals since its conception have been the establishment of an Islamist State in Lebanon, the destruction of Israel, and the recapture of Jerusalem. In addition to this many Hezbollah leaders felt that the real enemy, especially recently, has been the United States (Mannes 2004, 147–153).

Hezbollah has carried out the tactic of suicide/vehicle bombings successfully throughout the world, and is considered the innovator of the tactic among terrorist organizations. This was the case in 1983 in Beirut when a bombing at the U.S. Marine Barracks eventually lead to a U.S. withdrawal of forces in 1984 (Mannes 2004, 147). In 1992 Hezbollah was involved in the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, as well as the Argentine–Israeli Community Center in 1994. This was all part of its transnational approach to achieve the goal of defeating the government of Israel and the United States. Soon after investigating the attacks, it became evident that Hezbollah was involved with other extremist Islamic groups in the area conducting numerous criminal activities in the TBA to fund these operations here abroad (Hudson 2003, 12–23).

Hezbollah as a Transnational Advocacy Network

Similar to the international deforestation movement, Hezbollah is not a unitary actor, but rather a network of smaller networks, organizations, and individuals. As Magnus Ranstorp describes Hezbollah: “. . . Hezbollah is not a monolithic body with total subservience to Iran but rather a coalition of Lebanese Shiite clerics, who each have their own views and networks of followers as well as ties to Iran’s clerical establishment” (Ranstorp 1994). This structure is indicative of the way in which many terror networks take on the same organizational dynamics as advocacy networks.

Hezbollah has thrived through branching out and connecting with local groups, and these groups have become vital to Hezbollah’s existence. Organizational integration has not, however, been limited to local and like-minded groups. In fact, Hezbollah has had important interaction with many other terrorist groups and networks from around the world. One clear example of this is the fact that Hezbollah camps have trained operatives from such disparate groups as the Irish Republican Army (IRA), the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK), the Basque Fatherland and Freedom (ETA), and Italy’s Red Brigades (Goldberg 2002).

Given Hezbollah’s global ideology, various communities have proved to hold religious goals that are in line with Hezbollah’s own strategic goals (Meehan 2004). Due to its high Shi’ite population and various communities of the Lebanese Diaspora, an African continent plagued by ineffective governments and local law enforcement entities has been a key fund-raising and logistical support base. Hezbollah has found tremendous financial and political support abroad. Israeli intelligence reporting predicts that Hezbollah fundraising activities raise hundreds of thousands of dollars (U.S.) annually from the region, specifically from the Ivory Coast, Senegal, Benin, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and South Africa (Levitt 2004a).

In addition to Iran, Africa, and North America one of the fastest and most vital regions of the world to the transnational efforts of Hezbollah is the Tri Border Area (TBA) in South America of Brazil-Argentina-Paraguay. Due to limited government capability and investigation by the local governments, exact details of Hezbollah’s activities there are

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 27

not known; but according to Paraguayan officials, Arab communities in the TBA have contributed remittances of between $50 and $500 million (U.S.) between 1998 and 2001 to Islamic terror groups in the Middle East, Hezbollah being one of the primary recipients (Meehan 2004, 32).

Following the attacks of 11 September, the U.S. put increased pressure on the government of Paraguay to crack down on criminal actions linked to terrorist group activity in the TBA. Very soon after the attacks, 16 Lebanese nationals were arrested on immigration violations. Other arrests of suspected terrorists leaders soon followed, which yielded evidence of periodic payments to Hezbollah of amounts ranging from $25000 to $50000 and literature intended to increase recruitment into terrorist organizations linked to Hezbollah (Madani 2002).

Hezbollah utilizes modern communications to conduct terrorist activities and even has television network, Al-Manar, or “The Beacon.” In conjunction with the American telethon format Hezbollah has raised substantial cash donations with its 24-hour televisions station, many of the proceeds of which were funneled to Palestinian efforts in Israel (Mannes 2004, 160). These funds are then channeled to several Lebanese-based banks that are immune to having their assets frozen or confiscated by the government; these banks in turn have connections with many large U.S. banks, which prove useful in the channeling of funds abroad for terrorists’ activities. These banks include such high profiles banks as Bank of New York, Wachovia, and JP Morgan Chase (Jorisch 2003).

Much like the international deforestation movement, which made links to other environmental organizations, Hezbollah has branched out culturally as much as it has geographically. It has efforts to pool its resources with Sunni groups, most prominently Al Qaeda and its affiliates such as Egypt’s Al-Jihad and Algeria’s Armed Islamic Group. Some of Hezbollah’s founding members were even associated with the Fatah/Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) elite unit Force 17 (Mannes 2004, 161–165).

In terms of symbolic interpretation of the kind associated with TAN behavior, there have been two key successes for Hezbollah. Hezbollah has interpreted its terrorist tactics as successful, and many argue that they indeed were, in two key historical cases (Goldberg 2002). The first case was the U.S. and French withdrawal of peacekeepers after Hezbollah’s 1983 bombings of the U.S. embassy, a U.S. Marine Barracks, and a compound housing French peacekeeping troops (MIPT). The second case, perhaps less prestigious but certainly more closely related to Hezbollah’s raison d’etre, was the decision in the year 2000 of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to remove Israeli troops from Southern Lebanon. This retreat had left Hezbollah as the only terror or guerilla group with the demonstrated ability to force Israel to engage in troop withdrawals (Goldberg 2002), although others have taken credit for the recent withdrawal of settlers from the Gaza Strip.

By targeting their enemy (primarily Israel) throughout the globe, they have forced the world community to take notice. This increased global attention leads to sympathetic groups emerging elsewhere and completes the boomerang tactic employed by Hezbollah in its effort to achieve its objective (Ranstorp 1994). Although Hezbollah’s immediate and concrete goals all involve the domestic politics in Israel and Lebanon, they have carried out attacks on a Kuwaiti airline in Thailand, a U.S. airline in Denmark, and hijacked a TWA flight from Athens to Rome (MIPT). None of these actions had an instrumental effect of changing policies in Israel or Lebanon, rather using the boomerang effect and leverage politics, they were designed to accomplish goals by putting international pressure on Hezbollah’s side. This same kind of pressure was used by the international deforestation movement targeting Western states and international governmental organizations to use the boomerang effect on Malaysia and Brazil.

28 V. Asal et al.

The International Campaign to Ban Landmines

The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) is an umbrella organization that coordinates and facilitates for its myriad local affiliate groups. Although these local groups may have parochial aims, they have joined together with similar groups, creating one of the most impressive transnational advocacy networks ever assembled. At the close of the Cold War small civil conflicts became increasingly common, and problematically, increasingly likely to involve huge numbers of antipersonnel (AP) landmines. The proliferation and widespread use of AP landmines, which do not distinguish between civilians and combatants, began to raise the ire of many in the international community.

AP Landmines, because they are weapons of attrition, often simply (and purposely) maim their victims, thereby creating a strain on the resources of the opposing force. However, communities that had previously suffered through conflict and were attempting to create or recreate a functioning society were increasingly feeling this burden. As this became more and more common, disparate nongovernmental organizations began calling for a ban on AP landmines. Beginning in 1991 a number of human rights groups came out in favor of a ban, including Asia Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, and Medico International (Price 1998, 633, 642).

This momentum continued, and within a year, the NGO community had created a steering committee of six NGOs to address the issue of AP landmines. As high profile groups like Handicap International and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) began to pressure the world’s most powerful nations for moratoriums on AP landmine exports and use, the efforts began to snowball. In 1993 the ICRC held a conference in Switzerland devoted to the problems of AP landmines, which brought together NGOs, medical practitioners, military experts, de-mining groups, and various media. After 1993, the disparate NGOs and local anti-landmine groups would operate under the aegis of the ICBL (Price 1998).

The ICBL would go on to make great progress in their attempts to mitigate the harmful effects of AP landmine usage. Eventually it would encompass over 1,400 local NGOs and organizations in over 90 countries (ICBL.org). The ICBL ultimately facilitated the creation of a mine ban treaty signed in 1997 by 122 governments worldwide. Although 122 does seem like a very large number, it is important to note that nonsignatory states include the United States, China, India, and Russia (ICBL.org). Further, in 1997, the ICBL and its coordinator Jody Williams were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to eliminate AP mines (Rutherford 2000).

ICBL as a Transnational Advocacy Network

The Campaign to Ban Landmines is an archetypical TAN. Similar to the way Al Qaeda formed, the ICBL was a natural outgrowth of numerous local NGOs doing similar tasks and confronting similar challenges in different geographical locales. Because of increased interaction between these NGOs, both in real and virtual space, the ICBL emerged. In fact it was from this interaction that understanding that there existed an AP landmine problem arose, and was subsequently politicized. After the issue was identified, the ICBL became a clearinghouse for information, statistics, and rhetorical approaches (Deibert 2003). This coordination function for local organizations is a key aspect of the transnational advocacy network approach.

Another important facet of TANs is that they have transnational information and resource flows. Although resources indeed cross borders, one of the most important aspects

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 29

of what ICBL did was to collect and distribute information like statistics that contextualized the problems associated with AP landmines for an audience that had not previously known there was a problem. These information flows, especially utilizing the Internet after 1995 (Deibert 2003) were so extensive that Arquilla and Ronfeldt describe the ICBL as a “seminal case of worldwide netwar” (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001, 5). Along with using the Internet or virtual space to forge connections between local groups worldwide, the holding of conferences like those in Montreux, Switzerland and Vienna, Austria also create a real world forum for interaction and network consolidation (Price 1998).

The ICBL also used textbook examples of Keck and Sikkink’s different types of politics. Information politics, or sharing and making available information, led to the emergence of the issue on the global scene as well as to increased understanding of the scope of the problem (Price 1998). Leverage politics were also key to the ICBL strategy. The ICBL routinely published lists of the worst AP landmine offenders and their policies used to pressure nations to reform (Cameron 1999, 91). This strategy, what Cameron calls “mobilizing shame” is a classic TAN technique. In trying to mobilize the Muslim world Al Qaeda has used the same method. Symbolic politics, what Keck and Sikkink describe as framing issues by “identifying and providing convincing explanations” for events, was also an important tactic used by the ICBL (Keck and Sikkink 1998). For years AP landmines had been seen simply as one of many disarmament problems; however, the ICBL was able to recast the issue in far graver terms; framing it in the perspective of both human rights and its role as a stumbling block to economic and human development (Cameron 1999, 87). Finally, the idea of accountability politics is where the ICBL is currently doing the bulk of its work. There are over 100 researchers in 90 countries that monitor the progress and compliance of various states in regards to AP landmines (ICBL.org/lm).

The boomerang effect is also evident in the activities of the ICBL. One of the most common forms of protest that the ICBL used was what was termed shoe piles or shoe pyramids. These mounds of donated shoes were designed to represent the limbs lost to AP landmines throughout the world (Price 1998). The shame mobilization was not, however, used only in countries plagued by landmines, or even in Landmine Ban nonsignatory states; shoe piles were also employed in states that were sympathetic to the ban, like France (calm.org.nz) and those that vigorously worked for the ban, like Canada (Minesactioncanada.com). In this case, these protests were not intended to change the policy of the state they occurred in, but rather to help pressure these governments to exert influence over other states.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam

Among the most dangerous and well-organized terrorist organizations in the world is the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who have been waging war on the Sri Lankan government since 1983. The group, whose principal aim is to create a self-governing homeland for the Tamil minority within the island nation of Sri Lanka, has proven itself innovative, effective, and deadly. They claim that the majority Sinhalese oppress and repress the Tamil population, which is concentrated in the north of the island. The Tigers have at times controlled large portions of northern Sri Lanka, specifically the Jaffna Peninsula (MIPT). The group is led by Vellupillai Prabakharan, who has focused violent attacks not just on Sri Lankan officials and civilians, but also against those Tamils who would compete with him or the Tigers (Van de Voorde 2005, 183, 185).

30 V. Asal et al.

Their attacks have ranged from individual assassinations, to large-scale assaults that mirror those by conventional military forces (Byman et al. 2001). The Tigers are so effective that they are the only terrorist network that has been responsible for the assassinations of two heads of state, Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Sri Lankan leader Ranasinghe Premadsa (Chalk 2000).

The Tigers are deadly for several reasons, not least of which is their large-scale use of suicide bombing. This tactic has been one of the most important in their arsenal, with the LTTE having an entire wing or unit (The Black Tigers) devoted to suicide attacks (U.S. State Deptartment). The Black Tigers had conducted well over 100 suicide attacks using innovative bomb technology, and even incorporating training with gliders and micro-light aircraft (Chalk 2000). One of the most interesting aspects of the Tigers is the extent to which they have diversified their operations beyond suicide and car bombings. In fact, their military wing has naval and airborne sections, capabilities virtually unheard of among even the most developed terror networks (Chalk 2000).

The operational history of the Tigers illustrates a group that is extremely capable, and incredibly vicious. The 1996 bombing of the Central Bank in Colombo killed 96 people and injured over 1,400. Although that was the largest single attack, it does not seem particularly un-representative of the tactics and results of the Tigers. A 1987 railway blast in Madras killed 25 and injured 100, and a bus bomb in Maradana killed 32 and injured over 250 in 1998 (MIPT). An examination of these attacks quickly shows how effective the Tigers are operationally, and the extent to which bloodshed seems not to bother them.

The LTTE as a Transnational Advocacy Network

The LTTE may not, at first glance, seem particularly well suited to the TAN analogy. They are a terror group that is relatively narrowly focused on a nationalist struggle, and whose attacks have been confined to only two countries: Sri Lanka and India. This group might seem to lack the international operational character of Al Qaeda or Hezbollah. In this case however, looks are deceiving. Although the attacks of the LTTE have been geographically concentrated, the support network and logistical base that enables them is anything but. The violence may be parochial, but it relies on a massive global network of NGOs, charities, and individuals connected by information technology (Van de Voorde 2005, 191). India, Canada, the United States, Britain, Continental Europe, Singapore, and Malaysia are just a sample of the many places that support streams to the LTTE front (Wayland 2004, 418–419).

The network that supports the LTTE is vast, and generally agreed to be divided into three major roles: publicity, fund-raising, and weapons procurement (Byman 2001; Chalk 2000). Each of these roles is undertaken by a related network of individual members of the Tamil Diaspora, small Tamil interest NGOs, and larger umbrella organizations that help to coordinate these many disparate groups into a TAN to support the LTTE. For example, the publicity role is in large part conducted by organizations of smaller Tamil interest groups throughout the world. A mere sampling of these groups is purported to include the United Tamil Organization in Britain, the Federal Association of Canadian Tamils, the Australasian Federation of Tamil Associations out of Australia, and the French Federation of Tamil Associations (Byman et al. 2001). These groups coordinate with the LTTE leadership in bases of operation like the Eelam House in London, which, exploiting relatively liberal Western laws and multiculturalism, has served openly as by the de facto headquarters of

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 31

the LTTE outside of Sri Lanka (Byman et al. 2001). This worldwide information-sharing network plays the same role in educating constituencies around the world that Amnesty International and similar organizations did for the human rights movement.

The fund-raising operations take on a similar character as the publicity machine. Using the Tamil Diaspora and the charities and NGOs that it supports, the LTTE has managed to create a massive worldwide financial pipeline. In fact, some estimates are that they bring in as much as 80 million dollars per year (Wayland 2004, 421). The funding sources are as diverse as wealthy individuals, skimming money from legitimate charities, and involvement in organized crime. An example of the wealthy individuals is Shan Sunder a “medical practitioner” living in California who has contributed almost four million dollars to the Tigers (Byman et al. 2001). This “entrepreneur” as Keck and Sikkink would refer to him is representative of one type of funding opportunity that is presented to the LTTE.

Another major source of funds is the confiscation of money out of legitimate charities that claim to be doing social and humanitarian work for Tamils in Sri Lanka (Chalk 2000). This method of funding is in no way unique to the LTTE, but in fact is seen in areas of conflict around the world (Raphaeli 2003). Organized crime has also played prominently into the LTTE’s finances. They have been involved in drug running (Chalk 2000), human trafficking, and extortion of members of the Tamil Diaspora (Byman et al. 2001).

The Tigers have also embraced information technology both in terms of communication and coordination, as well as a way in which to broadcast its message and perspective to the rest of the world (Wayland 2004, 419–420). The Tigers have established a strong Internet presence using not only websites but also news groups, and extensive use of e-mail (Byman et al. 2001). They also maintain their own homepage, which offers updates, news, and propaganda (www.eelam.com). Finally they have even embraced the Internet as a forum for further terrorism. In 1996 the Tigers’ engaged in a cyberterror attack on the computers of several Sri Lankan embassies. By sending massive numbers of e-mails to the consulate’s computer systems, the Tigers were able to create a “virtual blockade” (Zanini and Edwards 2001). The Internet, however, is only the beginning of the Tigers’ embrace of information technology. They have their own radio shows and telephone hotlines (Byman et al. 2001) as well as their own television station (BBC 2005).

The LTTE also engage in much of Keck and Sikkink’s typology of politics. Information politics is the realm of the publicity arm, which by way of its various web portals and other media attempt to spread a multitiered message (Wayland 2004, 418). This message focuses on one hand on the discrimination against and oppression of Tamils in Sri Lanka and on the need for a homeland, but on the other hand it embraces the “legitimacy” of armed resistance (Eelam). This attempt to frame the debate in terms of human rights violations and self-determination, as opposed to in terms of terrorism or insurgency is key to the Tigers achieving the level of international acceptance that they have. The use of framing is the same as that being used by the land mines and deforestation movements.

Tied in with information politics is the conception of leverage politics. This idea, using international pressure to reform the host or local government is clearly present in the Tigers case. The aforementioned information politics have been used to confer an unusual status on the LTTE. In the international community the Tigers and the Tamil struggle for a homeland has been supported by several major NGOs including the World Council of Churches, International Federation of Journalists, the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, and the International Human Rights Law Group (Chalk 2000). This attempt to gain legitimacy and international support is a sort of indirect attempt to utilize the boomerang effect.

32 V. Asal et al.

What We Can Learn from the TAN Analogy

What is most striking when looking at the cases is that despite the stark relief offered by the distinction between violent and nonviolent tactics, there remains so much similarity. Indeed, some of the nonviolent networks differ more from each other than they do from the terrorist networks. Even so, the organizational dynamics, tactics, and avenues for communication and coordination are in many ways exactly the same. The same organizational and technical changes that have enabled an increasing level of international vigilance against human rights violations have also enabled the exponential increase in the danger posed by groups like Al Qaeda and Hezbollah. As seen in Table 1, when it comes to the key components of TANs all of the miniature case studies share the key characteristics of TANs. These organizations are Transnational Activist Networks and seeing them as such helps to understand them better.

TANs operate the way they do because they provide particular advantages to nongovernmental organizations facing stronger actors. It’s clear that Arquilla and Ronfeldt understood this when they observed: “Ethno-nationalists, criminals, and terrorists—all have found new power in networking. But so too have emerging global civil society actors . . .” (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001, 20). TANS allow for the adoption of boomerang and leverage strategies. Whether it is the International Campaign to Ban Landmines organizing shoe pile protests in Paris or Al Qaeda organizing the bombing of the Madrid subway, organizations are able to operate more effectively using a coalition of international coordinating groups, local affiliates, and entrepreneurial individuals. These symbolic acts were done to motivate policy change about places thousands of miles away—classic boomerang politics. Both were successful.

The boomerang pattern is not alone in being a tactic that crosses the violence divide between TANs and TTANs. Information politics is as important to the environmental movement as it is to the Tamil Tigers. Greenpeace must make others aware of its successes, failures, and what problems remain; so too must the Tigers keep their constituents abreast of their successes and failures, as well as bringing news of the cause to the outside world. That is why both groups maintain websites devoted to informing the public and mobilizing the supporters (www.greenpeace.org, www.eelam.com).

Leverage politics is also clearly evident across the spectrum from TANs to TTANs. The boomerang effect, attempting to manipulate international attitudes to apply pressure to domestic or local authorities, is readily apparent in both terror networks and issue-based advocacy groups. The more than 15 attacks on Germany in 1995 by the Kurdish Workers Party had far less to do with influencing the treatment of Kurds in Germany (MIPT), than it did with influencing their treatment in Turkey. In the same way, the groups supporting Planafloro and their lobbying effort before the U.S. Congress had virtually nothing to do with instrumentally affecting American domestic policy; rather it had to do with bringing the U.S.’s considerable international power to bear, in the form of political pressure, on the domestic situation in Brazil.

Symbolic politics too crosses the boundary between advocacy and terror. Symbolic interpretation of the type Keck and Sikkink discuss has been useful not just to advocacy groups, but to groups of all stripes. For example, terrorist use of symbolic politics is very clear in the emergence of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade during the recent intifada in Palestine, which resulted from the visit of Ariel Sharon to the Al Aqsa Mosque in September of 2000 (Council on Foreign Relations 2005).

Finally, even accountability politics, which may seem, of the four, the least suited to TTANs is in some ways evident in terror networks. Although it is clear that Amnesty

Ta bl

e 1

C om

pa ri

ng TA

N s

an d

te rr

or is

tT A

N s

N et

w or

ks /c

ha ra

ct er

is tic

H um

an R

ig ht

s C

am pa

ig ns

T he

A nt

i- D

ef or

es ta

tio n

M ov

em en

t

T he

In te

rn at

io na

l C

am pa

ig n

to B

an L

an dm

in es

A lQ

ae da

H ez

bo lla

h

T he

L ib

er at

io n

T ig

er s

of Ta

m il

E el

am

C ha

ra ct

er iz

ed by

vo lu

nt ar

y, re

ci pr

oc al

,a nd

ho ri

zo nt

al pa

tte rn

s of

co m

m un

ic at

io n

an d

ex ch

an ge

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

C oo

pe ra

tio n

be tw

ee n

ac to

rs fr

om di

ff er

en tc

ou nt

ri es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Sh ar

in g

of in

fo rm

at io

n in

te gr

al to

th e

ne tw

or k

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

U se

of le

ve ra

ge ,s

ym bo

lic an

d ac

co un

ta bi

lit y

po lit

ic s

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

Y es

U se

of th

e bo

om er

an g

ef fe

ct Y

es Y

es Y

es Y

es Y

es Y

es L

ev el

of st

ru ct

ur e

V ar

ie s

M ed

iu m

H ig

h L

ow H

ig h

H ig

h U

se of

vi ol

en ce

N o

N o

N o

Y es

Y es

Y es

33

34 V. Asal et al.

International’s reports on Human Rights violations are an attempt to hold nations accountable for their actions, in a similar yet distorted way the fatwa encouraging attacks on American civilians issued by Osama bin Laden is an attempt to do the same. Both are essentially proclamations, which attempt to hold a nation accountable for a real or perceived grievance. The difference is that one endeavors to do so using international norms and shame, whereas the other relies on the threat of force.

One can better understand the strategies of transnational terrorist groups by understanding that they are following a set of repertories that has been proved useful by many other nongovernmental organizations. Terrorists adopt the TAN model because it is one that brings with it a new range of repertoires, boomerang, leverage, symbolic and accountability politics, that often work. By understanding terrorist transnational networks as violent nongovernmental movements that are pursuing a strategy similar to that of other transnational nongovernmental an understanding is gained of why terrorist transnational networks behave the way they do. For example, international terrorism can be thought of as a violent boomerang effect motivating disengaged or unsupportive actors to take the Terrorist TANs seriously and to put pressure on the governments of interest to change their ways. The rise of international terrorism and international human rights movements and other world culture movements (Meyer et al. 1997) at the same time makes sense—they are part of the same phenomena except that some TANs choose to use indiscriminate violence and others do not.

Implications and Conclusions

There is a growing need to understand how terrorist networks function and the strategies and tactics they use to achieve their goals. This article argued that the theoretical framework of TANs is a useful one for thinking about terrorist transnational networks and can help frame them in such a way that they fit into the larger theoretical effort to understand international relations.

Of equal importance in identifying transnational terrorist networks as TANs begins to help one understand why such networks arose when and where they did. The enabling role of information technology, for example, offers an important explanation of how the former mujahideen leaving Afghanistan, and returning to their native countries were able to stay in touch creating perhaps the first truly global terror network in Al Qaeda.

This analogy also offers us some explanatory power in terms of why these networks behave the way they do and select the targets that they do. The Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) may not have had instrumental goals in its bombings in Western Europe; however, the importance of the boomerang effect and international leverage offer valuable insight into why instrumental goals are not sufficient for explaining much terrorist action.

Finally, by identifying terrorist transnational networks as TANs one can begin to look at terrorist networks as something other than a sui generis phenomenon and start to explore questions such as some groups turn to terrorism and why others do not while comparing the same units of analysis. This is important so as to remove the all too common view of the terrorist as crazed lunatic or irrational hate monger. Rather, the TAN analogy shows that terrorists operate in the same manner as other non-state actors attempting to affect change in the international system. By exploiting the same technologies and power dynamics, terrorists show clearly that they cannot be discounted as unique and perverse political actors, but rather must be viewed contextually as part of a spectrum of international political action.

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 35

This brief look at six TANS, three violent and three not, suggests that different kinds of ideologies may lead to different uses of violence by TANS. TANS that embrace norms that are inclusive in a World Culture (Meyer et al. 1997) sense may be less prone to violence whereas older religious and nationalist norms may use the framework of TANS but have less hesitancy to marry them to the tool of violence. However, this assertion is not without qualification. There exist many nonviolent religious advocacy networks, and there have in fact been many groups that have embraced terrorism as a tactic for traditional TAN goals like environmental advocacy or to bring attention to human rights violations. It may, however, be worth noting that the goals expounded by both terror TANs and traditional TANs are, whether stopping acid rain or reestablishing the divine kingdom on earth, couched in terms of changing the world for the better. There are good norms and bad norms, violent and nonviolent movements, and understanding how TANs can help either advance will shed light on all of them.

References

Adamson, F. B. April 2005. “Globalisation, transnational political mobilisation, and networks of violence.” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 18(1), pp. 35–53.

Angjeli, A. Summer 2003. “Mediterranean Quarterly.” The Challenge of Terrorism and Organized Crime 14(3), pp. 34–40.

Armbruster-Sandoval, R. Winter 2003. “Globalization and transnational labor organizing: The Honduran Maquiladora industry and the Kimi campaign.” Social Science History 27(4), pp. 551–576.

Arquilla, J. and D. F. Ronfeldt. 1996. The advent of netwar. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. Arquillam, John, and David F. Ronfeldt. 2001. Networks and netwars: The future of terror, crime,

and militancy. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. Arquillam, John, and David F. Ronfeldt. 2002. “The underside of netwar.” IPA Review 54(4), pp. 3–5. Attanassoff, V. 2005. “Bosnia and Herzegovina: Islamic revival, international advocacy networks and

Islamic terrorism.” Strategic Insights 4(5). Baer, R. 2003. Sleeping with the devil: How Washington sold our soul for Saudi crude. New York:

Crown Books. Basile, M. 2004. “Going to the source: Why Al Qaeda’s financial network is likely to withstand the

current war on terrorist financing.” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 27(3), pp. 169–186. BBC. 2005. “Tamil Tigers agree to hold talks.” Retrieved August 2005 at http://news.bbc.co.uk/

2/hi/south asia/4734121.stm. BBC. 2005. “Tamil rebels to launch television station.” Retrieved August 2005 at http://news.

bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south asia/4734121.stm. Bell, K. 2003. “Special policy forum: Hizballah fundraising in the American heartland,” The

Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Available at http://www.ciaonet.org/pbei/winep/ policy 2003/2003 700.html.

Bergen, P. 2001. Holy War Inc. New York: Free Press. Brysk, A. May 2005. “Two cheers for global civil society.” Social Movement Studies 4(1), pp. 95–103. Brysk, A. Spring 1996. “Turning weakness into strength: The internationalization of Indian rights.”

Latin American Perspectives 23(2), pp. 38–57. Burgerman, S. 1998. “Mobilizing principles: The role of transnational activists in promoting human

rights principles.” Human Rights Quarterly 20(4), pp. 905–923. Byman, D., P. Chalk, B. Hoffman, W. Rosenau, and D. Brannan. 2001. Trends in outside support for

insurgent movements. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. Cameron, M. Fall. 1999. “Global civil society and the Ottawa process: Lessons from the movement

to ban anti-personnel mines.” Canadian Foreign Policy 7(1), pp. 85–102.

36 V. Asal et al.

Chalk, P. 2000. “Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) international organization and operations—A preliminary analysis.” Canadian Security Intelligence Service (Winter) (Commentary No. 77)

Clark, A. M., E. J. Friedman, et al. October 1998. “The sovereign limits of global civil society: A comparison of NGO participation in UN World Conferences on the environment, human rights, and women.” World Politics 51(1), pp. 1–35.

Clarke, R. A. 2004. Defeating the jihadists: A blueprint for action. New York: Century Foundation Press.

CNN. 20 December 2000. Kurdish protesters seize London landmark. Available at http://edition.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/europe/UK/12/20/protest/.

Collins, J. N. Summer 2005. “Global environmentalism and local politics: Transnational advocacy networks in Brazil, Ecuador, and India (review).” Latin American Politics & Society 47(2), pp. 176–180.

Comras, V. 2005. “Al Qaeda’s finances and funding to affiliate groups.” Strategic Insights 4(1). Council on Foreign Relations. 2005. “Al Aqsa martyrs brigade, Palestinian nationalists.” Available

at http://www.cfr.org/publication/9127/. Cragin, K., and S. A. Daly. 2004. The dynamic terrorist threat: An assessment of group motivations

and capabilities in a changing world. Santa Monica: Rand Corporation. Cronin, A. K. Winter 2002/03. “Behind the curve: Globalization and international terrorism.”

International Security 27(3), pp. 30–58. Desker, B., and K. Ramakrishna. 2002. “Forging an indirect strategy in Southeast Asia.” The

Washington Quarterly. Deibert, R., and J. G. Stein. Spring 2002. “Hacking networks of terror.” International Organization

Dialogue 10, pp. 1–16. Dishman, C. 2005. “The leaderless nexus: When crime and terror converge.” Studies in Conflict &

Terrorism 24(1), pp. 43–58. Drake, C. J. M. Summer 1998. “Role of ideology in terrorists’ target selection.” Terrorism & Political

Violence 10(2), pp. 271–284. Eavis, P. December 2001. “The hidden security threat: Transnational organized criminal activity.”

RUSI Journal 146(6), pp. 36–37. Engel, R. 2001. “Inside Al-Qaeda: A window into the world of militant Islam and the

Afghani alumni.” Janes Intelligence Review. Available at http://www.janes.com/security/ international security/news/misc/janes010928 1 n.shtml.

Escobar, P. October 26, 2001. “The roving eye: Anatomy of a ‘terrorist’ NGO.” The Asia Times. Available at http://www.atimes.com/c-asia/CJ26Ag01.html.

Evangelista, M. Winter 1995. “The paradox of state strength: Transnational relations, domestic structures, and security policy in Russia and the Soviet Union.” International Organization 49(1), pp. 1–38.

Ferrari, L. L. Summer 2003. “Transnational advocacy against capital punishment: A role for the holy see.” International Journal of Human Rights 7(2), pp. 28–41.

Forsythe, D. P. 1976. “The Red Cross as transnational movement: Conserving and changing the nation-state system.” International Organization 30(4), pp. 607–630.

Galeotti, Mark 2002. “‘Brotherhoods’ and ‘associates’: Chechen networks of crime and resistance.” Low Intensity Conflict & Law Enforcement 11(2/3), pp. 340–352.

Goldberg, J. 2002. “In the party of God,” The New Yorker. Gunaratna, R. 1998. “Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict and national security,” Colombo: South Asian

Network on Conflict Research, p. 372. Henzel, C. 2005. “The origins of Al Qaeda’s ideology: Implications for US strategy.” Parameters

(Spring), pp. 69–80. Higgins, A., K. Leggett, et al. 11 November 2002. “How Al Qaeda put internet in service of global

jihad; with sites in China, Pakistan, a U.K.-based web master kept “the brothers” abreast; Disney and wildlife film clips.” The Wall Street Journal.

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 37

Hudson, A. October 2001. “NGOs transnational advocacy networks: From legitimacy to political responsibility?” Global Networks 1(4), pp. 331–352.

Hudson, R. 2003. “Terrorist and organized crime groups in the Tri-Border Area (TBA) of South America,” Federal Research Division, Library of Congress.

Islam, N. u. I. M. C. o. 1996. “The new powder keg in the Middle East.” October–November. Available at http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/LADIN.htm.

Jackson, B., J. C. Baker, P. Chalk, K. Cragin, J. V. Parachini, and H. R. Trujillo. 2005. Aptitude for destruction volume 1: Organizational learning in terrorist groups and its implications for combating terrorism. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.

Johnson, J. 2005. “Exploiting weakness in the far enemy ideology.” Strategic Insights 4(6). Jones, David Martin, Michael L. R. Smith, and Mark Weeding. 2003. “Looking for the pattern: Al

Qaeda in Southeast Asia—the genealogy of a terror network.” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 26(6), pp. 443–458.

Jorisch, A. July 22, 2003. “Hizbullah’s unwitting U.S. bankers.” Policy Watch 774. Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Available at http://www.ciaonet.org/pbei/winep/policy 2003/ 2003 774.html.

Karkkainen, B. C. February 2004. “Post-Sovereign environmental governance.” Global Environmen- tal Politics 4(1), pp. 72–96.

Keck, M. E., and K. Sikkink. 1998. Activists beyond borders. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Keck, M. E., and K. Sikkink. March 1999. “Transnational advocacy networks in international and

regional politics.” International Social Science Journal 51(159), pp. 89–101. Kraft, H. J. S. January 2002. “Track three diplomacy and human rights in Southeast Asia: The Asia

Pacific coalition for East Timor.” Global Networks 2(1), pp. 49–53. Krebs, V. 2004. Social network analysis of the 9-11 terrorist network [Webpage]. orgnet.com,

[Retrieved 22 November 2005]. Available at http://www.orgnet.com/hijackers.html. Laurance, E. 2002. “Shaping global public policy on small arms: After the UN conference.” The

Brown Journal of World Affairs 9(1), pp. 193–201. Levitt, M. 2004a. “The Hizballah threat in africa.” Policy Watch 823. The Washington Institute

for Near East Policy. Available at http://www.ciaonet.org/pbei/winep/policy 2004/2004 823/ 2004 823.html.

Levitt, M. Winter-Spring 2004b. “Networks of relationships case study: Abu Musab al Zarqawi.” SAIS Review 24(1).

Levitt, M. Winter–Spring 2004c. “Untangling the terror web: Identifying and counteracting the phenomenon of crossover between terrorist groups.” SAIS Review 24(1), pp. 33–48.

Madani, B. January 2002. “Hezbollah’s global finance network: The triple frontier.” Middle East Intelligence Bulletin 4(1). Available at http://www.meib.org/articles/0201 l2.htm.

Mannes, A. 2004. Profiles in terror: A guide to Middle East terrorist organizations. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Mason, M. Autumn 2004. “Representing transnational environmental interests: New opportunities for non-governmental organisation access within the World Trade Organisation?” Environmental Politics 13(3), pp. 566–589.

Meehan, H. V. December 2004. “Terrorism, diasporas, and permisive threat environment. A study of Hizballah’s fundraising operations in Paraguay and Ecuador.” Navel Postgraduate School. Ac- cessed through the Foundation of American Scientists at http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/hizb- fund.pdf.

Meyer, John W., John Boli, George M. Thomas, and Francisco O. Ramirez. 1997. “World society and the nation-state.” American Journal of Sociology 103(1), pp. 144–181.

Muradian, R., J. Martinez Alier, and H. Correa. October 2003. “International capital versus local population: The environmental conflict of the Tambogrande Mining Project, Peru.” Society & Natural Resources 16(9), pp. 775–792.

O’Neill, K. Summer 2004. “Transnational protest: States, circuses, and conflict at the frontline of global politics.” International Studies Review 6(2), pp. 233–252.

38 V. Asal et al.

Peacock, M. December 22, 2000. “Protests hit london as Kurds takeover famous landmark.” Saint Petersburg Times. Available at http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?action id=2&story id=13751.

Perreault, T. January 2003. “Changing places: Transnational networks, ethnic politics, and community development in the Ecuadorian Amazon.” Political Geography 22(1), pp. 61–88.

Price, R. Summer 1998. “Reversing the gun sights: Transnational civil society targets land mines.” International Organization 52(3), pp. 613–644.

Price, R. M. July 2003. “Transnational civil society and advocacy in world politics.” World Politics 55(4), pp. 579–606.

Raab, Jorg, and H. Brinton Milward. 2003. “Dark networks as problems.” Journal of Public Administration Research & Theory 13(4), pp. 413–489.

Ranstorp, M. Autumn 1994. “Hizbollah’s command leadership: Its structure, decision-making and relationship with Iranian clergy and institutions.” Terrorism & Political Violence 6(3), pp. 303– 339.

Raphaeli, N. Winter 2003. “Financing of terrorism: Sources, methods, and channels.” Terrorism & Political Violence 15(4), pp. 59–83.

Rodrigues, M. G. M. June 2005. “Global environmentalism and local politics: Transnational advocacy networks in Brazil, Ecuador, and India.” Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare 32(2).

Rodriguez-Garavito, C. A. June 2005. “Global governance and labor rights: Codes of conduct and anti-sweatshop struggles in global apparel factories in Mexico and Guatemala.” Politics & Society 33(2).

Rootes, C. December 2002. “Global visions: Global civil society and the lessons of European environmentalism.” Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations 13(4), pp. 411–429.

Rutherford, K. 2000. “The evolving arms control agenda: Implications of the role of NGOs in banning antipersonnel landmines.” World Politics 53(1), pp. 74–114.

Sageman, M. 2005. Understanding terror networks. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Sageman, M. 2005. “Understanding jihadi networks.” Strategic Insights 4(4). Sanderson, T. M. Winter–Spring 2004. “Transnational terror and organized crime: Blurring the lines.”

SAIS Review 24(1), pp. 49–61. Schneider, J. and P. Schneider. 2002. “The mafia and Al Qaeda: Violent secretive organizations in

historical perspective.” American Anthropologist 104(3), pp. 776–782. Schweitzer, Y. and S. Shay. 2003. The globalization of terror: The challenge of Al-Qaida and the

response of the international community. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers. Scruton, R. 2002. The West and the rest: Globalization and the terrorist threat. Wilmington, DE:

Intercollegiate Studies Institute Books. Sikkink, K. September 1998. “Transnational politics, international relations theory, and human rights.”

Political Science and Politics 31(3), pp. 516–523. Sikkink, K. Summer 1993. “Human rights, principled issue-networks, and sovereignty in Latin

America.” International Organization 47(3), pp. 411–441. Smith, P. 2002. “Transnational terrorism and the Al Qaeda model: Confronting new realities.”

Parameters 32(2), pp. 33–46. Stanislawski, B. H. Spring 2004. “Transnational “bads” in the globalized world.” Public Integrity

6(2), pp. 155–170. Stern, J. 2003. Terror in the name of God: Why religious militants kill. New York: Ecco/Harper

Collins. Stillerman, J. Winter 2003. “Transnational activist networks and the emergence of labor internation-

alism in the NAFTA countries.” Social Science History 27(4), pp. 577–601. Takeyh, R. Summer 2002. “Do terrorist networks need a home?” The Washington Quarterly 25(3),

pp. 97–108. Thomas, D. C. April 2002. “Boomerangs and superpowers: International norms, transnational

networks and US foreign policy.” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 15(1), pp. 25–44. Thomas, T. Spring 2003. “‘Al Qaeda and the internet: The danger of ‘cyberplanning.’” Parameters

33(1), pp. 112–123.

Terrorism as Transnational Advocacy 39

Trubek, D. M., J. Mosher, et al. Fall 2000. “Transnationalism in the regulation of labor relations: International regimes and transnational advocacy networks.” Law & Social Inquiry 25(4), pp. 1187–1211.

Tucker, David. 2001. “What is new about the new terrorism and how dangerous is it?” Terrorism & Political Violence 13(3), pp. 1–14.

Van de Voorde, C. 2005. “Sri Lankan terrorism: Assessing and countering the threat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).” Police Practice and Research: An International Journal 6(2), pp. 181–199.

Wayland, S. 2004. “Ethnonationalist networks and transnational opportunities: The Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora.” Review of International Studies 30(3), pp. 405–426.

Wieviorka, M. May 2005. “After new social movements.” Social Movement Studies 4(1), pp. 1–19. Wright, L. August 2, 2004. The terror web. The New Yorker. Zanini, M. and S. Edwards. 2001. “The networking of terror in the Information Age,” in Networks

and netwars: The future of terror, crime and militancy. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation. Zanini, Michele. 1999. “Middle Eastern terrorism and netwar.” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 22(3),

pp. 247–256. Zippel, K. Spring 2004. “Transnational advocacy networks and policy cycles in the European Union:

The case of sexual harassment.” Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State and Society 11(1), pp. 57–85.

Clandestine/Hidden Organizations CYNTHIA STOHL and MICHAEL STOHL University of California, Santa Barbara, USA

Clandestine organizations are composed of groups of people who keep their affiliations secret and conceal internal and external organizational activities. They have been vari- ously described as underground organizations, secret societies, illicit or dark networks, enclaves, black markets, backstreet businesses, anonymous agencies, gangs, covert col- lectives, hidden organizations, and shadow states. Many of these descriptors are laden with negative connotations; the terms “clandestine” or “hidden” are used in this entry to denote any sort of organizing that is intentionally shrouded from view. Since the early 2000s, the prominence and notoriety of clandestine organizations have made them the subject of much discussion, debate, and research. Pundits, politicians, scholars, and the popular press are filled with stories and reflections about the relationship between digital communication technology and the rise of secret organizations like the hacker activist group Anonymous, terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS, cyber drug car- tels, including the notorious Sinaloa cartel, and anonymous markets like the Silk Road, known for selling illegal drugs on the web. Likewise, much greater attention has been drawn to the clandestine aspects and behaviors of organizations that exist within the government sphere, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (Hoerl & Ortiz, 2015) and NSA (the National Security Agency, aka “No such Agency”) in the US, and GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) in the UK as a result of the Snowden revelations.

Research history

It is not just the affordances of the “dark net” and the covert protocols of servers like TOR (TheOnionRouter) that havemade hidden organizations and organizing possible. Clandestine organizations and secret societies have existed for centuries, conducting their business in hidden spaces and places, concealingmembership rosters,maintaining secret rituals, and keeping their identities and their ultimate goals strategically opaque. For example, the Knights Templar, a clandestine religiousmilitary group, was formed in the 12th century and had secret initiations and furtive financial holdings. The Knights of the Golden Circle was a 19th-century proslavery secret society whose most infa- mous member was John Wilkes Booth, the American who assassinated US President Abraham Lincoln in 1865. Many visible organizations have clandestine counterparts. The Freemasons was a well-known secret society that began in 1717 and had power- ful members such as GeorgeWashington.This fraternal organization continues to exist

The International Encyclopedia of Organizational Communication. Craig R. Scott and Laurie K. Lewis (General Editors), James R. Barker, Joann Keyton, Timothy Kuhn, and Paaige K. Turner (Associate Editors). © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2017 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. DOI: 10.1002/9781118955567.wbieoc022

2 CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS

today; members and some of its activities are well known and “legitimate,” but its inner workings remain awash with secrecy. Criminal secret organizations like the Mafia, ter- rorist groups including the Irish Republican Army (IRA), collegiate secret societies like The College of William and Mary’s “Flat Hat Club” founded in 1750 (Thomas Jeffer- son was a member), and backstreet businesses that include gambling and prostitution “houses” have long been of concern in the predigital era.

In 1906, sociologist Georg Simmel first published what was to become the seminal work on clandestine organizations, “The Sociology of Secrecy and of Secret Societies” (1906). Many of Simmel’s ideas regarding the influence of clandestine organizations on larger society are still cornerstones of contemporary social science research and the wayswe think about these organizations. For example, two of his propositions regarding the dynamics of secret collectives remain central concerns for contemporary schol- arship on clandestine organizing and continue to generate attention in our local and global communities: first, the breadth and depth of a clandestine organization’s span of control goes beyond the organization and permeates its members’ personal and social lives; second, the power of clandestine organizations is elaborated by manipulating the ratio of public knowledge to ignorance.

Today we recognize that clandestine organizations may be legal or illicit, profit or nonprofit, ideologically or socially grounded, and may promote prosocial behavior or embody antisocial values and activities. We know that these are organizations whose communication structures and patterns are unique and powerful. But because they operate in the shadows they are hard to study and analyze. What we do know, how- ever, suggests that clandestine organizations are a significant and embedded part of the contemporary organizational landscape; they recruit and socialize members in unique ways, they simultaneously are known and unknown to society, they exert influence on legitimate enterprise, and, although they are hard to see and understand, we ignore them at our peril.

The communicative constitution of clandestine organizations

In communication terms, a clandestine organization is a social network defined by “a persisting pattern of relationships which directly and indirectly links the participants in related secret activities” (Erickson, 1981, p. 189). From religious cults to university societies, terrorist cells to criminal cartels, intelligence agencies to black markets, these networks are part of the ebb and flow of domestic and global business, politics, cul- ture, and social relations. What distinguishes these groups from one another and from nonclandestine organizations is (1) the degree of organizational visibility– that is, how recognizable or identifiable it is to the public at large; (2) member identification – that is, the degree to which members express through words or behavior their identifica- tion with the organization; and (3) the relevant audience – that is, who are the central stakeholders and audiences for the organization (see Scott, 2013). But as varied as the goals, motives, reputation, identity, infrastructure, and activities of clandestine organi- zations may be, they have three common characteristics that insure a level of shrouded

CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS 3

secrecy not associated with other types of organizations (Stohl & Stohl, 2011). These characteristics have been the focus of recent communication research.

The first characteristic is that there ismutual agreement within the organization that bona fide members keep their association with the organization secret for some signifi- cant period of time. This creates several communication challenges. Gambetta (2009, pp. 149–150), who focuses on criminal organizations, identifies three problems: the communication problem, the identification problem, and the advertising problem.The response from clandestine organizations has been the development of what Gambetta labels signs and signals.The communication problem refers to howmembersmay com- municate with colleagues but not allow the interception or understanding of the mes- sage by outsiders.The identification problem concerns how to identify fellowmembers not yet known, while not being recognized by a third party (see also Morselli, Gigu’ere, & Petit, 2009). Thus, clandestine organizations often develop identity markers, includ- ing secret handshakes, tattoo markings, nicknames, hand gestures, code words, and other symbolic totems that are largely indecipherable to outsiders but meaningful for insiders. These markers enable members to identify and interact with other members while remaining unidentifiable to the outside world. The advertising problem refers to how organizations advertise their goods and services to people they do not know such that connections can be made without putting the organization at risk. But being able to identify and communicate with other members is not enough. Organizations need to solve the advertising problem and they need to recruit new members over time if they are to thrive or even just survive. But this is a very dangerous and risky activity. Clandestine organizations need to attract new members without letting others find out about the organization. Thus, they have to recruit in nontraditional ways, bypassing conventional avenues of marketing or posting job openings or recruitment materials on publically available open media sources and professional networks. Studies have shown that recruitment of new affiliates is through trusted networks of like-minded individuals, kinship and ethnic networks where in-group identities have already been established, or connections with other clandestine, sympathetic, or front organizations that hide the clandestine organization within it. Studies have typically shown that clan- destine networks based on kinship ties are more sustaining than those built on ideolog- ical commonalities (Mincheva & Gurr, 2013). Clearly, understanding the recruitment patterns and socialization dynamics of clandestine organizations is an important step in developing strategies and policies to intervene in their sustained development (on confronting al-Qaeda, e.g., see Eilstrup-Sangiovanni & Jones, 2008).

The second characteristic of clandestine organizations is that internal activities and governance structures are kept hidden from the public. For a long time, scholars assumed that all secret organizations were hierarchically organized with a well-articulated com- mand and control structure in place to ensure secrecy and adherence to organizational rules and expectations. More recent research has shown this is no longer the case, if it ever was. Clandestine organizations may be highly bureaucratized or loosely con- nected, centralized or decentralized, extremely ritualized with strong socialization rou- tines for newmembers or emergent systems that are highly flexible and entrepreneurial (Scott, 2013). Because of the surreptitious and changing nature of the organizational structure, policies and interventions designed to eliminate clandestine organizations

4 CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS

are quite precarious. Research suggests that the assumptions made by most politicians and law enforcement that clandestine organizations have similar hierarchical network structures, for example, has resulted in serious miscalculations about the magnitude, pervasiveness, and ability of drug cartels, human traffickers, or terrorist organizations to survive the capture, arrest, or death of significant portions of the leadership (Stohl & Stohl, 2007). Scholarship on social movements and the “public secret sphere” also show how clandestine organizing often entangles transparent organizations with shad- owed organizations, creating organizational hybrids and alternative structures that are difficult to monitor, regulate, or control (Bratich, 2014).

The third characteristic, namely, that external traces of the existence of the organization eventually become known (or at least rumored) outside the membership, but may remain hidden for very long periods of time, is associated with the degree to which the clandes- tine organization is embedded within the fabric of society. During World War II, the Franc-Tireurs et Partisans, a well-known resistance movement, operated furtively, but within local communities therewas tacit acknowledgment that they existed. Although it is clearly impossible to track the number of secret organizations we do not know about, ironically many clandestine groups have names that are extraordinarily well known, are or were in the public’s consciousness, and, in more than a few cases in the con- temporary period, have their own websites (e.g., www.kkkknights.com). The Ku Klux Klan, the Los Angeles Crips, the Japanese Yakuza, and the Sons of Liberty are just a few examples of groups with global reputations that have long and continuing histories. In the case of the Mafia, it has a powerful reputation; the public knows it exists because its daily lives are affected by the Mafia’s criminal activity, including extortion activi- ties that make it feared and the favors the organization bequeaths upon the community to try and build rapport and trust. Consequently, newspaper stories about the Mafia are commonplace, and its portrayal in popular media sensationalizes and/or glamor- izes the organization. But still, most of the actual organizational activity and Mafia practices remain hidden from sight. Similarly, in the case of the collegiate undergrad- uate secret society Skull and Bones, most Yale students and administrators know that the organization exists and are even aware that their membership roster has included US presidents, senators, and Supreme Court justices. Little is known, however, about their practices and routines. Only traces of the organization have entered public con- sciousness; members pledge to keep organizational business concealed and this has remained an honored tradition. The incomplete details and popular culture framing of clandestine systems, such as prostitution enterprises, gangs, or illegal immigration networks, sometimes lead to exaggerated, misguided, and inflated views of the size, organizing competencies, and collaborative dynamics of these hidden systems, giving them enhanced prestige and power beyond their actual operational capabilities (Egley & O’Donnell, 2009).

The study of clandestine/hidden organizations

By their very nature, clandestine organizations are difficult to study. At the most basic level it is often difficult to even know if an organization is clandestine or not. For

CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS 5

example, several contemporary organizations with early connections to the secret rituals and meetings associated with Freemasonry (such as the National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) are still seen by many as clandestine organizations where, beyond the basic membership level, there are higher levels at which you must swear oaths and partake in secret rituals (Rich & Merchant, 2003).

But even when scholars are fully aware that a clandestine organization exists, it is still especially challenging to study such groups. Traditional methods of research from both social scientific and humanistic perspectives (e.g., member surveys, interviews, experi- ments, content analysis of archival data, participant observation, and case studies) rely upon some degree of openness and transparency in the organization. Because secrecy is the defining feature of clandestine organizations, it is also very difficult to get human subject approval for any type of research protocol, and often there are ethical issues surrounding the collection and dissemination of the information.

Therefore, many methods used to study clandestine organizations are unconven- tional and at times controversial. For example, a great deal of journalistic work has been done by undercover agents (people who join the organization on false pretenses in order to learn the its secrets) who then partner with a journalist or scholar to articu- late and publicize their narratives and conclusions. One of the most extreme examples is described in Jacobs’s (2002) book Friend of the Family, which recounts the experi- ences of FBI undercover agent Edgar Robb, the only undercover agent to rise to the ranks of Mafia boss. In academic writing, research is sometimes also based on data gained by an undercover researcher who joins a group, such as a religious cult, with- out informing other members that the real reason for his or her membership is to learn about the organization (Lauder, 2011). It is more common, however, to find case studies based on a researcher’s own experiences as a bona fide member of a clandes- tine organization, as Rios (2011) did, or as a trusted confidant as Conquergood (1994) did in his work with Albany Park, Illinois residents, including members of the Latin Kings gang.

More conventional methods used to study clandestine organizations include inter- viewing informers (people who are, or were, members of the organization) and archival analyses of newspaper coverage or diaries of members. For example, Shu (2002) con- ducted in-depth interviews with 14 Taiwanese residents living in the United States who were members of an underground political group, and also published datasets about the activist demographic characteristics. Archival data has also been creatively used by scholars to investigate the social networks of Australian drug trafficking syndicates by analyzing judges’ sentencing comments (Bright, Hughes, & Chambers, 2012). Qualitative analyses of court cases related to clandestine drug laboratories found that the best intervention policies focused on location, chemicals, and equipment rather than on individual members of the clandestine organization (Townsley, 2011). Many communication scholars are also interested in how media portray particular types of clandestine organizations, most especially terrorist organizations. Because it is so difficult to obtain data about clandestine organizations, scholars often use a multi-method approach. To find out how women became engaged with illegal abortion clinics in Africa, for example, researchers interviewed women whose abortions had led

6 CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS

to complications and hence were under a doctor’s care, but, to enrich the study, these data were supplemented with focus group discussions, case study analyses, and key informant interviews (Osur et al., 2015).

Not surprisingly, the unprecedented growth of the internet, cybercrime, and online extremism have led to the development of new tools to collect and analyze dark web forums quantitatively as well as qualitatively (Ful, Abaasi, & Chen, 2010). Furthermore, the digital environment has given a new twist to traditional methods. For example, in one study of the motives, structure, and practices of Silk Road participants, the researchers were only able to recruit a participant informant after they had cultivated a lengthy relationship building phase on the silk road chat forum (Van Hout & Bingham, 2013). In a study designed to answer questions of identity development in clandestine systems, Dobusch & Shoeneborn (2015) relied upon a renowned journalist, who served as a trusted intermediary for interviews with key Anonymous hacktivists in order to develop a framework for analyzing publicly available “Anonymous” communication episodes (e.g., online texts from Twitter, Facebook, and the news media).

Studying clandestine organizations not only challenges researchers to develop appro- priate methods and address ethical concerns, but also raises theoretical issues that must be addressed.Most organizational and communication theories assume that interaction is knowable in some empiricalmanner, whether it be through self-reports, observations, or textual artifacts. Despite their vast differences in perspectives, the propositions, con- structs, and hypothesized relationship embedded in classical organizational theories (such as contingency theory, resource dependency theory, and institutional theory), as well as the arguments presented in more recent organizational theories (such as the communicative constitution of organizations, feminist theory, critical theory, and post- modernism), are all based on a “transparency principle” (Stohl & Stohl, 2011). This principle posits that although in all organizations there is some degree of mystery and not everything about the organization is public (strategies, finances, production, even motives may remain intentionally concealed), organizations are evolving empirical sys- tems that are knowable through conversations across multiple networks, texts and dis- course, observable communities of practice, articulated multiple voices, overt symbols and rituals, andmanifest aswell as latentmatrices of relational ties. In otherwords, these theories assume there are organizational dynamics, explicit goals and regulations, and relations and structures that can be empirically observed in some form. Nonclandestine organizations typically have clear makers for who does and who can speak for the orga- nization, a documented history and acknowledged narrative that enables scholars to contextualize the present organization, and a relatively clear delineation and definition of members. But this is not the case for clandestine organizations.Thus, new theoretical frameworks and new approaches to how to learn about organizations will continue to develop.

Clandestine/hidden organizations in the future

Technological innovations and future advancements will enable scholars and practi- tioners to more easily access the distinct features of clandestine organizations in the

CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS 7

future. The burgeoning use of social media provides entry into these organizations in ways that were never before deemed possible. The new analytic tools and web crawlers that are being developed will uncover traces of clandestine activity and links that were heretofore unavailable for analysis. Big datasets, new spatial recognition techniques, longitudinal network analyses, and sentiment analyses are just a few of the new ways in which researchers (and government intelligence agencies such as the NSA and GCHQ) can discover previously unseen communication patterns as well as explore newly rich sets of discourse about and from clandestine organizing. Of course, as researchers begin to use these powerful tools to learn about clandestine organizing, ethical dilemmas will continue to surface. Issues of surveillance and researcher/informant trust, and ques- tions of whether to publish secret information that might be detrimental to the wel- fare of individuals or nations (as was argued by governments in the context of the Snowden revelations) are all part of the research process. Making secrets public is not only enlightening, but also potentially dangerous for individuals both directly and not directly involved in the surreptitious activities.

Ironically, at the same time that digital technologies are enabling researchers to infiltrate more deeply the distinct and unique world of clandestine organi- zations, they are also making the study of clandestine organizations even more complex. The affordances of digital media have problematized the meaning of membership. Until recently, organizational membership had clear properties. Membership was bound in time and space and defined by the exchange of formal commitments. Today, as the boundaries between what is private and/or public or collective and/or individual action are blurred, it is increasingly difficult for researchers, law enforcement officials, and policymakers to know how to draw the line between members of the KKK, for example, and those who go online and share their racist materials and views with friends. This raises questions about whether the consumption and sharing of such communications constitute mem- bership in the network or organization. Underspecifying linkages or exaggerating connections has important theoretical as well as practical consequences for under- standing why clandestine organizations develop and the dynamics that keep them flourishing.

Clandestine organizations have been a significant part of the past and our present, and will undoubtedly continue to be so in the future. It is critical that we continue to strive to understand them. A special issue of Management Communication Quarterly, edited by Scott (2015), represents some of the latest conceptual/theoretical and empirical approaches being used to understand hidden organizations. Grounded in the dialectic tensions of visibility–invisibility and revelation–concealment (Wolfe & Blithe, 2015) as well as the communicative constitution of organization (Bean & Buikema, 2015), these studies embody a new generation of communication scholarship.

SEE ALSO: Communication & Terrorist Organizations; Information and Communi- cation Technologies (ICTs) in Organizations; Networks, Communication Networks; Privacy and Secrecy; Surveillance; Transparency

8 CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS

References

Bean, H., & Buikema, R. (2015). Deconsituting al-Qaeda: CCO theory and the decline and dissolution of hidden organizations. Management Communication Quarterly, 29, 512–238. doi:10.1177/0893318915597300

Bratich, J. (2014). Adventures in the public secret sphere: Police sovereign networks and communications warfare. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 14, 11–20. doi:10.1177/1532708613507883

Bright, D., Hughes, C., & Chalmers, J. (2012). Illuminating dark networks: A social network analysis of anAustralian drug trafficking syndicate.Crime, Law and Social Change, 57, 51–176. doi:10.1007/s10611-011-9336-z

Conquergood, D. (1994). Homeboys and hoods: Gang communication and cultural space. In L. R. Frey (Ed.),Group communication in context: Studies of natural groups (pp. 23–55). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Dobusch, L., & Shoeneborn, D. (2015). Fluidity, identity and organizationality: The commu- nicative constitution of anonymous. Journal of Management Studies. Retrieved from http:// onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joms.12139/abstract

Egley, A., Jr., & O’Donnell, C. E. (2009). Highlights of national gang survey. OJJDP factsheet. US Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention NCJ 225185.

Eilstrup-Sangiovanni, M., and Jones, C. (2008). Assessing the dangers of illicit networks. Inter- national Security, 33(2), 7–44. doi:10.1162/isec.2008.33.2.7

Erickson, B. (1981). Secret societies and social structure. Social Forces, 60, 188–210. doi:10.1093/sf/60.1.188

Ful, T., Abbasi, A., & Chen, H. (2010). A focused crawler for dark web forums. Journal of the American Society for Information, Science, and Technology, 61, 1213–1231.

Gambetta, D. (2009). Codes of the underworld: How criminals communicate. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Hoerl, K., & Ortiz, E. (2015). Organizatonal secrecy and the FBI’s COINTELPRO-Black Nationalist hate groups program. Management Communication Quarterly, 29, 590–615. doi:10.1177/0893318915597302

Jacobs, D. (2002). Friend of the family: An undercover agent in the Mafia. Washington, DC: How- ells House.

Lauder, M. (2011). Covert participant observation of a deviant community: Justifying the use of deception. Journal of Contemporary Religion, 18, 185–196. doi:10.1080/1353790032000067518

Mincheva, L. G., & Gurr, T. R. (2013). Crime-terror alliances and the state: Ethnonationalist and Islamist challenges to regional security. New York, NY: Routledge.

Morselli, C., Gigu’ere, C., & Petit, K. (2009). The efficiency/security trade-off in crim- inal networks. Social Networks, 29, 143–153. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ j.socnet.2006.05.001

Osur, J., Orago, A., Mwanzo, I., & Bukusi, E. (2015). Social networks and decision making for clandestine unsafe abortions: Evidence from Kenya. African Journal of Reproductive Health, 19, 34–43.

Rich, O., &Merchant, D. (2003). Religion, policy, and secrecy:The Latter Day Saints andMasons. Policy Studies Journal, 31, 669–678. doi:10.1111/1541-0072.00049

Rios, V. (2011). Street life: Poverty, gangs, and a PhD. California: Five Rivers Press. Scott, C. R. (2013). Anonymous agencies, backstreet businesses and covert collectives; Rethinking

Organizations in the 21st Century. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Scott, C. R. (2015). Bringing hidden organizations out of the shadows: Introduction to the special

issue.Management Communication Quarterly, 29, 503–511. doi:10.1177/0893318915596205

CLANDEST INE/HIDDEN ORGAN IZAT IONS 9

Shu, W. (2002). Who joined the clandestine political organization? Some preliminary evidence from the overseas Taiwan Independence Movement. In S. Corcuff (Ed.). Memories of the future: National identity issues and the search for a new Taiwan (pp. 47–69). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.

Simmel, G. (1906).The sociology of secrecy and of secret societies.American Journal of Sociology, 11, 441–498. doi:10.1086/211418

Stohl, C., & Stohl, M. (2007). Networks of terror: Theoretical assumptions and pragmatic conse- quences. Communication Theory, 17, 93–124.

Stohl, C., & Stohl, M. (2011). Secret agencies: The communicative constitution of a clandestine organization. Organization Studies, 32, 1197–1215. doi:10.1177/0170840611410839

Townsley, M. (2011). Crime script analysis of drug manufacturing in clandestine lab- oratories: Implications for prevention. British Journal of Criminology, 51(2), 355–374. doi:10.1093/bjc/azr005

Van Hout, M., & Bingham, T. (2013). “Silk Road,” the virtual drug marketplace: A single case study of user experiences. International Journal of Drug Policy, 24, 385–391.

Wolfe, A., & Blithe, S. (2015) Managing image in a core-stigmatized organization: Conceal- ment and revelation in Nevada’s legal brothels. Management Communication Quarterly, 29, 539–563.

Cynthia Stohl is professor of communication and Director of the Center for Informa- tion Technology and Society at theUniversity of California, Santa Barbara. Her research focuses on globalization, network processes, and social justice issues, most recently in the context of collective action and corporate social responsibility in the digital media environment.The author of more than 120 articles and book chapters, she has also pub- lished two award-winning books, Organizational Communications: Connectedness in Action (1995) and Collective Action in Organizations: Interaction and engagement in an era of technological change (2012).

Michael Stohl is professor of communication and Director of the Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His research focuses on political and organizational communication with special reference to political violence, terrorism, and human rights. He is the author, editor, or coedi- tor of 15 books and the author or coauthor of more than 100 scholarly journal articles and book chapters, including, with Cynthia Stohl, “Secret agencies: The communica- tive constitution of a clandestine organization,” Organization Studies, 32 (2011), and “Networks of terror: Theoretical assumptions and pragmatic consequences,” Commu- nication Theory, 47 (2007).

Human rights Organizations

Media Strategies, Messages, Platforms and Audiences

11. Comm 153 Spring 2023

Global Center on Cooperative Security

Human Rights Compliance While Countering Terrorism

Author(s): ALEX CONTE

Global Center on Cooperative Security (2008)

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.com/stable/resrep20370

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

Global Center on Cooperative Security is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to this content.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

january 2008

Handbook on Human rights Compliance While Countering Terrorism

by alex ConTe

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Handbook on Human rights Compliance While Countering terrorism

by alex Conte

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

about the author

Dr Alex Conte is a Reader in Law at the University of Southampton, England, where he teaches public international law, counterterrorism, and comparative civil liberties. He was the 2004 New Zealand Law Foundation International Research Fellow, undertaking a comparative study of the interface between counterterrorism and human rights as between New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom. A member of the Advisory Panel of Experts to the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism, Professor Conte is also a fellow to the International Policy Institute on Counter-Terrorism and has acted as a consultant on counterterror- ism to government, international and regional organizations, nongovernmental organizations, and research institutes. Dr. Conte’s research interests are in the areas of counterterrorism and human rights, and the use of force between States. Recent publications include Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights in New Zealand (2007), An Introduction to International Law (2006), Security in the 21st Century: The United Nations, Afghanistan and Iraq (2005), and Defining Civil and Political Rights: The Jurisprudence of the un Human Rights Committee (2004).

The views expressed in this handbook represent those of the author and not necessarily those of the Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation.

The Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation gratefully acknowledges the Ford Foundation for its generous support for this project.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

iii

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

executive summary

In September 2006, the Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation published the Report on Standards and Best Practices for Improving States’ Implementation of un Security Council Counter-Terrorism Mandates.1 The report provided an assessment of core standards and best practices for implementing rel- evant Security Council counterterrorism resolutions. For the purpose of assisting policymakers and practitioners in understanding and implementing the multiple requirements of Security Council Resolution 1373, the report identified three broad areas of counterterrorism implementation: combating terrorist financing, improving legal practice and law enforcement, and enhancing territorial control. It also identified three cross-cutting categories that apply to all implementation requirements: international cooperation, the provision of technical assistance, and compliance with human rights standards.

This Handbook on Human Rights Compliance While Countering Terrorism provides practical guidance on one of the three cross-cutting topics applicable to all aspects of implementation: human rights compliance while countering terrorism. This topic is particularly relevant given the adoption of the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy by the UN General Assembly in September 2006, which underlines the mutually reinforcing relationship between the promotion and protection of human rights and counterterrorism measures. Through the Strategy, all UN member States have committed to adopting mea- sures to ensure respect for human rights and the rule of law as the fundamental basis of the fight against terrorism. They further resolve to take measures aimed at addressing conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism, including viola- tions of human rights and lack of rule of law, and ensure that any measures taken to counter terrorism comply with their obligations under international law, in particular human rights law, refugee law, and international humanitarian law.2

Although sometimes portrayed as an obstacle to an effective response to the threat of terrorism, human rights are a key component of any successful coun- terterrorism strategy. International human rights instruments are structured to respond to conflict and to provide mechanisms to ensure peace and stability. In fact, a commitment to comply with international human rights standards ensures that measures taken to combat terrorism are sustainable, effective, and propor- tionate. Counterterrorism measures that violate human rights standards may instead give rise to adverse effects. Perceived as unjust and discriminatory, they may increase support for militant parts of society and thus diminish rather than enhance security in the long run.

1 See http://www.globalct.org/pdf/060831_CT_report_1.pdf (last accessed December 12, 2007). 2 UN General Assembly, The United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, A/RES/60/288,

September 20, 2006.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

iv

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

The objectives of this Handbook are twofold: first, to provide practical and functional assistance to decision-makers on the subject; and second, to do so in a manner that is able to give proper account to a State’s international human rights obligations, while recognizing the duty of States to protect their societies from terrorism and to contribute to the maintenance of international peace and secu- rity. To that end, this Handbook identifies five conditions applicable to human rights compliance while countering terrorism. These conditions are cumulative in nature and are presented in a chronological manner, enabling the decision- maker to progressively examine the validity of existing or proposed counterter- rorism law and practice.

1. Counterterrorism law and practice must comply with human rights law.

2. The right or freedom to be restricted by counterterrorism measure must allow for limitation.

3. Counterterrorism law and practice must be established by due process.

4. Counterterrorist measures seeking to limit rights must be necessary.

5. Counterterrorist measures seeking to limit rights must be proportional.

In setting out and explaining these conditions, reference is made to interna- tional human rights treaties, norms of customary international law, and vari- ous guidelines and documents that have been adopted or issued concerning or relevant to the subject of counterterrorism and human rights. Key documents3 include:

• the Siracusa Principles on the Limitation and Derogation Provisions in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; 4

• Human Rights Committee’s General Comment 29, States of Emergency; 5

• guidelines of the UN Commissioner for Human Rights in Criteria for the Balancing of Human Rights Protection and the Combating of Terrorism (Commissioner’s Guidelines); 6

• the Council of Europe’s Guidelines on Human Rights and the Fight Against Terrorism (Council of Europe’s Guidelines);7

3 Although not legally binding, these documents and guidelines provide useful references for a generally recognized interpretation of international human rights norms and obligations.

4 UN Commission on Human Rights, Siracusa Principles on the Limitation and Derogation Provisions in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, E/CN.4/1985/4 Annex (1985).

5 UN Human Rights Committee, General Comment 29, States of Emergency (Article 4), CCPR/C/21/ Rev.1/Add.11 (2001), reprinted in Compilation of General Comments and General Recommendations Adopted by Human Rights Treaty Bodies, HRI/GEN/1/Rev.6 (2003) at 186.

6 UN Commission on Human Rights, Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and Follow-up to the World Conference on Human Rights, E/CN.4/2002/18 Annex (2002) (“Proposals for ‘further guidance’ for the submission of reports pursuant to paragraph 6 of Security Council resolution 1373 (2001): Compliance with international human rights standards”) [hereinafter Commissioner’s Guidelines].

7 Council of Europe, Guidelines on Human Rights and the Fight Against Terrorism (Council of Europe Publishing, 2002) [hereinafter Council of Europe’s Guidelines].

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

v

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

• the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights’ Report on Terrorism and Human Rights.8

8 Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Report on Terrorism and Human Rights, OEA/ Ser.L/V/II.116 (October 22, 2002).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Condition �: Counterterrorist law and practice must Comply with Human rights law

�.� the duty to Comply with Human rights

States must ensure that any measures taken to counter terrorism comply with all of their obligations under international law, in particular international human rights law, refugee law, and humanitarian law.

The UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy recognizes the protection and promotion of human rights as an essential component of a sustainable and effective response to the threat of terrorism. In addition to this imperative of public policy, States must comply with their international human rights obliga- tions when countering terrorism. These legal obligations stem from customary international law (applicable to all States)9 as well as from international treaties (applicable to States parties to such treaties).10 As confirmed by world leaders during the 2005 World Summit:

international cooperation to fight terrorism must be conducted in confor- mity with international law, including the [UN] Charter and relevant inter- national conventions and protocols. States must ensure that any measures taken to combat terrorism comply with their obligations under international law, in particular human rights law, refugee law and international humani- tarian law.11

This position is reflected within resolutions of the UN Security Council, General Assembly, the Commission on Human Rights and its successor the Human Rights Council, as well as in reports of the UN Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC).

resolutions of the un securit y council

Security Council resolutions concerning terrorism have confined their attention to the threat of terrorism to international peace and security, reflecting the role of the Security Council as the organ of the United Nations charged with the

9 Military and Paramilitary Activities in and against Nicaragua (Nicaragua v. United States of America) (Merits) [1986] ICJ Reports, 76 ILR 349, paras. 172-201 [hereinafter Nicaragua v. United States of America].

10 See Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 1155 UNTS 331, art. 34. 11 UN General Assembly, 2005 World Summit Outcome, A/RES/60/1 (2005), para. 85.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security.12 That role is reflected in the language and scope of Security Council resolu- tions on terrorism, which, compared with General Assembly and Commission on Human Rights resolutions on the subject, are much narrower in focus. The Security Council’s resolutions generally address the adverse impacts of terrorism on the security of States and the maintenance of peaceful relations only, while the General Assembly and Commission on Human Rights take a much broader approach to the subject given their plenary roles.

Apart from two notable exceptions, the main inference that can be taken from Security Council resolutions about counterterrorism measures and their need to comply with human rights law arises from general statements that counter- terrorism is an aim that should be achieved in accordance with the UN Charter and international law.13 This means that such measures must be compliant with the principles of the Charter (which include the promotion and maintenance of human rights) and human rights law as a specialized subset of international law. Notable is the fact that members of the United Nations have undertaken, under Article 55(c) of and through the preamble to the Charter, to observe human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, language, or religion.

The first, more express exception mentioned is the 2003 Declaration of the Security Council meeting with Ministers of Foreign Affairs, adopted under Resolution 1456. The Declaration directs its attention to the question of compli- ance with human rights, paragraph 6 providing that:

States must ensure that any measure [sic] taken to combat terrorism comply with all their obligations under international law, and should adopt such measures in accordance with international law, in particular international human rights, refugee, and humanitarian law.

Although persuasive in its wording, the status of the Declaration should be noted. The contents of Security Council resolutions, when couched in mandato- ry language, are binding upon members of the United Nations.14 In the context of the Declaration adopted under Resolution 1456, the text of the Declaration is preceded by the sentence, “The Security Council therefore calls for the following steps to be taken” (emphasis added). Such an expression, although influential,

12 Under Article 24 of the UN Charter, the Security Council is charged with the maintenance of interna- tional peace and security, paragraph 1 providing that, “[i]n order to ensure prompt and effective action by the United Nations, its members confer on the Security Council primary responsibility for the main- tenance of international peace and security, and agree that in carrying out its duties under this responsi- bility the Security Council acts on their behalf.”

13 See, for example, Security Council Resolution (SC Res.) 1373 (2001), preambular para. 5; SC Res. 1438 (2002), preambular para. 2; SC Res. 1440 (2002), preambular para. 2; SC Res. 1450 (2002), preambular para. 4; SC Res. 1455 (2003), preambular para. 3; SC Res. 1456 (2003), preambular para. 8; SC Res. 1535 (2004), preambular para. 4; SC Res. 1540 (2004), preambular para. 14; SC Res. 1566 (2004), pre- ambular paras. 3 and 6; SC Res. 1611 (2005), preambular para. 2; SC Res. 1618 (2005), preambular para. 4; SC Res. 1624 (2005), preambular para. 2 and operative paras. 1 and 4.

14 UN member States have agreed to be bound by “decisions” of the Security Council. See UN Charter, art. 25.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

is exhortatory and therefore not a binding “decision” within the meaning of Article 25 of the Charter.15

The second resolution to be considered is Security Council Resolution 1624, adopted in 2005. It is largely focused on the steps States are to take to prevent the incitement to terrorism. Included in the resolution, however, is a provision that repeats the language in Resolution 1456, providing that:

States must ensure that any measures taken to implement paragraphs 1, 2 and 3 of this resolution comply with all of their obligations under interna- tional law, in particular international human rights law, refugee law, and humanitarian law.16

un counter-terrorism committee

In its comprehensive review report of December 2005, which was endorsed by the Security Council, the CTC reiterated that States must ensure that any measure taken to combat terrorism should comply with all their obligations under international law and that they should adopt such measures in accordance with international law, in particular human rights law, refugee law, and humanitarian law.17 It also stressed that the CTC’s Executive Directorate should take this into account in the course of its activities.

resolutions of the un general assembly

The General Assembly has adopted a series of resolutions concerning terrorism since 1972, initially taking the form of resolutions concerning measures to elimi- nate international terrorism, then addressing more directly the topic of terror- ism and human rights, as well as counterterrorism and human rights. The latter series of General Assembly resolutions began in late December 1993, with the adoption of Resolution 48/122, entitled Terrorism and Human Rights.18 Both series of resolutions contain various statements about the need to comply with international human rights standards when implementing counterterrorist mea- sures. A common formulation of this principle is contained in General Assembly Resolution 50/186 (1995):

Mindful of the need to protect human rights of and guarantees for the individual in accordance with the relevant international human rights principles and instruments, particularly the right to life,

15 In the Namibia Advisory Opinion, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) took the position that a resolution couched in nonmandatory language should not be taken as imposing a legal duty upon a member State. Legal Consequences for States of the Continued Presence of South Africa in Namibia (South- West Africa) Notwithstanding Security Council Resolution 276 (1990) (Advisory Opinion) [1971] ICJ Reports 53.

16 SC Res. 1624 (2005), para. 4. 17 UN Counter-Terrorism Committee, Report of the Counter-Terrorism Committee to the Security Council

for Its Consideration as Part of Its Comprehensive Review of the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate, S/2005/800 (2005).

18 General Assembly Resolution (GA Res.) 48/122 (1993).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

Reaffirming that all measures to counter terrorism must be in strict conformity with international human rights standards …

Calls upon States to take all necessary and effective measures in accor- dance with international standards of human rights to prevent, combat and eliminate all acts of terrorism wherever and by whomever committed.19

A slightly less robust expression of these ideas was seen in Resolution 56/88 (2001) following the events of September 11, although still requiring measures to be taken consistent with human rights standards.20 Its language should not be taken as a signal that the General Assembly was minded to turn a blind eye to the adverse impacts of counterterrorism upon human rights. To the contrary, the issue became the subject of annual resolutions on that subject alone, en- titled Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms While Countering Terrorism.21 The first operative paragraphs of these resolutions affirm that:

States must ensure that any measure taken to combat terrorism complies with their obligations under international law, in particular international human rights, refugee and humanitarian law.

These directions on the part of the General Assembly are reasonably strong in their language. It must be recalled, however, that resolutions of the General Assembly do not hold the same weight as international conventions or binding resolutions of the Security Council. Indeed, Article 10 of the Charter specifi- cally provides that resolutions and declarations of the General Assembly are recommendatory only.22 This principle is equally applicable to resolutions of the Commission on Human Rights, as a subsidiary organ of the Economic and Social Council,23 and those of the new Human Rights Council, a subsidiary organ of the General Assembly.24 Thus, the resolutions just discussed, and those of the Human Rights Commission to be discussed, represent guiding principles and nonbinding recommendations (what might be termed “soft law”) rather

19 See GA Res. 50/186 (1995), preambular paras. 13 and 14 and operative para. 3; GA Res. 52/133 (1997), preambular paras. 12 and 13 and operative para. 4; GA Res. 54/164 (1999), preambular paras. 15 and 16 and operative para. 4; GA Res. 56/160 (2001), preambular paras. 22 and 23 and operative paras. 5 and 6; GA Res. 58/174 (2003), preambular paras. 20 and 21 and operative para. 7.

20 GA Res. 56/88 (2001), preambular para. 9 and operative para. 3. The preambular paragraph returned to the language of combating terrorism “in accordance with the principles of the Charter,” and operative paragraph 4 talked of combating terrorism in accordance with international law, “including interna- tional standards of human rights.” For similar statements, see GA Res. 57/27 (2002), preambular para. 8 and operative para. 6; GA Res. 58/81 (2003), preambular para. 9 and operative para. 6; GA Res. 58/136 (2003), preambular para. 10 and operative para. 5; GA Res. 59/46 (2004), preambular para. 10 and operative para. 3.

21 GA Res. 57/219 (2002); GA Res. 58/187 (2003); GA Res. 59/191 (2004). See GA Res. 59/46 (2004), preambular para. 10 and operative para. 3; GA Res. 59/153 (2004), preambular paras. 11 and 12; GA Res. 59/195 (2004), preambular paras. 5, 23, and 24 and operative paras. 8 and 10; GA Res. 60/158 (2005), preambular paras. 2, 3, and 7 and operative para. 1.

22 Article 10 of the UN Charter provides that the “General Assembly may discuss any questions or any matters within the scope of the present Charter or relating to the powers and functions of any organs provided for in the present Charter, and, except as provided in Article 12, may make recommendations to the members of the United Nations or to the Security Council or to both on any such questions or matters.”

23 UN Charter, art. 62(2). 24 The UN Human Rights Council was established by the General Assembly in 2006 under Resolution

60/251 as a subsidiary body of the General Assembly. GA Res. 60/251 (2006).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

than binding resolutions, treaty provisions, or norms of customary international law (“hard law”). Nonetheless, these resolutions are influential and, importantly, representative of international comity. They may also constitute evidence of customary international law, if supported by State conduct that is consistent with the content of the resolutions and with the accompanying opinio juris required to prove the existence of customary law.25

resolutions of the un commission on human rights

The Commission on Human Rights paid considerable attention to the issue of the adverse consequences that counterterrorism can have upon the maintenance and promotion of human rights. It did so even before the flurry of antiterror- ism legislation that followed Security Council Resolution 1373 (2001). Pre-9/11 resolutions of the Commission and its Sub-Commission on the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights affirmed that all States have an obligation to pro- mote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms and that all mea- sures to counter terrorism must be in strict conformity with international law, “including international human rights standards.”26 Post-9/11 resolutions of the Commission became more strongly worded. Two such resolutions were adopted in 2004 alone. The issue was first addressed within the Commission’s annual resolution on human rights and terrorism.27 In a resolution later that month, the Commission again reaffirmed that States must comply with international human rights obligations when countering terrorism.28 The Commission’s Resolution 2005/80, pursuant to which it appointed a Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism, stated at paragraphs 1 and 6 that it:

[r]eaffirms that States must ensure that any measure taken to combat ter- rorism complies with their obligations under international law, in particular international human rights, refugee and humanitarian law…

[r]eaffirms that it is imperative that all States work to uphold and pro-

tect the dignity of individuals and their fundamental freedoms, as well as democratic practices and the rule of law, while countering terrorism.

The 2005 report of the Sub-Commission’s Special Rapporteur on terrorism and human rights also addressed the matter.29 Although the original mandate of this Special Rapporteur was to consider the impact of terrorism on human

25 For an example of the use of General Assembly resolutions to determine the content of customary rules, see Nicaragua v. United States of America, note 9 above (where the ICJ gave consideration to two General Assembly resolutions as evidence of the content of the principle of nonintervention: the Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic Affairs of States, GA Res. 213 [XX] [1965]; and the Declaration on Principles of International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co- Operation Among States, GA Res. 2625 [XXV] [1970]).

26 UN Commission on Human Rights Resolution (CHR Res.) 2001/37, preambular paras. 18 and 19 and operative paras. 7 and 8. Preambular para. 19 was later reflected in preambular para. 13 of UN Sub- Commission on Human Rights Resolution 2001/18.

27 CHR Res. 2004/44, preambular para. 24 and operative paras. 10–12. 28 CHR Res. 2004/87, paras. 1 and 2. 29 Kalliopi Koufa, Specific Human Rights Issues: New Priorities, in Particular Terrorism and Counter-

Terrorism, E/CN.4/Sub.2/2005/39 (June 22, 2005) (working paper).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

rights,30 she commented in her 2004 report that a State’s overreaction to ter- rorism can itself also impact upon human rights. The Sub-Commission Special Rapporteur’s mandate was therefore extended to develop a set of draft principles and guidelines concerning human rights and terrorism. Of note, the first-stated principle under the heading “Duties of States Regarding Terrorist Acts and Human Rights” reads:

All States have a duty to promote and protect human rights of all persons under their political or military control in accordance with all human rights and humanitarian law norms.31

Also of relevance, in September 2003 the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights produced a digest of jurisprudence on the protection of human rights while countering terrorism.32 Its declared aim was to assist policymakers and other concerned parties to develop counterterrorist strat- egies that respect human rights, stating that:

[n]o one doubts that States have legitimate and urgent reasons to take all due measures to eliminate terrorism. Acts and strategies of terrorism aim at the destruction of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. They destabilize [sic] governments and undermine civil society. Govern- ments therefore have not only the right, but also the duty, to protect their nationals and others against terrorist attacks and to bring the perpetrators of such acts to justice. The manner in which counter-terrorism efforts are conducted, however, can have a far-reaching effect on overall respect for human rights.33

The Human Rights Digest considers decisions of UN treaty-monitoring bod- ies, such as the Human Rights Committee, and those of regional bodies, in- cluding the European Court of Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. It looks at general considerations, states of emergency, and specific rights. On the subject of general considerations, two types of jurispru- dence are relevant here. The first emphasizes the duty of States to protect those within their territories from terrorism.34 The second emphasizes the jurispru- dence observing that the lawfulness of counterterrorism measures depends upon their conformity with international human rights law.35

30 This mandate was consequent to the request of the General Assembly for the Commission to do so and through the Commission’s own decision to consider the issue. See GA Res. 49/185 (1994), para. 6; CHR Res. 1994/46.

31 Koufa, note 29 above, para. 25. 32 UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Digest of Jurisprudence of the UN

and Regional Organizations on the Protection of Human Rights While Countering Terrorism, September 2003 [hereinafter Human Rights Digest]. The OHCHR is currently working on an updated edition of the Digest.

33 Ibid., p. 3. 34 Ibid., pp. 11–12. See, for example, UN Human Rights Committee, Delgado Paez v. Colombia,

Communication No. 195/1985, July 12, 1990, para. 5.5. 35 OHCHR, Human Rights Digest, pp. 13–15.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

�.� applicable Human rights law

States are bound by international human rights treaties to which they are party, as well as by human rights norms reflected within customary international law. These obligations have extraterritorial application and continue to apply during armed conflict.

It has been mentioned in the preceding section that States have international human rights obligations under customary international law (applicable to all States) and international treaties (applicable to States parties to such treaties). This pertains to the enjoyment of rights and freedoms by all within the territory of the State, not only nationals of the State. Two aspects concerning the applica- tion of human rights law should be clarified at this point, since these are matters that may be of particular importance to counterterrorism.

the extraterritorial application of human rights law

Particularly important to transnational counterterrorist operations, whether involving military action or the transfer of persons from one jurisdiction to an- other, is the fact that human rights are legally binding upon a State when it acts outside its internationally recognized territory. At a minimum, a State is respon- sible for acts of foreign officials exercising acts of sovereign authority on its terri- tory, if such acts are performed with the consent or acquiescence of the State.36 A State is also obliged to respect and ensure the rights and freedoms of persons within its power or effective control, even if not acting within its own territory.37

the interaction bet ween international humanitarian law and international human rights law

It is also a well-established principle that regardless of issues of classification, international human rights law continues to apply in armed conflict. This is a point made clear, for example, by the Human Rights Committee in its General Comment 31 and confirmed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).38 As explained in its Advisory Opinion Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, the ICJ stated that “the protection offered by human rights conventions does not cease in case of armed conflict, save through the effect of provisions for derogation of the kind to be found in

36 See Agiza v. Sweden, CAT/C/233/2003 (2005); Alzery v. Sweden, CCPR/C/88/D/1416/2005 (2006). 37 See UN Human Rights Committee, General Comment 31, Nature of the General Legal Obligation

on States Parties to the Covenant, CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.13 (2004), reprinted in Compilation of General Comments and General Recommendations Adopted by Human Rights Treaty Bodies, HRI/ GEN/1/Rev.8 (2006) at 235, para. 10; Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Advisory Opinion (2004) ICJ Reports 136, at 179, para. 109.

38 See General Comment 31, note 37 above, para. 11; Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons, Advisory Opinion (1996) ICJ Reports 226, at 240, para. 25.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

article 4” of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).39 The conduct of States involved in armed conflicts must therefore comply not only with international humanitarian law, but also with applicable international human rights law.

39 Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, note 37 above, at 178, para. 106. The ICJ more recently applied both human rights law and international humanitarian law to the armed conflict between the Congo and Uganda. See Armed Activities on the Territory of the Congo (Democratic Republic of the Congo v. Uganda), (Merits) [2005] ICJ Reports, paras. 216–220 and 345(3).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Condition �: the right or Freedom to be restricted by a Counterterrorism measure must allow for limitation

In determining the availability of any measure taken to counter terrorism that seeks to limit a right or freedom, it must be deter- mined whether the right in question is capable of limitation.

Most counterterrorism measures are adopted on the basis of ordinary legislation. In a limited set of exceptional circumstances, some restrictions upon the enjoy- ment of certain human rights may be permissible. Ensuring both the promotion and protection of human rights and effective counterterrorism measures can raise serious practical challenges for States, including, for example, the protection of intelligence sources. These challenges are not insurmountable. States can meet their obligations under international law through the use of the accommoda- tions built into the international human rights law framework. Human rights law allows for the possibility of recourse to limitations in relation to certain rights and, in a very limited set of exceptional circumstances, to derogate from certain human rights provisions.

Where it is understood that certain measures to counter terrorism must go be- yond ordinary legislation that permits the full enjoyment of rights, the first mat- ter to consider is whether the right being impacted is capable of limitation. If it is not, then the counterterrorist measure is impermissible. This question depends on the nature of the right being affected. Although all rights and freedoms are universal and indivisible, they can be classified into four categories:

1. The right is a peremptory norm of customary international law.

2. The right is nonderogable under applicable human rights treaties.

3. The right is only derogable during a state of emergency threatening the life of the nation.

4. The right falls outside one of the three latter categories.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�0

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

�.� peremptory rights at Customary international law (Jus Cogens rights)

Counterterrorist measures may not impose any limitations upon rights or freedoms that are peremptory norms of customary international law.

Rights or freedoms that fall into the category of peremptory norms of customary international law (jus cogens rights) cannot be restricted or limited in any circum- stances. The question of whether or not a specific right qualifies as a peremp- tory norm can be controversial and will not be examined in greater detail in this Handbook.40 It is generally accepted, however, that certain rights hold this abso- lute status. Least controversial is the status of the prohibition against torture (the commission of which is also an international crime).41 The prohibition against torture falls within the category of peremptory norms of international law that may not be subject to any form of limitation (jus cogens).42 The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has also identified the principle of nondiscrimination on the grounds of race as a norm of this character.43

�.� nonderogable rights under Human rights treaties

Where a counterterrorist measure seeks to limit a right that is nonderogable under an applicable human rights treaty, this will normally mean that the measure cannot be adopted, although this will depend upon the particular expression of the right.

The distinction between peremptory rights at customary international law and nonderogable rights under applicable human rights treaties is a fine but

40 For efforts to identify fundamental rights applicable in all circumstances, however, see Richard Lillich, “The Paris Minimum Standards of Human Rights Norms in a State of Emergency,” (1985) 79 American Journal of International Law 1072; UN Commission on Human Rights, Siracusa Principles, note 4 above. For identification by the Human Rights Committee of rights within the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) that reflect norms of general (customary) international law, see General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 13.

41 See generally R v. Bow Street Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex p. Pinochet Ugarte (No. 3) [1999] 2 WLR 827.

42 The International Law Commission has identified this, together with the prohibition against slavery, as a norm of jus cogens. International Law Commission, “Commentary on the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties,” (1966) 2 Yearbook of the International Law Commission 248. See also Matthew Lippman, “The Protection of Universal Human Rights: The Problem of Torture,” (1979) 1(4) Universal Human Rights 25; Bruce Barenblat, “Torture as a Violation of the Law of Nations: An Analysis of 28 U.S.C. 1350 Filartiga v. Pena-Irala,” (1981) 16 Texas International Law Journal 117; Eyal Benvenisti, “The Role of National Courts in Preventing Torture of Suspected Terrorists,” (1997) 8 European Journal of International Law 596; Richard Clayton and Hugh Tomlinson, The Law of Human Rights (Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 381–382; Erika de Wet, “The Prohibition of Torture as an International Norm of Jus Cogens and Its Implications for National and Customary Law,” (2004) 15(1) European Journal of International Law 97.

43 Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, “Statement on Racial Discrimination and Measures to Combat Terrorism,” in Report of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, A/57/18 (2002), 107.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

important one.44 Peremptory rights may not be limited at all. Nonderogable rights, on the other hand, may in certain circumstances be capable of limitation, depending on the particular expression of the right.

Article 4(2) of the ICCPR sets out a list of rights from which no State may derogate, even when a public emergency is declared by a State party to the Covenant. Similar provisions exist within regional human rights treaties, in- cluding Article 15 of the (European) Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and Article 27 of the American Convention on Human Rights.

the list of nonderogable rights

The ICCPR identifies several nonderogable rights and freedoms, including the:

• right to life;

• freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment;

• prohibition against slavery and servitude;

• freedom from imprisonment for failure to fulfill a contract;

• freedom from retrospective penalties;

• right to be recognized as a person before the law;

• freedom of thought, conscience, and religion.45

This list is not exhaustive. The Human Rights Committee has made the point that provisions of the ICCPR relating to procedural safeguards can never be made subject to measures that would circumvent the protection of the nonderogable rights just identified.46 Thus, for example, any trial leading to the imposition of the death penalty must conform to all the procedural requirements of Articles 14 and 15 of the ICCPR.

Referring to Article 4(1) of the ICCPR, which provides that any derogating measures must not be inconsistent with a State’s other international law obliga- tions and must not involve discrimination solely on the ground of race, color, sex, language, religion, or social origin, the Human Rights Committee has also pointed out that the full complement of “nonderogable rights” includes rights applicable as part of obligations under international human rights law, interna- tional humanitarian law, and international criminal law.47 Expanding upon this position, the Committee identified certain rights under customary international law (applicable to all States) as being nonderogable. These include the:

44 See General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 11. 45 ICCPR, 999 UNTS 171, arts. 6, 7, 8(1), 8(2), 11, 15, 16, and 18 (opened for signature December 16,

1966; entered into force March 23, 1976). 46 General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 15. 47 Ibid., paras. 9 and 10.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

• right of all persons deprived of their liberty to be treated with human- ity and with respect for the inherent dignity of the human person;

• prohibition against taking of hostages, abductions, or unacknowledged detention;

• international protection of the rights of persons belonging to minorities;

• deportation or forcible transfer of population without grounds permitted under international law;

• prohibition against propaganda for war or in advocacy of nation- al, racial, or religious hatred that would constitute incitement to discrimination, hostility, or violence.48

the limitation of nonderogable rights

In its General Comment 29, the Human Rights Committee explains that the sta- tus of a substantive right as nonderogable does not mean that limitations or re- strictions upon such a right cannot be justified. The Committee gives the exam- ple of the freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs (Article 18 of the ICCPR).49 Article 18 is listed within Article 4(2) and cannot therefore be derogated from under the Article 4 procedure. This listing does not, however, remove the per- missible limitations upon the right expressed within Article 18(3) (limitations as are prescribed by law that are necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others). Thus, whereas a peremptory right may not be the subject of any limitation at all, a nonderogable treaty right may be capable of limitation depending upon its particular expres- sion. Such a limitation must be both necessary and proportional to the exigen- cies of the situation (see Conditions 4 and 5 herein).50

�.� rights derogable only in states of emergency

Where a counterterrorist measure seeks to limit a right that is only derogable during a state of emergency threatening the life of the nation, the State must determine whether such an emergency exists and invoke the applicable derogation mechanisms.

The third category of rights are those that are only derogable in times of emer- gency threatening the life of the nation. By way of illustration, Article 4 of the ICCPR provides that:

[i]n time of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation and the existence of which is officially proclaimed, the States Parties to the present

48 Ibid., para. 13. 49 Ibid., para. 7. See also ibid., para. 11. 50 See the international guidelines discussed earlier; and General Comment 29, note 5 above, paras. 4 and 5.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Covenant may take measures derogating from their obligations under the present Covenant to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation, provided that such measures are not inconsistent with their other obligations under international law and do not involve discrimination solely on the ground of race, colour, sex, language, religion or social origin.

Assuming that the right in question is one from which a State can derogate (see Condition 2.2), four requirements must be noted, each dealt with next.

determining the existence of a public emergency

The ability to derogate under Article 4(1) of the ICCPR is triggered only “in a time of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation.” The Human Rights Committee has characterized such an emergency as being of an excep- tional nature.51 Not every disturbance or catastrophe qualifies as such. The Committee has commented that even during an armed conflict, measures derogating from the ICCPR are allowed only if and to the extent that the situ- ation constitutes a threat to the life of the nation.52 Whether terrorist acts or threats establish such a state of emergency must therefore be assessed on a case- by-case basis.

Interpreting the comparable derogation provision in Article 15 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the European Court of Human Rights has identified four criteria to determine whether any given situation amounts to “a time of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation”:

1. It should be a crisis or emergency that is actual or imminent.

2. It must be exceptional, such that “normal” measures are inadequate.

3. It must threaten the continuance of the organized life of the community.

4. It must affect the entire population of the State taking measures.53

On the latter point, early decisions of the European Court spoke of an emer- gency needing to affect the whole population. The Court appears to have subse- quently accepted that an emergency threatening the life of a nation might only materially affect one part of the nation at the time of the emergency.54

Outside the immediate aftermath of a terrorist attack or in the situation where clear intelligence exists of an imminent threat of a terrorist act, it is doubtful that

51 General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 2. 52 Ibid., para. 3. 53 See Lawless v. Ireland (No. 3) (1961) ECHR Series A, para. 28; The Greek Case (1969) 12 Yearbook of the

European Court of Human Rights 1, para. 153. 54 Brannigan and McBride v. United Kingdom (1993) ECHR Series A. For contrast, see ibid. (dissenting

opinion of Judge Walsh, para. 2).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

a continual state of emergency caused by the threat of terrorism can exist for the purpose of these derogating provisions.55

proclamation and notice of a state of emergency

Upon establishment that an emergency exists, a proclamation of derogation must be lodged in accordance with the requirements of the particular treaty.56 In the case of the ICCPR, before it can implement any derogating measure(s), a State party must officially proclaim the existence within its territory of a public emergency that threatens the life of the nation.57 Through the intermediary of the UN Secretary-General, a derogating State must also immediately inform other States parties to the ICCPR of the provisions from which it has derogated and the reasons for which it has done so.58 The Human Rights Committee has emphasized that notification should include full information about the measures taken and a clear explanation of the reasons for them, with full documentation attached concerning the relevant law.59 A further communication is required on the date on which a State terminates such derogation.60

review

In the context of the ICCPR derogations provisions, the Human Rights Committee has repeatedly stated that measures under Article 4 must be of an exceptional and temporary nature and may continue only as long as the life of the nation concerned is actually threatened. Thus, it will be important for the derogating State to continually review the situation faced by it to ensure that the derogation lasts only as long as the state of emergency exists.61 The Committee has added that the restoration of a state of normalcy where full respect for the provisions of the ICCPR can again be secured must be the predominant objective of a State party derogating from the Covenant.62 This position was reflected in the 1993 concluding observations of the Committee concerning the derogation of the United Kingdom under the ICCPR, where it recommended that:

[g]iven the significant decline in terrorist violence in the United Kingdom since the cease-fire came into effect in Northern Ireland and the peace pro- cess was initiated, the Committee urges the Government to keep under the

55 See generally UN Commission on Human Rights, Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, paras. 39–41. See also Alex Conte, “A Clash of Wills: Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights,” (2003) 20 New Zealand Universities Law Review 338, 350–354; James Oraa, Human Rights in States of Emergency in International Law (Clarendon Press, 1992); UN Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: Israel, CCPR/C/79/Add.93 (1998), para. 11.

56 For an example, see ICCPR, art. 4(3); General Comment 29, note 5 above, paras. 2 and 17. See also UN Commission on Human Rights, Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, paras. 42–47.

57 ICCPR, art. 4(1). 58 Ibid., art. 4(3). 59 General Comment 29, note 5 above, paras. 5, 16, and 17. 60 ICCPR, art. 4(3). 61 General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 2; Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, paras. 48–50. 62 General Comment 29, note 5 above, paras. 1 and 2.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

closest review whether a situation of “public emergency” within the terms of Article 4, paragraph 1, of the Covenant still exists and whether it would be appropriate for the United Kingdom to withdraw the notice of deroga- tion which it issued on 17 May 1976, in accordance with Article 4 of the Covenant.63

permissible extent of derogating measures

The extent to which a State derogates from any right must be limited “to the ex- tent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation.” Any derogating measure must therefore be both necessary and proportionate, thus calling into consider- ation Conditions 4 and 5 in this Handbook.64 The General Assembly has reaf- firmed that any derogating measures are to be of an exceptional and temporary nature.65 Considering States parties’ reports, the Human Rights Committee has expressed concern over insufficient attention being paid to the principle of proportionality.66

�.� other rights

Where a counterterrorist measure seeks to limit a right that is not a peremptory norm of international law, the limitation upon the right must be within the permissible range of limits provided within the applicable treaty or customary definition of the right.

The final category of rights are those that are neither peremptory, nondero- gable, nor subject to limitation only in states of emergency. The Human Rights Committee has acknowledged in this regard that the limitation of rights is allowed even in “normal times” under various provisions of the ICCPR.67 The permissible scope of the limitation of such rights will primarily depend upon their expression within the human rights treaty. This will give rise to two possible means of limitation, by a definitional mechanism68 and/or by a rights-

63 UN Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, CCPR/C/79/Add.18 (1993), para. 25.

64 General Comment 29, note 5 above, paras. 4 and 5; Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, para. 51. 65 GA Res. 59/191 (2005), para. 2; GA Res. 60/158 (2006), para. 3. See CHR Res. 2005/80, para. 3. 66 See, for example, Concluding Observations of the Human Rights Committee: Israel, note 55 above,

para. 11. 67 General Comment 29, note 5 above. 68 Definitional limitations are ones that fall within the meaning of the words contained in the expression

of the right itself. For example, the right to a fair and open hearing does not provide a person with the right to a hearing that favors the person in all respects. Rather, it guarantees that a person be afforded a “fair” and open hearing. A counterterrorist measure imposing limitations on the disclosure of informa- tion, based upon the need to protect classified security information, might for example be “fair” if the person’s counsel (with appropriate security clearance and restrictions on the sharing of that information) is permitted access to the information.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

specific limitations clause.69 Where it is determined that a specific right allows for limitation or restriction, legislators and decision-makers must examine four key questions in order to comply with international human rights law:

1. Is the limitation set out within a “prescription by law” (see Condition 3.1 herein)?

2. Does the measure pursue one of the objectives permitted within the expression of the right or freedom (see Conditions 4.1 and 4.2)?

3. Is the interference necessary and proportionate (see Conditions 4 and 5)?

4. Is the interference nondiscriminatory (see Condition 3.2)?

69 Rights-specific limitations are those that are authorized by a subsequent provision concerning the cir- cumstances in which the right in question may be limited. In the context of the ICCPR and again using the example of the right to a fair and open hearing, the first two sentences of Article 14(1) express the substance of the right, as just discussed. The next sentence then sets out the circumstances in which it is permissible to limit the right to an “open” hearing, allowing the exclusion of the press for reasons of morals, public order, or national security. The third sentence of Article 14(1) provides that:

[t]he press and the public may be excluded from all or part of a trial for reasons of morals, public order (ordre public) or national security in a democratic society, or when the interest of the private lives of the parties so requires, or to the extent strictly necessary in the opin- ion of the court in special circumstances where publicity would prejudice the interests of justice; but any judgement [sic] rendered in a criminal case or in a suit at law shall be made public except where the interest of juvenile persons otherwise requires or the proceedings concern matrimonial disputes or the guardianship of children.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Condition �: Counterterrorism law and practice must be established by due process

A number of procedural requirements are applicable to ensure that counterterrorist measures are established and undertaken by proper means.

Consideration of Conditions 1 and 2 of this Handbook will lead to the follow- ing conclusions: (1) counterterrorism law and practice must comply with human rights law, and (2) “compliance” with human rights law, by virtue of the flex- ibility incorporated within that body of law, can permit the limitation of certain rights in limited circumstances. Where it is determined that a counterterrorist measure must limit the enjoyment of a right or freedom to achieve its objective(s) and that the right in question is capable of limitation, it is next necessary to determine compatibility of the measure with the procedural requirements of due process. That is, the counterterrorist measure must:

1. be prescribed by law,

2. respect the principles of nondiscrimination and equality before the law,

3. impose appropriate restrictions upon discretionary powers,

4. be confined to the objective of countering terrorism.

�.� establishing Counterterrorism measures through legal prescriptions

Counterterrorist measures seeking to impose limitations upon rights and freedoms must be prescribed by law, requiring such prescriptions to be adequately accessible and formulated with sufficient precision so that citizens may regulate their conduct.

Common to all instruments authorizing the limitation of rights, any measure seeking to limit a right or freedom must be prescribed by law. The expression “prescribed by law” has been subject to examination both by domestic and international courts and tribunals with clear pronouncements on its meaning. The term was considered, for example, by the European Court of Human Rights in the Sunday Times case of 1978, where the Court concluded that two require- ments flow from it:

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

1. The law must be adequately accessible so that the citizen has an adequate indication of how the law limits his or her rights.

2. The law must be formulated with sufficient precision so that the citizen can regulate his or her conduct.70

The same language is found in the Commissioner’s Guidelines, the guidelines of the Council of Europe, and the report of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.71 It is likewise reflected in the Human Rights Committee’s General Comment 29 and the Siracusa Principles.72

�.� respect for the principles of nondiscrimination and equality before the law

Counterterrorist measures must respect the principles of nondiscrimination and equality before the law.

To comply with the rule of law, any legal prescription must respect the principles of nondiscrimination and equality before the law.73 As a general principle, a distinction will be considered discriminatory if it has no objective and reasonable justification, it does not have a very good reason for it, or it is disproportionate. In the counterterrorism context, particular attention has to be given to ensure that measures are not adopted or applied that discriminate on grounds of race, religion, nationality, or ethnicity.74 Recent resolutions of the General Assembly and Commission on Human Rights have also stressed that the enjoyment of rights must be without distinction upon such grounds.75

70 Sunday Times v. United Kingdom (1978) 58 ILR 491, 524–527. This test was later reaffirmed by the European Court. See Silver v. UK [1983] 5 EHRR 347.

71 See Commissioner’s Guidelines, note 6 above, paras. 3(a) and 4(a); Council of Europe’s Guidelines, note 7 above, Guideline III; Inter-American Commission on Human Rights report, note 8 above, para. 53.

72 General Comment 29, note 5 above, para. 16; Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, paras. 15 and 17. 73 Consider Albert Venn Dicey’s notion of the rule of law, requiring (1) the regulation of government ac-

tion so that the government can only act as authorized by the law, having the consequence that one can only be punished or interfered with pursuant to the law; (2) the equality of all persons before the law, which is the context in which this document refers to the rule of law; and (3) the requirement of proce- dural and formal justice. See Albert Venn Dicey, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (London: MacMillan, 1885), pp. 175–184.

74 See ICCPR, arts. 4(1) and 26. 75 The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has declared that the prohibition against

racial discrimination is a peremptory norm of international law from which no derogation is permitted. See GA Res. 59/191 (2005), preambular para. 12; CHR Res. 2005/80, preambular para. 15; “Statement on Racial Discrimination and Measures to Combat Terrorism,” note 43 above, 107.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

�.� discretionary powers must not be unfettered

Counterterrorist law must not confer an unfettered discretion, it must not be arbitrarily applied, and it must be implemented by means that establish adequate checks and balances against the potential misuse or arbitrary application of counterterrorist powers.

Counterterrorism measures prescribed by law may involve a conferral of a discretion. This brings two matters into consideration:

1. Any law authorizing a restriction of rights and freedoms must not confer an unfettered discretion on those charged with its execution.

2. Any discretion must not be arbitrarily applied.

Both requirements call for the imposition of adequate safeguards to ensure that the discretion is capable of being checked, with appropriate mechanisms to deal with any abuse or arbitrary application of the discretion. These restric- tions on the conferral of discretions are reflected within the Commissioner’s Guidelines and the guidelines of the Council of Europe, as well as within the Siracusa Principles.76

�.� Confining measures to the objective of Countering terrorism

Counterterrorist measures must be confined to the countering of terrorism.

A final matter relevant to the establishment or review of counterterrorism measures concerns the potential scope of application of any counterterrorist prescription or authorizing provision. The objective of countering terrorism must not be used as an excuse by the State to broaden its powers in such a way that those powers are applicable to other matters. This is an important issue expressly dealt with by the Commission and Sub-Commission Special Rapporteurs on counterterrorism.77 It is also reflected within the guidelines adopted by the Committee of Ministers to the Council of Europe and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. These guidelines require that those measures seeking to limit or restrict rights or freedoms for the purposes of counterterrorism must be defined as precisely as possible and be confined to the sole objective of countering terrorism.78 This principle is relevant to the creation and application of counterterrorism measures.

76 See the Commissioner’s Guidelines, note 6 above, paras. 3(b) and 3(j); Council of Europe’s Guidelines, note 7 above, Guideline II; Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, paras. 16 and 18.

77 See Martin Scheinin, Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms While Countering Terrorism, A/60/370 (2005), para. 47; Koufa, Specific Human Rights Issues, note 29 above, para. 33.

78 See Council of Europe’s Guidelines, note 7 above, Guideline III(2); Inter-American Commission on Human Rights report, note 8 above, paras. 51 and 55; Siracusa Principles, note 4 above, para. 17.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�0

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

Although seemingly unproblematic in theory, this issue may pose consider- able difficulties in practice due to the lack of a universally agreed-upon defini- tion of “terrorism.” The first substantive report of the UN special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism, however, provides a useful starting point to address these practical challenges.79

links to existing operational definitions (“trigger offenses”)

None of the 13 universal terrorism-related conventions and protocols contain a comprehensive definition of “terrorism.” Rather, the conventions are operational in nature and confined to specific subjects, whether air safety, maritime naviga- tion and platforms, the protection of persons, or the suppression of the means by which terrorist acts may be perpetrated or supported. Neither do resolutions of the various UN bodies expressly adopt a definition.

Nonetheless, several recent instruments utilize a useful trigger in determin- ing what conduct, in the absence of a comprehensive definition, should be characterized as “terrorist” by linking the term to existing conventions related to terrorism. The first is the Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism, which defines a “terrorist offence” as any of the offenses within 10 of the 12 antiterrorism conventions in force at the time of adoption, exclud- ing the Tokyo Convention on Offences and Certain Other Acts Committed on Board Aircraft and the Convention on the Marking of Plastic Explosives for the Purpose of Detection.80 All of the offenses within the Council of Europe Convention are thus linked to offenses created by and definitions within the universal conventions on countering terrorism that are currently in force. A simi- lar approach is taken in Article 2(1)(a) of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism.

The UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism has confirmed that this approach is a proper starting point.81 Although subject specific, the conventions are universal in nature, so that use of offenses described in them can be treated as broadly representative of international consensus.82 By itself, however, this approach is not sufficient to determine what conduct is truly terrorist in nature. The point can be illustrated with reference to the Tokyo Convention on Offences

79 Martin Scheinin, Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, E/CN.4/2006/98 (2005), chap. III. 80 “Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism,” 16 Council of Europe Treaty Series 196

(adopted May 16, 2005, not entered into force as of July 2006). The list of conventions mirrors the list contained within the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, but also includes the latter convention.

81 Scheinin, note 79 above, para. 33. 82 This approach must be qualified in one respect, to note that this linkage is not applicable in the case of

the Convention on the Marking of Plastic Explosives for the Purpose of Detection. Because the conven- tion does not actually proscribe any conduct but instead places obligations upon states relating to the marking of explosives, it cannot be used as a “trigger offence” treaty. “Convention on the Marking of Plastic Explosives for the Purpose of Detection,” ICAO Doc. 9571, arts. 2 and 3(1) (opened for signa- ture March 1, 1991; entered into force June 21, 1998).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

and Certain Other Acts Committed on Board Aircraft. The Convention calls on States to establish jurisdiction over acts that jeopardize the safety of a civil aircraft or of persons or property therein or that jeopardize good order and discipline on board.83 Although this certainly would capture conduct of a terror- ist nature, the description of acts over which States must establish jurisdiction is very broad and likely also to include conduct with no bearing at all to terrorism.

cumulative characteristics of conduct to be suppressed

The solution to the problem just identified can be drawn from Security Council Resolution 1566 (2004). Although the resolution did not purport to define “terrorism,” it called on all States to cooperate fully in the fight against terror- ism and, in doing so, to prevent and punish acts that have the following three cumulative characteristics:

1. acts, including against civilians, committed with the intention of caus- ing death or serious bodily injury, or the taking of hostages; and

2. irrespective of whether motivated by considerations of a political, phil- osophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or other similar nature, also committed for the purpose of provoking a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons, intimi- dating a population, or compelling a government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act; and

3. such acts constituting offences within the scope of and as defined in the international conventions and protocols relating to terrorism.84

The third criterion represents the “trigger offense” approach discussed above. The important feature of the resolution is the cumulative nature of its charac- terization of terrorism, requiring the trigger offense to be accompanied with the intention of causing death or serious bodily injury or the taking of hostages, for the purpose of provoking terror, intimidating a population, or compelling a government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act. This cumulative approach acts as a safety threshold to ensure that it is only conduct of a truly terrorist nature that is identified as terrorist conduct.85 Not all acts that are crimes under national or even international law are acts of terrorism, nor should be defined as such.86

By way of further example, there are clear parallels between acts of terrorism and other international crimes, including crimes against humanity, whether in

83 “Convention on Offences and Certain Other Acts Committed on Board Aircraft,” 704 UNTS 219, arts. 1(1), 1(4), and 3(2) (opened for signature September 14, 1963; entered into force December 4, 1969).

84 SC Res. 1566 (2004), para. 3. 85 A cumulative approach is, in fact, the one taken in defining prohibited conduct under the International

Convention Against the Taking of Hostages. Hostage-taking is defined as the seizure or detention of a person (a hostage) accompanied by a threat to kill, injure, or continue to detain the hostage in order to compel a third party to do or to abstain from doing any act. To that extent, hostage-taking, as de- scribed, encapsulates all three characteristics identified within Security Council Resolution 1566.

86 Scheinin, note 79 above, para. 38.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

the terms set out in the Statute of the International Criminal Court or in the proscription of such crimes under general international law. As already identified, the Security Council, General Assembly, and Commission on Human Rights have also identified terrorism as something that:

• endangers or takes innocent lives;

• has links with transnational organized crime, drug trafficking, money laundering, and trafficking in arms as well as illegal transfers of nuclear, chemical, and biological materials;

• is also linked to the consequent commission of serious crimes such as murder, extortion, kidnapping, assault, the taking of hostages, and robbery.87

Notwithstanding such linkages, counterterrorism must be limited to the countering of offenses within the scope of and as defined in the international conventions and protocols relating to terrorism or to the countering of associated conduct called for in Security Council resolutions, including the requirements as set out in Resolution 1566.88

87 See SC Res. 1269 (1999), preambular para. 1; SC Res. 1373 (2001), para. 4; SC Res. 1377 (2001), para. 6; SC Res. 1456 (2003), preambular paras. 3 and 6; SC Res. 1540 (2004), preambular para. 8; GA Res. 3034 (XXVII) (1972), para. 1; GA Res. 31/102 (1976), para. 1; GA Res. 32/147 (1977), para. 1; GA Res. 34/145 (1979), para. 1; GA Res. 36/109 (1981), para. 1; GA Res. 48/122 (1993), preambular para. 7; GA Res. 49/185 (1994), preambular para. 9; GA Res. 50/186 (1995), preambular para. 12; GA Res. 52/133 (1997), preambular para. 11; GA Res. 54/164 (1999), preambular para. 13; GA Res. 56/160 (2001), preambular para. 18; GA Res. 58/136 (2004), preambular para. 8; GA Res. 58/174 (2003), pre- ambular para. 12; CHR Res. 2001/37, preambular para. 16 and operative para. 2; CHR Res. 2004/44, preambular para. 7.

88 The recently adopted International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism is at odds with this cumulative approach. The Convention requires States parties to prohibit the possession or use of nuclear material or devices with the intent (1) to cause death or serious bodily injury, (2) to cause serious property damage or damage to the environment, or (3) to compel a person, organization or State to do or abstain from doing any act. The wording of Article 2(1) does not fit with Security Council Resolution 1566, treating the resolution’s first two characteristics (intent to cause death or in- jury or the taking of hostages; for the purpose of influencing conduct) as alternative rather than cumula- tive requirements. The UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism has expressed concern that, just as in the case of the Tokyo Convention already discussed, this may capture conduct that does not meet the general criteria for defining what acts are terrorist in nature. See Scheinin, note 79 above, para. 41.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Condition �: Counterterrorist measures seeking to limit rights must be necessary

Where a counterterrorist measure seeks to limit a right, this limitation must be necessary to pursue a pressing objective and rationally connected to the achievement of that objective.

The final two steps in determining whether rights limitations imposed through counterterrorist measures are in compliance with international human rights law involves consideration of the necessity (Condition 4) and proportionality (Condition 5) of such measures. Necessity involves three requirements:

1. The pursuit of an objective permitted by the expression of the right concerned

2. The need for that objective to be pressing and substantial in a free and democratic society

3. The existence of a rational connection between the objective and the measure in question

�.� the pursuit of permissible objectives

Where a counterterrorist measure seeks to limit a right, this limitation must be in furtherance of the permissible objectives identified in the expression of the right.

A matter considered earlier in this Handbook (see Condition 2.4) was that the permissible scope of any limitation of rights will ultimately depend upon their par- ticular expression. A number of human rights and fundamental freedoms codified by international instruments, such as the ICCPR, contain specific references to ob- jectives that may justify limitation or restriction. Those of relevance to counterter- rorism might include the protection of national security, territorial integrity, public order and safety, or the rights and freedoms of others.89 Reference to the particular expression of the right or freedom will be necessary in each case.

89 See, e.g., ICCPR, art. 19(3) (Freedom of Expression, providing that “[i]t may therefore be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary: (a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others; (b) For the protection of national security or of public order, or of public health or morals”).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

�.� pressing and substantial Concerns in a Free and democratic society

In principle, the objective of countering terrorism is one that is pressing and substantial in a free and democratic society and one that may therefore justify the limitation of human rights falling outside the category of peremptory norms. Notwithstanding the importance of counterterrorism per se, however, it is the objective of the particular legislative provision or counterterrorist policy/ measure that must be assessed.

A common feature of rights-limitation provisions, particularly within domestic human rights instruments, is the requirement that any limitation be necessary in a free and democratic society. In this regard, the State has an undeniable duty to protect its nationals; and it cannot be doubted that counterterrorism is a sufficiently important objective in a free and democratic society to warrant, in principle, measures to be taken that might place limits upon rights and free- doms. The fear-inducing nature of terrorist acts has far-reaching consequences. Likewise, the means through which terrorist activities are facilitated have links to other negative conduct and impacts upon individuals, societies, and international security. This is clearly recognized within the international guidelines mentioned and within a multitude of resolutions of the Security Council, General Assembly, and Commission on Human Rights.

There is clear recognition, then, that terrorism impacts both individuals and society as a whole so that the countering of those adverse effects must constitute an important objective in and of itself. Care should be taken not to oversimplify this position. Regard must be had to the objectives of the particular counterter- rorist measure being examined. Paragraph 4 of the Commissioner’s Guidelines advocates that limits must be necessary for public safety and public order (limit- ing this to the protection of public health or morals and for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others); must serve a legitimate purpose; and must be necessary in a democratic society. It will be instructive in this regard to consider the following objectives of counterterrorism law and practice.

the countering of an actual threat of terrorism against the state

Due to the manner in which terrorist organizations operate, it is a very difficult thing to assess the existence and level of the threat of terrorism, whether actual or potential. Determining the actual threat of terrorist acts against the State is a natu- ral starting point for determining the threat of terrorism to the State and the im- portance of the objective of a counterterrorist measure directed to assuaging such a threat. Although the obvious place to begin, evidence of actual threats is not so palpable. Establishing the existence of actual threats relies upon intelligence that, although very important, has its own set of complications.90 Intelligence is not

90 John Lewis, deputy director of the FBI Counterterrorism Division, acknowledged that “[i]ntelligence is an imperfect business at best.” John Lewis, paper presented at ICT’s Fifth International Conference on “Terrorism’s Global Impact,” Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Israel, September 13, 2005.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

always available,91 reliable,92 or properly assessed.93 Further complicating matters, the absence of intelligence does not mean an absence of a threat.

the countering of a potential threat of terrorism against the state

Assessing the threat of terrorist acts against the State, which is to be measured both against the probability of that potential being actualized and the probable consequences of such acts, also relies upon intelligence, but to a lesser extent.94 Potential threats can also be assessed by analyzing the motivation and opera- tional capacity of terrorist networks. In this regard, “operational capacity” refers to the ability of terrorist networks to gain access to the territory or to facili- ties of the State and perpetrate terrorist acts therein. Although States have paid increased attention to border security in the new millennium, transboundary activity and the inexpensive means of perpetrating terrorist acts means that the operational capacity of most terrorist entities should be viewed as being reason- ably high.95 Concerning the second factor in assessing the potential threat of ter- rorism, “motivation” refers (in simple terms) to the question of whether the State is a likely or possible target of terrorist networks.96

the contribution of the measure to the international antiterrorist framework

This next consideration is one that will be common to all States: the question of the State’s contribution to the international framework on antiterrorism and how the measure being examined furthers this objective. US Ambassador to the United Nations John Danforth made this point in an address to the CTC in 2004:

[The Committee] must never forget that so long as a few States are not acting quickly enough to raise their capacity to fight terrorism or are not

91 This is said to be the case leading up to the Bali bombings of October 2002 and 2005 and the London bombings in July 2005. Concerning the 2002 Bali bombings, see Mark Forbes, “No Warning of Bali Bombing,” Age, December 11, 2002, http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/12/10/ 1039379835160.html. For assertions that intelligence agencies did indeed have information pointing to such an event, see, for example, Laura Tiernan, “Australian Intelligence Inquiry Into Bali Warnings ‘a Whitewash,’” World Socialist Web Site, January 7, 2003, http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/ jan2003/igis-j07.shtml. For the London bombings on July 7, 2005, compare Wikipedia, “7 July 2005 London Bombings,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_July_2005_London_bombings; Wikinews, “Coordinated Terrorist Attack Hits London,” July 7, 2005, http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/ Explosions,_’serious_incidents’_occuring_across_London.

92 This was the case with the intelligence failures concerning the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq in the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. See, for example, “Report: Iraq Intelligence ‘Dead Wrong,’” CNN.com, April 1, 2005, http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/03/31/intel.report.

93 This is alleged to be the case prior to the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States of America. Subcommittee on Terrorism and Homeland Security, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Counterterrorism Intelligence Capabilities and Performance Prior to 9-11, July 2002, http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_rpt/hpsci_ths0702.html.

94 On the issue of assessing potential threats of terrorism, see, for example, Artificial Intelligence Lab, Eller College of Management, University of Arizona, Terrorism Knowledge Discovery Project: A Knowledge Discovery Approach to Addressing the Threats of Terrorism (September 2004).

95 See, for example, Marc E. Nicholson, “An Essay on Terrorism,” AmericanDiplomacy.org, August 19, 2003, http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/archives_roll/2003_07-09/nicholson_terr/ nicholson_terr.html.

96 See Alex Conte, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights in New Zealand (Wellington: New Zealand Law Foundation, 2007), pp. 8–16, http://www.lawfoundation.org.nz/awards/irf/conte/index.html.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

meeting their international counter-terrorism obligations, all of us remain vulnerable.97

�.� rational Connection

For a counterterrorism measure to “necessarily” limit a right or freedom, it must be rationally connected to the achievement of the objective being pursued by the measure in question.

The final component of necessity requires limiting measures to be rationally connected to the achievement of the objective being pursued. This compo- nent is relatively simple in its application and is drawn from the international guidelines on counterterrorism and human rights and the jurisprudence of the Supreme Court of Canada. Rational connection will require that the counter- terrorist measure being scrutinized logically further the objective of countering terrorism. The Supreme Court of Canada in Lavigne v. Ontario Public Service Employees Union, for instance, explained that the inquiry into “rational connec- tion” between objectives and means “requires nothing more than a showing that the legitimate and important goals of the legislature are logically furthered by the means the government has chosen to adopt.”98 Evidence of this connection might be necessary, however, where such a link is not plainly evident.99 This first requirement links with the Commissioner’s Guidelines and the guidelines of the Council of Europe and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.100

97 UN Foundation, “Counterterrorism Cooperation Improving, Security Council Told,” UN Wire, July 20, 2004, http://www.unwire.org/UNWire (last accessed November 20, 2007).

98 Lavigne v. Ontario Public Service Employees Union [1991] SCR 211, 219. The Supreme Court Directions on the Charter of Rights notes that the court has seldom found that legislation fails this part of the test, although there are instances where this has occurred. See David Stratas et al., The Charter of Rights in Litigation: Direction From the Supreme Court of Canada (Aurora, Ont.: Canada Law Book Inc., 1990), 6:06. In R v. Oakes, for example, section 8 of the Narcotic Control Act of 1970 was found to lack rational connection. Section 8, which had certain criminal process implications and thereby impacted upon criminal process rights, contained a statutory presumption that possession of even small amounts of narcotics meant that the offender was deemed to be trafficking in narcotics. There was no rational connection, said the court, between the possession of small amounts of narcotics and the countering of trafficking. R v. Oakes [1986] 1 SCR 103.

99 Figueroa v. Canada (Attorney General) [2003] 1 SCR 912. The Supreme Court of Canada was critical here of aspects of the Canada Elections Act of 1985 concerning the registration of political parties and the tax benefits that flow from such registration. The Act required that a political party nominate can- didates in at least 50 electoral districts to qualify for registration. Although the Court held that it was a pressing objective to ensure that the tax credit scheme was cost efficient, it found no rational connection between that objective and the 50-candidate threshold requirement. Iacobucci J. for the majority was particularly critical of the fact that the government had provided no evidence that the threshold actually improved the cost efficiency of the tax credit scheme.

100 See Commissioner’s Guidelines, note 6 above, paras. 4(b) and 4(d) (requiring limitations to be nec- essary for public safety and public order and necessary in a democratic society). See also Council of Europe’s Guidelines, note 7 above, Guideline III(2); Inter-American Commission on Human Rights report, note 8 above, paras. 51 and 55.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

Condition �: Counterterrorist measures seeking to limit rights must be proportional

As well as being necessary, any limitation upon the enjoyment of rights imposed by a counterterrorist measure must be proportional.

The principle of proportionality is not explicitly mentioned in the text of human rights treaties, but it is a major theme in the application of human rights law. Proportionality requires a reasonable relationship between the means employed and the aims to be achieved. Useful questions to ask when determining whether a measure limiting a right meets the requirements of proportionality include but are not limited to the following:

• Is the restriction or limitation in question carefully designed to meet the objectives in question?

• Is the restriction or limitation in question arbitrary, unfair, or based on irrational considerations?

• Is a less restrictive measure possible?

• Has there been some measure of procedural fairness in the decision- making process?

• Does the restriction or limitation in question destroy the “very essence” of the right in question?

• Does the restriction or limitation impair the right in question as little as possible?

• Do safeguards against abuse exist?

A number of aspects and nuances of these questions will be subject to closer examination and explanation in the following paragraphs.

�.� limitation, rather than exclusion, of rights

To achieve proportionality, the counterterrorism measure or leg- islative provision must effect a “limitation” upon rights, rather than an exclusion of them or such a severe limitation that would impair the “very essence” of the right or freedom being affected.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

The starting point in determining proportionality is that limitations imposed by counterterrorist measures must not impair the essence of the right being lim- ited.101 This is a matter that will be achieved through the proper application of Condition 2 herein (determining the permissible scope of limitations upon the right or freedom).

�.� assessing the Human rights impact of the Counterterrorist measure

Assessing the human rights impact of the counterterrorist mea- sure requires identification of the importance of or the degree of protection provided by the right or freedom affected and the effects (impact) of the limiting provision or practice upon the right or freedom.

Assessing the impact of a counterterrorist provision or measure upon human rights requires consideration not just of the level to which the measure limits a right but also the level of importance the right itself holds. Guidance here is again drawn from helpful decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada on the question of the limitation of rights. Although the Court has properly taken the approach of assessing each case individually, it has provided some assistance as to how one can undertake this task. In the well-known decision of R v. Oakes, the Court spoke of the need to ensure that the law that restricts the right is not so severe or so broad in its application as to outweigh the objective. In the case of R v. Lucas, the Court added that this requires consideration of the importance and degree of protection offered by the human right being limited.102 This distinction between the importance of the right versus the impact upon the right recognizes that a minor impairment of an important right, for example, might be more significant than a major impairment of a less important right. Privacy, for example, could be treated as a right less important than the right to life. Even a minor interference with the right to life will need to be treated as a serious matter.

101 Commissioner’s Guidelines, note 6 above, para. 4(c). Although decided only once by the Supreme Court of Canada and controversially so, a similar position was arrived at under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In Quebec Protestant School Boards, the Court had to consider the validity of the “Quebec clause” of the Charter of the French Language (Quebec Bill 101), which limited admis- sion to English-language schools to children of persons who themselves had been educated in English in Quebec. In accepting that the Quebec clause was inconsistent with section 23(1)(b) of the Charter, the Court held that it amounted to a denial of the Charter right and therefore refused to be drawn into the question of any justification under the general limitations provision. Attorney General for Quebec v. Quebec Protestant School Boards, [1984] 2 SCR 66. Professor Peter Hogg criticizes the distinction between “limits” and “denials” due to the fact that there is no legal standard by which Charter in- fringements can be sorted into the two categories. See Peter W. Hogg, Constitutional Law of Canada, student ed. (Thomson Carswell, 2005), p. 799. In a later Canadian case, the court described the Quebec Protestant School Boards case as a “rare case of a truly complete denial of a guaranteed right or free- dom” and, in doing so, recognized that most if not all legislative qualifications of a right or freedom will amount to a denial of the right or freedom to that limited extent. On the other hand, it observed, a limit that permits no exercise of a guaranteed right or freedom in a limited area of its potential exercise is not justifiable. Ford v. Quebec (Attorney General), [1988] 2 SCR 712, 773–734.

102 R v. Oakes at 106; R v. Lucas [1998] 1 SCR 439, para. 118.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

��

Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation

�.� assessing the Value of the Counterterrorist measure

Assessing the “value” of the counterterrorist measure requires identification of the importance of the objective being pursued by the counterterrorist provision or measure and the effectiveness of that provision or measure in achieving its objective (its amelio- rating effect).

The value or importance of the counterterrorist objective being pursued must also be assessed, as well as the efficacy of it, recognizing that different counter- terrorist measures will not just impact upon rights in a different way but will have different levels of effectiveness. The importance of the counterterrorist measure will have already been assessed when determining whether the measure is necessary (Condition 4 herein). Equally crucial, an analysis must be under- taken whether the measure limiting or restricting the right in question will be effective.103 It is beyond question that it can be notoriously difficult to make fair estimates on the effectiveness of counterterrorism measures. Yet, the difficulty of the task cannot be an excuse for the lack of thorough analysis and sound decision-making. An in-depth analysis may include an examination of the expe- riences from previous terrorism crises and comparable campaigns, such as the so-called war on drugs.

�.� assessing the proportionality of the Counterterrorism measure

A further proportionality requirement of international and national human rights law is that measures of limitation or restriction must impair rights and freedoms as little as reasonably possible.104 If the particular human rights limita- tion is trivial, then the availability of alternatives that might lessen that impact have tended to be seen as falling within the appropriate exercise of legislative choice, rather than one demanding intervention by the judiciary.105 Other than this understandable and reasonably minor degree of deference, this require- ment fits with paragraph 4(g) of the Commissioner’s Guidelines (being the least intrusive means of achieving the protective function of the limitation). In doing so, this also appears to fit with the reasonably broad requirement in paragraph 4(h) that any limitation must be compatible with the objects and purposes of

103 See, for example, Commissioner’s Guidelines, note 6 above, paras. 4(b) and 4(e)–(g). 104 See R v. Oakes at 106; R v. Edwards Books and Art Ltd. [1986] 2 SCR 713, 772–773. 105 In R v. Schwartz, for example, it was suggested that the statutory provision, which provided for a pre-

sumption that a person did not have a firearms license if he or she failed to produce one upon request, unnecessarily infringed the presumption of innocence. Counsel for Schwartz argued that police could simply check their computerized records to ascertain whether a license had indeed been obtained. McIntyre J. stated that “[e]ven if there is merit in the suggestion … Parliament has made a reasonable choice in the matter and, in my view, it is not for the Court, in circumstances where the impugned pro- vision clearly involves, at most, minimal—or even trivial—interference with the right guaranteed in the Charter, to postulate some alternative which in its view would offer a better solution to the problem.” R v. Schwartz [1988] 2 SCR 443, 492–493.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

�0

Ce nt

er o

n Gl

ob al

C ou

nt er

te rr

or is

m C

oo pe

ra ti

on

human rights treaties. Arising from the latter requirements but expressly stated within paragraph 4(d) of the Commissioner’s Guidelines is the important point that any counterterrorist provisions be interpreted and applied in favor of rights.

With these points in mind, one must undertake the final task of “balanc- ing” the human rights and counterterrorist scales with the aim of producing the least reasonably intrusive means of achieving the counterterrorist objective. To that end, this final Condition formulates the following substantive question for determination by the decision-maker:

Having regard to the importance of the right or freedom [Condition 5.2], is the effect of the measure or provision upon the right [Condition 5.2] proportional to the importance of the objective and the effectiveness of the legislative provision or measure [Condition 5.3]?

The issues raised by the question formulated will not normally be black and white, and its consideration is likely to require debate and the complex interac- tion of value judgments. Dispute remains over the peremptory versus qualified status of some human rights. Cultural ideals and political persuasions will like- wise result in different values being attached to certain rights, a matter that is in- herently recognized in the margin of appreciation jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights.106 What this Handbook seeks to ensure, however, is that such debate reflects upon all relevant factors germane both to countering terrorism and complying with international human rights obligations.

106 The margin of appreciation doctrine involves the idea that each society is entitled to certain latitude in resolving the inherent conflicts between individual rights and national interests or among different moral convictions. See Eyal Benvenisti, “Margin of Appreciation, Consensus, and Universal Standards,” (1999) 31 International Law and Politics 843, 843–844. For a comprehensive discussion of the doctrine, see Yutaka Arai-Takahashi, The Margin of Appreciation Doctrine and the Principle of Proportionality in the Jurisprudence of the ECHR (Antwerp: Intersentia, 2002).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

about the Center

The CenTer on Global CounTerTerrorism CooperaTion is a nonpartisan research and policy institute that works to improve internationally coordinated nonmilitary responses to the continually evolving threat of terrorism by providing governments and international organizations with timely, policy- relevant research and analysis.

The Center promotes a holistic approach that addresses issues of capacity building, information sharing, and law enforcement cooperation and the underlying conditions that can lead to terrorism, for example, extremism, poor governance, lack of civil rights, human rights abuse, religious and ethnic discrimination, political exclusion, and poverty. The Center aims to identify ways to bring together perspectives of the global North and South to develop a more unified global response to terrorism. It is the only research center in the world focusing on the role of multilateral institutions in the global campaign against terrorism.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

WashinGTon offiCe 1875 Connecticut avenue, nW suite 1012 Washington, DC 20009 Tel: 202-667-0610 fax: 202-667-4201 www.globalct.org

neW York offiCe 801 second avenue

suite 405 new York, nY 10017

Tel: 212-682-0998 fax: 212-697-3316 www.globalct.org

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Mon, 20 Dec 2021 21:23:21 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Global Networks 5, 1 (2005) 93–110. ISSN 1470–2266 © 2005 Blackwell Publishing Ltd & Global Networks Partnership 93

The strategies that bind:

NGO coalitions and their influence

HELEN YANACOPULOS

Abstract This article examines NGOs as strategic organizations that form coalitions in order to influence other actors, particularly international financial institutions. It has three primary aims: to examine NGOs as strategic organizations; to look at a particular type of NGO network, the coalition, which unlike a network involves more value and commitment; and to assess the factors that contribute to their strategies such as changes to the NGO environment. To do this, the resource dependency perspective is utilized to evaluate the influence of various resources (funding, legitimacy and information) on NGOs’ organizational strategy. Oxfam International, the NGO Working Group on the World Bank, and the Bretton Woods Project are three NGO coalitions examined. I conclude that there are differences between NGO networks and coalitions and that the coalitions strategically act and react to changing resources in their environments.

Change has become a defining characteristic of our time, and much of this change is described as, or as a result of, ‘globalization’. Fuelling ‘globalization’ are techno- logical advancements, the political effects of the ending of the cold war, the notion of the responsibilities and rights of the state and its inhabitants and the increasing prominence of international financial institutions (IFIs) (Edwards et al. 1999). Some have called this increase in prominence and influence of the IFIs a complex multi- lateralism (O’Brien et al. 2000). In response, non-governmental organizations increasingly redefine problems affecting the South as global or systemic, and there has been an increasing focus on their advocacy at this level. In this study I look at three development NGO coalitions and their organizational goals in response to their focus on systemic issues such as poverty. Specifically, I examine some of their ‘organizational strategies’, a broad term used to describe the plans organizations make to achieve their goals.

An organization’s goals and strategies are negotiated and frequently these are what have motivated NGOs to form collaborative arrangements such as networks and coalitions. Three such coalitions, Oxfam International (OI), the Bretton Woods Project (BWP) and the NGO Working Group on the World Bank (NGOWGWB), assert their goals and strategies in their mission statements. The similarities between these mission statements revolve around three key issues: members belonging to the coalitions are independent; members have chosen to work together in the coalition;

Helen Yanacopulos

94

and the strategy is meant to make an impact on global issues of poverty and related injustices (BWP-a; Oxfam-a; NGOWGWB-b).

The purpose of this article is to examine NGOs as strategic organizations that form networks and coalitions in order to influence other actors, particularly IFIs. While some scholars have examined NGOs and their strategies (Edwards and Gaventa 2001; Hilhorst 2003; Hudock 1999; Leipold 2000; Nelson 2000; Ramia 2003), we need to know more about how and why these strategies arise and are implemented. In this article I have three aims. The first is to look at NGOs and at NGO networks and coalitions as strategic organizations by examining their goals and the ways they set out to achieve them. While there have been numerous studies on networks, more work needs to be done on coalitions, the distinction being that one involves a higher level of commitment from members, which leads to my second aim. Finally, the third is to analyse the factors that contribute to NGOs’ organizational strategies such as the changes in the NGOs’ environment which affect their operation.

I take the work done on transnational advocacy networks (TANs) as a starting point. TANs are useful for explaining the transnational level of operation and for exposing how these networks operate. To evaluate the factors that contribute to the organizational strategy of NGOs, I refer to the resource dependency perspective (RDP). This research originated from the observations of three development NGO coalitions – Oxfam International, the NGO Working Group on the World Bank, and the Bretton Woods Project. These NGO coalitions are examined in further detail in the second section, with a particular focus on their organizational strategies.

Theoretical framework

Transnational advocacy networks

NGOs are strategic organizations whose arsenal includes the formation of coalitions, tactical lobbying and multi-level campaigning. The fact that NGOs form networks received a great deal of attention during the last decade. The seminal work of Keck and Sikkink (1998) provided a framework for exploring transnational networks in many issue areas, including the environment, the women’s movement and human rights. A transnational advocacy network is a broad term used to describe an activist network that transcends national boundaries and that consists of members motivated by shared values rather than professional or material concerns. While the level of cohesion between members of transnational networks varies, as does their organiz- ational appearance, they have some similarities. They are typically comprised of non- state actors; they share information on issues and are generally focused on a specific issue area (such as abolishing landmines or increasing debt relief). Examinations of these thematic and single-issue networks have made invaluable contributions towards expanding our focus to include transnational networks as actors in international governance, and have allowed us to better understand how the international system as a whole operates. Researchers reveal how these movements have shifted and influ- enced other international actors on particular issues; generally, transnational advocacy network research has followed the issue areas of the networks themselves – they have been examined from the perspective of the issue area. Many writers have used this

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

95

framework and there is a richness of studies in this field (Burgerman 2001; Clark 2001; Clark 2004; Florini 1999; Higgott et al. 2000; Khagram et al. 2002).

Keck and Sikkink provide the starting point for looking at the three NGO coali- tions in this research. However, the TAN framework requires complementing on two points. The first is that we find that some NGOs form more than transnational net- works – they form transnational coalitions. The difference between these two organizational forms is both subtle and important, and is discussed in the following section. The second is the environment of these organizations; many factors con- tribute to the strategies that some NGOs have adopted at an organizational level and these need further exploration.

What’s in a name? Networks or coalitions?

NGO coalitions form more permanent links than single-issue thematic transnational advocacy networks. They generally have permanent staff members, a more permanent membership base, a headquarters or secretariat, and are organizations in and of them- selves. Most importantly, they have broader strategic aims than single-issue thematically focused networks. Not surprisingly, while these NGO coalitions are organizational entities in and of themselves, they and their members also frequently belong to single-issue transnational advocacy networks.

While coalitions permit information sharing, they allow stronger links to develop between coalition members. Egan (1995: 179) describes an inherent ‘value-added’, whether real or perceived, in working with others in that ‘alliances that both partners ultimately deem successful involve collaboration (creating new value together) rather than mere exchange (getting something back for what you put in)’. Here Egan describes the fundamental difference between networks and coalitions. Coalitions create a greater value and commitment together. While networking is an important part of coalition building, networks can exist without coalitions. Increased communication and information sharing are common in coalitions; however, the other areas of ‘value- added’ in coalitions come from sharing resources, decreasing costs through group specialization, and increasing legitimacy and power by speaking with one voice.

Though these coalitions are emerging among different types of NGOs, the focus in this research is specifically on development NGOs. The coalitions of development NGOs are best defined by Fowler (1997: 115) as groupings that are both short or long term and that comprise national, continental and/or global associations of NGOs. They come together to promote mutual interests, creating a distinct entity for such a purpose, which may or may not formally register as a separate legal body. They are established around specific development issues rather than the concerns of the NGO sector. The required capacity can be provided by the membership, perhaps acting as a secretariat either permanently or on a rotational basis. Mandated by members after consultation to adopt and voice positions on their behalf, coalitions serve as platforms for the articulation of members’ interests. There is also no joint liability for oper- ational performance beyond the shared risk of losing credibility. A crucial organiz- ational feature of coalitions is the members’ active control of the new organization. The cost to the members is the time, human capacity, information and investment in

Helen Yanacopulos

96

the processes needed to reach collective options on issues, and then mandating the secretariat and office bearers accordingly. One benefit of a coalition is greater strength when voicing shared positions, together with enhanced informal access to information through trusted relations.

Coalitions require a high level of commitment between member organizations; generally they are created to deal with broad goals. This organizational structure reflects the multi-level functioning of a coalition in which members have connections with the grassroots while the coalition functions at the national and international levels. The coalition structure reveals that these organizations have moved beyond information sharing, particularly as one of the coalition’s primary objectives is to influence IFIs and governments. The for-profit literature calls these ‘strategic alliances’ in that they reflect a particular mode of inter-organizational relationship in which the partners make substantial investments in developing common operations over a long-term period. Coalitions involve a commitment of resources, mutually acceptable objectives and sharing the risk from environmental pressures (Egan 1995: 147). One of the most important drivers of coalition building is strategy. Such coalitions develop meta-strategies – shared visions or desires that motivate the NGOs to work together; this allows for ‘collective strategies [which] involve reaching agreement about how to implement a shared vision’ (Gray 1996: 59).

The resource dependency perspective

The resource dependency perspective, created by Pfeffer and Salancik and rooted in organizational studies, attempts to explain how organizations respond to change in their environments. They see the organization as a part of its environment and show how the organization attempts to influence others within that same environment. Organizations are presented as strategic entities that are affected by the availability of necessary resources required for their operation. To function within a resource-scarce environ- ment, these organizations are frequently driven to work with other organizations.

Pfeffer (1997) outlines the RDP argument in five points. First is the focus on the organization as the fundamental unit of analysis (he claims that we live in a society of organizations). Second, organizations do not operate independently but are bound by a network of interdependencies with other organizations. Third, the fundamental interdependence of organizations and the doubt that accompanies the actions of other organizations lead to a situation in which survival and continued success are uncertain. Fourth, organizations take actions to manage external interdependencies (though such actions are inevitably never completely successful and produce new patterns of dependence and interdependence). And fifth, such patterns of dependence produce inter-organizational as well as intra-organizational power, where power has some effect on organizational behaviour. Organizations tend to comply with the demands of those interests in their environment that can command relatively more power.

The organization’s environment encompasses every event in the world that may potentially have an effect on the organization’s activities; problems occur not only because organizations depend on their environment but also because their environ-

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

97

ment is undependable (Pfeffer and Salancik 1978: 3). Resources can increase or decrease as environments change, with new organizations continuously entering and exiting. As environments are dynamic, organizations face the prospect either of not surviving or of changing their activities in response to these environmental factors. The diversification of an organization’s activities does not reduce its dependence on the environment, but merely alters the nature of the interdependence and structures organizational dependence so that it is more readily managed. However, an organ- ization is not only reactive to its environment but it is also active within it.

In RDP terms, resource refers to anything upon which the organization is dependent. It is obvious that funding for non-profit organizations is a resource; however, here we argue that legitimacy is also a resource for many non-profit organ- izations.1 In addition, information and knowledge are also controlled and possessed and can be considered important resources for an organization.2 An organization’s vulnerability, relative to its environment, is a result of its dependence on resources that are controlled by others within the environment, which gives the environment its power. Hatch (1997: 78) states that the ‘dependency the organization has on its environment is not one single, undifferentiated dependency, it is a complex set of dependencies that exist between an organization and the specific elements of its environment found in the inter-organizational network’. Thus, environmental pressures are extremely important when addressing organizational behaviour. Development NGOs are dependent on at least three forms of resources – organizational legitimacy, funding and access to information and knowledge.

Pfeffer and Salancik (1978: 2) claim that organizations survive to the extent that they are effective, which they define as the successful management of the organiz- ation’s demands with particular reference to the demands of ‘interest groups upon which the organization depends for resources and support’. The scarcity of resources required for the operation of an organization, whatever form those resources take, are an essential element of operation. Faulkner (1995: 16) claims that the key to an organization’s survival is the ability to acquire and maintain the relevant resources, and that ‘it is not merely organizational efficiency, but organizational power and the capacity of the organization to preserve itself that determines competitive survival’. When the supply of a resource is stable and abundant, problems are unlikely. However, when an environment is changing and the resource is no longer certain and stable, the organization becomes increasingly vulnerable.

The decreasing amount of funding and the increasing number of NGOs has meant that the ‘development environment’ has been volatile and resources have been (or at least have been perceived as being) scarce.3 With respect to charitable organizations such as NGOs, Pfeffer and Salancik (1978: 177) state that environmental conditions may make charitable contributions scarce. In such cases, they predict that, ‘the par- ticipating agencies may willingly exchange their autonomy for the promise of some funding rather than face drastically reduced resources. No other options are available to them.’ They state that ‘power is inevitably organised around the most critical and scarce resources in the social system.’ Organizational strategies to control the environment require ‘interlocking activities with others, and such interlocking pro- duces concentrated power. Those organizations not involved in the resultant structure

Helen Yanacopulos

98

are less powerful and less able to cope with their problems of interdependence’ (Pfeffer and Salancik 1984: 158). Hatch (1997: 101) describes organizational strategy as top management’s planned efforts to influence organizational outcomes by manag- ing the organization’s relationship to its environment.

Turbulence and uncertainty in an environment necessitate changes from organiz- ations within that environment. Organizations deal with this uncertainty and instability by attempting to manage the interdependence through inter-organizational coordination: ‘by law, collusion, merger, co-option, and other strategies, organizations seek to avoid uncertainty arising from their need to acquire and maintain resources’ (Pfeffer and Salancik 1984: 156). Uncertainty results in greater efforts at coordination. Thus, if there is uncertainty within an organization’s environment, there is then a tendency towards organizational centralization. Likewise, centralization by the creation of alliances is a similar response of separate but related organizations. Therefore, ‘formal ties that bind the units of an organization together are replaced with a partnership among several organizations. Networks [and I would argue coalitions] seem most likely to form when organizations face rapid technological change’ (Hatch 1997: 191).

Inter-organizational linkages give four advantages to the management of environ- mental interdependence. First, they provide information about the activities of that organization that may impinge on or affect the focal organization. Second, they provide channels for communicating information to another organization on which the focal organization depends. Third, the exposure to other organizations provides an important first step in obtaining commitments of support from important actors in the environment. And fourth, inter-organizational linkages have a certain value for legitimating the focal organization (Pfeffer and Salancik 1978: 145).

Therefore, at certain critical moments many organizations face a dilemma. Future survival depends on the ability to adapt and work with other organizations. However, when joining collective structures, organizations run the risk of losing control over their own activities. Pfeffer and Salancik (1984: 134) emphasize that the ‘price for inclusion in any collective structure is the loss of discretion and control over one’s activities. Ironically, to gain some control over the activities of another organization, the focal organization must surrender some of its own autonomy.’

In the case of development NGOs, Hudock (1999: 5) asserts that there are subsequent gaps in how we analyse NGOs as strategic organizations. She states that ‘the political nature of NGOs is fully revealed through analysis of the way they manoeuvre and manipulate their external environments in order to extract resources from them.’ Thus, complementing existing frameworks with RDP provides us with the advantage of seeing how NGOs react and adapt to the resource constraints of their environment, and helps to explain why development NGOs form coalitions to better achieve their strategies.

NGO coalitions: case studies

The process of coalition building among development NGOs is relatively recent. It is interesting in a number of ways. First, working together involves a degree of nego- tiation and a surrender of autonomy to the collective in order to survive in a highly

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

99

competitive environment. Second, the impetus for working together is not only a defensive reaction but also a pro-active strategy for achieving shared goals. Through the three development NGO coalition case studies we will explore why these NGOs form coalitions and the strategically driven mechanics of their attempts to influence and participate in development processes at the highest level. Semi-structured inter- views were conducted and a variety of NGO documents were examined.4 Interviews were also conducted with various employees of international financial institutions, and donors who had been on the receiving end of NGO advocacy.

There were specific criteria for selecting these three development NGO coalitions. The first was that the primary focus of the coalition was on issues of development; while there has been some work on the role of networks and coalitions in the field of development, NGO networks and coalitions have generally been under-analysed (Henry et al. 2004). The second was that the primary target of organizational advo- cacy was on one or more of the IFIs, and that the coalition was consequently attempting to address not only programme issues but also systemic issues. The third criterion used to select groups was that the organizational forms these NGOs took were not loose single-issue networks but more formalized coalitions. This organiz- ational form implies a greater level of commitment from (and potential gain and loss by) all coalition members. In effect, the groups have formed (to varying degrees) new organizations, reflecting an ‘organizational reconfiguration’. The fourth criterion was that there was some connection between the ‘local’ and the ‘global’, linking the North and the South.

The first case study, Oxfam International, was established in 1995. The 12 national Oxfams that created Oxfam International did so for a number of reasons. These included improving coordination on projects between national Oxfams, improving the ‘branding’ of the Oxfam name and, most important for this research, pooling members’ strengths in national and international advocacy. OI is a separate entity from the national Oxfams, but it is also comprised of all national Oxfam members. The different Oxfams contribute towards running OI and have decided that it makes more sense to work together than apart.5 The opening of an OI advocacy office in Washington DC in 1995, which lobbies the World Bank, IMF and the United Nations on issues agreed by the members, is a reflection of an organizational move towards ‘global’ issues.

The second case study is the NGOWGWB, which was created in 1984. Its membership comprises operational and support NGOs, NGOs that engage in advocacy, and NGO networks, primarily from southern countries. The NGOWGWB is the only NGO with any official standing in the World Bank (the World Bank is required to meet representatives from the various regions of this group on an annual basis). The group is a global forum of NGOs engaged in policy dialogue and advocacy with the World Bank. A global steering committee meets high-level World Bank representatives, including regional vice-presidents, the president and the board of directors. The group was chosen for a number of reasons. The first was the unique insider/outsider relationship the group has with the Bank. The working group’s role as a global forum permits NGO members to address organization-wide Bank policy issues that might not easily be addressed in national forums. It also affords these

Helen Yanacopulos

100

members access to global-level decision-makers within both the Bank and its govern- ing bodies. They claim that their independent voice increases NGO credibility in the Bank even as it strengthens and balances international coalitions (NGOWGWB-a). Members of the coalition are national-level NGOs and NGO umbrella organizations within each region. Funding for the NGOWGWB comes from many sources, includ- ing membership fees, foundation funding and the World Bank itself.6

The third case study, the Bretton Woods Project (BWP), is based in London and was founded by a pre-existing network – the Aid and Environment Group, now renamed the Development and Environment Group. Its membership includes 27 of the largest international NGOs; it not only brings members together under the BWP umbrella but the BWP itself also belongs to a variety of other networks, making it a ‘network within networks’. The BWP was set up in 1995 to facilitate the work of UK- based international NGOs concerned with the social and environmental impacts of World Bank and IMF policies and projects.7 The BWP circulates information to NGOs across the world, identifies lobbying and campaigning opportunities, organizes meetings with UK and international organization officials, and prepares in-depth papers and a bulletin on IFI issues. The BWP has a small staff, the membership of the largest UK Development and Environmental NGOs, and a distribution database of thousands of individual and organizational members who receive their publications. BWP funding comes from a variety of sources, including members and foundations.

Coalitions, lobbying and campaigning

The resource dependency perspective proposes that organizations reconfigure in response to a changing or volatile environment – they form coalitions and advocate change. Advocacy is understood here (and is employed by the development NGOs themselves) as attempts to influence change at a political level. Keck and Sikkink (1998: 8) describe advocacy networks as ‘plead[ing] the causes of others or defend[ing] a cause or proposition. … [Advocacy groups] are organized to promote causes, principled ideas, and norms, and they often involve individuals advocating policy changes’. In the following sections, I examine three different (but not com- prehensive) strategies taken by development NGOs: forming coalitions, lobbying and campaigning.

‘More than an issue’ – coalition building as a strategy

The explanatory purchase of the resource development perspective is in the way it focuses on both the internal and external workings of organizations. It can help us to understand why development NGOs form coalitions.

A cost–benefit analysis occurs when joining a coalition. In their attempts to address ‘global’ and ‘system’ issues, NGOs form coalitions to challenge the increas- ing power of IFIs. Here, the issue of NGO legitimacy is imperative. As the RDP outlines, in situations of large power asymmetries between actors, it is common for the less powerful ones to decide to work together in an attempt to challenge these power asymmetries – they come together to be more effective and to speak with one voice. A member NGO of the BWP states that the project’s ‘strength is that there are

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

101

25 [sic] organizations asking the World Bank to do this, not a two-person organization’ (BWP-3). One member group of OI indicated that challenging these power asymmetries was the primary reason why the 12 national Oxfams started working together in OI:

[It was because of] changes in international policy-making and international communications. The world is slowly becoming more globalized, messages do not stop at national frontiers, and the medium operates globally. It all moves very quickly – international policy-making is far more an international affair. So you get a situation where Oxfams are conscious about the value and importance of their name. They find themselves in an international playing field and not a national playing field any more. You put the two together and it becomes blindingly obvious that you cannot work as eight [12] different Oxfams, all with the same name and then pretend to be effective in that area. That penny drops and you get a change in attitude and … therefore we have to get together.

(OXF-4)

While joining together to speak with ‘one voice’ potentially increases a coalition’s impact and legitimacy, it is also essential that these groups claim a connection to the grassroots and to their ground-level experience. One source of their legitimacy comes from transporting the voices and concerns of the poor. If development NGO coalitions did not have this connection to the grassroots, they would only be lobbying organizations, leaving themselves open to criticism and calls to defend their legit- imacy. This bridging function between the grassroots and the global level gives them legitimacy at a time when NGO credibility is being questioned. While this applies primarily to northern NGOs, southern NGOs also benefit from being in partnership with northern ones, or forming coalitions with other southern ones. Southern groups can not only utilize the reputation and standing of their northern partners, but they can also use the NGO coalition to give themselves legitimacy with their national governments – this ‘boomerang’ effect (Keck and Sikkink 1998) was employed by some NGOWGWB members. The bridging function gives legitimacy to NGOs, bridging their operation work to advocacy, bridging northern and southern NGOs and bridging the grassroots to the global. The importance of legitimacy as a resource was captured in a statement made by an employee of one of the IFIs. She stated that given the increased numbers and capacity of ‘southern’ NGOs, international or northern NGOs were becoming redundant in the field of development (IFI-8).

A development NGO’s funding has a significant impact on its organizational strategies. Aid budgets have been decreasing while the trend of allocating funds has shifted to southern groups. As one member of the NGOWGWB said, ‘What we feel in the south is that the northern NGOs, and … specifically in the past, the European NGOs, were our bridge to find resources. Now – it seems to be that they [resources] are going to the south … so we are going to compete’ (NGO-4).

An NGO member outlines concerns around funding for NGOs: ‘there is going to be a lot of competition soon for the declining pot of money outside direct service

Helen Yanacopulos

102

provision … and everyone is worried about that pot of money’ (BWP-4). One moti- vation in forming coalitions is their economies of scale. Advocacy at the global level is extremely expensive and no one NGO can afford to finance and support a global advocacy campaign. This factor has influenced the strategic reconfigurations of NGOs. For example, even one of the largest development NGOs, Oxfam Great Britain, would have to dedicate a large portion of its finances if it were conducting advocacy on a global level. Instead, Oxfam Great Britain, as part of OI, opened an office in Washington DC and hired lobbyists dedicated to lobbying the IFIs, thereby sharing the costs with other OI members. Another example is the BWP, created by some of the largest UK NGOs in order to have dedicated people consistently working on IFI issues.

Information sharing and the specialization of skills is also an essential cost saving and value-added element of forming coalitions. Information and communication technology, such as the Internet, mobile telephones and instantaneous media, has been essential in the information-sharing role of networks. However, an additional benefit of coalitions is that they harness expertise through pooling resources. It is extremely costly to employ experts, be they researchers or lobbyists, and members of Oxfam claimed that it is not only a way of ‘harnessing the resources of the affiliates in a more collaborative way’ (OXF-1), but also ‘that one of the long-term payoffs [is] that our collective overheads can be cut down. That with shared infrastructure, we can do more with all the money than … [an individual NGO member] could ever do on its own’ (OXF-4). This member continues:

You basically get very substantive research, branded as Oxfam International, and they [Oxfam Canada] can use it about Uganda in Canada. They would never have the capacity to produce their own research. Now they can go to their advocacy contacts and they appear very well informed, very substantive. They can be very authoritative – much more than they could ever be in their own capacity alone. That is the benefit of being part of an international group.

(OXF-4)

Sharing research (done by specialists working for the group) is also a resource of the coalition. In the case of the BWP, the coalition’s secretariat conducts and dissemin- ates the research. In the case of NGOWGWB individual members conduct the research and share it with the other members. For OI, the whole group takes advantage of the research capacities of the larger Oxfams.

In specializing, the quality of the research generally improves. Not only will member NGOs have access to this research to help them become more informed on an issue, but it is also a tool that they can use when they are lobbying local, national or international bodies. The quality of the research and analysis is important on two levels. The first is that high-quality research is imperative to members increasing their understanding of complex issues, outlined in the following statement: ‘we have one or two people working on it [debt relief] full time, probably more than the Bank people working on it. … My feeling is that we are going down the specialized route, and that we have therefore to get better at doing good analyses’ (BWP-3). The second reason

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

103

why high-quality research is important is that members’ credibility is increased when they use it: ‘I know that they [BWP] are highly regarded in Washington as well, by World Bank staff, and they have forced themselves onto the agenda and they have been taken seriously. And I think their expertise is known’ (BWP-4). This level of legitimacy is powerful and arguably allows groups to be taken seriously in their advocacy ambitions.

Coming together to work on advocacy is less problematic than coming together on programme work. While the interviewees from the three coalitions were generally positive about collaboration on advocacy, only one of the coalitions, OI, came together around programme work, and this seemed to involve more tensions between members. Collaborating for the purpose of advocacy tends to be easier to manage, and one explanation for this is that work is based on negotiated shared values, which bring the members together while involving very few risks (Hajer 1995). For example, the NGOWGWB regions have meetings prior to their annual meetings with the World Bank, and there are great attempts at consensus building. Disagreements between NGOs within coalitions frequently occur and should not be underestimated. However, even if there are differences of opinion within the coalitions, the individual NGOs still have some autonomy when it comes to their own individual advocacy efforts. And given that they are strategic organizations, these NGO members would cease to belong to the coalition if they were not benefiting from the relationship.8

Tactical lobbying

Lobbying involves engaging with those one wishes to influence, while campaigning involves vilifying and mobilizing support against a target, such as a government, IFI or corporation. Lobbying and campaigning require different tools and tactics. Lobbying is a much more targeted process, requiring the art of persuasion, expert knowledge and negotiating skills. In lobbying, vilifying is ineffective. NGO lobbyists (usually in conjunction with the policy departments and programmers) provide the groundwork for campaigns and contribute to the articulation of the organization’s position.

One challenge in lobbying for both individual NGOs and NGO coalitions is a classic political problem – how closely do they work within the ‘system’? There are two aspects to this problem. First, do individual NGOs see themselves as ‘reformists’ (working within the system to change it) or ‘revolutionaries’ (wanting to get rid of the system entirely)? The second is a practical issue. What degree of working inside or outside the system is most effective to achieve the coalition’s goals (without being co- opted by the very system they are trying to change)? The degree of working within the system is an imperative aspect on which agreement must be reached within a coalition. This is a strategic decision taken by the member NGOs depending on which approach is thought more effective.

NGOs have had a long history of lobbying at the national level. The difference now is that instead of only lobbying governments, development NGO coalitions have also been targeting the IFIs (in addition to local and national governments). Because of this, it has become essential for NGO lobbyists to be better versed in the internal

Helen Yanacopulos

104

working of the IFIs. Employing professional lobbyists is costly and their required skills and knowledge of the system are highly specialized. NGO coalitions enable NGOs that would not normally be represented in Washington, New York, Brussels and Geneva to have a voice in places where decisions are being made. In addition, all three NGO coalitions have access to officials that they would not have had without the coalition, through the OI advocacy office in Washington DC, through the BWP office in London and (to senior World Bank officials) through the NGOWGWB.

The ability to coordinate lobbying is fundamental to managing a coalition. The Oxfam formula is that it is essential to have ‘one or two very effective lobbyists with the right relationships and the right information flows to coordinate them [the NGO members]. So you walk in the right doors in a coordinated manner and you push on the players who push on each other’ (OXF-5). Lobbyists must present politically viable positions if they are to be taken seriously by their targets. An official of the IMF stated: ‘to be listened to, you must provide concrete answers to concrete problems’ (IFI-2). According to various officials at the IFIs, the solutions offered by development NGOs are appealing only if they are politically viable.

An IMF employee emphasized that if NGOs focused on concrete policy options, this would help provide ‘focused expert analysis’ of problems the IMF was trying to solve (IFI-3). He continues by stating that this expertise is essential if the proposal is to be taken seriously. Development NGO coalitions have an advantage over indi- vidual development NGOs; to provide solutions it is essential to have contact with individuals within the IFIs and to know what is politically feasible within these organizations. However, here there is a tension. It is more than likely that solutions which are deemed politically viable to the IFIs would correspond to the IFI paradigmatic views of development. These views would not necessarily match those of the NGO coalition (particularly if they have goals of systemic change). Thus, a paradox arises – what might be ‘politically viable’ solutions to an IFI might not be desirable to an NGO coalition. These ‘politically viable’ solutions could very well perpetuate the systemic problems originally identified by the NGO coalitions.

It appears that having strategic allies within a target institution, or other insti- tutions that have influence over the target institution, is essential when attempting to influence the course of events of the IFIs. An employee of the World Bank stated ‘you need people identifying a need within the Bank for external influences to be effective’ (IFI-6). This also applies to relations between NGOs and government agen- cies, as an employee of the UK’s Department for International Development outlined: ‘The informal contacts are probably really important, and those tend to be built up over time … if the NGO can get some sort of process going, whereby there is another meeting, and an action point agreed, then there’s more chance of influence’ (OTH-1).

However, there are risks in close collaboration with target institutions. As Fowler (1997: 6) states, ‘the International Financial Institutions are at an unrivalled position in setting the agenda in terms of the purpose and content of international assistance’. If this is the case, then IFI/NGO collaborations could potentially leave NGOs as mere accomplices. This is a perennial problem of organizations trying to influence without being co-opted. All three NGOs discussed this issue and said that they attempt to work inside and outside the system simultaneously. A member of OI outlines this:

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

105

‘The only way of real change is to harness the influence in capacities of some of the insider players. There are risks with this, but I don’t care. If they launch something that we don’t like, we will then lobby around it and criticize it. The key thing is to launch something, because then it leads to a decision-making process’ (OXF-1).

This insider/outsider NGO strategy poses a challenge for NGO coalitions, particu- larly as their autonomy could potentially be jeopardized when working closely with the IFIs. The development NGO community is divided on the amount of cooperation between NGOs and their targets. Some members of the organizations studied expressed caution, measuring the risks of collaboration with IFIs and governments by selecting the times and issues of collaboration very carefully. NGO coalitions such as Oxfam emphasized the benefits of working with their targets, and harnessing the influencing capacities of some of the inside players of the IFIs in utilizing ‘influencing opportunities’. The case study organizations were unified in that they remain autonomous throughout any collaboration; however, other NGOs did not necessarily see their actions in the same light, accusing some NGOs of working too closely with the IFIs and ‘selling out’ to their demands.

Regardless of whether an NGO has been co-opted, equally important is the perception of co-option of other development actors. If other NGOs perceive that this has occurred, the NGO or NGO coalition might have problems working with other NGOs in the future. A member of the NGOWGWB describes another NGO’s reac- tions to the NGOWGWB member working with the World Bank: ‘When we, for example, first became members of the NGO working group, which was in 1995, a lot of the organizations we had been working with just refused to work with us because they felt that just by engaging in dialogue with [the World Bank], we were co-opting ourselves and we were losing our political edge’ (NGO-3).

Coordinated campaigning

Campaigning and mobilizing people around an issue moves lobbying to overt public forums, from the lunches and corridors to the TV screens and streets. Campaigning requires a clear simple message and objective, and its purpose is to mobilize sup- porters by using the media to put pressure on decision-makers, something that coalitions are particularly well placed to do. It is typically adversarial, requiring a villain or an injustice. Keck and Sikkink (1998: 27) argue that a ‘causal story’ must be established so that responsibility for an injustice is obvious and that ‘the causal chain needs to be sufficiently short and clear to make the case convincing’.

Campaigns also serve other purposes: while influencing policy is a major factor, campaigns can also serve as vehicles for fundraising and raising the profile of an organization. Chapman and Fisher (in Leipold 2000: 453) identified the increase in NGO campaigning. Northern NGOs are looking for new roles. Chapman and Fisher identify a number of factors responsible for the increase in campaigning work of northern NGOs: projects have limited impact without structural changes; southern NGOs request that northern groups do more work on campaigns and policy influence; and finally the increasing desire among NGOs for a higher public profile (to increase their fundraising and standing).

Helen Yanacopulos

106

A member of Oxfam International describes the essence of campaigning:

In modern campaigning you need to have a clear proposition, the problem, solution and the villain. And you often also need what we call ‘issue campaigns’ – something very specific that illustrates the wider problem. … Landmines are a very good example. There’s a very clear villain – clear action is needed. But when you get into the kind of equity issues, health or education, or food or whatever, it’s more complex immediately about who the villain is … I mean, it’s multi-layers of villains and problems.

(OXF-1)

Single-issue networks are conducive to setting up powerful campaigns, such as debt cancellation campaigns, landmine banning campaigns and dam campaigns. The reason for this is that they focus on one issue that is easily understood while coalitions aim to deal with broader issues that are complex and have many causes. This is not to say that coalitions do not engage in campaigns – quite the opposite. What it does mean is that coalitions require a way to link a single issue to the broader aims of the coalition. Oxfam used the term ‘wedge’ to describe this linking. A member of OI talked about the education campaign as a ‘wedge’ into larger organizational goals. Education was the wedge: ‘that opens up a wider debate about equity and public expenditures, about decisions governments make about what different people get … that poverty is about injustice and it’s not just about material wealth’ (OXF-3). Another member of OI explains a further connection between the debt relief cam- paign, the education campaign and larger issues of poverty: ‘We’ll be lobbying on … changes to structural adjustment policy, particularly cost recovery, charging for basic education. … On debt as well, we’ll be trying to make a clearer link between debt and poverty and basic education’ (OXF-1).

In addition to using campaigns as a wedge to larger issues, the coalition structure allows for multi-level coordinated campaigns. The ‘multi-level’ approach, where groups work in a coordinated manner, in various countries and at various levels of politics, is one that is difficult for most individual NGOs to accomplish, because of the time required to coordinate such a campaign. One BWP member states that the group aims at ‘getting the UK officials to take things forward either in a kind of formal way by taking something to the Board [of the World Bank] or by getting the relevant paperwork through and calling in on the Bank people, or getting together other Executive Directors’ (BWP-1).

Coordination is an essential skill for managing multi-level campaigns. Probably due to its formal links, OI has been successful at conducting multi-level campaigns. One member describes the process of multi-level coordination and strategy:

You need to be able to lobby several countries and you need to be able to move to other influencing opportunities if you’re not making progress in one or two of them. You need to be able to take advantage of the media in many places to localize the pressure. All modern successful campaigns have to be international and in a way what we’re doing is gearing up more to be able to

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

107

do more international campaigning. But that doesn’t mean that the national bits of it aren’t key. It’s just being able to do it all at once.

(OXF-1)

Finally, timing is vital in these campaigns, whether it is an approach of a lobbyist, a letter requesting information, the presentation of a position or the exertion of pressure on a particular government, it is acknowledged to be vitally important to development NGO coalitions engaging in influencing IFIs. One member of OI stated that ‘if we want to move on HIPC, we’ll go and visit the Canadian government, the Dutch government, the US government on the same day and get them talking to each other. … We will visit Blair’s government and get them to ring the Treasury’ (OXF-5). Another member of OI claimed that ‘knowing what works, what’s in the pipeline, knowing what comes up, knowing who to talk to and when to do it – doing it at the right time, gives us the opportunity of influencing’ (OXF-4).

Conclusion

Transnational network formation and the role that NGOs play in these networks is a growing area of academic investigation. Most research in this field has generally examined loosely connected networks focused on one issue. This article started with the work of Keck and Sikkink on transnational advocacy networks, but looked specifically at development NGO coalitions – organizational forms with broader development aims, more permanent organizational structures and greater member commitment. This organizational structure has had an impact on the strategies these coalitions have taken. Through an investigation of the coalitions – Oxfam International, the Bretton Woods Project, and the NGO Working Group on the World Bank – we examined the various organizational strategies that were taken by these coalitions, and explored how these coalitions have attempted to influence other international actors.

In using RDP, we were able to focus on these coalitions as strategic organizations that formed strong ties. Judging from some of the comments made by members of these coalitions, we might conclude that NGOs need coalitions, not only because there is a significant discourse of collaboration within the development industry (be it networks, partnerships or coalitions) but also because the level of uncertainty in the funding environment is such that (particularly) northern NGOs need to redefine their role as legitimate in the development process. The effects of the development NGO environment has been under-investigated; this study treats the organization’s environment as an important factor in the formation of organizational strategy. The importance of resources such as funding, legitimacy and information cannot be underestimated in how they affect an organization’s attempts to achieve its goals.

Helen Yanacopulos Development Policy and Practice

Open University Milton Keynes, UK

Helen Yanacopulos

108

Acknowledgements

In writing this article I have benefited from the comments and suggestions of Jim Whitman, the three anonymous referees and the editor of this issue. This research was made possible through a Ph.D. fellowship from the Cambridge Political Economy Trust. I am also grateful for the time given by all of those interviewed for this research.

Notes

1. For example, the substance and status of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is undeniable and externally bestowed. Pfeffer and Salancik (1978: 194) argue that legitimacy is a bestowed status that is granted by other actors outside the organization. They continue in stating that ‘as with the existence of social norms generally, legitimacy is known more readily when it is absent than when it is present. … Legitimisation is, probably, a retrospective process, in which verbal justifications are mustered to provide approval for the organization in question.’

2. According to Hardy et al. (2000) discourse can also be mobilized as a strategic resource, although we are not addressing this here.

3. Since 1990, official aid flows have declined overall. In 1990 dollars, official grants to NGOs fell from $2.4 billion in 1988 to $1.7 billion in 1999, while private donations from individuals, foundations and corporations have doubled from $4.5 billion to $10.7 billion (Kaldor et al. 2003); thus, the reality is that funding to the NGO sector has increased over this time period. However, the number of NGOs and the work that they do has increased during this same period, which could arguably be leading to NGO perceptions of financial scarcity.

4. These interviews were conducted for Ph.D. research and are part of a set of 30 interviews, which took place in Washington DC, London, Paris, Addis Ababa, Penang and Kuala Lumpur during 1997–99. The interviewees in the case studies were selected either because of their experience in overseeing the NGO coalition, their contribution to lobbying and campaigning within the coalition, or for their capacity as researchers. The following are the selected interviews used in this article: BWP-1 (BWP employee, 24 September 1998, London); BWP-3 (BWP member, 18 August 1999, London); BWP-4 (BWP member, 23 July 1999, London); IFI-2 (IMF employee, 8 February 1999, Washington DC); IFI-3 (IMF employee, 12 February 1999, Washington, DC); IFI-4 (World Bank employee, 10 February 1999, Washington DC); IFI-6 (World Bank employee, 19 February 1999, Washington DC); IFI-8 (World Bank employee, 19 September 1999, Washington DC); NGO-1 (NGOWGWB member, 18 September 1999, Ethiopia); NGO-3 (NGOWGWB member, 13 November 1999, London); OTH-1 (DFID employee, 9 July 1999, London); OXF-1 (OI employee, 8 July 1998, Washington DC); OXF-3 (OI employee, 16 February 1999, Washington DC); OXF-4 (OI employee, 30 September 1998, Oxford); OXF-5 (OI employee, 25 June 1998, Boston).

5. While Oxfam members frequently mention the desire for closer partnerships with groups in the south, one member’s view was telling: ‘We do work with partners, and we do shape our views and what we push for based on what they decide to say, but I think it is hypocritical for us to claim they’re leading us. … I mean we choose them’ (OXF-3).

6. It is not completely clear how membership for each region of the NGOWGWB works – however, in my experience of two annual regional meetings it seemed that national umbrella networks were invited and most groups that wanted to attend were invited. The World Bank itself did not seem to have a veto power for the membership of the NGOWGWB, but there is clearly a self-selection process occurring.

The strategies that bind: NGO coalitions and their influence

109

7. In assessing the relationship between the BWP and IFIs it is difficult to gauge how IFI employees see the BWP. However, BWP employees referred me to some of the high-level IMF and World Bank personnel I interviewed, and it seemed that these people were complimentary about the project (even though they frequently disagreed with the BWP’s views). Probably more telling is the role the BWP has played in the World Bank’s various consultations of civil society, for example the 2000 World Development Report, where the World Bank selected the BWP as the organizing group for comments from the civil society consultation.

8. I attended one meeting of the Africa Region of NGOWGWB at which one member strongly disagreed with the decision of the group and the actions of the facilitator. He walked out of the plenary and did not attend the joint NGO and World Bank meetings at which the united front was presented.

References

Burgerman, S. (2001) Moral victories: how activists provoke multilateral action, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Clark, A. M. (2001) Diplomacy of conscience: Amnesty International and changing human rights norms, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Clark, J. (2004) Globalizing civic engagement: civil society and transnational action, London: Earthscan.

Edwards, M. and J. Gaventa (eds.) (2001) Global citizen action, Earthscan: London. Edwards, M., D. Hulme and T. Wallace (1999) ‘NGOs in a global future: marrying local

delivery to worldwide leverage’, conference background paper, NGOs in a Global Future Conference, 10–13 January, Birmingham.

Egan, C. (1995) Creating organizational advantage, Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. Faulkner, D. (1995) International strategic alliances: co-operating to compete, London:

McGraw-Hill Book Company. Florini, A. (ed.) (1999) The third force: the rise of transnational civil society, Tokyo and

Washington: Japan Center for International Change and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Fowler, A. (1997) Striking a balance, London: Earthscan Publications. Gray, B. (1996) ‘Cross-sectoral partners: collaborative alliances amongst business, government,

and communities’, in C. Huxham (ed.) Creating collaborative advantage, London: Sage Publications, 57–79.

Hajer, M. (1995) The politics of environmental discourse, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hardy, C., I. Palmer and N. Phillips (2000) ‘Discourse as a strategic resource’, Human

Relations, 53 (9) 1227–48. Hatch, M. (1997) Organization theory: modern, symbolic and postmodern perspectives,

Oxford: Oxford University Press. Henry, L., G. Mohan and H. Yanacopulos (2004) ‘Transnational networks as agents of

development’, Third World Quarterly, forthcoming. Higgott, R., G. Underhill and A. Bieler (2000) Non-state actors and authority in the global

system, New York: Routledge. Hilhorst, D. (2003) The real world of NGOs: discourses, diversity and development, London:

Zed Books. Hudock, A. (1999) NGOs and civil society, Cambridge: Polity Press. Kaldor M., H. Anheier and M. Glasius (eds) (2003) Global civil society 2003, Oxford: Oxford

University Press.

Helen Yanacopulos

110

Keck M. and K. Sikkink (1998) Activists beyond borders: advocacy networks in international politics, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Khagram, S., J. Riker and K. Sikkink (eds) (2002) Restructuring world politics: transnational social movements, networks, and norms, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Leipold, G. (2000) ‘Campaigning: a fashion or the best way to change the global agenda?’ Development in Practice, 10, 453–60.

Nelson, P. (2000) ‘Heroism and ambiguity: NGO advocacy in international policy’, Development and Practice, 10, 478–91.

O’Brien, R., A. M. Goetz, J. A. Scholte and M. Williams (2000) Contesting global governance: multilateral institutions and global social movements, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Pfeffer, J. (1997) New directions for organization theory, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pfeffer, J. and G. R. Salancik (1978) The external control of organization: a resource

dependency perspective, New York: Harper and Row. Pfeffer, J. and G. R. Salancik (1984) ‘The design and management of externally controlled

organizations’, in D. S. Pugh (ed.) Organizational theory, New York: Penguin, 130–61. Ramia, G. (2003) ‘Global social policy, INGO and strategic management’, Global Social

Policy, 3, 79–101.

Miscellaneous documents

BWP-a ‘Action aid (Bretton Woods Project): IFI-watchers network communications strengthening’, project proposal to the Ford Foundation, submitted October 2002.

Oxfam-a ‘Oxfam 2001–2004 Strategy Report’, Oxfam International, London. NGOWGWB-a ‘Information pack’, NGO working group on the World Bank, 1999. NGOWGWB-b ‘Enhancing civil society capacity to influence the emergence of participatory

socio-economic policy formulation in the World Bank’, NGO Working Group on the World Bank.

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=upcp20

Political Communication

ISSN: 1058-4609 (Print) 1091-7675 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/upcp20

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? How News Media Attention Helps Advocacy Groups to Achieve Their Policy Goals

Iskander De Bruycker

To cite this article: Iskander De Bruycker (2019) Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? How News Media Attention Helps Advocacy Groups to Achieve Their Policy Goals, Political Communication, 36:1, 103-126, DOI: 10.1080/10584609.2018.1493007

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1493007

View supplementary material

Published online: 02 Nov 2018.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 2114

View related articles

View Crossmark data

Citing articles: 19 View citing articles

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? How News Media Attention Helps Advocacy Groups to Achieve Their

Policy Goals

ISKANDER DE BRUYCKER

This article asks whether and under what circumstances a presence in news media debates helps advocacy groups to achieve their policy goals in European Union (EU) legislative politics. Common wisdom holds that lobbyists eschew the public spotlight and prefer to influence policymaking from behind the scenes. This percep- tion contrasts with the literature on media and interest groups, which typically conceives of media attention as a crucial commodity for interest groups to influence policy decisions. This article unites these seemingly contrasting stances by arguing that media attention can be both a blessing and a curse for advocacy. The central argument posited is that media attention may improve or reduce advocacy groups’ chances of preference attainment depending on how advocacy groups frame their message in the news. The analyses draw from interviews with more than 200 policy practitioners and content analysis of 3,557 media statements connected to a sample of 125 EU policy proposals. The findings demonstrate that an advocacy group’s media presence may improve preference attainment, but only when the advocacy group manages to frame its objectives in the news as aligned with the public interest.

Keywords interest groups, media and politics, European Union politics, framing

Media attention can be a crucial commodity for advocacy groups that wish to have their voices heard. The literature on interest groups and political public relations widely acknowledges the value of media attention as a weapon of advocacy to impact political decision making (Binderkrantz, Bonafont, & Halpin, 2017; Strömback & Kiousis, 2011). The presumption that media presence matters for political influence has led to a number of empirical studies on interest groups’ access to media coverage (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz, 2012; Danielian & Page, 1994; De Bruycker & Beyers, 2015; Thrall, 2006). Despite the attainment of important insights about which interest groups succeed in passing the media gates, no study to date has empirically addressed whether interest groups that receive media attention are also more likely to achieve their policy goals.

Iskander De Bruycker is a Postdoctoral Researcher & Lecturer for the Research Foundation Flanders at the University of Antwerp.

Address correspondence to Iskander De Bruycker, Research Foundation Flanders, University of Antwerp, Sint-Jacobstraat 2, Antwerp, 2000, Belgium. E-mail: [email protected]

Color versions of one or more of the figures in the article can be found online at www. tandfonline.com/upcp.

Political Communication, 36:103–126, 2019 Copyright © 2018 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN: 1058-4609 print / 1091-7675 online DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1493007

103

The image of news media attention as a blessing for advocacy stands in contrast with the common wisdom that lobbyists prefer to work behind the scenes and outside the purview of public scrutiny (Dür & Mateo, 2013; Hanegraaff, Beyers, & De Bruycker, 2016). Indeed, some recent studies have argued that media attention can constrain interest- group influence, particularly for business interests (Culpepper, 2010; Dür & Mateo, 2014). While the news media can provide a platform upon which advocacy groups can draw attention to themselves, media presence can backfire, for instance when advocacy groups are scandalized or receive negative coverage (Danielian & Page, 1994). Drawing from these two seemingly contrasting perspectives, this artcile argues that media attention can be both a blessing and a curse for advocacy groups, depending on the conditions under which they receive media attention. Identifying these conditions is the purpose of this study, which asks under which circumstances media attention constrains or facilitates interest groups in achieving their policy goals.

Identifying these circumstances aids in understanding the role of the news media and public scrutiny in advocacy processes. Former studies have identified a bias in media coverage toward business interests and well-endowed organizations (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz et al., 2017; Danielian & Page, 1994; Thrall, 2006). More insights into the relationships between media attention and preference attainment help in evaluating the normative implications of these biases and their consequences for policy outputs. This study analyzes how communication strategies and news media visibility impact power relationships and thus speaks to core themes in political communication research (Entman, 1993; Lasswell, 1950). This study aims at applying key concepts and insights from the political communication literature to the study of interest-group politics. It expands knowledge on framing and media effects from the realms of party politics and public opinion to interest-group research (see de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2003; Halahan, 2011).

As a research case, this study focuses on EU legislative lobbying. In past decades, the EU has become increasingly politicized and salient in national electoral debates (Hooghe & Marks, 2009; Hutter & Grande, 2014). In contrast to other (national) political arenas, the EU is said to lack a coherent public sphere, a situation reinforced by its transnational nature and complex decision-making procedures (Meyer, 1999). This situation could lead to the conclusion that EU legislative politics classifies as a least likely case for studying the impact of media attention on advocacy processes. Nonetheless, other scholars have highlighted the role of the news media as a crucial forum for connecting different EU policymakers, stakeholders, and citizens, precisely because the EU lacks alternative structural fora allowing for interaction and exchange (Koopmans, 2007; Trenz, 2004). Moreover, previous studies have demonstrated that advocacy groups are prominently present in media debates on EU legislative policymaking and make intensive use of media-oriented lobbying strategies (Dür & Mateo, 2013; Kriesi, Tresch, & Jochum, 2007). All of this indicates that media attention for EU advocacy processes is highly relevant.

The analyses draw on data sets that were established in the context of the INTEREURO project. The study relies on 238 semi-structured interviews with advocacy groups and European Commission (EC) officials as well as an extensive content analysis of media articles from six European outlets. The results demonstrate that media attention can be a blessing for preference attainment, but only if an interest group manages to frame its main message in the news as being aligned with the public interest.

104 Iskander De Bruycker

Media Attention, Pressure Politics, and Expanded Audiences

This article’s main objective lies in connecting media attention with preference attainment. Preference attainment is defined as the degree to which interest organizations succeed in achieving their policy goals on a specific issue (Bernhagen, Dür, & Marshall, 2014; Mahoney, 2008; Rasmussen et al., 2018). Media attention is conceptualized as the presence of an interest organization in the news media coverage on a specific issue. Seeking media attention is seen as part of an outside lobbying strategy geared at pressuring policymakers (Kollman, 1998; Schattschneider, 1960; Tresch & Fischer, 2015). The news media are a highly appropriate venue in which to direct the attention of policymakers and other relevant stakeholders and provide information about the expected political support (Beyers, 2004; Hanegraaff et al., 2016; Kollman, 1998). Not complying with broadly endorsed demands includes the risk of losing legitimacy or suffering electoral damage. Therefore, policymakers might submit to advocacy demands when they perceive these demands as broadly endorsed (Bentley, 1995; Kollman, 1998). The media provide a forum in which to signal the size and scope of support and opposition to elites or reframe an issue (Hallahan, 1999; Strömback & Kiousis, 2011). As such, gaining media attention is invaluable for advocacy groups that seek to impact policy outcomes.

Some advocacy groups may not actively or intentionally seek media attention but may appear in media debates nevertheless. Journalists are incentivized to include stakeholders that are not yet present in public debates in an effort to provide balanced coverage (Donsbach & Klett, 1993; Hopmann, Van Aelst, & Legnante, 2012). Consequently, some lobby groups may unintentionally be drawn into media debates, for instance, to react to opponents that receive much attention, or when journalists confront advocacy groups with accusations from opponents. Under these circumstances, interested organiza- tions may end up participating in media debates without having a direct policy incentive or the political leverage to pressure policymakers.

Moreover, not all interest groups are able to acquire access to news media debates, even if they want to. Journalists and news editors will select the media claims from interest groups which comply with news values (such as conflict, power, unexpectedness, and proximity) and which fit their own editorial goals and journalistic routines (Galtung & Ruge, 1965; Harcup & O’Neill, 2001; Van Aelst, Maddens, Noppe, Fiers, 2008). As a result, some interest groups will have a competitive advantage over others in passing the media gates. For instance the protests, demonstrations, and other such activities which civil society often exercise are particularly apt to draw media attention as they comply with the journalistic interest upon the conflictual (Danielian & Page, 1994, p. 1060). While groups may develop some “media savvy” to comply with news values and routines, it will still involve a substantial investment to acquire the necessary in-house journalistic exper- tise. As such, mostly affluent business organizations manage to secure access to news media debates (Thrall, 2006). This article assesses whether biased media access as observed in previous studies (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz, 2012; Danielian & Page, 1994; Thrall, 2006) exacerbates in biased preference attainment.

To explain the role of media presence for preference attainment, I assume that media attention leads to an expansion of the audiences advocacy groups can address. This logic is visually illustrated in Figure 1. In this function, the news media serve as a megaphone for advocacy groups that enables them to communicate to a broader array and a more diverse range of stakeholders, elites, and citizens. Audience expansion implies that the message of an advocacy group reaches beyond its core audience of directly involved parties toward a wider set of stakeholders, non-expert elites, and the broader public. Audience expansion

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 105

comes with both opportunities and threats. On the one hand, a presence in the news media can amplify the political support an interest group seeks to convey via outside lobbying (Froehlich & Rüdiger, 2006). The causal mechanism here is not that the public is persuaded by interest groups’ media claims per se, but rather that an advocacy group’s signal of support is perceived by policymakers as broadly approved (Manheim, 2011, p. 28). It is more difficult for policymakers to neglect widely endorsed demands if they are openly articulated in the news. Therefore, the advocacy camp that manages to (rhetori- cally) connect its own goals and interests with those of the expanded audience increases the political leverage of its policy demands and consequently increases the chances of realizing its policy goals (Hallahan, 1999, p. 207). On the other hand, the political signals of groups whose objectives seemingly contrast with the interests of the expanded audience will more easily be recognized by policymakers as peripheral. Those groups will therefore see their political leverage diminished and would fare better by remaining completely under the radar of public scrutiny.

Audience expansion also has consequences for the relationship between advocacy groups and their constituents. When participating in media debates, an advocacy group’s constituencies or benefactors can more easily monitor the organizations’ activities (Vliegenthart, Oegema, & Klandermans, 2005). They can evaluate whether their interests are addressed and actively promoted in the media. The increased scrutiny of constituents may constrain advocacy organizations as they should not only anticipate the consequences of their media presence on preference attainment, but also its impact on the relationship with constituencies (Hanegraaff et al., 2016; Schmitter & Streeck, 1981). The media tactics of advocacy groups will therefore always involve a balancing act between satisfy- ing constituents on the one hand and maximizing impact on policy outcomes on the other hand.

Hypotheses

When lobbying behind the scenes, advocacy groups relate to a narrow set of policy elites, and lobbying efforts can be meticulously targeted to a single person (Beyers, 2004). When entering the media realm, in contrast, advocacy groups engage with a much broader audience. Other stakeholders, citizens, and a wider range of (non-expert) elites are exposed

Expanded audience

Advocacy group

Core Audience

Media presence

Figure 1. Media attention and audience expansion.

106 Iskander De Bruycker

to the groups’ claims (Kollman, 1998; Tresch & Fischer, 2015). The signal of pressure an advocacy group articulates in the media will be perceived by policymakers as more credible and as widely endorsed when the interests of the advocacy group are aligned with the interests of the expanded audience. In the following I argue that this alignment with the broader public is signaled by the (a) substantive interests and goals an advocacy group represents, but also by (b) how these interests are framed in the news.

First, business groups that represent a narrow or specific interest face greater risk when they participate in media debates. Their specific interests may contrast with the interests of the broader public and the media are often skeptical toward their cause. The lobbying scandals that make it to the news headlines mostly involve business lobbyists who bribe or corrupt EU elites. Business interests are less likely to seek out media attention and often defend particularistic or economic interests that do not lend themselves for public advocacy (Culpepper, 2010; Dür & Mateo, 2013; Hanegraaff et al., 2016). Civil society groups, in contrast, often have a broad support base among citizens and represent diffuse constituencies and therefore have an advantage over business lobbyists when participating in media debates (Binderkrantz & Krøyer, 2012; Rasmussen et al., 2018). Consequently, business groups can more easily become subject to critique in media debates and policy elites are more likely to recognize their position as peripheral. Media attention can amplify the limited political support business organizations receive. Therefore, these groups fare better by staying outside of the public spotlight and concen- trate their efforts on direct lobbying strategies (Culpepper, 2010).

H1: A presence in media debates facilitates preference attainment for civil society groups, while it hinders preference attainment for business lobby groups.

Second, substantive interests are also subject to interpretation and can be commu- nicated through strategic framing (Boräng & Naurin, 2015; De Bruycker, 2017a; Klüver, Mahoney, & Opper, 2015). An advocacy group may pursue economic or specific interests, but it can still try to frame its objectives as aligned with those of the expanded audience (Baumgartner & Mahoney, 2008; Hallahan, 1999). Framing is defined as a process in which an advocacy group selects some aspects of a perceived reality and makes them more salient in a communicating message, in such a way as to promote their particular problem definition (de Vreese, 2005; Entman, 1993). On the one hand, framing is a strategic and deliberative process, while on the other hand, political actors are bound by the interests they represent and their policy context when framing an issue in a particular way (Cacciatore et al., 2016; De Bruycker, 2017a; Klüver et al., 2015).

Strategic media framing is a crucial aspect of an advocacy group’s political public relations and can determine the outcome of an outside lobbying strategy (Hallahan, 1999; Strömback & Kiousis, 2011). An important condition for successful outside lobbying is that the advocacy group enjoys the support of the expanded audience (Froehlich & Rüdiger, 2006; Kollman, 1998). Advocacy groups can garner support by establishing “common frames of reference” with the expanded audience (Hallahan, 1999, p. 207). To resonate with the broader public, frames need to reflect the values and norms of society and seek to advance various publics’ interests (Hallahan, 1999). When engaging in outside lobbying strategies, an advocacy group can frame its goals as aligned with the public interest, so that it can signal to policymakers that its goals enjoy broad endorsement. When gaining access to media debates, an organization’s audience expands, and the organization cannot justify or defend its position solely by referring to its own self-interest. Rather, the organization should relate to the interests of citizens or broad and diffuse constituencies

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 107

(Naurin, 2007; Schattschneider, 1960). When an advocacy group manages to frame its demands in the news as aligned with the public interest, policymakers will more easily perceive these demands as widely supported, which will benefit the advocacy groups’ chances of preference attainment.

H2: Media presence will facilitate an advocacy group in achieving its policy goals if the advocacy group manages to frame its objectives as aligned with the public interest.

A public-interest frame pertains to the welfare or well-being of a broad and diffuse collection of individual citizens for a specific policy. It is broader than the interests of parties, minority groups, territorial entities, or any other well-delineated or formalized group of citizens. It refers to a diffuse array of individual citizens or the general public, such as “taxpayers,” “the people,” “the public,” “consumers,” or European citizens in general (Boräng & Naurin, 2015; De Bruycker, 2017b; Naurin, 2007). While addressing public interests in the news can help an organization to realize its policy objectives, it will not always benefit the relationship with constituents. When advocacy organizations promote public interests while neglecting their core beliefs and unique identity, members or supporters may feel forsaken (Heaney, 2004). Lobbyists that address the wider public on the basis of openly self-seeking claims alone may satisfy constituents, but will not enjoy the sympathy of the broader public (Naurin, 2007; Schattschneider, 1960). Framing in the news is thus a balancing act between addressing the interests of the broader public on the one hand, while staying true to the specific goals and concerns of constituents on the other hand.

Importantly, the eventual framing of a statement in the news is not only the result of an advocacy strategy; it is also shaped by journalists and news editors through selection and editing processes (Tresch & Fischer, 2015). Advocacy groups can thus try to frame their interests as aligned with the public, but they can never fully control the statements that end up in the newspapers (Froehlich & Rüdiger, 2006). It is therefore crucial to control for whether the frames which advocacy groups articulated in the news media are a result of the outside lobbying strategies that they developed or a rephrasing of journalists to make the story more newsworthy.

Research Design

The data used to test these hypotheses are part of a larger project on EU legislative lobbying. The goal of this project is to analyze lobbying strategies and interest-group influence for a sample of 125 European legislative proposals (directives and regulations) that were submitted between 2008 and 2010 (see online supplemental Appendix). The sample procedure is equivalent to the procedure Thomson (2011) used in his research on EU legislative politics. Details about the precise procedure are described elsewhere (Beyers, Braun, Marshall, & De Bruycker, 2014a; Beyers, Dür, Marshall, & Wonka, 2014b). In this article, I draw on evidence collected through 143 interviews with 111 different interest organizations active on one of the 125 sampled proposals. Interviews were not conducted for all 125 sampled proposals. Forty proposals were dropped because a systematic analysis of EU-level media, interviews conducted with EC experts, and a range of brief telephone interviews demonstrated that these cases did not stimulate lobbying activity. Seven proposals were not included in the analysis because no interest groups could be convinced to participate in an interview or no one within the contacted organization remembered enough about the specific proposal.

108 Iskander De Bruycker

As described elsewhere, the main goal was to interview EU-level interest organiza- tions on each side of the issues identified for the legislative proposals (Beyers, Marshall, et al., 2014b). Of the 111 interviewed interest organizations, 86% were EU-level interest organizations. In cases in which no EU-level organizations were active, national or international organizations were interviewed. The largest portion (64%) of the respondents represented business associations; another 29% were nongovernmental organizations (NGOs); and the remaining 8% were officials from professional organizations, firms, or labor unions. These numbers correspond to the overall population of interest groups active in EU politics (Wonka et al., 2010).

The analyses rely on two measures of preference attainment. One measure is based on the judgment of the interviewed EC officials and the other is based on the self-perception of the interviewed lobbyists. The first measure of preference attainment, based on the judgment of EC officials, was developed by Bernhagen and colleagues (2014). This measure is based on 95 interviews with EC officials and was measured at the issue level: issues are specific aspects of a legislative proposal in which stakeholders adopted conflicting positions and disagreed on the preferred policy outcome. Based on interviews with interest organizations and EC officials, 292 distinct issues were identified in relation to 78 proposals. The EC officials were asked to mention for several issues for which organized interests sought policy influence. Then, they were asked to position these organizations on a one-dimensional scale vis-à-vis each other by giving them a score ranging from 0 to 100. Next, the EC official had to situate the initial proposal of the EC, the eventual outcome, and the reversion point of the issue on this scale. For this article, we use the distance-to-outcome measure, which presumes that the proximity of an actor’s position vis-à-vis the final outcome indicates the extent to which its preferences were achieved. Formally, the preference attainment of actor i with regard to issue j (sij) equals sij ¼ Q� xij � Oj

� �

� � , where Q is the distance between the minimum and the

maximum of the scale, xij is the position or ideal point of actor i, and Oj is the outcome on the issue.1 In the analyses, this measure was inverted so that positive values denote higher levels of preference attainment.

For the second preference attainment measure, interest group officials were asked whether the different aspects of a legislative proposal corresponded with their initial preferences.2 These answers can be connected to the same issues that were raised in the interviews with EC officials. This measure is more vulnerable to strategic responses by the respondent. Nonetheless, self-perceived measures of preference attainment are commonly used and including this measure provides a useful robustness check to cross-validate the empirical findings (Binderkrantz & Pedersen, 2018; Dür, 2008). As with all other mea- sures of preference attainment, measures of perception or self-assessment come with advantages and drawbacks (Dür, 2008; Pedersen, 2013). Although not all the drawbacks can be avoided, I tried to cope with them as best as possible by triangulating multiple data sources (suggested in Dür, 2008). Using multiple preference attainment measures provides for a unique opportunity to assess the robustness of the findings as well as to understand how different measures of preference attainment (dis)agree.

As an independent variable, I first include whether an interest organization made one or more statements on one of the sampled proposals in one of the six selected media outlets (Agence Europe, Euractiv, European Voice, Financial Times, Le Monde, and Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung). A statement is a quote or a paraphrase by an advocacy group linked to a specific issue (see also Koopmans & Statham, 1999). The media outlets were selected because they are known to extensively cover EU-related matters and give an audience to a diverse set of actors active in EU legislative processes. Moreover, these

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 109

outlets have been studied in former prominent projects on stakeholder representation in the EU (Mahoney, 2008; Thomson, 2011). To account for some national variation, a mix of both national and EU outlets were selected.

A second key independent variable gauges whether an interest organization is a business or civil society organization. This variable was coded by the researcher who interviewed the interest organization. Business organizations represent a certain industry or economic activity and have firms or professionals as members, while civil society groups advocate for certain norms, values, or ideals in society and typically have individuals as members or supporters (directly or indirectly via lower-level associations). This variable mainly serves to assess H1, but at the same time it is an important control variable for assessing H2. Namely, one could argue civil society groups experience more freedom to frame their goals in terms of the public interest and that they are more inclined to seek media attention compared to business groups (Binderkrantz et al., 2015; Danielian & Page, 1994, p. 1060). The effect of public-interest frames should therefore be estimated ceteris paribus the group type of the organization.

To measure whether an interest group managed to frame its position in terms of the public interest, the third key independent variable, the statements advocacy groups made in the news, were coded based on whether they referred to the interests of a diffuse array of citizens or broad segments of public opinion, such as “citizens,” “consumers,” “the people,” or “taxpayers.” This frame was not coded when a reference was made to specific subgroups in society such as “transport workers,” “weapon owners,” or “refugees.” For instance, one media statement in the data set that appeals to public interests was made by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in Euractiv (September 29, 2010) on a directive proposal about the energy performance of buildings [COM (2008)780]: “Unfortunately there is no provision at all which ensures that laggard member states will improve their building regulations. As a consequence, citizens will continue to spend a lot of money to warm the climate instead of their homes.” The online supplemental Appendix includes a more detailed description of the coding and 10 more examples.

To account for alternative explanations, I added a number of control variables which are known to impact preference attainment. First, some advocacy groups actively push for media attention, while others are unintentionally pulled into media debates by journalists. Evidently, media attention can be expected to be more beneficial to those who actively seek it as part of some outside lobbying strategy. Therefore, I control for the extent interest organizations relied on outside lobbying relative to inside lobbying strategies. Lobbyists were asked in the interviews what percentage of their efforts consisted of activities that were addressed to the public and media and what percentage concerned efforts to gain direct access to policymakers. In the regression analyses, I interact the relative investment in outside lobbying with the use of public-interest frames to assess whether this type of framing has value added for a group’s outside lobbying strategy. Moreover, this interaction allows to distinguish whether the effect of public-interest frames is a result of advocacy strategies or rather caused by exogenous factors.

Second, next to highlighting public interests, advocacy groups may address the wider public on the basis of openly self-seeking claims. This may not provoke the sympathy of the wider public, but it informs policymakers of the specific interests at stake. Moreover, this fits in a strategy to satisfy the members as it showcases that their specific interests are advocated for. Of the interviewed organizations, 30% addressed their constituencies’ self- interest in media claims, of which about 50% did not refer to public interests. To clearly delineate the effect of public-interest frames from the effect of self-interest frames, the latter is taken as a control variable. Self-seeking claims are claims that refer to the specific

110 Iskander De Bruycker

members, constituents, or supporters of an advocacy group, such as transport workers, the automobile industry, hunters, or translators. Third, the endorsement an advocacy group enjoys from other political actors in media debates can be consequential for its political influence. To grasp this endorsement, I use the content analysis of media claims. All articles discussing the 125 sampled legislative proposals in the six aforementioned media outlets were archived and 3,557 statements made by any actor (such as Members of the European Parliament [MEPs], European Commission officials, Council executives, firms, journalists, regulatory agencies, etc.) about a specific proposal were identified. For each statement we coded whether the statement sought to (a) support the proposal, (b) shape small parts, or (c) change the proposal radically or block it (De Bruycker & Beyers, 2015). To determine the most widely supported position, I rely on the modal position or simply the position that gained the most media prominence. Then, I compared the policy position an advocacy group adopted on an issue with the most popular position on that policy in the media. Based on this method, I established a dummy variable measuring whether the advocacy group aligned with the most popular position in the media (1) or not (0).

Fourth, the frames advocacy groups emphasize in the media can take many different forms. Earlier research in communication studies and social psychology drawing from prospect theory has pointed at the prevailing effects of negative frames over positive frames (de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2003; Druckman, 2004; Schuck & de Vreese, 2006). These findings may also be applicable to how advocacy groups frame their message. Namely, negative news frames are more beneficial to achieve preference attainment (Baumgartner, Berry, Hojnacki, Kimball, & Leech, 2009; De Bruycker, 2017a). Therefore, I controlled for whether advocacy groups emphasized negative frames (empha- sizing risks, losses, or negative consequences) and/or positive frames (emphasizing oppor- tunities, gains, or positive consequences) when appearing in the news.

Fifth, resources, in particular staff resources, are expected to lead to higher levels of media professionalization and to have a positive impact on preference attainment. Gaining access to media debates requires resources, expertise, and networks (Thrall, 2006). Wealthy advocacy groups can more easily meet the requirements to pass the media gates, as they can hire the necessary journalistic expertise, develop the required networks, and implement newsworthy media campaigns. Hence, I take staff size as a control variable (logged because of its skewed distribution) as it may be a confounding factor of media attention.

Sixth, earlier research has demonstrated that preference attainment can be explained by the policy position an interest organization adopted. Namely, those interests that seek policy change or that oppose the status quo are less likely to achieve their goals (Baumgartner et al., 2009). Moreover, previous studies have showed that groups that oppose policy initiatives can more easily gain access to news media debates as supportive statements on how good things are are less newsworthy than critical and juicy attacks on the policy initiatives taken by policymakers (De Bruycker & Beyers, 2015). Consequently, I control for if an interest organization supported a proposal (a), sought to shape some parts, (b) or sought to block or change most of the proposal (c).

Seventh, interest groups could be more or less free to frame their goals along the public interest depending on whether they cooperate with other organizations in an advocacy coalition. An advocacy coalition can send a more encompassing signal of political support than a single organization can. Being part of a coalition may thus be a confounding factor of public interest framing and is therefore included in the analysis as a control variable.

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 111

Eight, I controlled for whether the advocacy group is an EU-level organization or not. This because advocacy groups that are specialized in dealing with EU politics and have an EU-wide constituency can be expected to more likely achieve their preferences than national or international organizations.

Finally, to avoid having the results of media presence of a single interest group be produced by the overall media salience of the issue on which the group is active, I include the media attention an issue receives as an additional control variable. To estimate the media salience of a legislative proposal, I counted the total number of articles that reported on the 78 proposals in the selected media outlets.

Results

Before presenting the regression analyses, I briefly explore the distribution of the key independent and dependent variables. First, more than half of the interviewed advocacy groups (55%) made statements in the selected news outlets, while 45% did not. Advocacy groups figure more prominently in EU-level outlets (52%) compared to national outlets (9%). The dependent variables of the study gauging preference attainment are presented in Figure 2a and 2b. For 135 of the 446 issues (30%), I can compare self-perceived preference attainment with the preference attainment the EC experts attributed to them. Figure 2a presents the proximity-to-outcome measure and Figure 2b the measure based on self-perceived preference attainment. Both figures distinguish between groups that appeared in media debates (black lines) and groups that did not (gray lines).

The figures do not show stark differences between groups inside and outside media coverage. This finding is exemplified by the insignificant correlations between media presence and self-perceived preference attainment (Spearman’s rho = 0.02; p = 0.78) or media presence and the proximity-to-outcome measure (Pearson’s r = –0.08; p = 0.36). The preference attainment distribution of advocacy groups that received media attention is very similar to groups that did not. When looking at the simple bivariate relationship between media presence and preference attainment, media attention is thus neither a blessing nor a curse.3

The two measures of preference attainment portrayed in Figure 2 are positively and significantly related (Spearman’s rho = 0.28; p = 0.00). Nonetheless, the measures do not perfectly correspond and show different distributions. One source of inconsistency could be the obtrusive nature of the self-perceived measure. The self-estimation is likely to be more biased by motivated reasoning and strategic considerations. Furthermore, the proxi- mity-to-outcome measure is very demanding for policy experts to produce; they are not always aware of or cannot remember all the advocacy groups involved on an issue. Notwithstanding these important limitations, both measures are positively and significantly related, which indicates that they refer to a similar underlying construct. However, since both variables still differ considerably, I use them in separate models to explain the impact of media presence.

More precisely, I ran one regression model with the proximity-to-outcome measure as the dependent variable and a second model using the self-perceived measure (see Tables 1 and 2). Because observations are nested in issues, I estimate a random effect for issues or proposals.4 Proximity-to-outcome is modeled with a mixed effects ordinary least squares regression. Self-perceived preference attainment is modeled with an ordered logistic regression. Because the Brant test demonstrated a violation of the parallel slopes assump- tion for a model with four ordinal categories, I recoded the ordinal scale by collapsing the first two categories.5 More specifically, I model the likelihood that the outcomes were

112 Iskander De Bruycker

(a )

pr ox

im ity

-t o-

ou tc

om e

(

b) s

el f-

pe rc

ei ve

d pr

ef er

en ce

a tta

in m

en t

F ig u re

2. M ed ia

pr es en ce

an d pr ox

im ity

to ou

tc om

e (l ef t; N = 13

5) ; se lf -p er ce iv ed

pr ef er en ce

at ta in m en t (r ig ht ; N = 39

7) .

T ab

le 1

M ix ed -e ff ec ts or di na ry

le as t sq ua re s re gr es si on

w ith

pr ox im

ity to

ou tc om

e (N

= 11 6)

M od el

1 M od el

2 M od el

3

β S E

β S E

β S E

In te rc ep t

53 .9 0* *

(1 4. 40 )

53 .5 0* *

(1 4. 76 )

57 .0 8* *

(1 4. 80 )

M ed ia

pr es en ce

Y es

–2 .8 6

(8 .9 1)

–2 .5 5

(9 .1 8)

–8 .6 4

(1 1. 16 )

N o (r ef .)

P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e Y es

29 .1 9* *

(9 .1 1)

N o (r ef .)

S el f- in te re st fr am

e Y es

14 .9 5

(7 .8 9)

14 .9 2

(7 .9 0)

15 .9 6*

(7 .5 9)

N o (r ef .)

N eg at iv e fr am

e Y es

1. 97

(7 .6 0)

2. 17

(7 .7 8)

5. 27

(7 .5 7)

N o (r ef .)

P os iti ve

fr am

e Y es

–1 8. 25 *

(8 .4 0)

–1 8. 26 *

(8 .4 1)

–2 0. 71 *

(8 .1 2)

N o (r ef .)

M ed ia

en do rs em

en t

Y es

–1 .2 6

(6 .3 0)

–1 .4 4

(6 .4 1)

0. 57

(6 .1 8)

N o (r ef .)

G ro up

ty pe

C iv il so ci et y

–2 .7 0

(6 .0 2)

–1 .8 1

(8 .9 2)

–4 .2 6

(5 .8 2)

B us in es s (r ef .)

O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

(% )

0. 28

(0 .1 7)

0. 28

(0 .1 7)

–0 .0 1

(0 .2 5)

S ta ff (l og ge d)

4. 49

(2 .5 7)

4. 57

(2 .6 2)

4. 26

(2 .4 9)

A dv oc ac y co al iti on

Y es

–1 8. 99 **

(5 .6 6)

–1 9. 12 **

(5 .7 7)

–1 9. 19 **

(5 .6 2)

N o (r ef .)

E U -l ev el

or ga ni za tio

n Y es

4. 87

(1 0. 53 )

5. 03

(1 0. 62 )

8. 10

(1 0. 41 )

N o (r ef .)

M ed ia

hi ts is su e (l og ge d)

–0 .7 8

(4 .0 6)

–0 .7 2

(4 .0 9)

–0 .7 8

(4 .1 2)

G oa l

B lo ck

or ch an ge

m os t

–1 1. 65

(7 .0 3)

–1 3. 82

(6 .8 6)

–1 2. 57

(6 .8 1)

S ha pe

sm al l pa rt s

–1 3. 67 *

(6 .7 5)

–1 1. 77 *

(7 .1 2)

–1 4. 67 *

(6 .6 9)

S up po rt (r ef .)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x G ro up

ty pe

–1 .5 8

(1 1. 98 )

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e 26 .8 4*

(1 2. 06 )

10 .9 7

(1 3. 27 )

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

0. 24

(0 .3 9)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e x O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

0. 80 *

(0 .3 7)

Is su e (r an do m

ef fe ct )

41 0. 17

(1 63 .5 2)

40 5. 92

(1 66 .0 6)

48 1. 39

(1 60 .8 2)

A ka ik e in fo rm

at io n cr ite ri a

11 37 .7 0

11 39 .6 8

11 37 .3 9

W al d C hi

2 35 .0 4

34 .8 7

45 .7 4

df 17 .0 0

18 .0 0

19 .0 0

P ro p > C hi

2 0. 00

0. 00

0. 00

N ot es . C oe ff ic ie nt s ar e pr es en te d w ith

ro bu

st st an da rd

er ro rs

in pa re nt he se s an d si gn

if ic an ce

le ve l in di ca te d by

** α ≤ 0. 01

; * α ≤ 0. 05

. P le as e no

te th at

th e

co ef fi ci en t of

th e pu

bl ic -i nt er es t fr am

e va ri ab le is no

t re po

rt ed

in M od

el s 2,

3, 5,

an d 6 be ca us e it re pr es en ts a co m bi na tio

n of

va lu es

(a n in te ra ct io n)

th at do

es no

t oc cu r in

th e da ta

se t an d es tim

at io n of

th ei r re sp ec tiv

e co ef fi ci en t is

im po

ss ib le . N am

el y,

a pu

bl ic -i nt er es t fr am

e ca nn

ot be

co m m un

ic at ed

in th e m ed ia

if th e

ad vo

ca cy

gr ou

p di d no

t ap pe ar

in th e m ed ia in

th e fi rs t pl ac e; th us ,t he

in te ra ct io n of

co m m un

ic at in g a pu

bl ic -i nt er es t fr am

e in

th e m ed ia an d no

t ap pe ar in g in

th e

m ed ia

ca nn

ot be

es tim

at ed .

T ab

le 2

M ix ed -e ff ec ts or de re d lo gi st ic

re gr es si on

w ith

th e se lf -p er ce iv ed

pr ef er en ce

at ta in m en t m ea su re

(N = 34 5)

M od el

4 M od el

5 M od el

6

β S E

β S E

β S E

In te rc ep t 1

–4 .9 5* *

(0 .8 6)

–4 .9 3* *

(0 .9 0)

–5 .0 1* *

(0 .9 2)

In te rc ep t 2

–2 .9 6* *

(0 .8 3)

–2 .9 3* *

(0 .8 7)

–2 .9 4* *

(0 .8 8)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

Y es

–0 .0 1

(0 .5 0)

0. 01

(0 .5 5)

0. 09

(0 .6 4)

N o (r ef .)

P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e Y es

1. 39 **

(0 .5 5)

N o (r ef .)

S el f- in te re st fr am

e Y es

0. 45

(0 .4 7)

0. 44

(0 .4 8)

0. 34

(0 .4 9)

N o (r ef .)

N eg at iv e fr am

e Y es

0. 08

(0 .4 3)

0. 09

(0 .4 3)

0. 43

(0 .4 7)

N o (r ef .)

P os iti ve

fr am

e Y es

–0 .1 8

(0 .4 6)

–0 .1 8

(0 .4 6)

–0 .2 1

(0 .4 8)

N o (r ef .)

M ed ia

en do rs em

en t

Y es

–0 .8 8* *

(0 .3 6)

–0 .8 8* *

(0 .3 6)

–0 .9 1*

(0 .3 7)

N o (r ef .)

G ro up

ty pe

C iv il so ci et y

–0 .0 4

(0 .3 4)

–0 .0 1

(0 .4 9)

0. 04

(0 .3 5)

B us in es s (r ef .)

O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

(% )

–0 .0 1

(0 .0 1)

–0 .0 1

(0 .0 1)

–0 .0 3

(0 .0 2)

S ta ff (l og ge d)

0. 12

(0 .1 4)

0. 12

(0 .1 4)

0. 10

(0 .1 4)

A dv oc ac y co al iti on

Y es

–0 .8 0*

(0 .3 5)

–0 .8 0*

(0 .3 5)

–0 .8 6*

(0 .3 6)

N o (r ef .)

E U -l ev el

or ga ni za tio

n Y es

–0 .4 9

(0 .5 4)

–0 .4 8

(0 .5 5)

–0 .3 0

(0 .5 8)

N o (r ef .)

M ed ia

hi ts is su e (l og ge d)

0. 07 **

(0 .2 2)

0. 08 **

(0 .2 2)

0. 12 **

(0 .2 3)

G oa l

B lo ck

or ch an ge

m os t

–2 .4 7* *

(0 .4 5)

–2 .4 6* *

(0 .4 5)

–2 .4 5* *

(0 .4 7)

S ha pe

sm al l pa rt s

–1 .3 3

(0 .4 2)

–1 .3 3

(0 .4 2)

–1 .2 9

(0 .4 3)

S up po rt (r ef .)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x G ro up

ty pe

–0 .0 7

(0 .6 6)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e 1. 40 *

(0 .7 2)

0. 09

(0 .8 6)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

–0 .0 1

(0 .0 2)

M ed ia

pr es en ce

x P ub lic -i nt er es t fr am

e x O ut si de

lo bb yi ng

0. 06 *

(0 .0 3)

P ol ic y pr op os al

(r an do m

ef fe ct )

0. 63

(0 .4 5)

0. 51

(0 .3 6)

0. 88

(0 .5 2)

A ka ik e in fo rm

at io n cr ite ri a

50 1. 00

50 2. 99

48 9. 14

W al d C hi

2 41 .0 1

41 .0 4

43 .2 5

df 17 .0 0

18 .0 0

19 .0 0

P ro p > C hi

2 0. 00

0. 00

0. 00

N ot e.

C oe ff ic ie nt s ar e pr es en te d w ith

st an da rd

er ro rs

in pa re nt he se s an d si gn

if ic an ce

le ve l in di ca te d by

** α ≤ 0. 01

; * α ≤ 0. 05

.

perceived to be “close/identical to,” “a long way from,” or “opposite to” the advocacy group’s position.

I estimate three models with each of the two preference attainment measures as dependent variables. The first set of models (Models 1 and 4) includes only the main effects of all explanatory and control variables. The second set of models (Models 2 and 5) includes an interaction effect between media presence and group type in order to evaluate H1. The third set of models (Models 3 and 6) includes a three-way interaction among media presence, the public-interest frame, and outside lobbying.6 This positioning permits me to assess whether the hypothesized effect (H2) of public-interest frames in the media on preference attainment (reported in Models 2 and 5) is a result of outside lobbying activities of interest groups or the consequence of exogenous factors, such as journalistic selection processes. Namely, if the effect of a public-interest frame in the media is contingent on the propensity of interest groups to seek media attention (a significant three-way interaction), then we can assume interest groups can elicit this effect themselves. If the interaction is not significant, this effect is rather a result of factors exogenous to the lobbying strategy.

Table 1 presents the regression analyses with proximity-to-outcome as the depen- dent variable and Table 2 the regression analyses with self-perceived preference attainment as the dependent variable. The measures are organized so that positive values indicate higher levels of preference attainment. All models confirm the non- significant relationship between media attention and preference attainment. Also, if I would include a continuous measure for media attention in the models this non- significant finding holds true. Advocacy groups are not significantly more or less likely to achieve their policy goals if they figure prominently in the news. While the theoretical discussion did not so much focus on the main effect of media attention, it concentrated more on the conditions under which media attention can benefit or reduce preference attainment. This brings the analysis to assessing the conditional effects of media presence on preference attainment.

First, I anticipated that group type conditions the effect of media presence on preference attainment. More specifically, I expected media presence to be beneficial to civil society groups and damaging to business lobby groups (H1). This expectation is not confirmed in the models. This result can be derived from the insignificant interaction term between media presence and group type in Models 2 and 5. I find that group type has no significant impact on preference attainment; namely, business groups are not substantially more or less likely to achieve their policy goals than civil society organizations when appearing in the news. This finding speaks against the commonly held presumption that media attention serves as a leverage for civil society groups to counterbalance the influence of business groups (Danielian & Page, 1994).

Second, I expected that advocacy groups can benefit from media presence if they are able to frame their objectives in the news as aligned with the public interest (H2). This expectation is confirmed in all the models. Models 2 and 5 show that advocacy groups that voice public-interest frames in the news are more likely to achieve their policy goals compared to advocacy groups that do not (the interaction term between media access and the public-interest frame). Interest organizations estimate their preference attainment higher if they manage to appear in the news and frame their message in terms of public interests and the distance between their position and the eventual outcome as estimated by EC officials is smaller under such conditions. When entering the public arena, different rules apply, and policy objectives should be justified according to the interests of a broader and diffuse set of citizens and stakeholders (Naurin, 2007; Schattschneider, 1960).

118 Iskander De Bruycker

Advocacy groups that seek to pressure policymakers by means of media appearances should do so by linking their own interests and objectives to those of the broader public. If they refrain from doing so, media attention has no significant advantage for preference attainment.

The question remains, however, whether public-interest framing has value added to the outside lobbying strategies interest groups develop. To further assess whether this framing effect is triggered by the strategic actions of advocacy groups and not by journal- istic practices, I compared the use of outside lobbying strategies with the articulation of public-interest frames in the news (Models 3 and 6). This interaction is positive and significant. The marginal effects are shown in Figure 3, which shows the predicted change in preference attainment when interest groups express public-interest frames in the news

(a) proximity-to-outcome

-5 0

0 50

10 0

15 0

E ffe

ct s

on e

st im

at ed

'P ro

xi m

ity -t

o- ou

tc om

e'

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

% Outside lobbying

Public-interest frame in the news media

(b) self-perceived preference attainment

-. 5

0 .5

1

E ffe

ct s

on P

( C

lo se

to o

r id

en tic

al to

o ut

co m

e)

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100

% Outside lobbying

Public-interest frame in the news media

Figure 3. Marginal effects of preference attainment and public-interest frames in the media for different degrees of investment in outside lobbying (with 95% confidence intervals).

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 119

for different levels of outside lobbying. This interaction reveals that the impact of the public-interest frame on preference attainment is mostly due to strategic actions by lobbyists. If advocacy groups frame their positions in the news in terms of public interests and intensively deploy outside lobbying strategies, they are more likely to see their goals attained. In contrast, when advocacy groups do not actively seek media exposure, but end up articulating public-interest frames in the news nonetheless, their preference attainment is not significantly impacted. This interaction demonstrates that the impact of public- interest frames on preference attainment is conditional on the lobbying strategies interest groups develop. The impact of public-interest frames in the media is negligible as long as it is not part of a full-fledged outside lobbying strategy.

Regarding the remaining control variables, first, one of the few findings which are consistent across studies on preference attainment is that those who seek to change the policy status quo are less likely to achieve their goals (Baumgartner & Mahoney, 2008; Mahoney, 2008). Models 1 and 4 confirm that interest groups which support EC legislative proposals are more likely to indicate a higher level of self-perceived preference attainment and the eventual distance to their desired outcome is smaller.7 Second, the measure grasping the support of other actors in media debates is insignificant. Third, preference attainment is also unrelated to the amount of staff advocacy groups employ at their Brussels office. Fourth, coalition membership was included as a control variable. Interestingly, membership in a coalition has a negative impact on preference attainment (see also Mahoney & Baumgartner, 2004). Fifth, other types of media frames, such as positive, negative, or self-regarding frames do not render a consistent significant impact on preference attainment across the models. Finally, whether an organization has an EU-level constituency has no significant consequences for preference attainment.

A note of caution is in order with respect to potential problems of endogeneity. First, public-interest frames may be endogenous to other factors related to preference attainment such as group type, media salience, strategies, or the political goals advocated for. A correlation matrix with potential endogenous variables is presented in the online supple- mental Appendix (Table A4). The matrix shows that groups which support an EC proposal are less likely to appeal to public interests in the news, while the use of outside lobbying and being a civil society group is positively related. To address concerns about spurious relationships caused by confounding factors, these variables were included as controls in the regression analysis. Second, because of the cross-sectional nature of the data, concerns about reversed causation are in place. Namely, advocacy groups may more likely appeal to public interests in the media after they achieve their preferences. This should, however, not be a problem with the data at hand as all groups that appealed to public interests in the news did so before the Council adopted the EC proposal as law (or before it was with- drawn). The observations of public-interest frames in the news thus precede the measure- ment of preference attainment. Third, while observations of public-interest frames precede measures of preference attainment, advocacy groups may still have anticipated preference attainment, which could have amplified their propensity to voice public-interest frames. While this explanation cannot be ruled out completely, it is—based on both theory and the data—highly unlikely that the results are due to the anticipation of preference attainment. While it is difficult to measure the anticipation of preference attainment, the initial position of the advocacy group toward the EC’s policy proposal is a reasonable proxy. Namely, those who support the proposal are significantly more likely to anticipate preference attainment as most EC proposals are adopted as law (Beyers, et al., 2014b). The data show that groups which supported an EC proposal (and were thus likely to anticipate preference attainment) were less prone to appeal to public interests in the news (see online

120 Iskander De Bruycker

supplemental Appendix, Table A4). Moreover, the models partially control for the antici- pation of preference attainment by estimating the effect of public-interest framing ceteris paribus the positions interest organizations adopted vis-à-vis the proposed regulation. In addition, it is theoretically not conceivable that advocates who anticipate preference attainment will seek to expand the scope of conflict with public appealing claims, which directly runs counter to Schattschneider’s (1960) thesis that those who anticipate to prevail in political battles will seek to contain rather than expand the scope of conflict (see also Kollman, 1998). Finally, future longitudinal or experimental research could further sub- stantiate the causal relationship of the presented findings and further address concerns of endogeneity.

Conclusion

This study investigated the conditions under which media attention serves as a blessing or curse for advocacy groups active in EU legislative politics. It is the first study to empirically analyze how media attention facilitates or hinders advocacy groups in achiev- ing their policy goals. Media attention was conceptualized as a means for advocacy groups to exert pressure on political elites. Media attention allows advocacy groups to expand their audiences to a broader set of stakeholders, citizens, and elites and may, under specific conditions, increase or diminish the political leverage of their policy demands.

The analyses demonstrated that the relationship between media attention and prefer- ence attainment is generally insignificant. Media attention as such will not lead to higher or lower levels of preference attainment. This article’s main finding is that media attention can aid advocacy groups in achieving their policy goals if they manage to frame their objectives in the news as aligned with the interests of broad segments of society. Moreover, civil society groups are not more likely than business groups to benefit from media attention, and endorsement of other actors in the media does not affect the impact of media attention on preference attainment.

This study contributes to the literature on media and interest groups as it gauges advocacy groups’ sway over policy processes and the leverage of news media attention as a weapon of political influence. The presented findings aid in evaluating the severity of media biases in favor of affluent business organizations as identified in previous studies (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz, 2012; Danielian & Page, 1994; Thrall, 2006). This study demonstrates that biased media attention does not necessarily exacerbate in biased influence. Moreover, the evidence revealed that interest groups can themselves elicit the effects of media frames on preference attainment, rather than that these effects are due to journalistic selection processes or other exogenous factors. Furthermore, this study relied on two different and independent measures of preference attainment, which under- scores the robustness of the findings and contributes to the empirical quest of measuring lobbying influence (Dür, 2008; Klüver, 2009; Lowery, 2013; Pedersen, 2013).

This article expands the role of media and framing effects beyond the realms of public opinion and party politics (Entman, 1993; de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2003; Druckman, 2004). While media attention is of vital importance to parties and politicians (Strömback & Kiousis, 2011; Thesen, 2017), it is beneficial to interest groups only under very specific circumstances. Several aspects of this study are relevant beyond interest group research. Future research could explore whether the beneficial effects of people-centered frames also hold true for other political elites and in other political arenas, i.e., whether this leads to a competitive advantage for political parties or candidates in electoral campaigns (see, for instance: Aalberg & de Vreese, 2017; Jagers & Walgrave, 2007).

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 121

Since EU legislative politics can in many respects be considered a least likely case for studying the impact of media frames on preference attainment, we should be careful in generalizing the implications of the findings. While public-interest frames likely have comparable or even stronger effects in national political systems, the null findings of this study cannot be generalized to national settings or other stages in policymaking without further empirical analysis. In systems where citizens are more politically vigilant and where the news media’s sway over public opinion and elites is more resilient, the impact of public endorsement and media attention is likely even stronger. Moreover, future studies drawing on longitudinal or experimental research designs could further substantiate the causal relationship of the presented results and further rule out concerns of endogeneity.

In sum, these findings reveal a potential loophole for lobbyists in EU policymaking: Interest groups can prevail by presenting themselves as the vox populi, while their policy positions may enjoy only little approval by the public at large. As such, it seems that lobby groups can cloak their narrow or economic self-interest by appealing to public interests in media debates. This interpretation seems plausible, as civil society groups or groups that enjoy popular approval in media debates do not benefit significantly more from media attention. Future research is therefore warranted to further disentangle the link between public-interest frames and citizen preferences. Such a study would allow to further substantiate the normative implications of the findings for democratic responsiveness in and beyond the European Union.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Andreas Dür, Anne Rasmussen, Jan Beyers, the PolCom editorial team and the three anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions. Earlier versions of this manuscript were presented at the APSA Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 2017; the EUSA International Biennial Conference, Miami, 2017 and the QMSS Seminar, Amsterdam, 2017. I am thankful to the participants of these conferences for their constructive criticism. Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to all my colleagues within the larger INTEREURO project (www.intereuro.eu), and to the many lobbyists and European Commission officials who participated in the interviews.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Funding

The work presented in this article was made possible by a postdoctoral research grant [Nº. 12N1417N] from the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) to Dr. Iskander De Bruycker. The data collection was funded by research project grants from the European Science Foundation [10-ECRP-008] and the Research Foundation Flanders [GA 171-11N].

Notes

1. Bernhagen and colleagues (2014) propose two alternative measures based on the spatial positioning of interest organizations and policy outcomes by EC officials. From the three proposed measures the distance-to-outcome measure is the most comparable with the measure based on self- assessment (to what extent the outcome is consistent with the initial position of an interest group)

122 Iskander De Bruycker

and was therefore included in the analysis. In the annex, two models are presented in which the two alternative measures are taken as the dependent variable. The models corroborate the findings presented in this articlel.

2. With regard to each relevant issue, respondents were asked the following: To what extent is the outcome on the different issues consistent with your organization’s initial preferences? Is this outcome the exact opposite of your initial preferences (1), a long way from your initial preferences (2), close to, but not identical to your initial preferences (3), or identical to your initial preferences (4)?

3. Also when relying on other operationalizations of media presence (number of statements, distinguishing between media presence in EU and national outlets, looking at media prominence in the outlets individually), the overall insignificant and/or inconsistent relationship holds true.

4. In the model with self-perceived preference attainment only the inclusion of random effects for proposals (and not issues) leads to a significant improvement of the model fit. In the model based on proximity to outcome only the inclusion of random effects for issues (and not proposals) leads to a significant improvement of model fit. Therefore the models with self-perceived preference attain- ment and proximity to outcome as dependent variables were estimated with random effects for proposals and issues, respectively.

5. Models in which I recoded the ordinal dependent variable in a different manner (or dichotomous) produce largely similar outcomes, but the parallel odds assumption is violated.

6. I am well-aware that coefficients may be unstable and/or inflated when running three-way interactions with small-N samples that also include a number of additional control variables. Since the results of this interaction are consistent across the models with different dependent variables and not significantly affected by the inclusion of different control variables and VIF scores for multi- collinearity are satisfactory (<5), I consider the results robust.

7. In this study the policy status quo is considered a policy proposal adopted by the European Commission, because most EC proposals are adopted as law. This is different in the United States, where most bills fail and the policy status quo is better reflected by the policy situation before a bill is proposed.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website at https:/doi. org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1493007

References

Aalberg, T., & de Vreese, C. H. (2017). Introduction: Comprehending populist political communica- tion. In T. Aalberg, C. Reineman, J. Stromback, & C. de Vreese (Eds.), Populist political communication in Europe (pp. 13–21). New York, NY: Routledge.

Andrews, K., & Caren, N. (2010). Making the news: Movement organizations, media attention, and the public agenda. American Sociological Review, 75(6), 841–866. doi:10.1177/ 0003122410386689

Baumgartner, F., Berry, J., Hojnacki, M., Leech, B., & Kimball, D. (2009). Lobbying and policy change: Who wins, who loses, and why. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Baumgartner, F., & Mahoney, C. (2008). The two faces of framing – Individual-level framing and collective issue definition in the European Union. European Union Politics, 9(3), 435–449. doi:10.1177/1465116508093492

Bentley, A. (1995). The process of government: A study of social pressures. Bloomington, IN: Transaction Publishers.

Bernhagen, P., Dür, A., & Marshall, D. (2014). Measuring lobbying success spatially. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 3(2), 202–218. doi:10.1057/iga.2014.13

Beyers, J. (2004). Voice and access. Political practices of European Interest Associations. European Union Politics, 5(2), 211–240. doi:10.1177/1465116504042442

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 123

Beyers, J., Braun, C., Marshall, D., & De Bruycker, I. (2014a). Let’s talk! On the practice and method of interviewing policy experts. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 3(2), 174–187. doi:10.1057/iga.2014.11

Beyers, J., Dür, A., Marshall, D., & Wonka, A. (2014b). Policy-centred sampling in interest group research: Lessons from the INTEREURO-project. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 3(2), 160–173. doi:10.1057/iga.2014.10

Binderkrantz, A. S. (2012). Interest groups in the media: Bias and diversity over time. European Journal of Political Research, 51(1), 117–139. doi:10.1111/ejpr.2012.51.issue-1

Binderkrantz, A. S., Bonafont, L. C., & Halpin, D. R. (2017). Diversity in the news? A study of interest groups in the Media in the UK, Spain and Denmark. British Journal of Political Science, 47(2), 313–328. doi:10.1017/S0007123415000599

Binderkrantz, A. S., & Krøyer, S. (2012). Customizing strategy: Policy goals and interest group strategies. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 1(1), 115-138.

Binderkrantz, A. S., Christiansen, P. M., & Pedersen, H. H. (2015). Interest group access to the bureaucracy, parliament, and the media. Governance, 28(1), 95–112.

Binderkrantz, A. S., & Pedersen, H. H. (2018). The lobbying success of citizen and economic groups in Denmark and the UK. Acta Politica, Available online.

Boräng, F., & Naurin, D. (2015). “Try to see it my way!” Frame congruence between lobbyists and European Commission officials. Journal of European Public Policy, 22(4), 499–515. doi:10.1080/13501763.2015.1008555

Cacciatore, M. A., Scheufele, D. A., & Iyengar, S. (2016). The end of framing as we know it… and the future of media effects. Mass Communication and Society, 19(1), 7–23.

Culpepper, P. (2010). Quiet politics and business power: Corporate control in Europe and Japan. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Danielian, L., & Page, B. (1994). The heavenly chorus of interest group voices on TV news. American Journal of Political Science, 38(4), 1056–1078. doi:10.2307/2111732

De Bruycker, I. (2017a). Framing and advocacy: A research agenda for interest group studies. Journal of European Public Policy, 24(5), 775–787. doi:10.1080/13501763.2016.1149208

De Bruycker, I. (2017b). Politicization and the public interest: When do the elites in Brussels address public interests in EU policy debates? European Union Politics, 18(4), 603–619. doi:10.1177/ 1465116517715525

De Bruycker, I., & Beyers, J. (2015). Balanced or biased? Interest groups and legislative lobbying in the European news media. Political Communication, 32(3), 453–474. doi:10.1080/ 10584609.2014.958259

de Vreese, C. (2005). News framing: Theory and typology. Information Design Journal & Document Design, 13(1), 51–62.

de Vreese, C., & Boomgaarden, H. (2003). Valenced news frames and public support for the EU. Communications, 28(4), 361–381. doi:10.1515/comm.2003.024

Donsbach, W., & Klett, B. (1993). Subjective objectivity. How journalists in four countries define a key term of their profession. Gazette (Leiden, Netherlands), 51(1), 53–83.

Druckman, J. (2004). Political preference formation: Competition, deliberation, and the (Ir)relevance of framing effect. American Political Science Review, 98(4), 671–686. doi:10.1017/ S0003055404041413

Dür, A. (2008). Measuring interest group influence in the EU. European Union Politics, 9(4), 559– 576. doi:10.1177/1465116508095151

Dür, A., & Mateo, G. (2013). Gaining access or going public? Interest group strategies in five European countries. European Journal of Political Research, 52(5), 660–686. doi:10.1111/ ejpr.2013.52.issue-5

Dür, A., & Mateo, G. (2014). Public opinion and interest group influence: How citizen groups derailed the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. Journal of European Public Policy, 21(8), 1199–1217. doi:10.1080/13501763.2014.900893

Entman R. (1993). Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication, 43(4), 51–58.

124 Iskander De Bruycker

Froehlich, R., & Rüdiger, B. (2006). Framing political public relations: Measuring success of political communication strategies in Germany. Public Relations Review, 32(1), 18–25. doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2005.10.003

Galtung, J., & Ruge, M. (1965). The structure of foreign news: The presentation of the Congo, Cuba and Cyprus crises in four Norwegian newspapers. Journal of Peace Research, 2(1), 64–90. doi:10.1177/002234336500200104

Hallahan, K. (1999). Seven models of framing: Implications for public relations. Journal of Public Relations Research, 11(3), 205–242. doi:10.1207/s1532754xjprr1103_02

Hallahan, K. (2011). Political public relations and strategic framing. In J. Strömback & S. Kiousis (Eds.), Political public relations: Principles and applications (pp. 177-213). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.

Hanegraaff, M., Beyers, J., & De Bruycker, I. (2016). Balancing inside and outside lobbying: The political strategies of lobbyists at global diplomatic conferences. European Journal of Political Research, 55(3), 568–588. doi:10.1111/1475-6765.12145

Harcup, T., & O’Neill, D. (2001). What is news? Galtung and Ruge revisited. Journalism Studies, 2 (2), 261–280. doi:10.1080/14616700118449

Heaney, M. (2004). Outside the issue niche: The multidimensionality of interest group identity. American Politics Research, 32(6), 611–651. doi:10.1177/1532673X04267681

Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2009). A postfunctionalist theory of European integration: From permis- sive consensus to constraining dissensus. British Journal of Political Science, 39(1), 1–23. doi:10.1017/S0007123408000409

Hopmann, D., Van Aelst, P., & Legnante, G. (2012). Political balance in the news: A review of concepts, operationalizations and key findings. Journalism, 13(2), 240–257. doi:10.1177/ 1464884911427804

Hutter, S., & Grande, E. (2014). Politicizing Europe in the national electoral arena: A comparative analysis of five West European countries, 1970–2010. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 52(5), 1002–1018.

Jagers, J., & Walgrave, S. (2007). Populism as political communication style: An empirical study of political parties’ discourse in Belgium. European Journal of Political Research, 46(3), 319– 345. doi:10.1111/ejpr.2007.46.issue-3

Klüver, H. (2009). Measuring interest group influence using quantitative text analysis. European Union Politics, 10(4), 535–549. doi:10.1177/1465116509346782

Klüver, H., Mahoney, C., & Opper, M. (2015). Framing in context: How interest groups employ framing to lobby the European Commission. Journal of European Public Policy, 22(4), 481– 498. doi:10.1080/13501763.2015.1008550

Kollman, K. (1998). Outside lobbying: Public opinion and interest group strategies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Koopmans, R. (2007). Who inhabits the European public sphere? Winners and losers, supporters and opponents in Europeanised political debates. European Journal of Political Research, 46(2), 183–210. doi:10.1111/ejpr.2007.46.issue-2

Koopmans, R., & Statham, P. (1999). Political claims analysis: Integrating protest event and political discourse approaches. Mobilisation, 4(1), 203–221.

Kriesi, H., Tresch, A., & Jochum, M. (2007). Going public in the European Union: Action repertoires of Western European collective political actors. Comparative Political Studies, 40 (1), 48–73. doi:10.1177/0010414005285753

Lasswell, H. D. (1950). Politics: Who gets what, when, how. New York, NY: P. Smith. Lowery, D. (2013). Lobbying influence: Meaning, measurement and missing. Interest Groups &

Advocacy, 2(1), 1–26. doi:10.1057/iga.2012.20 Mahoney, C. (2008). Brussels versus the beltway: Advocacy in the United States and the European

Union. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. Mahoney, C., & Baumgartner, F. (2004) The determinants and effects of interest-group coalitions.

Presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago.

Blessing or Curse for Advocacy? 125

Manheim, J. (2011). Strategy in information and influence campaigns: How policy advocates, social movements, insurgent groups, corporations, governments and others get what they want. New York, NY: Routledge.

Meyer, C. (1999). Political legitimacy and the invisibility of politics: Exploring the European Union’s communication deficit. JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, 37(4), 617–639.

Naurin, D. (2007). Deliberation behind closed doors: Transparency and lobbying in the European Union. Colchester, UK: ECPR press.

Pedersen, H. H. (2013). Is measuring interest group influence a mission impossible? The case of interest group influence in the Danish parliament. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 2(1), 27–47. doi:10.1057/iga.2012.19

Rasmussen, A., Mäder, L., & Reher, S. (2018). With a little help from the people? The role of public opinion in advocacy success. Comparative Political Studies, 51(2), 139–164. doi:10.1177/ 0010414017695334

Schattschneider, E. E. (1960). The semi-sovereign people. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Schmitter, P. C., & Streeck, W. (1981). The organization of business interests: A research design to study the associative action of business in the advanced industrial societies of western europe. Berlin, Germany: Wissenschafts-Zentrum Berlin.

Schuck, A., & de Vreese, C. (2006). Between risk and opportunity: News framing and its effects on public support for EU enlargement. European Journal of Communication, 21(1), 5–32. doi:10.1177/0267323106060987

Strömback, J., & Kiousis, S. (2011). Political public relations: Defining and mapping an emergent field. In J. Strömback & S. Kiousis (Eds.), Political public relations: Principles and applica- tions. New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.

Thesen, G. (2017). An intervening intermediary: Making political sense of media influence. In S. Walgrave & P. Van Aelst (Eds.), How political actors use the media (pp. 21–37). Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

Thomson, R. (2011). Resolving controversy in the European Union. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Thrall, T. (2006). The myth of the outside strategy: Mass media news coverage of interest groups. Political Communication, 23(4), 407–420. doi:10.1080/10584600600976989

Trenz, H.-J. (2004). Media coverage on European governance: Exploring the European public sphere in national quality newspapers. European Journal of Communication, 19(3), 291–319. doi:10.1177/0267323104045257

Tresch, A., & Fischer, M. (2015). In search of political influence: Outside lobbying behaviour and media coverage of social movements, interest groups and political parties in six Western European countries. International Political Science Review, 36(4), 355–372. doi:10.1177/ 0192512113505627

Van Aelst, P., Maddens, B., Noppe, J., & Fiers, S. (2008). Politicians in the news: Media or party logic? Media attention and electoral success in the Belgian election campaign of 2003. European Journal of Communication, 23(2), 193–210. doi:10.1177/0267323108089222

Vliegenthart, R., Oegema, D., & Klandermans, B. (2005). Media coverage and organizational support in the Dutch environmental movement. Mobilization: An International Quarterly, 10 (3), 365–381.

Wonka, A., Baumgartner, F. R., Mahoney, C., & Berkhout, J. (2010). Measuring the size and scope of the EU interest group population. European Union Politics, 11(3), 463–476.

126 Iskander De Bruycker

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=upcp20

Political Communication

ISSN: 1058-4609 (Print) 1091-7675 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/upcp20

More Bang for the Buck: Media Freedom and Organizational Strategies in the Agenda-Setting of Human Rights Groups

Max Grömping

To cite this article: Max Grömping (2019) More Bang for the Buck: Media Freedom and Organizational Strategies in the Agenda-Setting of Human Rights Groups, Political Communication, 36:3, 452-475, DOI: 10.1080/10584609.2018.1551256

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1551256

Copyright © 2019 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

View supplementary material

Published online: 09 Jan 2019. Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 1791 View related articles

View Crossmark data Citing articles: 8 View citing articles

More Bang for the Buck: Media Freedom and Organizational Strategies in the Agenda-Setting of

Human Rights Groups

MAX GRÖMPING

Studies investigating the agenda-setting of human rights groups disagree on both their prospects of garnering political attention, and the factors that help them in that quest. This study makes the argument that we need to take account of both macro-institutional oppor- tunity structures and actor-level strategies in order to gain a more complete understanding of the group-media interface. Specifically, it posits that the urgency of social problems only drives media attention toward groups if a country’s media landscape is sufficiently free, and that within these institutional constraints, groups themselves can enhance theirmedia access by providing newsmakers with information subsidies. These claims are substantiated byway of a novel cross-nationally comparative data set of more than 1,000 domestic election monitoring and advocacy organizations. Findings show that media attention is structurally limited by the degree to which the news media serve as an open arena, and that even in countries with a free press, few groups achieve media access. At the same time, the most successful groups are not necessarily the most resourceful ones. Rather, strategic choices to invest in media effort, narrow policy engagement, and professionalization substitute for scarce resources, thereby giving groups “more bang for their buck.” The results clarify the causal mechanisms behind the dominance of resource-rich groups on the media agenda and reinforce calls for more globally comparative research into media agenda-setting.

Keywords agenda-setting, interest groups, NGOs, press freedom, electoral integrity, human rights

Introduction

“You can survive without direct access to legislators or the authorities. But you cannot survive without the press.”1 This quote from the head of a Central American electoral monitoring and advocacy organization succinctly summarizes the rationale of outside

Max Grömping is a lecturer at the Institute for Political Science at Heidelberg University, Germany.

Address correspondence to Max Grömping, Institute of Political Science, Ruprecht-Karls- Universität Heidelberg, Rm 03.019, Bergheimer Str. 58, Heidelberg 69115, Germany. E-mail: [email protected]

I wish to thank Elena Escalante Block for her diligent and meticulous help with countless Factiva queries. I also thank Alessandro Nai, Ferran Martínez i Coma, Marcel Hanegraaff, Darren Halpin, Saraa Inkinen, Ruben Ruiz Rufino, Adele Webb, and two anonymous reviewers for their invaluable comments.

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which per- mits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.

Political Communication, 36:452–475, 2019 Copyright © 2019 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. ISSN: 1058-4609 print / 1091-7675 online DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1551256

452

lobbying, a strategy utilized by many human rights advocacy groups around the world.2,3

Aiming to influence political outcomes, human rights activists tend to “go public,” frequently privileging media-centric strategies over direct access, and in so doing balancing their twofold goal of political influence on the one hand (e.g., expanding the conflict and convincing the public and policymakers that “their” issue is worth addressing) and orga- nizational maintenance on the other (e.g., attracting members and funding).4 This attention- seeking imperative dictates that “if you are not covered by the media, you do not exist.”5

Yet, while media attention is vitally important to human rights advocates, it is a scarce resource (Gamson & Wolfsfeld, 1993; Jones & Baumgartner, 2005; Koopmans, 2004).

This study seeks to determine the factors that drive media attention to human rights groups. In a departure from established scholarship on the impact of human rights norms (e.g., Hafner-Burton, 2013; Keck & Sikkink, 1998; Ron, Golden, Crow, & Pandya, 2017; Simmons, 2009), I treat these actors as a sub-category of interest groups.6 Of course, human rights groups are unique in that they advocate for public (rather than private) interests, habitually come into direct conflict with governments, and are often connected to transnational advocacy networks and donors headquartered in the Global North. Yet there are important similarities between them and interest groups at large. They seek political influence using a repertoire of strategies, and they depend on the crucial resource of political attention. In focusing on attention-getting, this article thereby brings together disconnected scholarships on human rights, interest groups, and agenda-setting.

A number of studies investigate the drivers of media attention to groups (e.g., Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz, 2012; Binderkrantz, Bonafont, & Halpin, 2017; Binderkrantz, Christiansen, & Pedersen, 2015; Danielian & Page, 1994; De Bruycker & Beyers, 2015; Elliott, Amenta, & Caren, 2016; Rohlinger, Kail, Taylor, & Conn, 2012; Seguin, 2016; Thrall, 2006; Thrall, Stecula, & Sweet, 2014). Yet scholars disagree on both the prospect of groups garnering attention, and the factors that help them in that quest. Some point to the remarkable agenda-building successes of public interest groups in a range of issue spaces (Baumgartner, De Boef, & Boydstun, 2008; Berry, 1999). Others, however, regard the prospect of outside voices gaining media prominence, let alone political influence, as exceedingly low (Danielian & Page, 1994; Schlozman, Verba, & Brady, 2012; Thrall, 2006). In such studies, it is the differing level of organiza- tional resources that is seen as a key reason for skewed media access (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz et al., 2015; Thrall, 2006). Resourceful groups amass attention, while cash-strapped ones are left in the dust.

Despite the development of compelling arguments, a problem with both views in the existing literature is their empirical reliance on single-country case studies in established postindustrial democracies.7 This effectively limits the scope of the inquiry to group-level explananda, while ignoring important variation in the functioning of the public commu- nication systems in which groups operate. What is more, the causal mechanisms behind the impact of resources on groups’ attention-getting ability—corroborated by many studies— are unsatisfactorily explained.

In this article, I posit a twofold argument: First, that macro-institutional opportunities outside groups’ control crucially structure their ability to garner media attention. Specifically, the urgency of social problems in the real world drives journalists’ attention toward human rights groups in that issue space only if a country’s news media landscape is sufficiently free. Second, within the confines of these institutional constraints, groups themselves can and do compensate for scarce resources by substituting strategies such as

More Bang for the Buck 453

media involvement and narrow policy engagement, thereby maximizing the “bang for their buck.”

I empirically substantiate these claims through a case study of domestic election monitoring and advocacy organizations8—a subclass of human rights groups who focus on the public interest issue of electoral integrity.9 Electoral integrity relates explicitly to a large number of human rights treaties and standards (Davis-Roberts & Carroll, 2010), placing election monitors firmly within the study population of interest. Election watch- dogs may present a “most likely” case to find effects of media freedom on attention- getting, as “their” issue is pivotal in distributing access to power and political offices. As such, outside lobbying by election monitors is likely more sensitive to variation in media freedom than that by other human rights groups.

I draw on a novel cross-national data set of 1,176 organizations across 118 countries, measuring attention to each group via news content analysis, and monitoring organiza- tional strategies and basic characteristics through a bespoke organizational survey. Macro-institutional constraints are tracked by data on freedom of the press, while the “objective” urgency of the social problem these groups advocate on (electoral malprac- tice) is monitored via an expert survey (Norris, Wynter, & Grömping, 2017). For illustrations and additional evidence, I draw on interviews and background talks with election watch activists from 15 countries.

The results not only support the argument in this article, but they contribute more generally to studies of interest groups by highlighting the need for a joint appreciation of media system-level factors and group-level strategies. This calls for a much broader comparative approach to media agenda-setting. In addition, the results also shed light on the policy processes in non-democracies, suggesting that complex ways of interest intermediation may exist, even under authoritarianism. Finally, the study has ramifica- tions for research into human rights impacts, by specifying one vector of norm-building, namely the domestic pressure group-media nexus.

The article proceeds with a section discussing different theories of groups’ media attention-getting. I develop the theoretical model of institutional constraints and informa- tional subsidies. I then present data and methods, and discuss the empirical results. The article concludes by drawing out wider implications of the findings.

Theories of Attention-Getting

Attention is a necessary (if not sufficient) condition for achieving political influence (Jones & Baumgartner, 2005). It consists of resources (time and otherwise) actors dedicate toward discussing or thinking about an issue, and is produced and expended in different arenas (i.e., the news media, the legislature, or the executive branch; Hilgartner & Bosk, 1988). Its quantitative aspect (e.g., the number or length of news stories) makes attention a useful yardstick by which to measure agenda-building success (Green-Pedersen & Walgrave, 2014, p. 10).

But as we know, the carrying capacity of individuals and institutions is limited, making attention a scarce resource—a bottleneck through which would-be agenda- builders need to pass. For human rights groups, as for others engaged in outside lobbying, the first hurdle to pass is to gain attention in the news media (Gamson & Wolfsfeld, 1993; Koopmans, 2004). The pertinent question is therefore: Why do some groups achieve media access while others remain obscure? There are two broad approaches scholars have used to explain attention to groups.

454 Max Grömping

Issue Characteristics

On the one hand, scholars contend that issue-specific factors provide the backdrop of attention dynamics in a way in which groups have little say. This might range from the competition of issues in a congested agenda space (Boydstun, 2013), or a group’s position vis-à-vis a specific issue (for or against?; De Bruycker & Beyers, 2015), to the political leanings of news outlets regarding an issue (Rohlinger et al., 2012).

Seminal work on the “issue-attention cycle” supposes that objective conditions drive the early stages of public interest in an issue (Downs, 1972). Although such attention cycles can later take on a life of their own, real-world problems and events have been recognized as driving forces of news coverage (Lawrence, 2000). Scandals, disasters, and other “focusing events” (Birkland, 1997) afford different actors oppor- tunities to interpret and frame what occurred. When such disruptions happen, inde- pendent voices and activists may have greater chances of attracting attention because they will be sought-after sources (Bennett, Lawrence, & Livingston, 2006). For example, studies have found that the news media dedicate more attention to economic issues if there are negative economic developments (i.e., when the issue is more urgent; Behr & Iyengar, 1985). The same is true for a range of issue spaces from violent conflict (Miller & Albert, 2015), or unemployment (Soroka, 2012), to immi- gration (Vliegenthart & Boomgaarden, 2007). Contradictory results (Kleinnijenhuis & Rietberg, 1995) may point to the persisting challenge of measuring the “objective” urgency of a social problem. Still, if such a measurement could be devised, a relationship between issue urgency and issue attention in the media is plausible. And since issue attention increases the news value of actors that are “thematically relevant” (Wolfsfeld & Sheafer, 2006), issue urgency should also funnel attention to them.

This approach expects attention to groups to be higher when their cause resonates well with audiences, which is more likely where “their” social problem or issue is more urgent.

Resources

On the other hand, a number of studies link media access to variation in organizational characteristics, primarily groups’ resources. Many such studies would agree that attention is dramatically skewed, with only few organized interests receiving the bulk of attention while the majority remain unnoticed (Binderkrantz, 2012; Binderkrantz et al., 2017; Danielian & Page, 1994; Thrall, 2006; Thrall et al., 2014). Chief among concerns is the view that there are structural biases in news coverage that are simply too difficult to overcome for non-elite actors. “Official” voices are routinely privileged, as newsmakers tend to “index” coverage to the views expressed in mainstream government discourse (Bennett, 1990). Only groups that are well-endowed with financial and human resources manage to cut through this skew in coverage. Typically, such groups are business lobbyists or trade unions, but not human rights groups.

A number of studies have found organizational resources to be a strong predictor of media attention (Andrews & Caren, 2010; Binderkrantz et al., 2015; Thrall, 2006). As Fenton notes, “[w]ealthy organizations can inundate the media[…] while the attempts of resource poor organizations quickly become marginalized” (Fenton, 2010, p. 159). So much so, that some have called the “outside initiative” or outside lobbying a “myth” (Thrall, 2006).

More Bang for the Buck 455

This argument therefore holds that attention will flow mainly toward resource-rich groups rather than resource-poor ones, and that all else being equal, only the best- financed human rights groups will achieve media access.

Institutional Constraints and Informational Subsidies as Drivers of Attention

Being cognizant of the important contributions just outlined, I argue that limitations in the empirical and theoretical scope of these studies have led scholars to disregard relevant variation in the drivers of attention at both the contextual level and the group level.

This twofold argument builds on related accounts of the sociology of news produc- tion (Reese, 2001) and exchange perspectives of group influence (Berkhout, 2013). Reese’s (2001) “hierarchy of influences” approach stipulates that there are different layers influencing media content, encompassing (a) social systems and ideology, (b) social institutions, (c) media organizations and routines, and (d) media workers’ socialization and attitudes. The layered nature of these influences on media content is underappreciated in studies of group attention-getting. I argue that two layers in particular need to be taken into account: social institutions and media routines.

The Functioning of the Media as an Arena

Just like other political actors, human rights groups rely on the news media as an arena (van Aelst & Walgrave, 2016). However, news coverage is structured strongly by social institutions exogenous to the media and pressure groups themselves. In one of the few comparative studies of attention to groups, Binderkrantz and colleagues (2017) find variation in attention across different European media systems. Yet, their media system typology based on Hallin and Mancini (2004) might be too narrow for a truly compara- tive look (Stier, 2015). For the functioning of the media as an arena, de jure and de facto restrictions on press freedom are arguably more important than political parallelism and media marketization, factors emphasized by Hallin and Mancini. The exclusive focus on Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) democracies in studies of groups and media, however, disregards relevant variation in this regard because it assumes a permeable public communication process. Thus, a broader empirical scope is needed.

State control of the media—through regulation, financing, or coercion—presents an overarching extra-media influence that impacts on the very spectrum of topics that newsmakers are able to cover. In authoritarian and hybrid polities journalists may not report critically—or not at all—on occurrences of fraud, corruption, or human rights abuses. Often, oppressive libel laws stifle critical stories (Stanig, 2015). Or worse, violence directed against journalists muzzles political reporting (Hughes et al., 2017). In the specific issue industry of electoral integrity, for instance, “endemic political pressures[…] are strongly and directly detrimental to a fair coverage of elections” (Nai, 2017, p. 192).

This logic holds that, all things being equal, the “real-world” severity of social problems is likely related to higher media attention (see earlier discussion), so that where the urgency of human rights issues is high, media attention to human rights groups will be high (H1a). At the same time, where newsmakers face restrictions in their work, they will be less willing or able to report critically, meaning that only where freedom of

456 Max Grömping

the press is respected, media attention to human rights groups will be high (H1b). Connecting these arguments suggests that the linear relationship between issue urgency and attention will be broken where the news media face harsh restrictions. Put differently, I expect an interactive effect of issue urgency and media freedom (i.e., where freedom of the press is respected, media attention to human rights groups will increase with issue urgency, but where there is little press freedom, this will not be the case) (H1c).10

Group Strategies as Information Subsidies

Faced with institutional constraints, can groups actively influence their media access? I contend that agency does indeed matter. Regardless of the aforementioned institutional constraints, strategic choices afford advocates with opportunities to maximize attention. Specifically, I expect that attention is related to a group’s ability to produce “information subsidies”—“[e]fforts to reduce the prices faced by others for certain information, in order to increase its consumption” (Gandy, 1982, p. 8). Certain group decisions regarding media strategy, policy engagement, and professionalization in turn structure their ability to provide information subsidies that match well with journalistic news routines.11

While Reese’s layer of “routines” is incorporated in some of the literature (e.g., Tresch & Fischer, 2015), it remains underappreciated and disconnected from the institu- tional layer. Routines are the unwritten rules guiding newsmakers’ decisions to turn a select few of the manifold occurrences happening in the world into news stories. They are shaped by norms regarding the journalistic profession, the media’s role in politics, and the imperatives of for-profit newsmaking (Bennett, 1996). Three important routines derived from these norms are “defensive” routines such as fact-checking and objectivity (Schudson, 1978), the adherence to news values such as conflict, timeliness, or negativity (Galtung & Ruge, 1965), and economic considerations such as deadlines and resource efficiency (Tuchman, 1978). Rather than challenging such routines, human rights groups commonly accept them as given and try to emulate them as closely as possible (Powers, 2018, p. 131). As sources, they engage in a transaction with news- makers, in which they provide information subsidies that mimic news routines in exchange for latent public opinion support, and favorable issue expansion or containment (Berkhout, 2013, p. 240). In other words, resources are only a crude proxy for the many ways in which groups can enhance their exchange relationship with newsmakers. Rather than just counting money and staff we should take a closer look at what these resources are used for (i.e., actor-specific strategies and capacities; Halpin, 2014, p. 180).

Information subsidies are effective if and when they “clone” news routines (Fenton, 2010)—that is, if they match well with the economic concerns, news values, and objectivity norms of newsmakers mentioned above. This in turn is plausibly related to groups’ decisions about the strategies and scope of their advocacy.

Groups may involve themselves in different strategies of influence, from the mobi- lization of members, or the direct contacting of legislators or bureaucrats, to media- centric strategies (Binderkrantz, 2008; Kollman, 1998). Insights from journalism studies suggest that groups who closely match the news routine of economic constraints (efficient news production with ever-smaller budgets, shrinking newsrooms, and accelerated news cycles) make themselves indispensable (Fenton, 2010; Powers, 2018; Waisbord, 2011). This requires frequent and proactive interactions with journalists on the part of the group, as this alleviates journalists’ time and budget constraints. The story comes to them instead of them having to chase it. Frequent contact can be fabricated through pseudo-events such

More Bang for the Buck 457

as press conferences, writing op-eds, or through directly contacting newsmakers. This type of involvement—termed here “media effort”—has indeed been found to relate positively to media attention to groups (Binderkrantz & Pedersen, 2017). I therefore hypothesize that all else being equal, human rights groups that put a great deal of effort into media contacts will attract a lot of media attention (H2a).

Furthermore, I contend that newsmakers will be more amenable to information subsidies received from groups with a narrow policy engagement, rather than from policy generalists. Specialist groups develop exclusive expertise on a select few core issues, while generalists work on many different issues (Halpin & Binderkrantz, 2011). Narrow policy focus signals in-depth expertise and commitment to an issue, making it a valuable exchange good in the group-journalist relationship. Importantly, narrow policy engage- ment matches well with the news routine of objectivity and fact-checking, a core char- acteristic of which is reliance on “expert” sources (Albæk, 2011). Specialization signals expertise, and newsmakers will seek out groups whom they expect to be the most knowledgeable source on the given subject. This spares the journalist the arduous translational work of interpreting and backgrounding arcane policy issues.12 This sug- gests that all else being equal, human rights groups with a narrow policy engagement will attract a lot of media attention (H2b).

In addition, well-conceived information subsidies recognize the importance of news values and package the group’s information accordingly. This is easier for more profes- sionalized groups, as professionalization includes the creation of dedicated public rela- tions positions (spokesperson, social media officer, graphic designer). Oftentimes, former journalists are hired, as they know precisely how to satisfy news values (Fenton, 2010; Powers, 2018). Professionalization also entails the introduction of hierarchical structures, increased division of labor, formalization of processes, a shift of professional self- identities from activists to employees, and increased demands placed on formal education credentials (Klüver & Saurugger, 2013; Maier, Meyer, & Steinbereithner, 2016). To newsmakers, this signals a “costly effort” that only a group “truly committed to social change would be willing to pay” (Gourevitch & Lake, 2012, p. 15). This may increase the credibility of that group as a source. On the other hand, the opposite may also be true. Professionalization may decrease groups’ credibility with audiences, because they are seen as inauthentic checkbook manifestations (Maloney, 2015). Still, professionalization has been linked to expanded media access of environmental groups (Andrews & Caren, 2010), as well as to heightened impact of European Union (EU) lobby groups (Klüver, 2012), international election monitors (Hyde, 2012), or Latin American social change NGOs (Waisbord, 2011). On balance, therefore, this suggests that all else being equal, human rights groups that are highly professionalized will attract a lot of media attention (H2c).

Finally, are information subsidies equally potent under different media regimes? On the one hand, news routines may be contingent on certain conditions relating back to social institutions. In particular they may be less manifest under “dictatorial conditions where[…] journalistic autonomy is not respected” (Høyer, 2005, p. 16). In this view, the limited range of “allowable” topics and the lack of economic competition among news outlets reduces the salience of news routines and thereby the power of information subsidies. On the other hand, repressive regimes—notoriously ill-informed about public sentiment or optimal policy solutions—may encourage a modicum of “consultation” or “deliberation” via the group-media interface (He & Warren, 2011; Teets, 2014), implying that news routines such as objectivity and news values still hold salience to some degree.

458 Max Grömping

And as media commercialization introduces economic pressures even under authoritar- ianism (Stockmann, 2012), efficient news production is still a prime concern. Information subsidies are per se unrelated to the content of that information, be it benign or regime threatening, which is why I expect that all else being equal, the effects of media effort (H3a), narrow policy engagement (H3b), and professionalization (H3c) hold equally in free and unfree press environments.

Evidence and Methods

I investigate the merits of these theoretical expectations by taking a globally comparative look at groups in a specific human rights issue industry—electoral integrity. Previous research has recognized election monitoring groups as important actors in the governance network “producing” electoral integrity—next to electoral authorities, political parties, the judiciary, and of course the voters themselves.13 Empirically, I draw on a novel global data set of domestic election monitoring initiatives (DEMIs).14 These data are based on a comprehensive mapping of citizen-based electoral observation and reform groups in all countries around the world. The DEMI data set covers 1,176 groups in 118 countries, and is used to track media attention and organizational characteristics of groups. I also develop illustrative evidence from interviews with election watch activists from 15 countries.15

Dependent Variable

I measure attention to groups as the count of news items in which a group’s name appears. To increase robustness, I use two alternative measures, one for domestic and one for international news attention, both indexed to the period two months before until two months after the last national election in the country in which each group is based.16

The domestic news attention indicator draws on daily newspapers in each country that receive everyday all-page archiving in the Factiva news archive service.17 In the 118 observed countries, a total of 449 newspapers adhere to this criterion.18 The number of sources per country range from zero to 15, with a mean of 4.5 and a median of three sources. Due to a lack of Factiva coverage, 20 countries and 226 corresponding groups are dropped from the data set.19 The measure for international news attention is based on the same time frames and search terms, but is sourced from international news wires such as Associated Press, Agence France-Presse (AFP), Xinhua, or Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).20 These services structure “Western” newspapers’ reporting, and may therefore tap into different aspects of attention. Only four countries need to be excluded from the data set for this variable. Due to the different measurement criteria, while the DEMI data set encompasses 1,176 groups in 118 countries, domestic news attention is only measured for 950 groups in 98 countries, and international attention is tracked for 1,109 groups in 114 countries.

Independent Variables

The role of institutional constraints—in particular the functioning of the media as an arena— is monitored via the Reporters sans frontières (RSF) Press Freedom Index, indexed to the election year.21 For the analysis here it is reversed and normalized to a scale of 0 to 1. For the countries under observation, media reporting is most restricted in Yemen (press freedom

More Bang for the Buck 459

score of 0.00) and most free in Sweden (0.92). Tracking issue urgency requires a real-world indicator, “a variable that measures more or less objectively the degree of severity or risk of a social problem” (Dearing & Rogers, 1996, p. 28). This is achieved through the inverted 10- point electoral integrity rating (1 = no electoral malpractice; 10 = very highmalpractice/failed election) of the Perceptions of Electoral Integrity (PEI) expert survey (Norris et al., 2017). This measure is indexed to the same election as the attention measure. In the countries under observation, problems of electoral malpractice were measured as least urgent in Denmark (malpractice score: 1.2) and most urgent in Burundi (9).

I derive measures for organizational strategies from a bespoke survey administered to groups in the DEMI data set (response rate 41%). All indicators are additive indices standardized to a range from 0 to 1, with higher values denoting higher media involve- ment, narrower policy engagement, and higher professionalization. First, the media effort index is based on how often groups publish reports and analyses, how frequently they contact journalists, and how often they write opinion pieces for the press. Second, specialization (narrowness of policy engagement) assesses how many policy areas other than electoral integrity the group is involved in, and the percentage of their resources specifically committed to work on elections. Finally, the professionalization index covers whether the group has established a number of specialized staff positions, issues a membership card, hires leadership positions on the open job market, and has fixed meeting schedules for the board.22

Controls

To control for the possibility that organizational strategies are themselves limited by the resources a group possesses, an ordinal measure of the group’s annual budget in an election year, the number of paid full-time staff employed, and the number of volunteers working for the group are combined to a resources index ranging from 0 (minimum) to 1 (maximum). In addition, attention might result simply from having been around for a while, and the group having established itself in the policy com- munity. I therefore control for organizational longevity, operationalized as the age of the group, combined with an ordinal measure of how many elections the initiative has observed thus far. Furthermore, groups that are internationally recognized may have better standing and therefore enjoy higher media access. This possibility is accounted for via a dummy coding membership in the Global Network of Domestic Election Monitors (GNDEM) and a number of regional networks. Group strategies might also be endogenous to attention-getting itself, because media coverage may lead to a group attracting more funds and training from donors, which then allows more expenditure on these areas. To control for a spurious relationship between groups’ capabilities and media attention, the modeling therefore accounts for lagged attention during the previous election cycle.

Analysis and Results

The analysis proceeds in three steps: First, I describe the distribution of the dependent variables at group and country level. Second, I look at the association between institu- tional constraints and attention, and third at the relationship between group strategies and attention, given the institutional constraints. To these ends, I use hierarchical logistic and negative binomial regression models to identify the factors explaining the crossing of the

460 Max Grömping

threshold between none vs. some attention and the absolute amount of attention beyond that threshold. In addition to the statistical modeling, I provide some illustrations from the interviews.

The Power Law of Media Attention

I find an exponential power-law distribution of attention, which concurs with other studies on groups’ media attention (Binderkrantz et al., 2017; Thrall, 2006). Figure 1 graphs the cumulative distribution of attention across all groups in all countries. For cross-national comparability, both dependent variables are standardized by the total number of news articles/wires covering the election in question.23 This is necessary given that election coverage varies drastically, from only 39 news articles in Factiva covering the 2011 Liberian election to 197,556 articles on the Indian election of 2014. Controlling for this variation, the x-axis of Figure 1 therefore represents the share of attention a group receives on the media agenda, as a proportion of total election coverage. The y-axis depicts the percentage of groups remaining below a given proportion of attention.

There are very similar dynamics in both attention arenas in that 71% of groups receive not a single mention in the domestic press, and 72% remain unnoticed in international news. At the same time, there is a small percentage of extremely successful groups capturing large shares of attention. For instance, 14 organizations (1.5% of all groups) manage to surpass 5% of domestic news attention, meaning that they are named in every twentieth newspaper story about the election in their respective country. Six groups (0.5%) achieve the same in the international attention arena. The middle section of the graph suggests that the power law of attention is more pronounced in the international arena, and less pronounced in the domestic press.

There is also evidence for a similar power law of attention within countries, as Figure 2 shows. The graph plots two common indicators of divergence from normality for

Figure 1. Cumulative distribution of media attention at group level. Note: Proportion of atten- tion = articles mentioning a group as percentage of all articles within ± 2 months of election, N = 950 (domestic), N = 1,109 (international).

More Bang for the Buck 461

the distribution of media attention to groups in each of the countries under investigation. The upper pane shows the skew of media attention by country. Only about 5% of countries display a “fairly symmetrical” distribution of attention (skewness < 0.5) whereas the distribution is “highly skewed” (>2) in at least 40% to 50% of countries.24

Second, the lower pane plots the cumulative distribution of kurtosis, which measures the combined sizes of the two tails of an empirical distribution. The distribution of attention indicates “peakedness” or infrequent extreme deviations (kurtosis above 1) in all but 10% of countries.

In combination, Figures 1 and 2 demonstrate that media attention remains elusive for most organizations across the international ecology of groups as a whole, and within almost all national group ecologies.

Outside Lobbying in Free and Unfree Media Systems

Given the striking gap between successful and unsuccessful attention-getters, what factors explain a group’s ability to pass the threshold between none and some attention? And what drives the absolute amount of attention beyond that threshold? I use logistic regression models to tackle the first question (dichotomizing the dependent variables) and negative binomial count models to approach the second one. Standardized coeffi- cients of four models are reported in Figure 3. The first two explain the crossing of the attention threshold in domestic (M1) and international (M2) news, and the other two explain the absolute amount of attention in the domestic (M3) and international (M4) news arena, respectively.25

Figure 2. Cumulative distribution of skew and kurtosis of media attention at country level. Note: N = 98 (domestic), N = 114 (international).

462 Max Grömping

Turning first to institutional constraints, the results show that, other things being equal, neither issue urgency nor press freedom by themselves predict media attention. However, press freedom facilitates media access for human rights groups, if and when

Figure 3. Explaining media attention to human rights groups. Note: M1: Dependent variable (DV) = dichotomized domestic attention (1 = yes, 0 = no); M2: DV = dichotomized international attention; M3: DV = count of domestic attention; M4 = count of international attention; M1 and M2 are generalized linear mixed-effects models (GLMM), logit link function, random effect for country; M3 and M4 are negative binomial count models, random effect for country, offset for total election-related attention. N = 188 (M1), 273 (M2), 190 (M3), 265 (M4). Variables centered and z-transformed. Depicted with 95% confidence intervals.

More Bang for the Buck 463

“their” issue is an urgent problem in the real world, as the positive and significant coefficients for the interaction term suggest. The substantive size of the relationship is modest, but consistent across all four models.26 Figure 4 further explores this relation- ship, based on the results of models M1 and M2. Each pane shows on the y-axis the predicted probability of receiving attention from 0% to 100%. The x-axis varies issue urgency from 4, where electoral malpractice is not a major problem (e.g., Morocco) to 9, where malpractice is endemic (e.g., Burundi). The indicator for a free environment for journalists is set at two levels, low = 0.4 (ca. the level of Sri Lanka) and high = 0.9 (level of Austria).27

The theory of event-driven news would expect that where election fraud, gerrymander- ing, or voter intimidation are common, election watchdogs should be sought-after sources. And indeed, this is the case in countries where the media approach the ideal of an open arena (depicted by triangles in Figure 4). Here, an increase in issue urgency beyond a certain threshold of about seven virtually ensures attention in both attention arenas. However, the situation is dramatically different in countries where reporters face repression (depicted by circles). Here, the likelihood of coverage is about equal to countries with a free press, when issue urgency is low. But when wrongdoings around elections rise, this is actually associated with a lower likelihood of attention, decreasing to a point of being negligible in the worst cases. Rather than exposing problems, and devoting more coverage to monitors as key sources, the press either self-censors or bows down to repression. Outside lobbying becomes exceedingly difficult under such conditions.

Election advocates interviewed for this study repeatedly flagged censorship, intimi- dation of journalists, or government ownership of news outlets as major obstacles. An

Figure 4. The effect of institutional constraints and issue urgency on the predicted probability of achieving media attention. Note: Based on M1 and M2 (Figure 3), at median random effect, other variables held constant at mean, 90% confidence interval. N = 188 (domestic), 265 (international).

464 Max Grömping

interviewee from an African country with a “difficult situation” for journalists according to RSF said for example that “it is rare to be covered unless you are a government entity […] media pluralism is on top of our wish list for reform.”28

Maximizing Attention

All three indicators of information subsidies are predictors of attention, but to varying degrees. Media effort is associated with a higher likelihood of attention and a higher absolute amount of attention in both news arenas (M1, M2, M3, and M4), whereas specialization predicts the threshold and the count of domestic attention (M1 and M3), but only the count of international attention (M4). Professionalization finally is associated only with domestic attention (M1 and M3).

Media effort is indeed the strongest of all model predictors. The interviews corroborate that the vast majority of groups recognize media effort as a strategy with high payoffs. Interviewees talked of the “one-minute pitch” and said they felt “like an advertisement agency trying to get content to be viral.”29 There was an understanding that the more frequent and institutionalized contacts with newsmakers become, the better.30 Some organizations sign a memorandum of information-sharing with news outfits every election. This mutually beneficial exchange relationship “works both ways,” as news organizations “don’t have employees throughout the country. So, if we tell them [about malpractices], they can either send a reporter, or our own volunteers can even serve as their citizen reporters on elections. […] In return, we get our voter education program in for free.”31 The groups with the strongest involvement in media effort convene “situation rooms” on election day, where journalists can observe the NGOs work in action, are provided with regular press updates/ conferences, and are quite literally subsidized with an infrastructure of printers or Internet access.32

Specialization, niche expertise, and superior data were also noted as crucial assets by interviewees. Some were highly confident of the newsworthiness of such narrow policy focus, saying things such as “if you read anything about how much a campaign costs in Guatemala, you know it through our data. And this is reflected in the media.”33 Most groups strive to showcase their specialization whenever possible, presenting data at press conferences that no one else could produce (e.g., about malfunctioning voting machines, which would “definitely” make them “front-page material”).34 The advantage in expertise coming with specialization is sometimes so large that groups would convene trainings for journalists whenever new electoral issues arise, “so that they know what we’re talking about: the pros and cons. This is in order to skill them.”35

As for professionalization, numerous interviewees were of the view that an organiza- tional division of labor and staff dedicated exclusively to specific tasks aids attention-getting. One group that was particularly lauded at international conferences for their professionalism has “a centralized communication strategy.[…] If regional staff, or office staff are asked to give an interview, they contact management[…] or topic expert, and we agree on the messages.”36 Another interviewee pointed out that the NGO has “a stand-by graphics designer, a trained social media officer, and also a freelance journalist.[…] They help us make our information visually appealing, to condense it, make it easy to understand.”37

Importantly, the statistical models also show that these three group strategies relate to attention in free and in unfree media environments alike. Interaction terms of press freedom with all three organizational indicators are not significant.38 At the same time, the findings are robust to some alternative explanations such as organizational longevity

More Bang for the Buck 465

and membership in international networks, which are not associated with more attention. And crucially, a group’s resources are unrelated to news coverage, once lagged media attention is factored into the equation.39 This finding concurs with De Bruycker and Beyers (2015), who also reject the hypothesis that resources facilitate media access, but stands in contrast to some influential studies on groups’ attention-getting, which typically find that resources facilitate access (Binderkrantz et al., 2017; Thrall, 2006).

In summary, human rights groups’ uphill battle for scarce attention is exacerbated by the constraining effect of institutions where they cannot rely on a fair media arena. In free and unfree media landscapes alike, groups’ involvement in media effort relates to higher media access in all arenas. The likelihood and the absolute amount of domestic attention is also associated with group specialization and professionalization, while in the interna- tional arena, professionalization does not matter, and specialization only relates to the absolute amount of attention. The results are summarized in Table 1. Taken together, the statistical models as well as the qualitative interviews suggest that information subsidies —facilitated by organizational strategies—give human rights groups “more bang for their buck.” They substitute for resources and provide an effective way to maximize the chances of news coverage, even under conditions of media repression. This gives strong evidence supporting hypotheses H1c and H2a, and partially supporting H2b and H2c. There is also evidence upholding H3a,b,c, because media freedom does not affect the efficaciousness of information subsidies.

Conclusion and Discussion

Grabbing media attention is the sine qua non of human rights pressure group influence around the world. Activists interviewed for this study made this abundantly clear, saying that

Table 1 Summary of the drivers of media attention to human rights groups

Hypothesis Mechanism Indicator Domestic News

Int’l News

H1a Issue urgency Electoral malpractice H1b Institutional constraints Press freedom H1c Issue urgency under

institutional constraints Press freedom X Electoral malpractice

++ +

H2a Information subsidies: Involvement

Media effort ++ ++

H2b Information subsidies: Narrow policy engagement

Specialization ++ +

H2c Information subsidies: Professionalization

Formalization ++

H3a/b/c Information subsidies under institutional constraints

Press freedom X Media effort/Specialization/ Formalization

Note. “+” = variable is significant predictor for either threshold or count; “++” = predictor for threshold and count.

466 Max Grömping

“the onlyway that [our]message gets to the stakeholders is through themedia,”40 “interaction with the media is really key,”41 “without presence in the media we would not have achieved what we have achieved,”42 and “the only way for us to pressure the government is to make something public.”43

In this article, I presented the twofold argument that in order to develop a more complete understanding of the interest group-media interface beyond the OECD world and beyond counting money and staff, we need to take account of macro- institutional opportunity structures and actor-level strategies. The empirical evi- dence drawn from a globally comparative study of human rights groups—in parti- cular election monitoring and advocacy NGOs—confirmed this argument. First, the real-world urgency of social problems is only associated with increased attention to human rights groups if a country’s news media landscape is sufficiently free. A certain permeability of the public communication system is thus a necessary condition for agenda-building. Second, groups who are good at producing informa- tion subsidies are better at garnering attention. Strategies focusing on media effort, narrow policy engagement, and professionalization—rather than purely resources— allow groups to maximize their exchange relationships with journalists, thereby getting more “bang for their buck.” Third, these information subsidies are effective in free and in unfree media landscapes alike.

Some important limitations of the research should be acknowledged. As a study of attention in two offline arenas (newspapers and wires), one particular group type (citizen groups) in one particular issue industry (human rights), there are certainly limits to the generalizability of results. For instance, where print media are constrained, public attention may merely be displaced to online social media, rather than completely muted. Furthermore, results may not travel to other types of organized interests (e.g., business groups or profes- sional associations). As human rights advocacy routinely attributes blame to the government, and may even threaten the regime’s legitimacy in more authoritarian contexts, caution is also advised in applying the results to other public interest issue areas. Electoral integrity in particular is the ultimate “redistributive” issue (Lowi, 1964), in that it affects the distribution of access to political office and power. The stakes are much higher than in other issue areas, as one interviewed activist noted: “Whenever we publish anything, there is a reaction. I stayed in jail as a result of this reaction.[…] There are 3,000 NGOs in Azerbaijan.[…] Only I and three colleagues—also human rights defenders involved with the election process—were arrested.”44 The media, in turn, may shun such groups due to the high stakes involved. Finally, some findings—for instance, the one on narrow policy engagement—may not hold if one considers the whole spectrum of issues rather than only one. Generalist groups may well receive more overall attention than specialists on the media agenda as a whole, simply because they have the potential to be thematically relevant to more than one issue.

Keeping in mind these limitations, the study contributes to several existing research programs, drawing strength from its globally comparative design. First, for studies of interest groups, the lesson that social-institutional variation matters, is one of signifi- cance. Outside lobbying is much harder under hybrid and autocratic regimes with limited media freedoms. This calls for an expansion in the empirical scope of interest group and agenda-setting studies. It also raises interesting questions about how groups may circum- vent institutional constraints. In this regard, I was able to show that strategies matter, perhaps more than resources once one controls for previous attention success. This adds nuance to studies showing a positive relationship between resources and attention (Binderkrantz et al., 2017; Thrall, 2006), and clarifies the causal mechanisms underlying

More Bang for the Buck 467

that finding. Indeed, it is good news for public interest advocates, because—somewhat contrary to previous research (Tresch & Fischer, 2015)—I show that typical outside lobbying strategies facilitate media access. Clever public relations work, niche expertise, and shrewd allocation of specialized staff can lift them out of obscurity, even in repressed media environments. Having said that, the findings do not per se challenge the well- established understanding that interest systems on average tend to be biased in favor of rich groups. They merely establish—in principle—the substitutability of resources among an overall resource-poor sample of interest groups.45 The idea of “more bang for the buck” is perhaps most applicable to the underdogs among interest groups.

Second, the findings shed light on the policy process in non-democracies. Even where the press is not free, some citizen groups apparently gain access to the media agenda. Attention may drop off exponentially and may be highly skewed toward the best information subsidizers, but this is not so different in democracies. This suggests that complex ways of interest intermediation exist even under authoritarianism. Autonomous citizen groups may indeed expand and contribute to policy agendas while remaining within the boundaries of subtler, yet tightening state control (Teets, 2014). The extent and limits of this interface certainly calls for further investigation.

Third, there are ramifications for research into the diffusion of human rights norms. The findings add nuance to the “boomerang” model of norm diffusion, in which domestic groups circumvent repression by appealing to international allies and transnational advocates (Keck & Sikkink, 1998). The domestic vector of pressure “from below” in the boomerang model is perhaps less systematically studied. As it turns out, media-savvy human rights activists can influence the media’s agenda, thereby expanding human rights language and values. This creates avenues for mobilization around these issues and for the embedding of human rights norms.

In conclusion, the present research has shown that there is merit in expanding the empirical scope of political agenda-setting research beyond the OECD world, and that there is still much to be discovered about bias in interest representation toward resource- rich groups. It has necessarily left many questions unanswered, providing fertile ground for future research. For instance, do the findings bear out for other issue industries, different group types, or in different media? Under which conditions does media attention precipitate preferred framing and/or political attention? And how do technological affor- dances mediate attention-getting? All this makes for an exciting comparative research agenda on human rights groups and the media.

Notes

1. Interview with Guatemalan electoral reform advocate. See online Supplemental Material, interview GTM-01-UMM.

2. “Outside” lobbying consists of the mobilization of public opinion via news media and public actions, and is often juxtaposed with “inside” strategies, such as direct interactions with policymakers (Beyers, 2004; Kollman, 1998).

3. Human rights groups are here defined as locally headquartered nonprofit collective actors other than political parties or bureaucracies seeking the achievement of human rights-related legislation and/or practices that, if materialized, would benefit all of society, not only the group’s members or constituency. They use a human rights frame in their mission and draw on international norms, but also domestic laws (see also Ron et al., 2017, p. 3). The definition used here pertains to local actors and does not encompass international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs). However, the category may contain actors studied elsewhere under

468 Max Grömping

the rubrics nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), social movement organizations (SMOs), or civil society organizations (CSOs).

4. Outside lobbying by (international) human rights groups is often discussed under the heading of “information politics” (Keck & Sikkink, 1998; Ramos, Ron, & Thoms, 2007; Ron, Ramos, & Rodgers, 2005; Thrall et al., 2014). Interest group studies also note outside lobbying as the strategy of choice of citizen groups (Dellmuth & Tallberg, 2017; Dür &Mateo, 2013; Hanegraaff, Beyers, & De Bruycker, 2016; Junk, 2016; Tresch & Fischer, 2015).

5. Interview GTM-01-UMM. 6. Human rights groups are most akin to the category of “citizen groups” in interest group

studies (Berry, 1999). See also Beyers, Eising, and Maloney (2008) for a discussion of the overlap of different conceptual frameworks in this space.

7. See Binderkrantz and colleagues (2017), Dür and Mateo (2013), or Tresch and Fischer (2015), for comparative perspectives, which are nevertheless situated in OECD democracies.

8. These are nonstate, nonprofit, nonpartisan, and nonmedia collective actors that witness and document electoral malpractice in their own country, and/or advocate for legislative or procedural changes in the way elections are conducted (Grömping, 2017). Political party observers, international election monitors, news media, and for-profit electoral assistance providers are excluded.

9. Defined here as electoral conduct adhering to international norms applying universally to all countries and throughout the whole electoral cycle (Norris, 2013, p. 564).

10. Most likely, institutional constraints will affect different issues in differential ways. Issues that readily allow or even imply blame attribution to the government (such as human rights) will likely be curtailed first, while the news gates may remain open longer for more “benign” issues. However, this differential effect is not tested in this study.

11. It should be noted that the concept “information subsidies” is unrelated to the types of information (e.g., expert knowledge or knowledge about encompassing interests) that groups provide (Bouwen, 2004). Indeed, information subsidies reduce the costs journalists face to discover either type of information.

12. This argument has most traction when focusing on only one clearly delineated issue industry (human rights in this case). The opposite argument has been made in broader studies of interest groups’ lobbying success across many issue areas, where generalists may be at an advantage (Binderkrantz & Pedersen, 2017).

13. See Kelley (2012) on international and Grömping (2017) on domestic election monitoring. 14. See Footnote 8. 15. The online Supplemental Material details the sampling procedure, measurement of variables, and

the interviews. 16. All elections under observation took place between 2011 and 2016. 17. https://global.factiva.com. 18. The availability of news sources in Factiva may have led to the nonrandom exclusion of

local newspapers, or those in vernacular languages. What is presented here is thus a conservative measure of attention. If it registers attention to a group, there are likely many more articles about the group in the real world. Still, the possibility of false negatives cannot be ruled out.

19. Conducting the content analysis around a high-salience political issue (election integrity that simultaneously receives a spike in attention (an election)— two factors predicting a convergence of the agendas of different news outlets into one national news agenda (Atkinson, Lovett, & Baumgartner, 2014, p. 374)—justifies using only a few newspaper sources per country (up to a minimum of one). However, as a robustness check, all analyses were duplicated with a minimum requirement of two sources per country. The results are substantively the same.

20. Operationalized through the Factiva autocodes “Reuters news wires” (trtw) and “World wide news wires” (twww).

21. https://rsf.org/en/ranking.

More Bang for the Buck 469

22. The three indicators are not colinear with each other (Pearson’s r between –.14 and .21) or with the other group-level controls (Person’s r between .12 and .35). They thus likely tap into different group characteristics. Missing data in the survey responses are treated with multiple imputation using chained equations (Rubin, 1987), allowing observation of the independent variables for 298 groups. Details are found in the online Supplemental Material.

23. That is, articles containing the terms “election*” OR “elector*” and their equivalents in other languages.

24. See Hair, Black, Babin, and Anderson (2009) for a discussion of these rule-of-thumb thresholds.

25. All models are fully reported in the online Supplemental Material. Figure 3 shows the best- fitting ones as judged by log likelihood, Akaike information criterion (AIC), and the root of the mean squared error (RMSE).

26. In M4, the interaction is slightly less significant than in other models at p < .1, but just barely outside the .05 threshold.

27. Some countries in the data have even harsher conditions for journalists (e.g., Yemen or Sudan with scores of below 0.2). However, there are only few survey responses and furthermore insufficient variation of electoral malpractice in these countries. Therefore, a cutoff of 0.4 is chosen for the depiction in Figure 4.

28. Interview ZWE-01-VCR. 29. Interview JOR-01-FAD. 30. Interview LBN-01-LKJ. 31. Interview PHL-01-QMD. 32. Interviews JOR-01-FAD, KEN-01-OMM, KHM-01-EPK. 33. Interview GTM-01-UMM. 34. Interview PHL-01-QMD. 35. Interview ZWE-01-VCR. 36. Interview GEO-01-WLN. 37. Interview JOR-01-FAD. 38. Except for M4, where press freedom interacts significantly with media effort, but not the

other two strategies. 39. See the full models in Tables A.8 through A.11 in the online Supplemental Material. Resources

are significant when entered on their own, but drop out once lagged attention is controlled for (domestic news), or when the group strategies are introduced to the model (international news), except in M4. Furthermore, Table A.12 in the online Supplemental Material reports all four full models excluding lagged attention. Resources are a significant predictor in all of these models when lagged attention is ignored, whereas the effect of all group strategies remains broadly the same. This suggests that resources are endogenous to attention-getting, but how these resources are spent is not, meaning that strategies can substitute for resources.

40. Interview ZWE-01-VCR. 41. Interview LBN-01-LKJ 42. Interview PHL-01-QMD. 43. Interview GEO-01-WLN. 44. Interview AZE-01-YMA. 45. The average election-year budget of the studied groups is only USD $50,000 to $100,000 and

the median staff category is 5–9.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

470 Max Grömping

Funding

This work was supported by a PhD scholarship provided under the Australian Research Council Kathleen Fitzpatrick Australian Laureate Fellowship Award [FL110100093], and by The University of Sydney’s Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences’ Doctoral Research Travel Grant; University of Sydney [FASS Doctoral Research Travel Grant].

Supplemental material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website at https:// doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2018.1551256.

ORCID

Max Grömping http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1488-4436

References

Albæk, E. (2011). The interaction between experts and journalists in news journalism. Journalism, 12(3), 335–348. doi:10.1177/1464884910392851

Andrews, K. T., & Caren, N. (2010). Making the news: Movement organizations, media attention, and the public agenda. American Sociological Review, 75(6), 841–866. doi:10.1177/ 0003122410386689

Atkinson, M. L., Lovett, J., & Baumgartner, F. R. (2014). Measuring the media agenda. Political Communication, 31(2), 355–380. doi:10.1080/10584609.2013.828139

Baumgartner, F. R., De Boef, S., & Boydstun, A. E. (2008). The decline of the death penalty and the discovery of innocence. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Behr, R. L., & Iyengar, S. (1985). Television news, real-world cues, and changes in the public agenda. Public Opinion Quarterly, 49(1), 38–57. doi:10.1086/268900

Bennett, W. L. (1990). Toward a theory of press-state relations in the United States. Journal of Communication, 40(2), 103–125. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1990.tb02265.x

Bennett, W. L. (1996). An introduction to journalism norms and representations of politics. Political Communication, 13(4), 373–384. doi:10.1080/10584609.1996.9963126

Bennett, W. L., Lawrence, R. G., & Livingston, S. (2006). None dare call it torture: Indexing and the limits of press independence in the Abu Ghraib scandal. Journal of Communication, 56(3), 467–485. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.2006.00296.x

Berkhout, J. (2013). Why interest organizations do what they do: Assessing the explanatory potential of ‘exchange’ approaches. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 2(2), 227–250. doi:10.1057/iga.2013.6

Berry, J. M. (1999). The new liberalism: The rising power of citizen groups. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.

Beyers, J. (2004). Voice and access: political practices of European interest associations. European Union Politics, 5(2), 211–240. doi:10.1177/1465116504042442

Beyers, J., Eising, R., & Maloney, W. (2008). Researching interest group politics in Europe and elsewhere: Much we study, little we know? West European Politics, 31(6), 1103–1128. doi:10.1080/01402380802370443

Binderkrantz, A. S. (2008). Different groups, different strategies: How interest groups pursue their political ambitions. Scandinavian Political Studies, 31(2), 173–200. doi:10.1111/ j.1467-9477.2008.00201.x

Binderkrantz, A. S. (2012). Interest groups in the media: Bias and diversity over time. European Journal of Political Research, 51(1), 117–139. doi:10.1111/ejpr.2012.51.issue-1

More Bang for the Buck 471

Binderkrantz, A. S., Bonafont, L. C., & Halpin, D. R. (2017). Diversity in the news? A study of interest groups in the media in the UK, Spain and Denmark. British Journal of Political Science, 47(2), 313–328. doi:10.1017/S0007123415000599

Binderkrantz, A. S., Christiansen, P. M., & Pedersen, H. H. (2015). Interest group access to the bureaucracy, parliament, and the media. Governance-An International Journal of Policy Administration and Institutions, 28(1), 95–112. doi:10.1111/gove.2015.28.issue-1

Binderkrantz, A. S., & Pedersen, H. H. (2017). The lobbying success of citizen and economic groups in Denmark and the UK. Acta Politica. doi:10.1057/s41269-017-0076-7

Birkland, T. A. (1997). After disaster: Agenda setting, public policy, and focusing events. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.

Bouwen, P. (2004). Exchanging access goods for access: A comparative study of business lobbying in the European Union institutions. European Journal of Political Research, 43(3), 337–369. doi:10.1111/ejpr.2004.43.issue-3

Boydstun, A. E. (2013). Making the news: Politics, the media, and agenda setting. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

Danielian, L. H., & Page, B. I. (1994). The heavenly chorus: Interest group voices on TV news. American Journal of Political Science, 38(4), 1056. doi:10.2307/2111732

Davis-Roberts, A., & Carroll, D. J. (2010). Using international law to assess elections. Democratization, 17(3), 416–441. doi:10.1080/13510341003700253

Dearing, J. W., & Rogers, E. M. (1996). Agenda-setting (Vol. 6). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. De Bruycker, I., & Beyers, J. (2015). Balanced or biased? Interest groups and legislative lobbying

in the European News Media. Political Communication, 32(3), 453–474. doi:10.1080/ 10584609.2014.958259

Dellmuth, L. M., & Tallberg, J. (2017). Advocacy strategies in global governance: Inside versus outside lobbying. Political Studies, 65(3), 705–723. doi:10.1177/0032321716684356

Downs, A. (1972). Up and down with ecology-the issue-attention cycle. The Public Interest, 28, 38. Dür, A., & Mateo, G. (2013). Gaining access or going public? Interest group strategies in five

European countries. European Journal of Political Research, 52(5), 660–686. doi:10.1111/ ejpr.2013.52.issue-5

Elliott, T. A., Amenta, E., & Caren, N. (2016). Recipes for attention: Policy reforms, crises, organizational characteristics, and the newspaper coverage of the LGBT Movement, 1969–2009. Sociological Forum, 31(4), 926–947. doi:10.1111/socf.2016.31.issue-4

Fenton, N. (2010). NGOs, new media and the mainstream news: News from everywhere. In N. Fenton (Ed.), New media, old news: Journalism & democracy in the digital age (pp. 153–168). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Galtung, J., & Ruge, M. H. (1965). The structure of foreign news the presentation of the Congo, Cuba and Cyprus Crises in four Norwegian newspapers. Journal of Peace Research, 2(1), 64–90. doi:10.1177/002234336500200104

Gamson, W. A., & Wolfsfeld, G. (1993). Movements and media as interacting systems. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 528(1), 114–125. doi:10.1177/ 0002716293528001009

Gandy, O. H. (1982). Beyond agenda setting: Information subsidies and public policy. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation.

Gourevitch, P. A., & Lake, D. A. (2012). Beyond virtue: Evaluating and enhancing the credibility of non-governmental organizations. In P. A. Gourevitch, D. A. Lake, & J. G. Stein (Eds.), The credibility of transnational NGOs. When virtue is not enough (pp. 3–34). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Green-Pedersen, C., & Walgrave, S. (2014). Political agenda setting: An approach to studying political systems. In C. Green-Pedersen & S. Walgrave (Eds.), Agenda setting, policies, and political systems: A comparative approach (pp. 1–16). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Grömping, M. (2017). Domestic election monitoring and advocacy: An emerging research agenda. Nordic Journal of Human Rights, 35(4), 407–423. doi:10.1080/18918131.2017.1401776

472 Max Grömping

Hafner-Burton, E. (2013). Making human rights a reality. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Hair, J. F., Black, W. C., Babin, B. J., & Anderson, R. E. (2009). Multivariate data analysis (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, N.J: Prentice Hall.

Hallin, D. C., & Mancini, P. (2004). Comparing media systems: Three models of media and politics. Cambridge, UK/New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Halpin, D. R. (2014). The organization of political interest groups: Designing advocacy. New York, NY: Routledge.

Halpin, D. R., & Binderkrantz, A. S. (2011). Explaining breadth of policy engagement: Patterns of interest group mobilization in public policy. Journal of European Public Policy, 18(2), 201–219. doi:10.1080/13501763.2011.544499

Hanegraaff, M., Beyers, J., & De Bruycker, I. (2016). Balancing inside and outside lobbying: The political strategies of lobbyists at global diplomatic conferences. European Journal of Political Research, 55(3), 568–588. doi:10.1111/1475-6765.12145

He, B., & Warren, M. E. (2011). Authoritarian deliberation: The deliberative turn in Chinese political development. Perspectives on Politics, 9(2), 269–289. doi:10.1017/S1537592711000892

Hilgartner, S., & Bosk, C. L. (1988). The rise and fall of social problems – A public arenas model. American Journal of Sociology, 94(1), 53–78. doi:10.1086/228951

Høyer, S. (2005). The idea of the book. In S. Høyer & H. Pöttker (Eds.), Diffusion of the news paradigm 1850-2000 (pp. 9–16). Göteborg, Sweden: Nordicom.

Hughes, S., Mellado, C., Arroyave, J., Benitez, J. L., de Beer, A., Garcés, M., … Márquez-Ram írez, M. (2017). Expanding influences research to insecure democracies. Journalism Studies, 18(5), 645–665. doi:10.1080/1461670X.2016.1266278

Hyde, S. D. (2012). Why believe international election monitors? In P. A. Gourevitch, D. A. Lake, & J. Gross Stein (Eds.), The credibility of transnational NGOs. When virtue is not enough (pp. 37–61). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Jones, B. D., & Baumgartner, F. R. (2005). The politics of attention: How government prioritizes problems. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Junk, W. M. (2016). Two logics of NGO advocacy: Understanding inside and outside lobbying on EU environmental policies. Journal of European Public Policy, 23(2), 236–254. doi:10.1080/ 13501763.2015.1041416

Keck, M. E., & Sikkink, K. (1998). Activists beyond borders: Advocacy networks in international politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Kelley, J. G. (2012). Monitoring democracy: When international election observation works, and why it often fails. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Kleinnijenhuis, J., & Rietberg, E. M. (1995). Parties, media, the public and the economy – Patterns of societal agenda-setting. European Journal of Political Research, 28(1), 95–118. doi:10.1111/j.1475-6765.1995.tb00488.x

Klüver, H. (2012). Informational lobbying in the European Union: The effect of organisational characteristics. West European Politics, 35(3), 491. doi:10.1080/01402382.2012.665737

Klüver, H., & Saurugger, S. (2013). Opening the black box: The professionalization of interest groups in the European Union. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 2(2), 185–205. doi:10.1057/iga.2013.2

Kollman, K. (1998). Outside lobbying: Public opinion and interest group strategies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Koopmans, R. (2004). Movements and media: Selection processes and evolutionary dynamics in the public sphere. Theory and Society, 33(3/4), 367–391. doi:10.1023/B:RYSO.0000038603.34963.de

Lawrence, R. G. (2000). The politics of force: Media and the construction of police brutality. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

Lowi, T. J. (1964). American business, public policy, case-studies, and political theory. World Politics, 16(4), 677–715. doi:10.2307/2009452

Maier, F., Meyer, M., & Steinbereithner, M. (2016). Nonprofit organizations becoming business-like: A systematic review. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 45(1), 64–86. doi:10.1177/0899764014561796

More Bang for the Buck 473

Maloney, W. A. (2015). Organizational populations: Professionalization, maintenance and demo- cratic delivery. In D. Lowery, D. Halpin, & V. Gray (Eds.), The organization ecology of interest communities. Assessment and Agenda (pp. 99–116). New York, NY: Palgrave MacMillan.

Miller, R. A., & Albert, K. (2015). If it leads, it bleeds (and if it bleeds, it leads): Media coverage and fatalities in militarized interstate disputes. Political Communication, 32(1), 61–82. doi:10.1080/10584609.2014.880976

Nai, A. (2017). The Fourth Estate. In P. Norris & A. Nai (Eds.), Election watchdogs. Transparency, accountability, and integrity (pp. 191–210). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Norris, P. (2013). The new research agenda studying electoral integrity. Electoral Studies, 32(4), 563–575. doi:10.1016/j.electstud.2013.07.015

Norris, P., Wynter, T., & Grömping, M. (2017). Perceptions of electoral integrity, (PEI-5.5) (Publication no. 10.7910/DVN/EWYTZ7). from Harvard Dataverse doi: 10.7910/DVN/ EWYTZ7

Powers, M. (2018). NGOs as newsmakers. The changing landscape of International News. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

Ramos, H., Ron, J., & Thoms, O. N. T. (2007). Shaping the northern media’s human rights coverage, 1986-2000. Journal of Peace Research, 44(4), 385–406. doi:10.1177/0022343307078943

Reese, S. D. (2001). Understanding the global journalist: A hierarchy-of-influences approach. Journalism Studies, 2(2), 173–187. doi:10.1080/14616700118394

Rohlinger, D. A., Kail, B., Taylor, M., & Conn, S. (2012). Outside the mainstream: Social move- ment organization media coverage in mainstream and partisan news outlets. In J. Earl & D. A. Rohlinger (Eds.), Media, movements, and political change (pp. 51–80). Bingley, UK: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

Ron, J., Golden, S., Crow, D., & Pandya, A. (2017). Taking root: Public opinion and human rights in the Global South. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

Ron, J., Ramos, H., & Rodgers, K. (2005). Transnational information politics: NGO human rights reporting, 1986-2000. International Studies Quarterly, 49(3), 557–587. doi:10.1111/ j.1468-2478.2005.00377.x

Rubin, D. B. (1987).Multiple imputation for nonresponse in surveys. Hoboken, NJ: JohnWiley& Sons. Schlozman, K. L., Verba, S., & Brady, H. E. (2012). The unheavenly chorus: Unequal political voice

and the broken promise of American democracy. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press. Schudson, M. (1978). Discovering the news: A social history of American newspapers. New York,

NY: Basic Books. Seguin, C. (2016). Cascades of coverage: Dynamics of media attention to social movement

organizations. Social Forces, 94(3), 997–1020. doi:10.1093/sf/sov085 Simmons, B. A. (2009). Mobilizing for human rights: International law in domestic politics.

Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Soroka, S. N. (2012). The gatekeeping function: Distributions of information in media and the Real

World. Journal of Politics, 74(2), 514–528. doi:10.1017/S002238161100171X Stanig, P. (2015). Regulation of speech and media coverage of corruption: An empirical analysis of

the Mexican Press. American Journal of Political Science, 59(1), 175–193. doi:10.1111/ ajps.2015.59.issue-1

Stier, S. (2015). Democracy, autocracy and the news: The impact of regime type on media freedom. Democratization, 22(7), 1273–1295. doi:10.1080/13510347.2014.964643

Stockmann, D. (2012). Media commercialization and authoritarian rule in China. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Teets, J. C. (2014). Civil society under authoritarianism: The China model. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Thrall, T. A. (2006). The myth of the outside strategy: Mass media news coverage of interest groups. Political Communication, 23(4), 407–420. doi:10.1080/10584600600976989

474 Max Grömping

Thrall, T. A., Stecula, D., & Sweet, D. (2014). May we have your attention please? Human-Rights NGOs and the problem of global communication. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 19(2), 135–159. doi:10.1177/1940161213519132

Tresch, A., & Fischer, M. (2015). In search of political influence: Outside lobbying behaviour and media coverage of social movements, interest groups and political parties in six Western European countries. International Political Science Review, 36(4), 355–372. doi:10.1177/ 0192512113505627

Tuchman, G. (1978). Making news: A study in the construction of reality. New York, NY: Free Press.

van Aelst, P., & Walgrave, S. (2016). Information and arena: The dual function of the news media for political elites. Journal of Communication, 66(3), 496–518. doi:10.1111/jcom.2016.66.issue-3

Vliegenthart, R., & Boomgaarden, H. G. (2007). Real-world indicators and the coverage of immigration and the integration of minorities in dutch newspapers. European Journal of Communication, 22(3), 293–314. doi:10.1177/0267323107079676

Waisbord, S. (2011). Can NGOs change the news? International Journal of Communication, 5, 24. Wolfsfeld, G., & Sheafer, T. (2006). Competing actors and the construction of political news: The

contest over waves in Israel. Political Communication, 23(3), 333–354. doi:10.1080/ 10584600600808927

More Bang for the Buck 475

Terrorism Research Initiative

The Dead Drops of Online Terrorism

Author(s): Gabriel Weimann and Asia Vellante

Source: Perspectives on Terrorism , August 2021, Vol. 15, No. 4 (August 2021), pp. 39-53

Published by: Terrorism Research Initiative

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/27044234

REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/27044234?seq=1&cid=pdf- reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

Terrorism Research Initiative is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Perspectives on Terrorism

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

39ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

The Dead Drops of Online Terrorism: How Jihadists Use Anonymous Online Platforms by Gabriel Weimann and Asia Vellante

Abstract

The proliferation on terrorist online postings and their documented impact on recruitment of fighters and activation of lone-wolf operations caused governments and security agencies to launch various countermeasures. These measures—such as “deplatforming” or removal of terrorist online content, suspension of social media accounts, and pressuring social media companies to remove terrorist propaganda—have led terrorists to seek new alternatives. One of the more sophisticated ways extremists and terrorists are recently communicating is through the use of virtual dead drops. The dead drop, a term taken from the espionage terminology, was used to secretly pass information items using a clandestine location. Recently, the physical dead drop has been transformed to a digital one mainly in the form of anonymous sharing portals and cloud services. This study reveals the various platforms used by terrorist groups like the Islamic State, al Qaeda and al Shabaab to store and disseminate material on online dead drops. Scanning these dead drops led to a database containing all links used for directing to the virtual dead drops and the content posted herein, including texts, photos, videos, news broadcasts, weapon manuals (‚cook books’) and infographics. The database was subjected to a systematic content analysis, using a codebook with a list of criteria such as the platforms used for the dead drops, date of publication, type of content posted, a brief description of the content and extra links included in the posts, audience reaction (comments, likes, retweeting). The findings reveal that Jihadists are using the dead drops with growing sophistication, relying on more outlets and more links to the same content. Some groups are systematically using several anonymous platforms to publish their daily report, providing their followers with multiple ways to access and download propaganda content. This method allows them to reach larger audiences, to maintain their online presence for a longer time and to avoid total removal of their postings. The findings lead to several implications regarding the dialectic nature of the struggle between online terrorism and counter terrorism and the required preemptive measures.

Keywords: Online terrorism, anonymous platforms, cloud-share platforms, Internet, social media, terrorist propaganda

Introduction The documented connection between the growing spread of violent extremist and terrorist content on the Internet and social media, and the increase of terrorist attacks and successful recruitment of foreign fighters, caused governments and security agencies to launch various countermeasures.[1,2,3,4,5] These measures include removal of online terrorist content, suspension of social media accounts, hacking websites and pressuring social media companies to remove terrorist propaganda as well as monitor the “chatter” for intelligence purposes (with the added value of Big Data analysis). Attempting to adapt to these countermeasures and maintain their online campaigns, groups like ISIS had to diversify their communication campaigns by moving from mainstream online platforms to fringe platforms.[6] Indeed, they have substituted popular platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube with encrypted platforms like Telegram, Signal, and WhatsApp, as well as with anonymous sharing portals. As Stern and Modi (2010) argued, “terrorists respond to changes in their environments by changing their mission and changing their shape. What is important in such events is that information logistics is essential in disseminating messages of terror.”[7]

As revealed by a report by Fisher, Prucha and Winterbotham on “Mapping the Jihadist Information Ecosystem”[8], terrorists are innovative in responding to disruption efforts by authorities and counter terrorism agencies and find new ways to distribute content. As their study reveals, “While previously online jihadi activity was focused on posting content directly on major platforms, the research shows major platforms are now often

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

40ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

used to share URLs instead to facilitate access to content stored elsewhere. The major platforms are therefore being used as ‘beacons’ directing users to the material.” Several studies revealed how the public digital storage Internet Archive is used by terrorists and extremists.[9] In June 2021, The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) reported that their researchers discovered a large cache of explosive manuals on the Internet Archive, finding 37 different manuals totaling more than 1,000 pages. The collection had been online for five years and received more than 10,000 views before it was removed by the Internet Archive. These manuals were made by various sources, including ISIS supporters and a weapons research group affiliated with the al-Nusra Front.[10]

One of the more sophisticated ways extremists and terrorists are using online communication to avoid detection is the use of virtual dead drops. The dead drop, a term taken from the espionage terminology, was used to secretly pass information items using a clandestine location for interim storage. Recently, the physical dead drop has been transformed to a digital one mainly in the form of anonymous sharing portals. Anonymous sharing portals are a catch-all name for online sites that are openly available, have no login requirement and thus provide anonymity and allow for sharing links of which content is to be collected, shared and mass distributed. Thus, these portals and sites act as a way to build in redundancy and protect against widespread content loss due to deplatforming. As such, they actually are the “Black Boxes” of cyber communication, being opaque from the outside. Consequently, anonymous sharing portals such as JustPaste.it, Sendvid.com, and Dump.to have become some of the most-used sites by ISIS and other terrorist and extremist groups. These websites can be used as supplementary sites in addition to YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. In Shehabat and Mitew’s study ‘Black-boxing the Black Flag: Anonymous Sharing Platforms and ISIS Content Distribution Tactics’, the authors explore anonymous sharing portals and how ISIS uses them.[11]

The Dead Drops Platforms

There are several anonymous sharing platforms. The most popular is JustPaste.it, a Polish-made site that does not require registration, is not open to search engines and specific contents are accessible only by a given or shared link. This site also offers advanced features such as formatting and exporting to PDF, pasting text directly from a word processor or a web page, importing and pasting of images, secure content publishing and password-protected access. More important, from the terrorist point of view, is the ability to protect the contents from automated searches by web crawlers and algorithms by allowing the use of encrypt tags. The site received international attention after it became clear that ISIS supporters and operatives used it to post and disseminate information. ISIS used this site for disseminating video clips, images of executions and beheadings, texts promoting its radical ideology, and its online magazine Dabiq and its later editions. As reported by Stalinsky and Sosnow (2016), “JustPaste.it has been the most important content-sharing website for jihadis.”[9] Very often, as reported by Shehabat and Mitew (2018), links to items uploaded on JustPaste.it have been shared on social media such as Twitter, Facebook, Telegram, and other social media platforms to aid in exposure.[13]

Well-known cases of using JustPaste.it by ISIS include the posting of a threat to Twitter employees who shut down ISIS accounts and publishing the names and addresses of American armed forces personnel (i.e., doxing). The posting on JustPaste.it was presented as a reaction to Twitter’s censorship causing the suspension of 20,000 accounts suspected of ISIS association in February 2015. Fishwick (2015) noted that “JustPaste.it’s role in Islamic State’s propaganda machine has largely gone unnoticed,”[14] while Silverman (2014) argued that “jihadists discovered it as well, and the site soon became one of the favored tools of the Islamic State for sharing news, official communiques, and graphic propaganda.”[15] Interestingly, most of these postings should have been deleted by JustPaste.it according to the platform’s Terms of Service stating that “Any content that may spread hate or cause harm will be removed instantly.” The site is owned and operated by Mariusz Żurawek, a Polish entrepreneur from Wroclaw. He maintains the site independently and argues: “It’s not my choice that ISIS has selected my site … As long as I’m cooperating with the police, removing content, not allowing ISIS to make propaganda, I think it’s good for the site that many people will know about it.”[16] In 2014, JustPaste.it removed some graphic postings that were calling ISIS operatives to launch their own content-sharing pages. In response, new sharing sites emerged, including Manbar.me in 2014, nasher.me in 2015, and Alors.ninja in

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

41ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

July 2015. These sites enabled ISIS to post and share propaganda material such as photos of attacks, battles and raids. Later, ISIS introduced PasteMaker and Share Text, which mirror the encrypted messages of JustPaste.it. Despite using these platforms occasionally, ISIS kept using JustPaste.it.[17]

Another online dead-drop site is Sendvid.com, providing a platform for anonymous video sharing thus substituting YouTube and Dailymotion. The potential was noted by various illegal groups including terrorists. ISIS, for example, posted its high-quality videos such as Flames of War 1 and 2, Message Covered with Blood, and Healing of the Hearts on Sendvid.com. As noted by Shehabat and Mitew (2018), “Sendvid is a crucial element of ISIS’s information logistics as videos linked to Sendvid can also be shared via other social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, archive.org, Tumblr, Telegram, dump.to and email, or can be stored in users’ Google Drive or Dropbox for future retrieval.”[18] Dump.to is an alternative to JustPaste.it and was used by ISIS to “share, upload and converge links from similar sharing sites such as JustPaste.it and sendvid.com where all types of data can be stored and shared via a link to ISIS’s affiliate networks.”[19] ISIS uses Dump.to for “documents, video, voice messages, and music to be stored and shared, which in turn allows ISIS affiliates to aggregate, edit, curate, reclassify, and republish jihadi propaganda content.”[20]

Terrorists and extremists are also migrating to cloud-sharing services. One such new platform is Telegram’s blogging platform called Telegraph. This is an anonymous blog that offers the opportunity to share content with others without the need to own a Telegram account. Although Telegram did remove some Islamic State content and profiles from their platform, on Telegram’s app Telegraph, terrorist groups—especially the Islamic State— have been posting, sharing and spreading their messages.[21] ISIS and its supporters are also using the Internet Archive platform to upload their content and thus frustrate efforts to delete their online propaganda. Internet Archive is used by ISIS by taking a screenshot of a page and then sharing the links to an Internet Archive location so if the content is taken down online it will available on the web archive. The Internet Archive, a San Francisco–based nonprofit organization committed to preserving the Internet and all of its content, became a useful platform for extremists and terrorists. In his report on “The Dark Side of Internet Archive”, Fisher-Birch (2018) notes that “The site is rife with videos that offer instructions on making explosives as well as propaganda and recruitment videos made by terrorist and extremist groups.”[22] The report reveals that a variety of terrorist groups such as ISIS, al-Qaeda, and the banned British neo-Nazi group National Action are storing on Internet Archive instructions like bomb-making videos, beheading clips, seductive calls to commit terrorist attacks, and attempts to recruit new members and followers. In her report “Digital Decay: Tracing Change Over Time Among English-Language Islamic State Sympathizers on Twitter”, Alexander (2017) presents findings from the data set of tweets by ISIS sympathizers.[23] The report noted the Internet Archive was one of the top file- sharing services that was referenced in links within the tweets. In 2017 14.3 percent of all the ISIS-related material that was shared online was done so through archive.org compared with 6.9 percent on YouTube and 0.8 percent on Twitter.[24]

An additional platform used is Amazon Drive: Designed for storing and sharing videos, images, text and other content, it has been adopted by several terrorist and extremist groups. They found it to be a stable and reliable platform for disseminating their content. First, they upload the content and then share the links with followers and sympathizers, primarily through social media. According to Amazon’s website, “All photos, videos and other files you upload to Amazon Drive are  securely and privately  stored in your Files and your Amazon Photos library.” While Amazon has guidelines for its many platforms, including specific bans on terrorism, bigotry, hatred, or illegal discrimination, it has not been very active in removing terrorist content.

A study conducted by Ayad, Amarasingam and Alexander (2021) attempted to reveal the “Cloud Caliphate”, the online repositories of Islamic State materials seemingly managed by sympathizers of the Islamic State.[25] The scan retrieved more than 90,000 items of propaganda content stored online. Using the initial links to a non-password-protected version of the cache promoted by pro-Islamic State accounts on Twitter, researchers gained access to what seemed to be the full extent of the 2.2-terabyte repository. This “Cloud Caliphate” is functioning as the archive of choice for a series of Islamic State websites and serves as a means to keep the memory of the “caliphate” alive. The study ends with the call “to identify, document, and study accessible

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

42ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

repositories and take stock of the methods used to build, promote, and maintain such resources”in order to really understand the propaganda dynamics and the options for countering this new challenge.[26]

The present article is an attempt to reveal the various platforms used by terrorist groups like the Islamic State, al Qaeda and al Shabaab to store and disseminate material on a variety of virtual dead drops like anonymous platforms and cloud services. We attempt to answer several research questions:

RQ1: What are the platforms used by terrorist groups as their virtual dead drops?

RQ2: Who are the terrorist groups using the dead drops?

RQ3: What type of information is stored in these dead drops?

RQ4: Are there differences in the use of dead drops across terrorist groups?

RQ5: Are there changes over time in the use of these dead drops?

Method

To examine the use of online dead drops by terrorist groups, we applied several stages of data collection and analysis. The first step involved creating a content database based on several basic criteria: we selected any terrorist content that included material designed for intimidation, radicalization, recruitment, online guidance to use weapons and explosives, calls for attacks and, in addition, materials published either on an anonymous sharing platform or available to download from a cloud-share platform. It should be noted that anonymous platforms such as JustPaste.it and Telegraph don’t have a home page and it is possible to access the content only if one has the direct link. Therefore, to create the database we had to search for the links. We searched Twitter for any links to anonymous platforms and cloud sharing: Twitter was chosen since Stalinsky and Sosnow already noted the “use of Twitter and other services to share links to extensive content that they post on content-sharing web services such as JustPaste.it is well documented.”[12] On Twitter, we searched for terrorist postings containing the following keywords, all associated with anonymous and cloud-share platforms: JustPaste.it, Telegra.ph, dump.to, Noteshare.id, pastethis.at, manbar.me, nasher.me, files.fm, pixeldrain, OneDrive, Nextcloud, cloud drive, Top4top, Yandex.Disk, MixDrop, 4shared, Cloudmail, Archive.today, PCloud, UsersDrive, and Dropapk. to. For example, on Archive.today, a cloud-sharing platform popular among terrorists, we searched daily for terrorist content by looking into all the screenshots saved on the web archive under the host JustPaste.it, telegra. ph, noteshare.id, pastethis.at, manbar.me, nasher.me, and dump.to. In addition, we followed @takedownterror account’s initiative to keep track of the most frequently anonymous sharing platforms used by terrorists and added those to the dead drop data. In the third stage we analyzed the database of the content accumulating after both stages of our search. The database includes the links used for directing to the virtual dead drops and the content posted there, including text, photos, videos, news broadcasts, weapon manuals (‘cook books’), and infographics.

The database, composed by this inductive process, was subjected to a systematic content analysis, using a codebook with a list of criteria such as the platform used for the dead drops, date of publication, type of content posted, a brief description of the content, extra links included in the posts and audience reaction (comments, likes, retweeting). We chose content analysis since, as highlighted by Krippendorff [28], content analysis not only gives the chance to the researcher to highlight trends and patterns from a large body of data but also provides an objective method of research. In fact, we created and analyzed two databases, one for the anonymous platforms and one for the cloud-share platforms. Our six-month scan (December 2020 to May 2021) revealed numerous postings on the dead-drop sites, as described in Table 1.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

43ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

Table 1: Postings by Terrorists on Dead Drops (December 2020—May 2021)

Analysis

Our analysis is based on the five Research Questions we outlined. First we examine the various platforms used for the dead drops (RQ1), the terrorist groups using them (RQ2), the content posted using the dead drops (RQ3), the differences across groups (RQ4); and finally, the changes over time in the patterns of use and content posted (RQ5). For the sake of clarity, in the first part of the analysis we will present each platform used, the groups using them, illustrative examples of the content available on this platform and differences across

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

44ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

groups. In the second part of the analysis, we will present the evolution over time in the use of online dead drops. Answering our first three Research Questions (the platforms, the users and the content) is the following descriptive analysis, differentiating between two types of platforms: a. anonymous posting platforms and b. cloud hosting platforms.

Anonymous Posting Platforms

JustPaste.it

The most frequently used platform of anonymous posting by terrorist groups is JustPaste.it. Terrorist groups using Paste.it usually direct their audiences to JustPaste.it by posting links on Twitter, in other posts published on other anonymous platforms or on the site archive.is (titled ‘Archive Today’ on its website), a platform that allows for storing screenshots of web pages. Terrorists can use this site by snapshotting it and then sharing the links, directing the users to the dead drop on JustPaste.it. This way there is a possibility that the link will not be available on the JustPaste.it site itself but it will be online and archived on Archive.today.

Our analysis reveals that the Islamic State—including its factions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, West and Central Africa, as well as Al Shabaab, the jihadist fundamentalist group based in East Africa and Yemen and the Taliban (The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan)—is using the most frequently JustPaste.it. During our search period we found that the Islamic State has published at least one daily post on this dead drop. We also found that JustPaste.it is used more by terrorist groups and less by individuals supporters of these groups.

The Islamic State has been using JustPaste.it as one of the main anonymous platforms in combination with Telegra.ph (the anonymous platform created by Telegram) to share their content after other platforms such as nasher.me and manbar.me were taken down. Unlike other terrorist groups, the Islamic State uses JustPaste. it more frequently to spread terrorist content by including multiple links to other JustPaste/Telegraph posts, including various radical and extreme contents. Our database reveals that the Islamic State and its news agencies are using JustPaste.it for multiple purposes. First, the Islamic State is providing a daily update of the Islamic State action through a detailed news report including the number of people they either injured, killed or kidnapped, the number of weapons seized, and the number of villages destroyed or raided. Sometimes these daily posts are just updated with the latest news while in other cases a new report is created and posted. Every day the Islamic State presents in its daily report news items such as descriptions of the Mujahiddin actions in Iraq, Syria, Africa and other theaters of Jihad. Additionally, the Islamic State uses JustPaste.it to share photographic reports of its actions and screenshots of the latest issue of its current magazine (Al Naba magazine). For example, one of the photo reports from March 2021 shows the “Caliphate’s Soldiers” attacking two Congolese army barracks. A detailed description of the Islamic State actions is attached to the photo report mentioning that during the attack against the barracks of the Congolese Army in a few villages of the Ronzuri area in Beni, the Islamic State affiliate did not only kill a few members of the Congolese army but also seized various weapons and ammunition. Another photo report included shows the Islamic State soldiers kidnapping and killing a member of the Egyptian army near Rafah, a Palestinian city in the Gaza Strip.

JustPaste.it, as mentioned before, is also used as a way to provide extra links to other extreme and radical content. In fact, each daily report post includes several links to other cloud-sharing platforms in case of removal of the original posting as well as links to previous daily reports, the latest issue of their magazine, video versions of the daily reports, propaganda videos, PDF books, infographics and video and radio transcripts in multiple languages. During Ramadan, several infographics included in the reports are dedicated to the principles and the rules of Ramadan especially how to fast, when to pray as well as the value of offering food to those in need. The material posted offers two-way communication for interactive platforms like Telegram official accounts and bot accounts. Other than the daily reports, the Islamic State publishes frequently special posts on JustPaste. it highlighting specific occasions such as the appearance of a new propaganda video, the publication of a new issue of Al Naba, or new infographics. In these instances, the posts are completely different from the daily reports since they are shorter and focus on a single topic but provide a long list of links to multiple sharing

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

45ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

platforms. Finally, the Islamic State uses JustPaste.it to post analyses of documents (e.g., the analysis in English of Zawahiri’s letter to Zarqawi).

Another active actor on JustPaste.it is al Shabaab, whose presence on this platform increased significantly since we started our data collection in February 2021. Yet, their use of this platform differs from that of the Islamic State. First, their use is not as frequent as that of the Islamic State since they are not publishing a daily report but they are using the platform sporadically to share propaganda content. Yet, similarly to the Islamic State, al Shabaab postings come mostly Al Kata’ib, the group’s media outlet. The links to JustPaste.it posts are available either on an archive platform or shared on Twitter by some of Al Shabaab’s supporters. Unlike other terrorist postings on JustPaste.it, al Shabaab seems to follow the “traditional” postings on anonymous platforms by publishing single-topic posts. From the data collected, al Shabaab used the platform mostly as a venue for spreading their propaganda videos. These posts are rather simple and include the title of the video, the poster of the video and a list of links to cloud-sharing platforms to access the streaming, download of the content with different video resolutions as well as the transcript of it in English with multiple file option (PDF and DOC). As other terrorist groups, al Shabaab uses JustPaste.it for sharing its propaganda on a more secure platform that will not be tracked by counter terrorism.

The Taliban (or the Islamic Emirate) is also using JustPaste.it but as our analysis reveals, its presence on this platform is more sporadic and also mostly conducted by individual supporters. Similarly, the Taliban and its supporters use the platform for multiple purposes: to repost Taliban statements concerning multiple topics (e.g., accusing CIA agents for killing women and children or highlighting the need to punish the Americans for their intervention in Afghanistan) and to provide links to their official website and blogs.

Telegraph

Telegram is a freeware, cross-platform, cloud-based instant messaging (IM) software and application service. Telegram provides end-to-end encrypted voice and video calls  and optional end-to-end encrypted “secret” chats. Users can send text and voice messages, animation, make voice and video calls, and share an unlimited number of images, documents, video clips, contacts, and audio files. In January 2021, Telegram surpassed 500 million monthly active users. It was one of the most downloaded apps worldwide in January 2021. Other than providing a secure messaging app, Telegram also launched an anonymous blogging platform named Telegraph. Telegraph is an anonymous platform with a minimalist interface that allows users to publish articles anonymously as well as posting videos, pictures, and more. The anonymity provided by Telegraph attracted several terrorist groups and their followers. From the data we collected, it was evident that the Islamic State uses Telegraph frequently.

The Islamic State has been using Telegraph for a long time and in a very consistent way. Our data reveals that like in the case of JustPaste.it, the main benefit of the platform in combination with cloud-share platform is to remain anonymous and under the radar of countermeasures applied by the authorities or the social media operators. Telegraph is used by the Islamic State for multiple purposes. The first type of content shared on Telegraph is the daily report. These reports are very similar to those posted on JustPaste.it and contain the news from the Islamic State’s news agency, covering events in Iraq, Central and West Africa, Sinai and the Levant. The news, according to the Islamic State, revolves mainly around the group’s actions and military successes. It is clear that the Islamic State, following its heavy losses in Syria and Iraq, is trying to regenerate its image by providing evidence to its ongoing fighting, conquests and the victimization of the enemies and tributes to their martyrs. An example of the information provided from March 2021: the conquest of Palma in Mozambique and the killing of more than 55 soldiers. Here as well, these daily posts often include the online publication of Al Naba magazine, links to the previous Islamic State’s reports, propaganda video clips, daily reports in video format, religious books and publications. To encourage interaction, they also post the official accounts of the Islamic State’s news agency as well as official Hoop Messenger accounts. Some of the posts include links to access material posted on other cloud-sharing platforms. Finally, some posts on Telegraph are used as databases with lists of multiple links to all forms of propaganda material: videos, audio recordings, books and

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

46ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

other items. Some of the links to the group’s postings on Telegraph were found on archive.is but mostly in other JustPaste.it posts, highlighting how the Islamic State is trying to connect its audiences and followers to various dead drops and increase exposure.

Cloud-sharing Platforms

Cloud-sharing is a system in which the user is allotted storage space on a server, providing end users with the ability to access files with any Internet-capable device from any location. At its simplest, it is a secure virtual space that any user can access via his/her browser or a desktop application. The actual location of the stored files is usually in a data center somewhere, in a server, on a hard drive or solid-state drive. Usually, the users have the ability to grant access privileges to other users as they see fit. Terrorist organizations use these cloud-sharing platforms in combination with anonymous platforms to share propaganda online without being flagged and consequently their content stays online longer. As our study revealed, terrorists use multiple cloud-sharing platforms. The most commonly used are files.fm, Pixeldrain, Mediafire, OneDrive, CloudShare, Nextcloud, Cloudflare, Yandex.Disk, Mixdrop, 4shared, Cloudmail, Top4top, pCloud, UsersDrive, and Dropapk. to. The links terrorists post to direct their audiences to these cloud platforms are in their posts on anonymous- share platforms or directly on Twitter. Our scan of these cloud-sharing platforms reveals that terrorists provide multiple links to identical content they stored on various clouds in order to protect these materials from being completely removed. Moreover, the material is available in multiple format and language options, resolutions, and the option in certain cases to stream the content. The content that terrorists share on cloud-share platforms is not only about propaganda and news reports; it is broader and more varied, including, for example directions on how IS members should deal with COVID-19 or how to defend themselves from hackers, religious books and more. We also noted in our scan that terrorists do not use the option to publish password-protected links on cloud-sharing platforms, maybe in order to increase the reach and exposure of their material. In one exceptional case, when the posting included sensitive information concerning Mossad agents’s identities, the cloud-sharing links were published on manbar.me and the password itself was included in the anonymous platform post. The terrorists using the cloud-sharing platforms, as our data show, are mainly the Islamic State and its affiliated groups as well as al Shabaab, al Qaeda and its affiliated groups and the Taliban. While terrorists are using numerous cloud services, the following section will review the most popular platforms.

Files.fm

The most frequently used cloud service used by terrorists is Files.fm, a cloud-storage platform that is private and encrypted, offering to stream the content before downloading it and the options to comment and if desired, to set up a password for accessing the material stored. The platform offers multiple plans; with the free one it offers storage up to 20 GB and upload up to 5 GB, messaging and an encrypted data channel. While the free plan offers only a few features, the pro plan offers the option to create password-protected links, direct download links, disable downloads (view only) and unlimited P2P traffic. The latest version is the business plan that offers unlimited-size files, and 2FA security service (2FA is the Two-Factor Authentication feature, when the clients’ accounts on Files.fm are more secure and protected from unauthorized access due to the fact that they require an additional code when signing in).

Files.fm cloud-sharing platform has been used by several terrorist groups and as our scan reveals, mostly by the Islamic State especially for storing propaganda content. We noted that very often the links to the Files.fm files were posted on several social media (especially JustPaste.it) thus attempting to attract a broader audience and to avoid removal of a single guiding link. For example, we found that three links to the Islamic State’s files stored on Files.fm were mostly added to the daily report post on JustPaste.it, directing to the stored Arabic video version of the daily report. Other than the daily report the Islamic State uses this cloud-sharing platform for other types of content, including the latest issue of Al Naba online magazine, infographics, propaganda videos such as the documentary published by Hadm al Aswar, a pro-Islamic State media outlet, entitled “Preparing Lions to Slaughter the Jews”. Furthermore, the Islamic State uses this specific cloud-sharing service to enable its followers to download PDF files of Jihadi religious books such as the book of the Ummah or the Thalaathat-ul-

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

47ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

Usool (The Three Principle and Their Proof). The links directing to these Files.fm files are often included in the daily posts published on JustPaste.it and Telegraph. These multiple links provide various sizes and file options, different video resolutions and various video formats.

Another group using this cloud sharing is al Shabaab. Like the Islamic State, al Shabaab, uses Files.fm cloud mainly for propaganda purposes and in a similar method, posts the links guiding to the cloud files. The content stored by al Shabaab on Files.fm includes video clips created by the Harakat Al Shabaab Al Kataib Media such as the one entitled “From the Frontiers of Glory”. The video includes footage of Al Shabaab Mujahiddin fighting against Somali and Burundian soldiers, dead Somali soldiers and the mujahiddin seizing weapons and destroying the enemy outposts. The content stored by al Shabaab on Files.fm includes video clips of their messages, such as the message to the people of Djibouti by the group’s spokesperson Sheik Abu Ubdeydah Ahmad Omar. Al Shabaab also relies on the use of multiple links directing to the cloud file, using platforms and providing their followers with various file types and sizes. Thus, for example, the Sheik Abu Ubdeydah Ahmad Omar’s message is available on Files.fm in multiple video resolutions as well as transcriptions of the speech in PDF and Word formats. Al Qaeda is also using Files.fm. Yet, al Qaeda uses Files.fm sporadically and it is not one of their most-used cloud platforms. Moreover, the majority of the links directing to the cloud files are published on Twitter and not on anonymous platforms. Al-Hurr, one of al Qaeda’s Media outlets, has been using this cloud-share platform to share propaganda videos such as the one focusing on al Qaeda’s messages to the Muslims of Kashmir.

Pixeldrain

Another cloud platform used by terrorist groups is Pixeldrain. This platform does not require registration and is free of charge. The free version allows advertisers to get the user’s IP address and browser fingerprint while the premium version can be paid with bitcoin and preserves the user’s anonymity. Pixeldrain also offers different paid options to prolong the storage time, allowing the option of up to 1,920 days with the so-called infinity plan. Our scan revealed that this platform is used mostly by the Islamic State and its affiliates. Pixeldrain is one of the cloud-sharing platforms used by the Islamic State to store and present the issues of Al Naba magazine and infographics, sometimes with the zip file option. Like in other platforms, the Islamic State uses Pixeldrain as an additional outlet to share propaganda video clips with multiple video resolutions (e.g., Islamic State of Sinai’s video entitled “The Epic Makers”). Consequently, for each propaganda video, there are at least five Pixeldrain links so that the followers have the option to download the file with 1080p, 720p, 480p, 360p and 240p. Most of the Pixeldrain postings revealed by our scan have a close expiring date, indicating that the Islamic State’s operatives are using mostly free accounts and not the premium accounts offering longer periods.

Although Al Shabaab is not using cloud-share platforms in the same extensive way as the Islamic State, it uses Pixeldrain to store and share its propaganda video clips such as the video message to the people of Djibouti by Sheikh Abu Ubeydah Ahmad Omar. The link to Pixeldrain appears with other links on a JustPaste post. The directing links also lead to Pixeldrain which presents the English transcript (PDF or DOC file) of the Al Shabaab spokesperson’s message. Like the Islamic State, Al Shabaab uses multiple Pixeldrain files to provide its followers with the option to download the file in different resolutions and consequently different size files (e.g., the propaganda video published by Al-Kataib Media entitled “Verily Our Soldiers Will Be the Victors”).

Mediafire

Mediafire is a file-hosting, file-synchronization and cloud-storage platform that offers the user up to 50 GB of free space, no download limit with ad-supported downloads. Using the business and premium plan one can have ad-free sharing and downloads, no captcha codes, password-protected files and one-time links. Mediafire has been used in combination with other platforms as a way to spread terrorist content and especially propaganda videos such as the one published by the Islamic State’s al Khayr media foundation entitled “The State of Islam Will Remain”. This video includes footage of Mujahidin’s fighting to conquer a city or to maintain their outposts. The links to the Mediafire cloud storage of such videos are included in JustPaste.it postings

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

48ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

posts devoted to the recent release of propaganda videos highlighting the Islamic State’s success and resilience, despite territorial losses. Mediafire is also used by the Islamic State for storing and sharing its new releases of online magazines as well as infographics. Here as well, different Mediafire links are posted to provide users the options to download the file in different sizes and video resolutions. From the data we collected there has been no case where the Islamic State shared Mediafire links to on social media such as Twitter or Facebook as they prefer posting these links on JustPaste.it or Telegraph.

OneDrive

OneDrive is a personal cloud storage platform that offers the option to upload multimedia from mobile devices with a user-friendly interface. Its links are not designed as anonymous. However, there is an option to generate anonymous guest links. OneDrive is used by terrorist groups to keep the flow of terrorist content online and provide safer storage and dissemination.

OneDrive is a cloud-share platform that has been rarely used by the Islamic State but, as our scan revealed, this platform is used to share content that is different than other Islamic State’s cloud-sharing platforms. For example, the Al Furqan Foundation, one of the Islamic State’s media production units, used a OneDrive link to share the audiotape of the speech of the official spokesman of the Islamic State Sheikh Al-Muhajir Abu Hamza Al-Qurashi titled “Tell Stories So That They May Reflect”.

Unlike the Islamic State, Al Shabaab uses this cloud-sharing platform more frequently, especially to share propaganda videos through anonymous platforms. An example of the use of OneDrive by Al Shabaab is the propaganda video created by the official outlet Al-Kataib Media, titled “The Blessed Manda Bay Raid”. The video included drone footage from when Al Shabaab attacked the US airfield and base at Manda Bay Airfield in Kenya. The links to the OneDrive contents were included in a JustPaste.it article and the links to the JustPaste. it article were found on Twitter.

Nextcloud

Nextcloud is a cloud-sharing platform that works similarly to Dropbox and Google Drive and provides a cloud platform based on Open Standards and Free Software. Thanks to the easy web and mobile interfaces, it allows the users to share files with others, create and send password-protected public links and upload files to the cloud. Nextcloud provides the option to let users upload and edit files anonymously. Similar to their use of cloud-share platforms, Islamic State operatives use Nextcloud to share propaganda videos by adding Nextcloud links to several JustPaste.it articles. For example, one of the propaganda videos the Islamic State shared when using Nextcloud was produced by the Al Furqan media outlet, and titled “They Answered the Call”. This video includes footage of fighting as well as of the combatants’ daily life in training camps plus highlights of their social activities such as helping people in need by donating money and food. Like with other cloud-share platforms, the Islamic State included for each new release of a propaganda video at least five Nextcloud links, one for each video resolution.

Top4top.io

Top4top.io is an Arab cloud-based storage system for uploading and downloading images, audio and video files of large sizes. Top4top is very popular in the Middle East and it is one of the favorite cloud service of the Islamic State. The Islamic State includes Top4top links in their JustPaste.it and Telegraph postings thus sharing PDF copies of the newest issue of Al Naba and propaganda videos. An example of the terrorist content shared with a Top4top link is the propaganda video created by the Al Battar media foundation, titled “the Muslim Prisoners of Patience”. This video includes footage of Jihadi prisoners’ daily lives as well as footage of martyrs dying in battle and gruesome footage of beheadings. The links to Top4top’s Al Battar video were posted on JustPaste.it. Al Qaeda has also used this platform in numerous cases to share propaganda videos and PDF documents of their spokespersons’ speeches. Through its Al Sahaab (meaning: “the cloud”) news media agency, Al Qaeda is

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

49ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

promoting the exposure to content by offering Top4top links to download propaganda documents in English such as the one titled “If You Repeat the Crime We Shall Repeat the Punishment”. Another group, al Shabaab, also relies on Top4top to share its propaganda campaigns. For example, links to Top4top have been included in a JustPaste.it posting, to share Al Shabaab Al Kataib media outlet videos and English transcription of texts. An example of such video is one titled “Punish Them Severely to Disperse Those Who are Behind Them”. This video includes footage of a few Al Shabaab terrorist attacks more specifically destroying Somali army tanks and trucks with rocket launchers.

Our scan of terrorist use of cloud-sharing revealed a vast range of platforms. In addition to those presented above, we found also Yandex.Disk, MixDrop, 4shared, CloudMail, pCloud, UsersDrive, and Dropapk.to. On all of these platforms we found terrorist materials and especially that of Jihadi groups. For example, on Mixdrop the Islamic State stores its video titled “Spirits in the Mountain”, produced by the Turjuman al Asawirti, an Islamic State media production outlet. This video includes beheading footage of Islamic State prisoners, two speeches by former US presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump about the heavy prices of fighting the Islamic State, and the commitment of the Islamic State to destroy its enemies and establish a global Islamic State. Another example is the propaganda video of al Qaeda titled “The Wound of the Rohingya is the Wound of the Ummah”. Looking more like a brief documentary, this video includes audio clips of Sheikh Ayman al Zawahiri and real footage of Myanmar soldiers’ atrocities against civilians while showing support for al Qaeda from the Rohingya community. On CloudMail, the Islamic State shares a video created by Hadm Alaswar media production, a sublevel pro Islamic State media outlet, entitled “Time to Pay”. This video focuses on depicting the Islamic State martyrs as victims of the West, presenting real footage of Muslim orphan children and calling other Mujahidin to substitute the martyrs and bring about victory and justice. On UsersDrive, for example, Al Furqan, Islamic State media outlet, presents the “Trample of War”, a propaganda video shot in Africa by the Islamic State–affiliated group Talea al-Ansar. This video provides footage of the Mujahidin fighting in the Sahel and a segment from an interview with French President Emmanuel Macron.

Evolution over Time

Our study has allowed us to track certain changes in the use of virtual dead drops by terrrorist actors and thus answer our Research Question 5 about possible evolution in the use of dead drops. It is clear that they migrated from “older” anonymous platforms such as nasher.me, Manbar.me, NoteShare or PasteThis to newer platforms such as Just.Paste.it and Telegraph. The content changed as well: before moving to newer platforms, the Islamic State used to publish posts dedicated to a single topic with just a few links while presently—except for sporadic cases like the launching of a new Islamic State propaganda campaign or the release of a new issue of Al Naba magazine—they create multi-topic posts. Moreover, some of the groups, especially the Islamic State, have added new features to their online propaganda in the form of daily reports that include news items from multiple countries, as well a list of links connecting the reader to various types of content. This ultimately serves to promote a broader range of propaganda content (e.g., books, magazines, audio and video clips).

The changing content included a change in the content from positive items to more negative items. For example, when scanning “older” postings on nasher and Manbar, we found photo reports of the livestock and poultry market in an Islamic State–conquered city Hawija in the Kirkuk Province of Iraq, photo reports of streets and public toilet repairs or photo reports of the distribution of food baskets to the poor. Such positive items are no longer featured in newer platforms like JustPaste.it and Telegraph, where violent, aggressive, threatening texts and visuals are the dominant themes. Before moving to JustPaste.it and Telegraph, the Islamic State was using specific platforms for specific types of content (e.g., using Dump.to to publish photo reports) while more recently those photo reports are included in the daily reports or in any dead-drop postings that have become multimedia platforms. These changes are also reflecting changes in terrorist propaganda strategy. For example, it is clear from our database that newer postings are clearly including more text while postings on the former anonymous platforms like Manbar, nasher, PasteThis and NoteShare focused on visual content (e.g., infographics, photo reports). Today the Islamic State is presenting longer news reports, combining texts with visuals. We also noted a significant decrease in the reactions of users to the content posted on most of the used

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on:ffff:ffff on Thu, 01 Jan 1976 12:34:56 UTC

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

50ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

anonymous platforms. Thus, photo reports published in the past by the Islamic State on Dump.to received multiple comments while now the majority of the articles published on JustPaste or Telegraph do not receive any kind of comments from the users.

The new use of dead drops relies on more outlets and more links to the same content. Some terrorist groups are using systematically several anonymous platforms to publish day after day their latest report, providing their followers with multiple ways to access and download propaganda content. This method allows them to reach larger audiences, maintain their online presence for a longer time and avoid total removal of their postings. Another major change is that many of the newer dead drops are not posted by the group itself as was the case in the past, but by supporters, followers and sympathizers. Our scan also reveals an impressive increase in the use of dead drops, either in the forms of anonymous platforms or cloud sharing. For example, the Islamic State added to its anonymous daily posts another messaging app called Hoop Messenger to provide an additional option for contacting the group and also to give another venue to share propagada. Hoop Messenger was included in few posts in December 2020 and January 2021 but then abandoned until April 2021, giving more space to Telegram accounts. We also noted an increasing number of link postings on social media directing to content stored in cloud-sharing platforms. For example, the Islamic State increased its postings of links to cloud sites on platforms like Files.fm. These links directed the users to a variety of propaganda content (such as daily-report videos, transcription of videos in other languages, PDF books, infographics and newest magazine issues).

Conclusions

In the short time that the Internet has been publicly available (since the early 1990s) and the even shorter time that it has been widely used (since the late 1990s), it has revolutionized, for better or for worse, multiple aspects of lives in all corners of the world: politics, commerce, communications, education and entertainment. Couple the Internet’s ubiquitous and extensive influence with the unprecedented rate of development in Internet technology, and there is little doubt that the medium will continue to evolve and affect the world’s populations. One of the emerging threats is the free online flow of hate speech, incitement and violent extremism. Terrorists have used online services for more than two decades and have become more sophisticated in doing so. As terrorist use of the new media became more intensive, sophisticated, and alarming, so did the various countermeasures launched by governments, military, and counter-terrorist agencies. But the never-ending dialectic struggle between cyber-savvy terrorists and counter-terrorism professionals requires new thinking, preemptive measures and future-oriented policies.

This study has several limitations: our sampling relied on a search based on content and keywords (looking for any terrorist content that included material designed for radicalization, recruitment, online guidance to use weapons and explosives, calls for attacks, etc.) We searched on anonymous sharing platforms or cloud-sharing platforms. This means that our sample is far from being representative of the entire population of dead drops. Moreover, our data collection covered six months, and thus does not reflect changes or dynamics over a longer time frame.

As this study reveals, terrorist groups are reacting to countermeasures of deplatforming, removal of content, blocking access and pressuring social media companies to regulate their services. The use of dead drops in the form of using anonymous platforms and cloud sharing poses a real challenge to countering online terrorism and extremism. From a theoretical perspective, our findings should be interpreted within the framework of the new terrorist and extremist online ecosystem. As Fisher, Prucha, and Winterbotham suggested [8], the new online ecosystem is a large and complex network, connecting a vast array of platforms across the surface and dark web. Thus, the use of dead drops by jihadist movements joins other changes in their operating environment online and exploits a sophisticated online ecosystem characterized by speed of distribution, agility, and resilience of the network structure. This online struggle for survival and relevance creates an evolutionary process involving constant innovations and modifications.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

51ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

From a practical perspective, our findings show that despite the efforts made by the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) and Tech Against Terrorism to enforce regulations and removal of terrorist online content, the cyber-savvy terrorists are moving to new forms of online presence. In 2018 the JustPaste.it owner and founder decided to join the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) and specifically to use the GIFTC hash-sharing database to locate terrorist content on his platform. JustPaste.it informed Tech Against Terrorism that thanks to the database, JustPaste.it “has been able to remove 10–12,000 articles including terrorist content.”[24] It is indeed a promising way to empower smaller platforms with the tools to track down terrorist content on their platforms. Yet, the GIFTC forum’s limited potency should be noted: the companies or the platforms are not required to report the content brought up by the database nor take down the terrorist content found. As our findings reveal, JustPaste.it and other platforms are still hosting terrorist postings and material on a daily basis, suggesting that even if the GIFTC database is used, its effectiveness is rather limited.

By posting their content on anonymous platforms and directing users to them and to other platforms, terrorists make their online existence harder to detect and remove. Although all these abused platforms and services are privately owned, it is largely in the hands of states and governments to react to abuses by extremists and terrorists. Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) are widely seen as a necessity to combat terrorist use of the Internet in general and certainly more so in the case of new unregulated and anonymity-providing platforms. PPPs have been defined as collaboration between a public sector (government) entity and a private sector (for- profit) entity to achieve a specific goal or set of objectives. These partnerships have been discussed in narrow ways in the scholarly literature with regard to online security, new platforms and regulating privately owned platforms. In light of the challenges that PPPs face, the public and private sectors would be well served by showing why government-business partnerships are necessary and how their existence benefits online security. PPPs are more likely to achieve concrete objectives when both government and business immediately benefit from the collaboration.

To conclude, our findings suggest that counter-terrorism agencies should consider specific measures for dealing with anonymous and cloud-share platforms. The strategy has to be based on each platform’s specific characteristics; for example, in the case of anonymous platforms the fact that the URLs posted to direct audiences to the dead drops do not include any sort of keywords or information but just random numbers and letters. In addition, countering online terrorist propaganda should take into consideration the dynamic nature of the dead-drop technique. Terrorists are not only exploiting the advantages of these anonymous services, namely anonymity, freedom of speech, lack of regulation and free access, but they also change their strategies, methods and propaganda dynamics, making it harder to harder to track them down.

Finally, so far the war on online terrorism has been mainly responsive and reactive. Counter-terrorism agencies have been monitoring online terrorism and attempted to respond with various measures. This resulted in a cat- and-mouse dialectic struggle. Instead, as this study may suggest, we should look forward and consider future platforms and challenges. Preemptive thinking should focus on emerging trends on the next generation of platforms and online services. There are numerous incentives that can be offered to the planners, designers and developers of the future for considering counter-terrorism measures in their plans and design. Governmental support and rewards are certainly some of the promising incentives.

About the Authors:

Gabriel Weimann is a full professor, Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy & Strategy; senior researcher at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT), the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel and a full professor (Emeritus), Department of Communication, University of Haifa, Israel.

Asia Vellante received a master’s degree in global peace and security studies at Vesalius College in Brussels and she is currently a research intern at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT), Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

52ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

Acknowledgments: The authors wish to thank Prof. Boaz Ganor, Stevie Weinberg, Prof. John Morrison and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions.

Notes [1] Berger, J. M. (2015). “The Metronome of Apocalyptic Time: Social Media as Carrier Wave for Millenarian Contagion.” Perspectives

on Terrorism, 9 (4), pp. 61–71.

[2] Klausen, J. (2015). “Tweeting the Jihad: Social media networks of Western foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq.” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 38 (1), pp. 1–22.

[3] Weimann, G. (2014). “New terrorism and new media.” Washington, DC: Commons Lab of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

[4] Weimann, G. (2015). Terrorism in Cyberspace: The Next Generation. New York: Columbia University Press.

[5] Weimann, G. (2016). “Why do terrorists migrate to social media?” Violent extremism online: New perspectives on terrorism and the Internet, pp. 67–84.

[6] Conway, M., Khawaja, M., Lakhani, S., Reffin, J., Robertson, A. & Weir, D. (2019). “Disrupting Daesh: Measuring takedown of online terrorist material and its impacts.” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 42 (1–2), pp. 141–160.

[7] Stern, J. & Modi, A. (2010). “Producing terror: organizational dynamics of survival”; in: D. M. Jones, A. Lane, and P. Schulte (Eds.), Terrorism, Security and the Power of Informal Networks, (pp. 257–288), Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, p. 282.

[8] Fisher, A., Prucha, N. & Winterbotham, E. (2019). “Mapping the Jihadist information ecosystem: Towards the next generation of disruption capability.” Global Research Network on Terrorism and Technology: Paper No. 6, London: Royal United Services Institute, p. 1.

[9] Major, D. & Gomes, D. (2021). “Web archives preserve our digital collective memory” in: D. Gomes, E. Demidova, Winters, E. & J., Risse, (Eds.) The Past Web (pp. 11–19). Cham: Springer. ‏

[10] The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) (2021). “Extremist content online: Cache of explosive manuals found on Internet Archive.” URL: https://www.counterextremism.com/press/extremist-content-online-cache-explosive-manuals-found-internet-archive

[11] Shehabat, A. & Mitew, T. (2018). “Black-boxing the black flag: anonymous sharing platforms and ISIS content distribution tactics.” Perspectives on Terrorism, 12 (1), pp. 81–99.‏

[12] Stalinsky, S. & Sosnow, R. (2016). “The jihadi cycle on content-sharing web services 2009–2016 and the case of JustPaste.it: favored by ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and other jihadis for posting content and sharing it on Twitter—jihadis move to their own platforms (Manbar, Nashir, Alors, Ninja) but then return to JustPaste.It.” MEMRI Inquiry & Analysis Series No. 1255 (6).‏

[13] Ibid., p. 8.

[14] Fishwick, C. (2015). “How a Polish student’s website became an ISIS propaganda tool”, The Guardian, 15 August 2014. URL: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/15/-sp-polish-man-website-isis-propaganda-too

[15] Silverman, J. (2014). “Loose Tweets Sink Ships: Will the Islamic State’s aggressive Internet strategy expose it to investigators?” Politico. URL: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/08/islamic-state-twitter-110418/

[16] Ilinksky, A. (2015). “Interview with Mariusz Zurawek, founder of JustPaste.it, the anonymous sharing tool, Hostadvice.” URL: https://hostadvice.com/blog/justpaste-it-is-the-quickest-way-to-share-content-online/

[17] Ibid., p. 8.

[18] Ibid., p. 8.

[19] Ibid., p. 8.

[20] Amarasingam, Maher A. and Winter, S. (2021). “How Telegram Disruption Impacts Jihadist Platform Migration. Centre for Research and Evidence on Security Threats,” p. 6. URL: https://crestresearch.ac.uk/resources/how-telegram-disruption-impacts- jihadist-platform-

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

53ISSN 2334-3745 August 2021

PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM Volume 15, Issue 4

[21] Fisher-Birch, J. (2018). “The dark side of the Internet Archive.” A report by the Counter Extremism Project. URL: https://www. counterextremism.com/blog/dark-side-internet-archive-0

[22] Alexander, A. (2017). “Digital decay? Tracing change over time among English-language Islamic State sympathizers on Twitter.” Washington, DC: George Washington University, Program on Extremism. URL: https://extremism.gwu.edu/sites/ extremism.gwu.edu/files/DigitalDecayFinal_0.pdf

[23] Gibbons, K. (2018). “ISIS exploits online loophole to spread murder videos and hate.” The Times, May 15, 2018. URL: https:// www.thetimes.co.uk/article/isis-exploits-online-loophole-to-spread-murder-videos-and-hate-ffqlnfq62

[24] Stalinsky, S. (2019). “Amazon Drive is hosting terrorist content.” USA Today, February 20, 2019. URL: https://www.usatoday. com/story/opinion/2019/02/20/amazon-links-terrorist-content-tech-firms-confront-online-threat-column/2907719002/

[25] Ibid., p. 17.

[26] Ayad, M., Amarasingam, A. and Alexander, A. (2021). “The Cloud Caliphate: Archiving the Islamic State in Real-Time, Institute for Strategic Dialogue (IST).” Special Report (May 2021). URL: https://ctc.usma.edu/the-cloud-caliphate-archiving-the-islamic- state-in-real-time/

[27] Krippendorff, K. (2018). “Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology.” Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications. ‏

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:54:44 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=uter20

Studies in Conflict & Terrorism

ISSN: 1057-610X (Print) 1521-0731 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/uter20

Terrorist Transformations: The Link between Terrorist Roles and Terrorist Disengagement

Mary Beth Altier, Emma Leonard Boyle & John G. Horgan

To cite this article: Mary Beth Altier, Emma Leonard Boyle & John G. Horgan (2020): Terrorist Transformations: The Link between Terrorist Roles and Terrorist Disengagement, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, DOI: 10.1080/1057610X.2019.1700038

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2019.1700038

Published online: 21 Jan 2020.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 906

View related articles

View Crossmark data

Citing articles: 2 View citing articles

Terrorist Transformations: The Link between Terrorist Roles and Terrorist Disengagement

Mary Beth Altiera , Emma Leonard Boyleb, and John G. Horganc

aCenter for Global Affairs, New York University, New York, New York, USA; bDepartment of Political Science, La Salle University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; cDepartment of Psychology, Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

ABSTRACT Research pays little attention to the diverse roles individuals hold within terrorism. This limits our understanding of the varied experi- ences of the terrorist and their implications. This study examines how a terrorist’s role(s) influence the likelihood of and reasons for disengagement. Using data from autobiographies and in-person interviews with former terrorists, we find that role conflict and role strain increase the probability of disengagement. We show those in certain roles, especially leadership and violent roles, incur greater sunk costs and possess fewer alternatives making exit less likely. Finally, certain roles are associated with the experience of different push/pull factors for disengagement.

ARTICLE HISTORY Received 27 September 2019 Accepted 25 November 2019

To hold a gun is to hold power, but even as I felt the excitement of firing live bullets, I knew that I could never use a gun on another human being. I did not mind setting up operations in which people would be shot, but I knew my limitations: I would never be a shooter.

Eamon Collins1

Unearthing why and how, as well as which, individuals choose to leave terrorism behind has important implications for the design of policies intended to facilitate or trigger defection. It also informs the risk assessment of terrorist detainees and the design of disengagement or “de-radicalization” programs. While recent studies examine why and how terrorists disengage,2 they pay little attention to the different roles individuals hold within terrorism. Evidence, however, suggests that terrorists’ roles are important for dis- cerning profiles and pathways into terrorism3 and developing more valid instruments for individual risk assessment.4 As such, greater attention to terrorists’ roles may also offer important insights for our understanding of pathways out of terrorism. Given the variety of roles within a terrorist group, it is plausible that individuals in

certain roles may incur greater sunk costs and/or possess fewer alternatives as a result of involvement making disengagement more difficult. Individuals in certain roles may also be more prone to experience specific push or pull factors for disengagement (e.g. difficulty adapting to the clandestine lifestyle, difficulty carrying out attacks, interactions with moderates). Further, as the opening quotation by Collins highlights, terrorists often

CONTACT Mary Beth Altier [email protected] Center for Global Affairs, New York University, New York, NY, USA. Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2019.1700038.

� 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2019.1700038

possess expectations about what their involvement will entail. Assignment to tasks incompatible with one’s expectations or skillset may result in disillusionment or dissatis- faction that then drives disengagement decisions. Altier et al.5 found experiencing disillusionment with day-to-day tasks increased the likelihood of voluntary disengage- ment by 55 percentage points. A terrorist’s role, therefore, may have important implica- tions for understanding whether an individual is likely to disengage, why the individual might choose to leave and what factors may be most effective in precipitating and sus- taining disengagement. To investigate these claims, we use detailed qualitative and quantitative data gleaned

from 87 autobiographies authored by individuals involved in terrorism as well as nine semi-structured interviews with former terrorists. Using the autobiographical data, we compare 49 cases of individual, voluntary disengagement from terrorism with a com- parison group of 54 cases of individual, involuntary disengagement (usually as a result of imprisonment) where the individual immediately reengaged upon their release under the premise these individuals would have otherwise remained involved in terrorism. Our evidence suggests first, that individuals experiencing role strain – a mismatch between their abilities and assigned role – and role conflict – conflicting roles within or outside the group – are more likely to leave terrorism. Second, those in leadership and violent roles are less likely to leave terrorism behind and those in support roles are more likely, even when controlling for ideological commitment and push factors likely to influence their satisfaction with involvement. This, in combination with our qualita- tive evidence, suggests leaders and violent operators incur greater sunk costs and pos- sess fewer alternatives. Finally, we show individuals in certain roles are more likely to experience specific push and pull factors associated with disengagement. We begin by reviewing what a “role” is, highlight how greater attention to terrorists’

roles might better inform our understanding of disengagement and put forth a series of hypotheses. Second, we summarize our autobiographical and interview data and methods. Third, we test the plausibility of our hypotheses and present the results. We conclude by summarizing our findings, their limitations, the implications for counter- terrorism policy and directions for future research.

Terrorist Roles and Terrorist Disengagement

What is a Role?

Individuals involved in terrorist groups,6 like any conventional organization, may carry out different tasks or serve different functions. An individual’s role within an organiza- tion, according to Krantz and Maltz,7 who have studied traditional work organizations, is comprised of two parts: role as given and role as taken. Although leaders may assign certain roles or sets of tasks to individuals within the organization (role as given), indi- viduals interpret their roles in unique ways (role as taken).8 Consistent with Krantz and Maltz, we believe an individual’s role should be conceptualized not just as what the individual is told or assigned to do, but also how the individual understands, interprets and carries out the tasks within the normative framework and social context of the group.

2 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

What Do We Know About Terrorist Roles?

To date, there is little systematic research on the various roles individuals occupy within terrorist groups. Although research has yet to establish a typical terrorist profile,9 schol- ars still tend to examine terrorists as if they were a homogenous entity with similar characteristics. Such approaches ignore key differences in the individuals who become involved in terrorism and how their experiences while involved shape their attitudes and behavior, including their commitment to the group and the likelihood they will remain involved. Indeed, Ross10 noted while terrorists bring certain knowledge, skills and personal beliefs to the group, they are subsequently exposed to various learning experiences that cause them to adopt different roles, orientations and behavior. Recent research demonstrates greater attention to roles and functions within a terror-

ist group may help us more systematically identify profiles and pathways into terrorism. Perlinger et al.’s study of violent Islamist terrorists across a range of networks found the disaggregation of their sample by roles and functions (violent participation, skilled/ unskilled, position and tenure, network connectivity) yielded statistically significant soci- oeconomic attributes or profiles.11 Gill and Horgan’s study of 1240 Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) members similarly concluded that certain sociodemographic characteristics emerged when one disaggregated by role(s) (gunrunner, bomber, bomb- maker, gun-man, nonviolent).12 Likewise, Simcox and Dyer’s study of 171 individuals convicted of Al-Qaeda related or inspired offenses in the U.S. finds the disaggregation of the sample into five types of terrorist activity (active participants, aspirants, facilita- tors, trained aspirants and ideologues) yields different sociodemographic profiles.13

While research has considered the relationship between roles and profiles and pathways into terrorism, the purpose of this study is to consider their influence on possible path- ways out of terrorism.

How Roles Relate to Disengagement

We define terrorist disengagement as the cessation of terrorist activity and note that it connotes a behavioral change and, thus, is distinct from the process of de-radicalization, which entails an attitudinal change or loss of faith in the ideology underlying a terrorist cause. Existing research tends to categorize the factors that drive terrorists’ disengage- ment decisions into a push/pull framework (Table 1).14 Push factors are those aspects of involvement in terrorism that drive individuals away from the group, while pull factors are factors outside of involvement that lure individuals to a more conventional social

Table 1. Factors for terrorist disengagement.75

Push factors Pull factors

� Unmet expectations (including disillusionment with day-to-day tasks)

� Disillusionment with strategy/actions of group � Disillusionment with personnel � Difficulty adapting to clandestine lifestyle � Inability to cope with physiological/

psychological effects of violence � Loss of faith in ideology � Burnout

� Competing loyalties � Positive interactions with moderates � Employment/educational demands or opportunities � Desire to marry/establish a family or family demands � Financial incentives � Amnesty

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 3

role. Recently, Altier et al. noted that although the push/pull framework provides a use- ful heuristic listing those factors most commonly associated with disengagement deci- sions, it remains theoretically underdeveloped and lacks predictive value as certain individuals may experience one or some of these factors and never disengage.15 Further, the framework fails to specify which factors or which combinations of factors are most important in driving disengagement decisions within the terrorist population, for certain groups, or for certain types of individuals.16

In order to move beyond the push/pull framework, Altier et al. proposed Rusbult and colleagues’ investment model from social psychology.17 The model specifies one’s com- mitment to (or probability of exit from) a given organization, relationship or social role at any given point in time is a function of three factors: (1) the extent to which the individual obtains satisfaction from involvement, (2) the perceived quality of available alternatives and (3) the investments (or sunk costs) accrued (Figure 1). The satisfaction component is a function of the actual rewards and costs vis-�a-vis those an individual expects from involvement. There is substantial empirical evidence in support of Rusbult’s investment model in

explaining exit decisions across a variety of organizations18 and relationships or social roles.19 Research also suggests satisfaction may be more pivotal in predicting exit than alternative quality and that some weighting of the components may be in order.20

Nevertheless, the model provides a more dynamic and comprehensive theoretical frame- work for understanding terrorist disengagement that takes into account why certain push/pull factors matter for some individuals and not others, the interaction or cumula- tive effects of different push/pull factors, and why the experience of certain push/pull factors may not precipitate disengagement for an individual at one point in time, but may be pivotal later.21

The investment model suggests the role(s) individuals hold while involved in terrorism may influence the likelihood of disengagement and the potential causes of disengagement in several ways. First, individuals may enter a terrorist group with a clear sense of what role(s) they want to assume (e.g. bomber, martyr, assassin, recruiter, trainer) and the expected rewards or satisfaction they will derive from involvement, including their day- to-day tasks. For example, an individual who would like to take on a violent operational role might not be satisfied when ordered to work as a recruiter or fundraiser. Indeed, the inability to attain the role one desires within a terrorist group may result

in what sociologists term role strain.22 Role strain occurs when an individual lacks the requisite knowledge, skills or traits to successfully fulfill their assigned role. An individ- ual, for example, who has trouble coping with carrying out violent acts, may experience

Figure 1. Rusbult’s investment model.

4 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

role strain if assigned to be a bomber or an assassin. Role conflict, on the other hand, occurs when an individual occupies multiple roles that place competing or conflicting demands on the individual.23 Someone, for instance, who is both a father/husband and a member of a terrorist group, may experience role conflict if tasked with traveling or remaining in hiding for long periods of time precluding him from seeing his family. Individuals may also experience role conflict as a result of multiple roles held within the same terrorist group that are difficult to balance. Role conflict and role strain may generate dissatisfaction,24 thereby depleting one’s commitment to involvement and increasing the likelihood of exit. Indeed, early research in industrial and organizational psychology suggests role conflict and role strain as well as role ambiguity (i.e. unclear or undefined expectations about what one’s tasks entail) are associated with low job satis- faction and turnover in traditional workplace settings.25 We summarize our hypotheses regarding role strain and role conflict below:

H1: Individuals experiencing role strain are more likely to disengage, all else equal.

H2: Individuals experiencing role conflict are more likely to disengage, all else equal.

Additionally, certain roles may be associated with higher investments or fewer alter- natives. A terrorist trained, for example, in a very specialized role such as a bomber may possess few transferable skills, have forensic evidence tying him/her to crimes, and a reputation with law enforcement and even the community at large. This may hinder the individual’s exit, despite the presence of substantial dissatisfaction. Individuals involved in more peripheral or less criminal roles, on the other hand, may face far fewer barriers to exit. Thus, we hypothesize:

H3: Individuals in leadership roles incur greater investments and possess fewer alternatives and are less likely to disengage, all else equal.

H4: Individuals in violent, operational roles incur greater investments and possess fewer alternatives and are less likely to disengage, all else equal.

Finally, individuals in particular roles may be more likely to experience certain push/ pull factors associated with disengagement. Looking at Table 1, it seems, at least on the surface, that push/pull factors such as loss of faith in the ideology, or the desire to marry as one ages are equally likely to occur regardless of one’s role(s). Other push/pull factors, such as the inability to cope with the physiological and/or psychological effects of violence, difficulty adapting to the clandestine lifestyle, or positive interactions with moderates, seem more or less associated with certain roles. For example, individuals who carry out violent attacks (e.g. bombers, snipers) or who play an integral part in violent operations (e.g. getaway drivers, lookouts) may be more likely to experience dif- ficulty coping with the physiological or psychological effects of violence given their proximity than those solely involved in nonviolent operations (e.g. publicity/propa- ganda, fundraising). Likewise, individuals involved in certain nonviolent roles may lead more open lifestyles and, as such, may experience less difficulty adapting to a clandes- tine lifestyle and may be more likely to experience frequent and sustained interactions with moderates. Thus, we hypothesize:

H5: Individuals in certain roles may be more (less) likely to experience certain push/pull factors commonly associated with disengagement.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 5

Data and Methods

Terrorists and even many former terrorists are clandestine populations that wish to evade detection, rendering methods such as random sampling and surveying impossible. To explore the possible relationships between one’s role(s) within a terrorist group and disengagement, we therefore turned to qualitative and quantitative data collected from 87 English-language autobiographies authored by members of terrorist groups. We also conducted semi-structured interviews with nine individuals formerly involved in a ter- rorist group. The dataset obtained from the autobiographical accounts provides system- atic information on terrorist roles and how they might relate to disengagement over an extended period of time for a diverse sample of terrorists across a range of groups – information that would be time consuming and difficult to obtain through in-depth interviews. The in-depth interviews, conversely, allow us to probe more deeply and ask specific questions relevant to our research. Recent studies highlight the potential insights autobiographies26 and in-depth inter-

views27 offer into the experiences and decision-making processes of terrorists. There are, of course, limitations. There may be something systematically different about those who choose to give an interview or publish a memoir.28 Further, their accounts may be subject to hindsight bias. They also may have incentives to portray their involvement in terrorism in a certain light and may misrepresent, embellish or omit key facts.29

Interviews are further subject to reactivity, in that the behavior of or questioning by the researcher may inadvertently influence the account an interviewee provides. Autobiographies, on the other hand, restrict the researcher to an account of only what the author or editor deems interesting. With regard to roles, the autobiographical data therefore may provide an incomplete picture of the number and type of roles held by individuals, as they may not discuss certain roles or key tasks associated with those roles. The omission may be deliberate, for instance, to protect themselves or other group members or may be inadvertent, in which case omission arguably would occur with shorter-held or less encompassing roles. Despite these limitations, we believe the triangulation of autobiographical and interview data offers important insights into this clandestine population, which is not easily studied by other means. Indeed, these accounts are often more revealing than intended.30

Autobiographical Data

The autobiographical accounts represent the life histories of 85 unique terrorists31 and cover individuals engaged in a range of terrorist groups including those motivated by nationalist, extreme right-wing, extreme left-wing, religious and single-issue (e.g. envir- onmental, antiabortion) ideologies. Since the purpose is to understand disengagement from terrorism, the codebook and dataset are arranged by engagement event, rather than by autobiography or individual terrorist. An engagement event begins when an individual engages in terrorist activity32 on behalf of the group and ends when they stop, whether voluntarily or involuntarily. Thus, an individual terrorist may experience multiple engagement (and disengagement and reengagement) events over his/her life course and hold different roles during each of these periods of involvement. The final sample consists of 185 engagement events.33 Forty-nine culminated in voluntary,

6 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

individual disengagement (i.e. the individual choosing to leave an active terrorist group). For the purpose of quantitative analysis, up to five roles held by the individual during a particular engagement event and the role held at the time of engagement and disengagement are coded. When individuals held multiple roles at the time of their engagement or disengagement, the most salient roles are recorded. As the exact or even rough time frame in which individuals held a particular role is unclear in a large number of accounts, the data do not include measures of how long one served in a particular role. Often, individuals did not have formally defined roles. Some would carry out disparate

assigned tasks and were simultaneously involved in multiple “roles”. For example, Omar Cabezas described his experience with the Sandinista Nationalist Liberation Front:

Finding houses for compa~neros in the underground, or for meetings, or storing things, or for mail drops; coming up with cars, car repair shops; getting information about who Somoza’s informants were, spying on houses of girl friends of the Guard. So I started to work, doing everything they asked me to do and everything I thought needed to be done.34

In other instances, individuals possessed clearly defined, specialized roles and often an associated title. In the PIRA, Sean O’Callaghan noted he was “Operating Commander of the IRA Southern Command, and a member of the GHQ staff and the Sinn Fein National Executive”.35 Describing an earlier role he held, O’Callaghan explained his “job was to clean them [guns] and sort ammunition into the correct cali- ber to suit the guns before the bulk of them was moved to Northern Ireland a few days later”,36 a rather specialized task. However, even within highly structured organizations such as the PIRA, there seemed, at times, to be an obscuring of roles. Maria McGuire noted “under the pressure of events the division between people’s roles in Kevin Street [PIRA headquarters] was frequently blurred”.37

Given that organizational, operational and contextual differences largely determined the specific roles or tasks assigned to individuals or the titles given, we classified the roles held by those in the autobiographical sample into 15 general categories relevant across a range of groups. Our role categories emerged organically from the roles identi- fied in the autobiographies. The 15 role categories are listed in Table 2 as well as the role held at the time of one’s disengagement, and the further collapsed category (sup- port, violent, leadership) that we use for our logistic regression analyses.38 We compare the role held at disengagement for those engagement events that ended with an individ- ual, voluntary disengagement (n¼ 49) where the individual chose to leave, with our comparison group of engagement events that ended with an involuntary disengagement from terrorism (usually as a result of imprisonment or detention) where the individual immediately reengaged upon their release (n¼ 54) under the premise these individuals would have otherwise remained involved. We have data on the role held at disengage- ment for 48 of the 49 cases of individual, voluntary disengagement and for 51 of the 54 cases in our comparison group.

Interview Data

Our nine semi-structured interviews were conducted by one, and in some cases, two of the authors in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. over a two-year period between 2011 and

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 7

2013. Two universities’ Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) approved the research. Our inclusion criteria consisted of individuals 18 and older who could confirm they were former members of a terrorist group. We used a combination of purposive and snow- ball sampling, reaching out to individuals via email, telephone or a gatekeeper. Although our aim was to obtain an equal number of individuals from nationalist, Islamist, left-wing, right-wing and single-issue terrorist groups, our resulting interview- ees consisted of two nationalists, one Islamist and six right-wing former terrorists. All of the former left-wing terrorists that we contacted refused to be interviewed either for personal reasons or because our research was government-funded. No two individuals in our interview sample were members of the same terrorist group. Clearly, our interview sample is small and likely unrepresentative. However, these

interviews allow for probing and follow-up questions and therefore offer additional insights on the importance of one’s role(s) for disengagement that cannot be obtained from the autobiographies. Further, the triangulation of the interviews with the autobio- graphical data, which draw on a rich and fairly large sample of individuals representing over 70 terrorist groups, should help circumvent these limitations.

Analysis

Role Selection and Role Satisfaction

As we conjecture that role strain (H1) or role conflict (H2) may increase dissatisfaction and the probability of disengagement, it is important to first consider how individuals come to hold certain roles, formal or informal, within a terrorist group. A systematic review of the qualitative data obtained from the autobiographies suggests that, despite some exceptions, roles are largely assigned rather than selected.39 Individuals across a range of terrorist groups reported being told what their duties or specific role would be. Leila Khaled, a former member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine rec- ollected she “was assigned to go to Schular camp near Zarqa, to give public lectures”,

Table 2. Role held at time of disengagement. Total number/percentage

Role

Individual voluntary disengagement

(n¼ 48)

Individual involuntary disengagementþ

re-engagement (n¼ 51) Collapsed role

category

Executive leader 4/8.3% 10/19.6% Leadership Low-level leader 3/6.3% 7/13.7% Leadership Violent operator 5/10.4% 11/21.5% Violent Bomb-maker 0/0.0% 1/2.0% Violent Operational planner 1/2.1% 1/2.0% Violent Publicity officer 1/2.1% 3/5.9% Support/logistical Intelligence officer 1/2.1% 1/2.0% Support/logistical Security officer 0/0.0% 0/0.0% Support/logistical Political officer 1/2.1% 0/0.0% Support/logistical Trainer 2/4.2% 0/0.0% Support/logistical Financier 2/4.2% 3/5.9% Support/logistical Transporter/courier 4/8.3% 2/3.9% Support/logistical Materials acquisition/storage coordinator 4/8.3% 1/2.0% Support/logistical Recruiter 3/6.3% 2/3.9% Support/logistical General member 15/35.4% 9/17.7% Support/logistical Total 48/100.0% 51/100.0%

8 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

was later “ordered to go and give another public lecture at Jabel Al-Taj school”, and then, “Dr. Habash ordered us to prepare petrol bombs to use against Hussein’s sol- diers.”40 A member of the Italian Red Brigades, who uses the alias Giorgio, commented, “But the ‘work’ itself was grueling. I had been assigned, and it had not been my choice, to the ‘manufacturing sector’.”41

Once individuals hold a high-ranking position, they seem to have more discretion over their tasks and role(s). For example, Abu Iyad, a high-ranking member of the Palestinian Liberation Organization and Fatah, recounts, “We took advantage of the intervening few days to launch a fund-raising drive through the ‘popular committees’ set up by our representatives in the early sixties …We created a counterespionage ser- vice … .”42 Nevertheless, Iyad was still assigned certain duties by his superiors. On not- ing the leadership’s decision to create an underground organization in Jordan, Iyad writes he was “designated as the head of the organization.”43

Individuals who have very little say in the role(s) they hold are more likely to experi- ence role strain, which may have important implications for their satisfaction with involvement. Abdul Salam Zaeef, a former member of the Taliban recounted: “I came to Afghanistan to take part in jihad, but found myself carrying out mundane tasks for other people.”44 Shane Paul O’Doherty similarly noted when he joined the PIRA:

But oh, the boredom of being a new IRA volunteer in 1970! It was excruciating … I was firstly attached to a “section” there where the entire emphasis was on defense. There were the endless “parades” in our Section Leader’s house, where we did little but learn to respond to march commands given in Irish and where we stood at attention, turned on the spot and stood at ease.45

O’Doherty, however, was able to initiate a change in his role. After continually expressing his desire to work in explosives, O’Doherty’s decided to independently carry out a successful, but unsanctioned, bombing that caused the group to:

Take me seriously when I again asked to specialize in explosives, and they promised to arrange for me to meet and work with the best man they had in the field. I had been catapulted into a minor prominence a year or two before I might otherwise have earned it.46

Others reported satisfaction with their initial roles. Raymond Gilmour, a former member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) and a police informant explained, “As a junior member my INLA jobs were mostly menial duties, picking up guns and ammunition for the real hard men who were going to do the actual shooting. This suited me very well, however, for I’d not wish to point a gun at anyone.”47 Omar Nasiri, a former member of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA, Algeria), commented on his gunrunning, “I knew what I was doing, and it didn’t bother me. For me this was business. I was making good money, and the work was exciting. Of course, I knew where all these weapons were going.”48

Further, a recruit might be initially satisfied, even excited, in a role and then become dissatisfied as the day-to-day reality fails to live up to one’s expectations. Tass Saada writes of his assignment as a sniper in Palestinian Liberation Organization:

More than in weaponry, however, I needed training on the mental aspects of sniping. They taught me how to sit or lie absolutely still for hours on end. In fact, some of the exercises went on for three or four days, around the clock … That was my introduction to the Simonov, which has been specifically designed for assassinations from a distance. It had a

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 9

silencer to reduce the noise of the shot and to limit the muzzle flash. I became eager to master this weapon and learn what it took to be a sniper.49

Soon, however, Saada grew disillusioned and became increasingly bored, even ques- tioning his use of violence: “Looking through the telescopic sight, I watched village peo- ple come and go. The hours dragged on. Why am I doing this? Why should I erase this life? I asked.”50

Ben Turok, of the African National Congress (ANC) similarly writes:

All this casework held some interest and gave satisfaction, but the chamber itself brought nothing but torture. Although reasonably experienced as a public speaker as a result of the Congress meetings, I had little gift for the debating style required in the chamber. Furthermore, I had an intense dislike of the formality required and, indeed, I refused to use the word ‘honourable’ in referring to members of the House … My job was not to persuade the House, but rather to reach the press, which had been permanently installed above the Speaker’s chair, and so I directed my speeches to them. But it led to sleepless nights in anticipation and I am not sure that I succeeded very well. For one thing, being absorbed in the Treason Trial and remote from Cape Town, it was difficult to do the necessary research on the local issues dealt with in the council. Also, I had no time to familiarize myself with the complex parliamentary procedure.51

The qualitative data further suggest that role conflict, in addition to role strain, may generate dissatisfaction with involvement. David Hamilton, of the Ulster Volunteer Force, writes:

Shortly after I had joined we planned a bank robbery. I was annoyed because they planned the heist for Thursday morning. That was the day, I had to pick up my paycheque so I couldn’t take part in the robbery.52

A female member of an Islamist extremist group described conflicting work and familial roles, the stress it created, and how she tried to create boundaries for herself and her family:

In the beginning it was fine, but it just got several months down the line … it became very nitty gritty where … like, for example, basic necessities of working. I remember one time I was working as a chambermaid at one bed and breakfast because I didn’t come up with good grades from school. One sister thought she was doing me good by asking the sheik if it was okay for me in Islam to work and the sheik totally said, ‘No’. The more intrusive they became in my life um I thought okay I need to start putting barriers and boundaries whether that was physically at home. I’d stop them from coming to my home because it was not only overtaking my home. It was overtaking my family as well … So dropping my kids off and having to go to events or organize events – that was stressful. Trying to hold down a job, a normal day job, it’s a very, very schizo-situation because you are having to be normal yet you’re working for a cause.53

A former member of a right-wing terrorist group similarly explained the role conflict his friend experienced as a father. He elaborates:

His second child was born and he was working, like, 60 h [hours] a week to feed his family and keeps the light on, and so he would just come around less and less and I would be like, Well, I you know, where have you been? How come you haven’t been drinking in the hall with us and you know, rolling up Racial Loyalty newspapers?” And he would say, “Well, you know, I got to work. I’ve, I’ve been working all the time. We got, we got a new house, the rent, blah, blah, blah.54

10 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

When considered through the lens of Rusbult’s investment model, these accounts highlight how role strain and role conflict may increase dissatisfaction with involve- ment. In terrorist groups where individuals have more autonomy in their initial role assignment or the ability to shift roles if they are unhappy or where the terrorist group seriously considers the match between an individual’s skill set, characteristics and com- peting demands and the role(s) to which one is assigned, we would expect a lower inci- dence of role-related dissatisfaction among members. Two examples of individuals who recounted role-related dissatisfaction are illustra-

tive. The first is Ahmed Kathrada, a former member of the ANC and the ANC’s mili- tant wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK). Kathrada explained his decision to leave MK and assume a more political role in the movement:

At no time did I object in principle to the decision to move to an armed struggle, and I have never harboured the slightest regret about MK’s formation. I did, however, terminate membership of the regional command during the first half of 1962, after discussing certain reservations with some of my senior comrades. Not all men are born to be soldiers, and I realized at a fairly early stage that my aptitude lay in the political rather than the military field.55

The second is Aukai Collins, who grew increasingly disillusioned with the menial, behind-the-scenes roles he was assigned. Collins recounts how he expressed his growing disillusionment to the group’s leadership, who did not take measures to mitigate his role-related dissatisfaction:

I talked with Umar about the situation over the next few days. We’d benefitted from the camp, but I wanted to call it quits if I had to sit around and wait instead of making jihad somewhere … I wanted to make jihad on the front lines … One day everything came to a boil. Umar and I sat down with the commanders and had a very candid discussion. I told them that I didn’t care for the way they were treating me and that I hadn’t come all the way from America to sit and watch other mujahideen train and fight in Tajikistan. I tried to get a straight answer out of them about when they would send me to fight in Tajikistan … They didn’t conceal their anger either and told me to hit the road if I didn’t like the way things were going … getting past the NWFP tribal police [border checkpoint guards] with Harakat-ul Jihad’s blessings had been dangerous and difficult. If they washed their hands of me and I left now—friendless, penniless and foreign—getting out of Afghanistan alive would be next to impossible. I should have apologized to the commanders and continued to stick it out in camp, but I was young and hotheaded and told them good-bye.56

These accounts suggest disengagement may be more likely in groups that do not allow for the expression of role-related dissatisfaction and accommodate such dissatis- faction accordingly. Further role-related dissatisfaction, for some, may be sufficient to trigger disengagement. Indeed, a quantitative analysis of the frequency and importance of certain push/pull

factors in explaining individual, voluntary disengagement decisions highlights its importance. For our analysis, we considered not only whether one stated a particular push/pull factor played a role (large or small) in the decision to voluntarily disengage, but we also coded whether individuals were experiencing certain push/pull factors likely associated with role-related dissatisfaction during their involvement and then examined whether the experience of these push/pull factors are associated with an increase in the probability of individual, voluntary disengagement. As individuals are likely to experi- ence multiple push and pull factors associated with disengagement, we coded all rele- vant push/pulls experienced and self-reported to play a role in one’s disengagement.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 11

The results (Table 3) suggest individuals who voluntarily disengaged were more than eight times as likely to experience disillusionment with their day-to-day tasks (i.e. role strain) than those in our comparison group. A v2 test reveals this difference is statistic- ally significant. Further, 43% reported disillusionment with one’s day-to-day tasks played a role in their decision to leave the group (22.5% a large role, and 20.9% a small role). To examine the potential influence of role conflict in explaining disengagement decisions, we examined the frequency and importance of the following pull factors, which highlight a likely incompatibility between one’s terrorist role and a more conven- tional social role: desire to seek employment/education, dedicate more time to family, too hard to balance with family life, dedicate more time to existing job/educational pro- gram, desire to marry and desire to have children.57 Although all with the exception of “too hard to balance with family life” were more likely to be experienced among those who voluntarily disengaged, the only pull factors that were statistically significant were the desire to dedicate more time to one’s family and the desire to have children. Although less frequently cited as playing a role in disengagement decisions that disillu- sionment with one’s day-to-day tasks, it is crucial to note that the desire to marry and have a family, the demands of family, the desire to seek conventional employment or education, or work/school demands were all reported as pivotal in explaining the disen- gagement decisions of some individuals who chose to walk away from terrorism. Despite these findings, it is important to reiterate that individuals may experience

role strain or conflict and remain because of the satisfaction they obtain from other aspects of involvement or because they have invested heavily in the group and/or pos- sess few alternatives. Cecilia Bobrovskaya, a former member of the Revolutionary Cells in Russia, for example, discussed how she was experiencing a conflict between her roles as a terrorist and a midwife. Due to her increasing involvement in the Revolutionary Cells, she had little time for outside employment and, as such, could often not afford food. Bobrovskaya explains:

During those times of intense hunger I would be in utter despair. I would rather die than give up Party work and daily intercourse with the comrades; yet if I looked for employment it would mean that I would have to give up my Party work and become occupied with something that I neither knew nor liked. I hated midwifery.58

Table 3. Relationship between disengagement & role strain and role conflict. Comparison

group (n¼ 54) Disengagement (n¼ 49)

Push/pull factor Experienced

(%) Experienced

(%) Any

role (%) Large role (%)

Small role (%)

Role strain Disillusionment with day-to-day tasks��� 5.6 42.9 42.9 22.5 20.4 Role conflict Desire to seek employment/education 16.7 26.5 14.3 8.2 6.1 Dedicate more time to family� 13.0 26.5 12.2 6.1 6.1 Too hard to balance with family life 24.1 20.4 14.3 4.1 10.2 Dedicate more time to existing job/

educational program 5.6 14.3 10.2 4.1 6.1

Desire to have children�� 0.0 10.2 8.2 4.1 4.1 Desire to marry 5.6 8.2 4.1 2.0 2.0 �p< .10.��p< .05.���p value for v2 test for experiencing push/pull factor is less than .01.

12 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

Just as satisfaction in other areas can mitigate the effects of role conflict and role strain on one’s decision to exit, so too can satisfaction in one’s role offset the effects of growing dissatisfaction in other arenas. Eamon Collins described how the pride he obtained from his new role helped counteract the doubts that he was experiencing about certain operations and the PIRA’s ideology:

My promotion to the security unit had given me an initial glow of satisfaction. I tried to allow the swelling of my ego to overshadow the horror of what I was involved in. My “promotion” became a crutch to support myself in the collapse of my belief in the armed struggle. But so advanced was the process of mental deterioration that I could no longer quite believe my own desperate attempt at self-deception. I knew I was staring at my own defeat. Yet my vanity gave me the strength to continue acting out for a little while longer a role that was no longer mine.59

Roles, Sunk Costs and the Quality of Available Alternatives

It is possible one’s role influences not only the satisfaction component of Rusbult’s investment model, but also the investments and alternatives (H3). Although this rela- tionship was not commonly expressed explicitly in the autobiographical data, Leyden, a former neo-Nazi skinhead, noted that he considered his role and what part it would play in his ability to leave:

Since Skins don’t take kindly to people who just get in their way, I couldn’t imagine how they would feel against anyone in power who broke the oath and left the movement. I remember thinking, “Don’t bother trying to get out or you’ll get seriously messed up” [emphasis added].60

For Leyden, his high-ranking role meant that any alternative to involvement would entail the threat of continual persecution by the group, thereby limiting the appeal of leaving. Leyden’s account is corroborated in interviews with three other former members of

right-wing terrorist groups. These individuals mentioned that it was much easier for those “less involved” in the group or on the periphery to leave without facing retribu- tion.61 One elaborates:

You’ve been in it longer, you know you’ve got more at stake … you’ve lived the ideology, you’ve lived the lifestyle for so long, you have people that look up to you, you know, you have people that listen to you, that follow what you say, and you know, and when they lose what they consider a leader, that’s not a good thing.62

Another interviewee, who was a member of a nationalist group, also recounted:

Not common at all, but it wasn’t impossible to leave… I think it all depends how valuable they were to the organization. Then, it would be easier to leave or just drift away or just not be involved. So it wasn’t that difficult… So I suppose it all depends on your seniority in the organization and what you know about that organization. If you’re in a crucial position. Say you’re somebody who’s in charge of weapons. That’s not somebody who’s going to walk out of the organization, you know.63

In addition to leaders, it seems individuals in violent operational roles may incur greater sunk costs, possess fewer alternatives and have a harder time disengaging. One inter- viewee, who operated as a bomb-maker and bomb-planter in a nationalist terrorist group, noted his role shaped his ability to leave in two somewhat different ways. First, because he served in a direct violent operational role, the possible alternatives were limited:

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 13

It was possible for very, very prominent people to work their way out, you know, but you see it was easier if they were more involved in the command structure and hadn’t been in the physical jobs front… like they hadn’t been in the actual operations. They might have ordered the operations where they were more morally and legally responsible than the young person they sent out to do the job, but for somebody like me who was the front- line [terrorist], who made, planted or carried the [explosive] … For me the options to get out without necessarily going over to the enemy, you were kind of constrained by that.64

Second, the deep investments he made in the group made it more difficult to leave because they signaled to the leadership his commitment to the cause and his capacity to continue:

You see I wouldn’t have been in the category of somebody who needed to leave. Here they’d be looking at somebody who was quite active, fully gritty and determined, and they definitely would have been… it would’ve been quite difficult to pop your head above the part and say I have a fundamental disagreement with the aims and philosophy and ideology of the organization…There were no rules or rubrics for how people were going to be facilitated in that area [i.e. leaving the terrorist group because they no longer agreed with its underlying ideology].65

To further test these claims we ran a series of logistic regressions, which compare the effect of one’s role – specifically leadership and violent, operational roles – at the time of disengagement on the probability an individual chose to leave terrorism. Due to the sample size, there is not enough variation to use all 15 role categories. We therefore col- lapse our role categories into leadership (executive leader & low-level leader), violent operators (violent operator, bomb-maker, operational planner) and support/logistics (trainer, intelligence officer, financier, recruiter, security officer, courier, publicity offi- cer, political officer, materials acquisition, general member). We control for whether the individual was experiencing certain push/pull factors likely to influence the satisfaction component of Rusbult’s investment model in order to help isolate the influence of role- related sunk costs and alternatives. One could argue leaders and violent operators are generally more ideologically committed and thus, less likely to disengage. We therefore control for the level of ideological commitment at the time of disengagement. Finally, following Abadie et al.,66 we cluster the standard errors by terrorist group, as Altier et al. note individuals from certain groups are more likely write an autobiography and thus be “sampled.”67 We also rerun the analysis clustering standard errors by individual to address dependencies across engagement events in our sample by individual. These and other robustness checks68 are in the Online Appendix. The results (Table 4) suggest that holding a leadership role or a violent role decreases

the probability of voluntary disengagement from terrorism (Models 1 and 2), while holding a support role increases the probability. These results in conjunction with our interview data suggest that leaders and those more directly involved in violent operations are less likely to walk away from terrorism and that this may be driven, in part, by the greater investments they make in the group and/or the fewer alternatives available. To calculate the substantive effects of one’s role, we simulated the expected probabil-

ity of disengagement by setting all control variables to their means and allowing one’s role to vary.69 We find holding a leadership role reduces the probability of voluntary disengagement by 19 percentage points (Model 1), holding a violent role reduces the probability by 24 percentage points (Model 2), and holding a support role increases the probability by 26 percentage points (Model 3).

14 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

Roles and the Likely Presence of Push/Pull Factors

Qualitative evidence from the autobiographies also supports hypothesis H4 that individ- uals in certain roles are more likely to experience certain push/pull factors associated with leaving. Tass Saada, a former member of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, for example, described the toll his role as a sniper took:

Back in camp, I realized with surprise how mentally exhausted I was. Killing someone is neither easy nor insignificant. You think right away about what you’ve done. Especially if you planned the act ahead of time. It’s different being in hot battle: there, you kill on instinct to avoid getting killed yourself in the next two seconds. But when you’ve laid an ambush and deliberately set a trap to destroy another human being, it takes its toll (2008:36).

By contrast, Eamon Collins had little difficulty coping with the effects of carrying out attacks. He mentioned:

Yet I was satisfied: satisfied that I had acted as an IRA man, as a volunteer, and I was prepared to move on to the next operation, the next hi [sic], the next kill – for that was what it was all about (1997: 28).

Instead, Collins seemed to experience burnout as a result of the careful planning that attacks required:

It was always like this: I would try to get on with the normal things of life but I would spend my time continually thinking about violent operations. Going for a drink, playing

Table 4. Effect of roles on probability of disengagement. Model 1 Model 2 Model 3

Leadership role �1.18� (0.61)

Violent role �1.49� (0.87)

Support/logistical role 1.70��� (0.53)

Disillusionment with strategy �0.50 (0.73)

�0.42 (0.63)

�0.42 (0.66)

Disillusionment with leadership 1.06� (0.63)

1.25�� (0.61)

1.06� (0.60)

Disillusionment with members 1.18 (0.74)

0.98 (0.63)

1.19� (0.68)

Disillusionment with day to day tasks 2.58�� (1.00)

2.75��� (1.05)

2.74�� (1.08)

Burnout 0.22 (0.74)

0.85 (0.72)

0.66 (0.78)

Difficulty coping with attacks �1.01 (1.09)

�1.39 (0.93)

�0.76 (1.19)

Ideological commitment (none)

Some �0.76 (1.14)

�0.17 (0.98)

�0.16 (1.05)

A lot �0.91 (1.00)

�0.83 (0.77)

�0.35 (0.92)

Constant 0.04 (1.06)

�0.23 (0.88)

�1.89� (1.13)

n 98 98 98 Pseudo R2 0.2854 0.2905 0.3298

Logistic regression results. Robust standard errors clustered at group level.�p< .10, ��p< .05, ���p< .01.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 15

with the kids, visiting the relatives, preparing Sunday lunch, going for a drive in the country, reading the newspapers – I liked to do all these normal things which ordinary people did, but the enjoyment of such normality was impossible. I could pretend, but I could never be relaxed or absorbed by normal activities, because thoughts of the IRA were always at the front of my mind, nagging me, putting me on edge, torturing me with images of what might go wrong… (1997:157).

Collins further suggested his role not only caused burnout, but socially isolated him:

I had come to ditch almost everything and everybody not connected in some way to the IRA. It had become my whole life and I was beginning to ask myself what sort of life I had. I went through the motions of enjoying myself, but how could I live happily when I spent most of my time in the company of people whose business was death? And I was one of them. Always looking for people to kill, finding people to do the killing, constantly exposing myself to danger, more and more danger. There was no respite. (1997:157–158)

To systematically test these claims, we ran a series of logistic regressions to examine whether one’s role70 increased the probability of experiencing a particular push/pull fac- tor for disengagement, regardless of how the engagement event ended. We controlled for ideological commitment and, when appropriate, marital status at the time of disen- gagement. The latter may influence the likelihood of certain push/pull factors such as family demands or the desire to marry and have children. Following Abadie et al.,71 we cluster the standard errors by terrorist group, as individuals from certain groups are more likely write an autobiography and thus be “sampled.”72 Results clustered by indi- vidual are in the Online Appendix.73 Table 5 lists the results for leaders, Table 6 for vio- lent operators and Table 7 for support/logistical roles. Our findings suggest, on average, those in leadership roles are more likely to report

experiencing disillusionment with members, difficulty living a clandestine lifestyle and regret for their role in attacks (Table 5). Those in leadership roles are also less likely to report maintaining ties to nonextremists. Violent operators are more likely to experi- ence physiological distress as a result of involvement and burnout (Table 6). Those in support or logistical roles are less likely to experience difficulty living a clandestine life- style, difficulty coping with attacks and regret for their role in attacks (Table 7). One’s role does not have a statistically significant effect on the experience of other push fac- tors including disillusionment with day-to-day tasks or the strategy or actions of the group, and pull factors including the desire to marry and have children, to dedicate more time to one’s family, to seek employment or education or the offer of amnesty or material incentives. Our results further show that even when controlling for one’s role, a deep ideological commitment reduces the probability an individual will report the experience of most push/pull factors except the desire to dedicate more time to one’s job or education, the desire to marry and offers of amnesty. While these findings pro- vide insight into which push/pull factors individuals in certain roles more commonly experience, it is important to reiterate that whether they precipitate disengagement depends on a myriad of other factors including what motivates the individual’s involve- ment, the available alternatives and any investments incurred. In order to calculate substantive effects, we simulated the expected probability of

experiencing a particular push/pull factor by setting all control variables to their means and allowing one’s role to vary.74 We find the largest effect of being a leader is on the likelihood of experiencing regret for one’s role in attacks, which increases by 14

16 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

Ta bl e 5.

Th e ef fe ct

of ho

ld in g a le ad er sh ip

ro le

on th e pr ob

ab ili ty

of ex pe rie nc in g pu

sh /p ul lf ac to rs

fo r di se ng

ag em

en t.

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /d ay -t o-

da y ta sk s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /s tr at eg y

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /le

ad er s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /m

em be rs

D iff ic ul ty

w /c la nd

es tin

e lif es ty le

D iff ic ul ty

co pi ng

w / at ta ck s

Re gr et

ro le

in at ta ck s

Ph ys io lo gi ca l

di st re ss

Ps yc ho

lo gi ca l

di st re ss

Bu rn ou

t

Ti es

to no

ne xt re m is t

in di vi du

al s

D iff ic ul ty

ba la nc in g

fa m ily

lif e

D ed ic at e

m or e

tim e to

fa m ily

Se ek

jo b or

ed uc at io n

D ed ic at e

m or e tim

e to

jo b/

ed uc at io n

D es ire

M ar ry

D es ire

ch ild re n

Am ne st y

Fi na nc ia l/

m at er ia l

in ce nt iv es

Le ad er

�0 .3 3

(0 .5 5)

�0 .1 8

(0 .4 6)

�0 .2 4

(0 .4 4)

0. 60 �

(0 .3 6)

0. 83 ��

(0 .4 0)

0. 71

(0 .5 2)

1. 08 ��

(0 .5 2)

�0 .2 6

(0 .6 4)

�0 .2 6

(0 .5 3)

�0 .2 3

(0 .4 1)

�0 .6 6�

(0 .3 8)

0. 55

(0 .3 8)

0. 72

(0 .6 0)

0. 05

(0 .3 6)

0. 09

(0 .5 6)

�0 .0 5

(0 .9 0)

�0 .4 6

(1 .1 0)

0. 11

(0 .8 1)

�0 .5 7

(0 .9 2)

Id eo lo g.

Co m m it.

(N on e)

So m e

�0 .4 3

(0 .6 3)

�0 .8 7

(0 .9 7)

�1 .0 4

(0 .7 2)

�2 .1 8� ��

(0 .7 6)

�1 .7 3� �

(0 .8 3)

�1 .9 2� ��

(0 .6 1)

�1 .4 6� ��

(0 .5 4)

�1 .3 0� �

(0 .6 2)

�1 .1 2�

(0 .6 3)

�0 .7 3

(0 .6 9)

�0 .6 2

(0 .8 0)

�1 .2 0�

(0 .6 2)

�2 .1 1� ��

(0 .7 2)

�1 .2 7�

(0 .6 7)

�0 .3 3

(1 .0 3)

�1 .5 5

(1 .3 2)

�1 .9 8

(1 .3 3)

1. 45

(1 .0 3)

�0 .7 9

(0 .5 7)

A Lo t

�1 .8 8� ��

(0 .4 9)

�2 .8 4� ��

(0 .9 4)

�2 .2 2� �

(0 .6 3)

�3 .3 6� ��

(0 .6 4)

�1 .3 8� �

(0 .6 9)

�2 .8 3� ��

(0 .6 9)

�2 .2 7� ��

(0 .5 8)

�1 .9 1� �

(0 .7 7)

�1 .1 8� �

(0 .5 7)

�1 .2 5� �

(0 .5 8)

�1 .1 6�

(0 .7 2)

�1 .4 9� �

(0 .6 1)

�2 .0 1� ��

(0 .5 1)

�1 .4 6� ��

(0 .5 1)

�0 .0 4

(0 .9 0)

�1 .1 0

(0 .7 6)

�2 .0 4� ��

(0 .7 2)

�0 .0 3

(1 .1 5)

�2 .7 9� ��

(0 .9 0)

M ar rie d

1. 05 ��

(0 .5 0)

1. 51 ��

� (0 .4 8)

�0 .6 2

(0 .5 7)

�0 .2 8

(0 .6 1)

Co ns ta nt

�0 .1 8

(0 .4 8)

1. 85 ��

(0 .9 0)

1. 00

(0 .6 3)

1. 62 ��

� (0 .6 2)

�1 .9 9

(0 .7 9)

�0 .3 3

(0 .5 5)

�0 .2 5

(0 .5 6)

�0 .8 3

(0 .7 7)

�0 .2 0

(0 .6 0)

�0 .2 1

(0 .6 0)

2. 05 ��

� (0 .7 2)

�0 .6 3

(0 .5 1)

�0 .8 4�

(0 .5 1)

�0 .3 1

(0 .4 1)

�2 .2 8

(0 .7 2)

�1 .6 0� �

(0 .7 5)

�1 .2 2�

(0 .7 3)

�3 .0 3� ��

(1 .1 1)

�0 .9 9

(0 .5 8)

n 15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 7

15 7

Ps eu do

R2 0. 10 99

0. 18 83

0. 11 68

0. 19 57

0. 07 59

0. 19 68

0. 13 72

0. 08 64

0. 03 02

0. 03 86

0. 04 42

0. 08 06

0. 14 87

0. 04 98

0. 00 21

0. 00 21

0. 00 35

0. 05 79

0. 17 51

Lo gi st ic re gr es si on

s. Ro bu

st st an da rd

er ro rs

cl us te re d at

gr ou

p le ve l.

� p < .1 0,

�� p < .0 5,

�� � p

< .0 1.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 17

Ta bl e 6.

Th e ef fe ct

of ho

ld in g a vi ol en t op

er at io na lr ol e on

th e pr ob

ab ili ty

of ex pe rie nc in g pu

sh /p ul lf ac to rs

fo r di se ng

ag em

en t.

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /d ay -t o-

da y ta sk s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /s tr at eg y

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /le

ad er s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w /m

em be rs

D iff ic ul ty

w /c la nd

es tin

e lif es ty le

D iff ic ul ty

co pi ng

w /a tt ac ks

Re gr et

ro le

in at ta ck s

Ph ys io lo gi ca l

D is tr es s

Ps yc h.

D is tr es s

Bu rn ou

t

Ti es

to no

ne xt re m is t

in di vi du

al s

D iff ic ul ty

ba la nc in g

fa m ily

lif e

D ed ic at e

m or e

tim e to

fa m ily

Se ek

jo b or

ed uc at io n

D ed ic at e

m or e tim

e to

jo b/

ed uc at io n

D es ire

M ar ry

D es ire

ch ild re n

Am ne st y

Fi na nc ia l/

m at er ia l

in ce nt iv es

Vi ol en t

op er at or

�0 .0 7

(0 .5 3)

0. 30

(0 .6 4)

0. 48

(0 .6 0)

�0 .5 3

(0 .4 6)

0. 22

(0 .3 3)

1. 09

(0 .9 0)

0. 16

(0 .6 2)

1. 26 ��

(0 .6 0)

0. 78

(0 .5 3)

0. 91 ��

(0 .4 0)

0. 56

(0 .5 9)

�0 .6 2

(0 .6 6)

�1 .0 7

(0 .7 3)

0. 33

(0 .5 1)

�0 .2 6

(0 .9 6)

0. 38

(0 .7 6)

0. 77

(0 .8 3)

�0 .9 8

(1 .2 1)

O m itt ed

Id eo lo g.

Co m m it.

(N on e)

So m e

�0 .3 4

(0 .5 8)

�0 .8 7

(0 .9 4)

�1 .0 6

(0 .6 8)

�2 .2 2� ��

(0 .7 0)

�1 .9 5� �

(0 .7 9)

�2 .3 2� ��

(0 .6 8)

�1 .6 9� ��

(0 .5 5)

�1 .5 3� �

(0 .6 2)

�1 .2 0� �

(0 .5 8)

�0 .8 4

(0 .7 0)

�0 .5 2

(0 .7 4)

�1 .2 7� �

(0 .6 3)

�2 .2 2� ��

(0 .7 5)

�1 .3 4�

(0 .6 9)

�0 .3 2

(1 .0 1)

�1 .6 1

(1 .2 8)

�2 .0 4

(1 .2 6)

1. 55

(1 .0 0)

�0 .4 7

(0 .5 9)

A lo t

�1 .8 8� ��

(0 .4 8)

�2 .8 7� ��

(0 .9 4)

�2 .2 8� ��

(0 .6 0)

�3 .2 5� ��

(0 .6 8)

�1 .3 2�

(0 .6 8)

�2 .9 2� ��

(0 .6 5)

�2 .1 0� ��

(0 .5 4)

�2 .1 2� ��

(0 .7 4)

�1 .2 8� �

(0 .5 4)

�1 .3 7� �

(0 .6 3)

�1 .5 23 �

(0 .6 7)

�1 .3 7� �

(0 .5 9)

�1 .8 4� ��

(0 .5 3)

�1 .4 9� ��

(0 .5 1)

�. 01

(0 .8 8)

�1 .1 4

(0 .7 6)

�2 .1 7� ��

(0 .7 4)

0. 03

(1 .1 6)

�2 .7 3� ��

(0 .9 1)

M ar rie d

0. 98 ��

(0 .4 8)

1. 40 ��

(0 .4 9)

�0 .5 8

(0 .5 9)

�0 .1 3

(0 .7 2)

Co ns ta nt

�0 .2 8

(0 .4 6)

1. 77 ��

(0 .8 1)

0. 88

(0 .5 9)

1. 85 ��

� (0 .6 0)

�0 .7 2

(0 .5 5)

�0 .1 9

(0 .6 6)

0. 08

(0 .5 7)

�1 .0 6

(0 .8 5)

�0 .3 6

(0 .6 5)

�0 .3 8

(0 .6 1)

1. 75 ��

� (0 .6 5)

�0 .3 7

(0 .5 5)

�0 .4 7

(0 .5 8)

�0 .3 2

(0 .4 2)

�2 .2 3� ��

(0 .7 2)

�1 .6 7� �

(0 .7 0)

�1 .5 0� �

(0 .6 8)

�2 .9 3� ��

(1 .0 1)

�1 .0 3� �

(0 .4 9)

n 15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 7

12 9

Ps eu do

R2 0. 10 72

0. 18 92

0. 12 03

0. 19 13

0. 05 45

0. 20 66

0. 10 34

0. 12 03

0. 04 72

0. 05 85

0. 03 52

0. 07 72

0. 14 71

0. 05 22

0. 00 31

0. 05 16

0. 11 84

0. 07 04

0. 17 74

Lo gi st ic re gr es si on

s. Ro bu

st st an da rd

er ro rs

cl us te re d at

gr ou

p le ve l.

� p < .1 0,

�� p<

.0 5,

�� � p < .0 1.

18 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

Ta bl e 7.

Th e ef fe ct

of ho

ld in g a su pp

or t/ lo gi st ic al ro le

on th e pr ob

ab ili ty

of ex pe rie nc in g pu

sh /p ul lf ac to rs fo r di se ng

ag em

en t.

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w / da y- to –

da y ta sk s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w / st ra te gy

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w / le ad er s

D is ill u-

si on

m en t

w / m em

be rs

D iff ic ul ty

liv in g

cl an de st in e

lif es ty le

D iff ic ul ty

co pi ng

w /a tt ac ks

Re gr et

ro le

in at ta ck s

Ph ys io lo gi ca l

D is tr es s

Ps yc h.

D is tr es s

Bu rn ou

t

Ti es

to no

ne xt re m is t

in di vi du

al s

D iff ic ul ty

ba la nc in g

fa m ily

lif e

D ed ic at e

M or e

tim e to

fa m ily

Se ek

jo b or

ed uc at io n

D ed ic at e

m or e tim

e to

jo b/

ed uc at io n

D es ire

M ar ry

D es ire

ch ild re n

Am ne st y

Fi na nc ia l/

m at er ia l

in ce nt iv e

Su pp

or t/

Lo gi st ic

Ro le

0. 29

(0 .5 5)

�0 .0 3

(0 .3 6)

�0 .1 1

(0 .3 5)

�0 .1 9

(0 .3 2)

�0 .9 6� �

(0 .4 1)

�1 .4 2� �

(0 .7 0)

�1 .1 0� �

(0 .5 3)

�0 .6 7

(0 .5 5)

�0 .2 8

(0 .4 8)

�0 .4 2

(0 .3 0)

0. 28

(0 .4 2)

�0 .1 9

(0 .3 3)

�0 .2 3

(0 .5 2)

�0 .2 5

(0 .3 7)

0. 06

(0 .4 9)

�0 .1 9

(0 .6 3)

�0 .1 0

(0 .7 8)

0. 42

(0 .7 2)

1. 40

(0 .8 5)

Id eo lo gi ca l

Co m m itm

en t

(N on e)

So m e

�0 .3 8

(0 .6 2)

�0 .8 2

(0 .9 4)

�0 .9 8

(0 .6 8)

�2 .2 7� ��

(0 .6 8)

�1 .8 9� �

(0 .7 8)

�2 .1 3� ��

(0 .6 5)

�1 .6 7� ��

(0 .5 5)

�1 .2 1� �

(0 .5 5)

�1 .0 4

(0 .6 4)

�0 .6 5

(0 .6 7)

�0 .4 7

(0 .7 7)

�1 .3 1� �

(0 .6 4)

�2 .2 6� ��

(0 .7 2)

�1 .2 6�

(0 .6 6)

�0 .3 6

(1 .0 1)

�1 .5 3

(1 .2 2)

�1 .8 8

(1 .1 9)

1. 39

(0 .9 7)

�0 .8 1

(0 .5 7)

A Lo t

�1 .8 6� ��

(0 .5 0)

�2 .8 5� ��

(0 .9 2)

�2 .2 4� ��

(0 .6 0)

�3 .3 1� ��

(0 .6 6)

�1 .4 7� �

(0 .7 1)

�3 .1 2� ��

(0 .7 3)

�2 .3 5� ��

(0 .6 1)

�2 .0 3� ��

(0 .7 6)

�1 .2 4� �

(0 .5 7)

�1 .3 2� �

(0 .6 1)

�1 .1 5�

(0 .6 8)

�1 .4 7� �

(0 .6 1)

�1 .9 7� ��

(0 .5 2)

�1 .5 0� ��

(0 .5 1)

�. 02

(0 .8 9)

�1 .1 2

(0 .7 8)

�2 .0 7� ��

(0 .7 7)

0. 03

(1 .1 3)

�2 .7 1� ��

(0 .9 1)

M ar rie d

1. 05 ��

(0 .4 7)

1. 50 ��

� (0 .4 7)

�0 .6 0

(0 .5 2)

�0 .2 2

(0 .6 7)

Co ns ta nt

�0 .4 6

(0 .5 2)

1. 81 ��

(0 .8 1)

0. 98 �

(0 .5 5)

1. 91 ��

� (0 .5 9)

�0 .1 8

(0 .5 9)

0. 71

(0 .7 4)

0. 74

(0 .7 2)

�0 .5 6

(0 .7 9)

�0 .1 3

(0 .6 6)

�0 .0 5

(0 .6 8)

1. 63 ��

� (0 .6 1)

�0 .3 4

(0 .5 9)

�0 .4 6

(0 .6 8)

�0 .1 5

(0 .4 8)

�2 .2 9� ��

(0 .7 5)

�1 .5 2

(0 .8 3)

�1 .3 2� �

(0 .6 1)

�3 .2 5� ��

(1 .0 1)

�2 .0 9� �

(0 .7 7)

n 15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 8

15 7

15 7

Ps eu do

R2 0. 11 00

0. 18 75

0. 11 55

0. 18 75

0. 08 26

0. 23 47

0. 14 00

0. 09 81

0. 03 50

0. 16 91

0. 03 16

0. 07 18

0. 13 45

0. 05 20

0. 00 20

0. 05 00

0. 10 84

0. 06 26

0. 21 26

Lo gi st ic re gr es si on

s. Ro bu

st st an da rd

er ro rs

cl us te re d at

gr ou

p le ve l.

� p < .1 0,

�� p < .0 5,

�� � p

< .0 1.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 19

percentage points. The probability of reporting disillusionment with other members increases by 10 percentage points and difficulty living a clandestine lifestyle by 9 per- centage points. Leaders also experience a 13 percentage point reduction in the probabil- ity they possess ties to nonextremists. For those in violent roles, the probability of reporting burnout increases by 15 percentage points and the probability of experiencing physiological distress increases by 10 percentage points. For those in support roles, the probability of reporting regret for one’s role in attacks decreases by 14 percentage points and the probability of reporting difficulty coping with attacks and difficulty living a clandestine lifestyle decrease by 11 percentage points each.

Conclusion

Our analysis provides the first systematic evidence of a potential link between the role(s) individuals hold within a terrorist group and their likelihood of voluntary disen- gagement. We theorize the ways in which one’s role(s) influence the key components of Rusbult and colleagues’ investment model and thus, the probability of exit. We find evi- dence to support the claim that individuals experiencing role conflict and role strain are more likely to disengage. Evidence also suggests those in leadership and violent, oper- ational roles are less likely to leave even when controlling for factors likely to influence one’s satisfaction suggesting that these individuals may incur greater sunk costs and possess fewer alternatives. Those in support roles, conversely, are more likely to exit. Finally, we show even when controlling for ideological commitment certain roles are more commonly associated with the experience of particular push/pull factors hypothe- sized to drive disengagement decisions. These findings indicate that greater attention to a terrorist’s role(s) may lend import-

ant insights for encouraging or facilitating their disengagement. For example, those experiencing role conflict or role strain may be more susceptible to leaving. As such, terrorist groups which allow some autonomy in role selection or those that factor in an individual’s knowledge, skills and abilities when assigning roles may be less prone to shedding members. Individuals in leadership or violent, operational positions may be less likely to disengage unless there are policies in place that provide them with adequate alternatives outside the group (e.g. amnesty, protection from reprisal). Further, knowing one’s role in the group may provide additional insight into the push/pull fac- tors for disengagement he or she may be experiencing. Our findings indicate that lead- ers are more likely to experience regret over their role in terrorist attacks and a harder time living underground. Violent operators are more likely to experience burnout and physiological distress. Such information can help in the development of more tailored interventions especially when knowledge of the individual’s motivations and circumstan- ces are lacking. Finally, a deeper understanding of the link between terrorist roles and terrorist disengagement can also inform policies for countering violent extremism. Counter-narratives that emphasize the mismatch between the roles one expects to hold in a terrorist group and the reality of the roles that one will hold or the dissatisfaction associated with certain roles may help deter involvement. Although each individual’s characteristics and experiences in a terrorist group, like any social group, are unique and must be considered, individuals assigned to certain tasks and functions may

20 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

encounter many of the same challenges and these challenges may influence the likeli- hood of disengagement and the reasons for disengagement in a relatively systematic way. Future research should continue to explore the relationships outlined here.

Notes

1. Eamon Collins and Mick McGovern, Killing Rage (UK: Granta, 1998). 2. See, Tore Bjørgo and John Horgan, eds., Leaving Terrorism Behind: Individual and

Collective Disengagement. (London: Routledge, 2008); John Horgan, Walking Away from Terrorism (Abington, UK and New York, NY: Routledge, 2009); Fernando Reinares, “Exit from Terrorism: A Qualitative Empirical Study on Disengagement and Deradicalization among Members of ETA,” Terrorism and Political Violence 23, no. 5 (2011); Rogelio Alonso, “Why do Terrorists Stop? Analyzing Why ETA Members Abandon or Continue with Terrorism,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 34, no. 9 (2011); Mary Beth Altier, Christian Thoroughgood, and John Horgan, “Turning away from Terrorism; Lessons from Psychology, Sociology, and Criminology,” Journal of Peace Research 51, no. 5 (2014); Kate Barrelle, “Pro-Integration: Disengagement from and Life After Extremism,” Behavioral Sciences or Terrorism and Political Aggression 7, no. 2 (2015); Neil Ferguson, Mark Burgess, and Ian Hollywood, “Leaving Violence Behind: Disengaging from Politically Motivated Violence in Northern Ireland,” Political Psychology 36, no. 2 (2015); Mary Beth Altier, Emma Leonard Boyle, Neil Shortland, and John Horgan, “Why They Leave: An Analysis of Terrorist Disengagement Events from 87 Autobiographical Accounts,” Security Studies 26, no. 2 (2017).

3. See Arie Perlinger, Gabriel Koehler-Derrick, and Ami Pedhazur, “The Gap between Participation and Violence: Why We Need to Disaggregate Terrorist ‘Profiles’,” International Studies Quarterly 60, no. 2 (2016); John Horgan, Neil Shortland, Suzette Abbasciano, and Shaun Walsh, “Actions Speak Louder than Words: A Behavioral Analysis of 183 Individuals Convicted of Terrorist Offenses in the United States from 1995 to 2012,” Journal of Forensic Sciences 61, no. 5 (2016); Robin Simcox and Emily Dyer, Al Qaeda in the United States: A Complete Analysis of Terrorism Offenses (London, UK: The Henry Jackson Society, 2013); Paul Gill and John Horgan, “Who were the Volunteers? The Shifting Sociological and Operational Profile of 1240 Provisional Irish Republican Members,” Terrorism and Political Violence 25, no. 3 (2013).

4. John Monahan, “The Individual Risk Assessment of Terrorism,” Psychology, Public Policy, & Law 18, no. 2 (2012).

5. Altier et al., “Why They Leave”. 6. We define terrorist activity according to the U.S. Department of Defense as “the calculated

use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear, intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.” This definition is consistent with those usually employed in the academic literature by Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998) and Alex Schmid and Albert Jongman, Political Terrorism: A New Guide to Actors, Authors, Concepts, Databases, Theories, and Literature (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1988).

7. James Krantz and Marc Maltz, “A Framework for Consulting to Organizational Role,” Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research 49, no. 2

8. Ibid, 137. 9. Some have argued terrorist share certain characteristics including insanity or psychopathy

(e.g. Friedrich Hacker, Crusaders, Criminals, Crazies: Terror and Terrorism in our Time (New York, NY: Norton, 1976); K. I. Pearce, “Police Negotiations,” Canadian Psychiatric Association Journal 22, no. 4 (1977) or psychopathic tendencies (e.g. H. H. A. Cooper, “What is a Terrorist: A Psychological Perspective,” Legal Medical Quarterly 1, no. 1 (1977), and H. H. A. Cooper, “Psychopath as Terrorist,” Legal Medical Quarterly 2, no. 4 (1978).

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 21

Jeff Victoroff, “The Mind of a Terrorist: A Review and Critique of Psychological Approaches,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 49, no. 1 (2005) notes that psychological research on terrorism is “largely flawed” and based on unscientific methods.

10. Jeffrey Ross, “A model of the Psychological Causes of Oppositional Political Terrorism,” Peace and Conflict 2, no. 2 (1996).

11. Perlinger et al., “The gap between participation and violence”. 12. Gill and Horgan, “Who were the Volunteers”. 13. Simcox and Dyer, “Al Qaeda in the United States”. 14. Altier et al., “Turning Away”. 15. Altier et al., “Turning Away”. 16. Ibid. 17. D. Farrell and C. E. Rusbult, “Exchange Variables as Predictors of Job Satisfaction, Job

Commitment, and Turnover: the Impact of Rewards, Costs, Alternatives, and Investments,” Organizational Behavior and Human Performance 28 (1981); C. E. Rusbult, “Commitment and Satisfaction in Romantic Associations: A Test of the Investment Model,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 16 (1980); C. E. Rusbult, “A Longitudinal Study Test of the Investment Model: The Development and Deterioration of Satisfaction and Commitment in Heterosexual Involvements,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 45 (1983); C. E. Rusbult and D. Farrell, “A Longitudinal Test of the Investment Model: The Impact on Job Satisfaction, Job Commitment, and Turnover of Variations in Rewards, Costs, Alternatives, and Investments.” Journal of Applied Psychology 68 (1983).

18. Benjmain Le and Christopher Agnew, “Commitment and Its Theorized Determinants: A Meta-Analysis of the Investment Model,” Personal Relationships 10, no. 1 (2003); Karen van Dam, “Employee Attitudes Toward Job Changes: An application and extension of Rusbult and Farrell’s Investment Model,” Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology 78, no. 2 (2005); Caryl Rusbult, Dan Farrell, Glenn Rogers, and Arch Mainous III, “Impact of Exchange Variables on Exit, Voice, Loyalty, and Neglect: An Integrative Model of Responses to Declining Job Satisfaction,” Academy of Management Journal 31, no. 3 (1988); Meni Koslowsky and Avraham Kluger, “Commitment to Participation in Musical Activities: An Extension and Application of the Investment Model,” Journal of Applied Psychology 16, no. 9 (1986).

19. Yuan-Huei Lin and Caryl Rusbult, “Commitment to Dating Relationships and Cross-Sex Friendships in America and China,” Journal of Social and Personal Relationships 12, no. 1 (1995); Caryl Rusbult and John Martz, “Remaining in an Abusive Relationship: An Investment Model Analysis of Nonvoluntary Commitment,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 21, no. 6 (1995); Caryl Rusbult, Dennis Johnson, and Gregory Morrow, “Predicting Satisfaction and Commitment in Adult Romantic Involvements: An Assessment of the Generalizability of the Investment Model,” Social Psychology Quarterly 49, no. 1 (1986); Thomas Raedeke, “Is Athlete Burnout more than Just Stress? A Sport Commitment Perspective,” Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology 19, no. 4 (1997); Paul Carpenter and Richard Coleman, “A Longitudinal Test of Elite Youth Cricketers’ Commitment,” International Journal of Sport Psychology 29, no. 3 (1998)

20. Le and Agnew, “Commitment and”. 21. Altier et al., “Turning away”. 22. W.J. Goode, “A Theory of Role Strain,” American Sociological Review 25, no. 4 (1960); S. R.

Marks, “Multiple Roles and Role Strain: Some Notes on Human Energy, Time and Commitment,” American Sociological Review 42, no. 6 (1977); J. D. Snoek, “Role Strain in Diversified Role Sets,” American Journal of Sociology 71, no. 4 (1966).

23. J. W. Getzels and E. G. Guba, “Role, Role Conflict, and Effectiveness: An Empirical Study,” American Sociological Review 19 (1954); J. T. Gullahorn, “Measuring Role Conflict,” American Journal of Sociology 61, no. 4 (1956).

24. Orsini, for example, documents role conflict and role strain producing dissatisfaction in interviews with far left and far right terrorists. Alessandro Orsini, Anatomy of the Red Brigades (Cornell University Press, 2011), 72, 266-67.

22 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

25. R. L. Kahn, D. M. Wolfe, R. P. Quinn, and J. D. Snoek, Organizational Stress. (New York, NY: Wiley, 1964); J. R. Rizzo, R. J. House, and S. I. Lirtzman, “Role Conflict and Ambiguity in Complex Organizations,” Administrative Science Quarterly 15, no. 2 (1970); R. T. Keller, “Role Conflict and Ambiguity: Correlates with Job Satisfaction and Values.” Personnel Psychology 28 (1975).

26. Jacob N. Shapiro, The Terrorist’s Dilemma: Managing Violent Covert Organizations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2013); Jacob N. Shapiro and David A. Siegel, “Moral Hazard, Discipline and the Management of Terrorism Organizations,” World Politics 64, no. 1 (2012); Mary Beth Altier, John Horgan, and Christian Thoroughgood, “In their Own Words? Methodological Considerations in the Analysis of Terrorist Autobiographies,” Journal of Strategic Security 5 (2012); Bonnie Cordes, “When Terrorists do the Talking: Reflections on the Terrorist Literature,” Journal of Strategic Studies 10, no. 4 (1987).

27. Michael Kenney, Stephen Coulthart, and Dominick Wright, “Structure and Performance in a Violent Extremist Network: The Small World Solution,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 61, no. 10 (2016); Barrelle, “Pro-Integration”; Anne Speckhard and Ahmet S. Yayla, “Eyewitness Accounts from Recent Defectors from Islamic State: Why They Joined, What They Saw, Why They Quit,” Perspectives on Terrorism 9, no. 6 (2015); Horgan, Walking Away.

28. Altier et al., “In their Own Words?”. 29. Cordes, “When Terrorists do the Talking”; Rachel Gamson, Jessica Gottesman, Nicholas

Milan, and Sitara Weerasuriya, Cues to Catching Deception in Interviews (College Park, MD: START, 2012).

30. Cordes, “When Terrorists do the Talking”; Altier et al., “In their Own Words?” 31. Two individuals in the sample, Michael “Bommi” Baumann and Martin McGartland, each

wrote two distinct autobiographical accounts. 32. We define terrorist activity as “the calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful

violence to inculcate fear, intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological” (U.S. Department of Defense).

33. See the Online Appendix for a description of how the dataset was created. 34. Omar Cabezas, Fire From the Mountain: The Making of a Sandinista (Crown Publishing

Group, 1985), 13. 35. Sean O’Callaghan, The Informer (London, UK: Corgi, 1998), 198. 36. Ibid, 28. 37. Maria McGuire, To take arms: A year in the Provisional IRA (London, UK: Macmillan,

1973), 135. 38. Table 1A in the Supplementary Appendix lists the inclusion criteria for each role. 39. For our analysis of roles, we analyzed text on three questions: (1) What positions or roles

did the individual hold within the terrorist organization or its affiliates? (2) Was the individual satisfied (happy) with his/her position(s) or role(s) within the organization and the day-to-day tasks that each entailed? and (3) Did the individual change positions or roles within the organization? If so, please include information as to when and why these changes occurred.

40. Leila Khalid, My People Shall live: The Autobiography of a Revolutionary (Hodder and Stoughton, 1973), 173–75.

41. N. Ascherson, Memoirs of an Italian Terrorist (Basic Books, 2003), 94. 42. Abu Iyad with E. Rouleau, My Home, My Land: A Narrative of the Palestinian Struggle

(New York, NY: Times Books, 1981), 54–56. 43. Ibid, 95. 44. Abdul Salam Zaeef, A. S. Van Linschoten, and F. Kuehn. My life with the Taliban (New

York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2010), 22. 45. Shane Paul O’Doherty, The Volunteer: A Former IRA Man’s True Story. (Strategic Book

Publishing, 2011), 53–54. 46. Ibid, 53–54. 47. Raymond Gilmour, Dead Ground: Infiltrating the IRA (Warner Books, 1999), 85.

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 23

48. Omar Nasiri, Inside the Global Jihad (Jacana Media, 2006), 36. 49. Tass Saada and D. Merrill, Once an Arafat Man: The True Story of how a PLO Sniper found

a New Life (Tyndale House Publishing, 2008), 34. 50. Ibid, 35. 51. Ben Turok, Nothing but the Truth: Behind the ANC’s Struggle Politics (Jonathan Ball

Publishers, 2003), 70–73. 52. David Hamilton, A Cause Worth Living For: The Journey of David “Packie” Hamilton

(Highland Books, 1997), 51. 53. Interview 8/20/13. 54. Interview 10/1/12. 55. Ahmed Kathrada, Letters from Robben Island: A selection of Ahmed Kathrada’s prison

correspondence, 1964–1989 (Zebra, 2000), 141–42. 56. Collins, My Jihad, 36–37. 57. Summary statistics for these and variables included in the remainder of our analyses are

located in Table 2A in the Online Appendix. 58. Cecilia Bobrovskaya, Twenty Years in Underground Russia: Memoirs of a Rank-and-File

Bolshevik (International Publishers, 1934), 30–31. 59. Collins and McGovern, Killing Rage, 233. 60. T. J. Leyden and M. B. Cook, Skinhead Confessions: From Hate and Hope (Sweetwater

Books, 2008), 104. 61. Interviews 10/2/12, 11/16/12 and 8/4/13. 62. Interview 8/4/13. 63. Interview 8/20/13. 64. Interview 9/11/12. 65. Ibid. 66. Alberto Abadie, Susan Athey, Guido W. Imbens, and Jeffrey Wooldridge, “When Should

You Adjust Standard Errors for Clustering?” NBER Working Paper #24003 (2017). 67. Altier et al., “Why They Leave”. 68. Following Altier et al. (2017), Table 3A in the online appendix excludes Aukai Collins, who

is a potential outlier given the number of times he disengaged (n¼ 11) and re-engaged (n¼ 10). Table 4A excludes individuals involved as spies. Table 5A excludes Collins and spies. Table 6A includes age at disengagement, which significantly reduces the sample size and why it is not included here. Table 7A presents the results with robust standard errors clustered by individual. When clustering by individual or excluding spies, the effect of holding a violent role is close to, but no longer statistically significant at the .10 level. When excluding Collins or Collins and spies or including age at disengagement, holding a leadership or violent role are no longer statistically significant, but holding a support role is. Given that the coefficients remain relatively the same and in the same direction, we believe this is a reflection of the reduction in our sample size. In every specification, holding a support role increases the likelihood of disengagement.

69. We used Gary King, Michael Tomz, and Jason Wittenberg’s CLARIFY macro. Gary King, Michael Tomz, and Jason Wittenberg, “Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation,” American Journal of Political Science 44, no. 2 (April 2000).

70. Because we lack temporal data on when the individual experienced the push/pull during engagement and what role s/he was in at the time, we choose to use the most salient role at disengagement. While this is an imperfect measure, it is the best available.

71. Alberto Abadie, Susan Athey, Guido W. Imbens, and Jeffrey Wooldridge, “When Should You Adjust Standard Errors for Clustering?” NBER Working Paper #24003 (2017).

72. Altier et al., “Why They Leave”. 73. When clustering by individual, difficulty living a clandestine lifestyle and ties to non-radical

individuals are no longer statistically significant for leaders though difficulty living a clandestine lifestyle is very close (p< .101); the findings for violent operators and supporters remain relatively the same.

24 M. B. ALTIER ET AL.

74. We used Gary King, Michael Tomz, and Jason Wittenberg’s CLARIFY macro. Gary King, Michael Tomz, and Jason Wittenberg, “Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation,” American Journal of Political Science 44, no. 2 (April 2000).

75. Adapted from Altier et al., “Why They Leave”.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the editor, anonymous reviewers, Kurt Braddock, Neil Shortland and Joe Young for helpful comments. We also thank Christian Thoroughgood for research assistance.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

The research from which this article is drawn was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate and coordinated through the U.K. Home Office. The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the official policies, either expressed or implied, of the Department of Homeland Security or the Home Office.

ORCID

Mary Beth Altier http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9939-6022

STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 25

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=cjhr20

Journal of Human Rights

ISSN: 1475-4835 (Print) 1475-4843 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjhr20

Prioritization in human rights NGOs: The role of intra-organizational units of planning

Monika Krause

To cite this article: Monika Krause (2020) Prioritization in human rights NGOs: The role of intra-organizational units of planning, Journal of Human Rights, 19:2, 168-182, DOI: 10.1080/14754835.2019.1647101

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14754835.2019.1647101

© 2019 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

Published online: 18 Dec 2019.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 2337

View related articles

View Crossmark data

Prioritization in human rights NGOs: The role of intra-organizational units of planning

Monika Krause

London School of Economics

ABSTRACT Drawing on forty in-depth interviews with program managers in nineteen Western international human rights organizations, this article examines how human rights organizations make decisions about how to allocate resources and how to manage their commitments to specific causes, spe- cific people, and specific areas. It argues that organizational routines shape the allocation of resources relatively independently of other factors and it pays particular attention to the role played by intra-organizational “units” of work and planning. Units of work and planning function as candidates for the allocation of resources within organizations. Resources are not allo- cated directly to issues or causes but rather are distributed on the one hand among a set of range of practices, such as reports and campaigns, and ways of responding, which are considered legitimate, and on the other hand among the thematic and geographical units, which structure human rights organizations. The article concludes by discussing some factors that play a role in the selection among these units. As human rights workers consider where their organizations can make a difference, other organiza- tions and conditions for their work come into view, levers matter, and the way making a difference can be demonstrated plays a role.

Human rights apply to every individual across the world, and different rights, such as the right to freedom of expression, or the right to education, are in principle equally valid and important. At the same time, human rights organizations work with limited resources and it is clear that they are not able to report on or otherwise respond to every right, rights holder, or violation.

In this context, this article examines empirically how Western international human rights organizations make decisions about how to allocate resources, and how to manage their commitments to specific causes, specific people, and specific territorial units. The article draws on 40 in-depth interviews with program staff in a range of Western international human rights organizations, on organizations’ reports, and on other publicly available information.

Western international human rights organizations—what de Waal (2003) has called “secondary human rights organizations”—are only one site for investigating “human rights”. Human rights claims circulate in and through different world regions and different institutional sites (Merry and Levitt 2009; Nash 2012), including national and local activist scenes, social movements, the UN (Moeckli and Nowak 2007; O’Flaherty 2007), the European Union (EU), the African Union (Killander and Abebe 2011), humanitarian and development nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) (Fox 1995; Frohardt, Paul, and Minear 1999; Brennan and Martone 2007; Miller 2010;

CONTACT Monika Krause [email protected] Department of Sociology, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, WC2A 2AE, London, United Kingdom. � 2019 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor and Francis Group, LLC. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 2020, VOL. 19, NO. 2, 168–182 https://doi.org/10.1080/14754835.2019.1647101

Wong 2012; Krause 2014), international courts (Hagan 2003), national courts and national polit- ical institutions (Wanyeki 2003; Sassen 2006; Nash 2007; Schjolden 2009; Mwambene 2018), uni- versities, and the news media (McPherson 2012). But Western international human rights NGOs have shaped the imagination of what “human rights” are disproportionately; the debates between the “champions” of human rights and their critics in particular have taken these NGOs as a cen- tral reference point.

In the context of these debates, I treat questions about the allocation of resources as both an end and a means. Questions about the allocation of resources are important in themselves: There is a legitimate public interest in making more transparent how NGOs allocate resources. Questions about resource allocation are also a specific empirical entry point for developing an understanding of practices and taken-for-granteds in this particular set of organizations, which can then be used to answer other questions about the role these organizations play and do not play.

The article begins by introducing pertinent observations from previous research on human rights organizations. It then discusses some sensitizing concepts from the study’s context in the sociology of knowledge and organizations and describes its data and methods. The core of the article analyzes the role of different “units” of work and planning, which are construed by rou- tines within organizations and are available as candidates for the allocation of resources. Resources are distributed on the one hand among a set of acceptable practices and ways of responding, and on the other hand among the thematic and geographical units, which structure human rights organizations. These intra-organizational processes mediate the allocation of resour- ces among different rights and violations. I then discuss some factors that play a role in the selec- tion among these units. As human rights workers consider where their organizations can make a difference, other organizations and conditions for their work come into view, levers matter, and the way making a difference can be demonstrated plays a role.

International human rights NGOs and global civil society

This article builds on two waves of research on international human rights NGOs. Pioneering work on global civil society focused on the history of human rights NGOs as transnational actors, on their stated values, and on the degree to which they did or did not succeed in producing change in line with their stated values (Keck and Sikkink 1998). A second wave of studies of human rights NGOs has expanded on this work in three ways. It has, first, focused more closely on the ways international human rights organizations do their work in practice (e.g., Smith, Pagnucco, and Lopez 1998; Merry 2003; Hopgood 2006; Goodale and Merry 2007; Hopgood 2010; Wong 2012; Pruce 2015; Pruce and Budabin 2016). Scholars have, second, widened the scope of questions about the effects of NGOs. Scholars moved beyond a concern only with NGOs’ stated goals and became interested in the range of effects of human rights work, including positive as well as negative, and intended as well as unintended effects (Barnett 2002; Kennedy 2004; Guilhot 2005; Meyers 2019). These studies, third, built on a recognition that human rights are not only “expressed” through NGOs, but are also given meaning by them, in a way that is necessarily specific and also selective (de Waal 2003; Merry and Levitt 2009).

Particularly in making this third point concerning the shaping of human rights by NGOs, pre- vious research has established the foundation also for questions of prioritization. Under the head- ing of “agenda setting” this research has highlighted some factors that are directly relevant to the questions addressed in this article. The factors highlighted by this work can be discussed under two rubrics: This research has, first, drawn attention to cultural patterns in the ways human rights are applied to the world; it has, second, analyzed the role of a range of external actors who influence NGOs.

Regarding cultural patterns, scholars have observed, for example, that human rights NGOs have historically prioritized civil and political rights over social and economic rights (de Waal

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 169

2003; Hertel 2006). This can be linked to an affinity between human rights as a discourse and lib- eralism as a tradition that prizes individual autonomy and freedom “from” over freedom “to” (e.g., Douzinas 2014). Scholars have also highlighted the way gendered ideologies of vulnerability have shaped the agenda of international NGOs, for example, by making some noncombatants vis- ible as civilians and not others (Carpenter 2005; Hahn and Holzscheiter 2013).

Second, researchers have identified the way different social groups and external stakeholders shape NGOs’ agendas. External stakeholders include very prominently donors to human rights NGOs: Clifford Bob (2002; 2010) has memorably suggested that Western human rights organiza- tions produce information for a “market in information” and are influenced by demand in this market by donors and political audiences. The influence of donors has also been an important theme in the literature on development (Hulme and Edwards 1997).

Scholarship has also clarified the influence of actors other than donors: Clifford Bob has shown how human rights NGOs are influenced by social groups that try to draw attention to their issues and try to market themselves as victims of human rights abuses (Bob 2005). In a ser- ies of studies of campaigns related to labor and economic rights in different regions of the world, Shareen Hertel has shown that partner organizations on the ground also shape which issues are taken up, and in what form (Hertel 2006). Researchers have shown that NGOs are embedded in networks of other NGOs, within which some NGOs are able to exert more influence than others (Carpenter 2007a; 2011).

In what follows, I contribute to this conversation based on concerns from the sociology of organizations, which highlights the impact of mundane routines inside organizations. I draw in particular on a sociology of organizations influenced by phenomenology and the sociology of knowledge (Berger and Luckmann 1966). This work focuses on management practices, and pays specific attention to the knowledge involved in constructing a shared world, which then is a pre- condition for action within that world.

Shared practices in a field of organizations

Previous research on decision making inside organizations has drawn attention to the tacitly held assumptions and taken-for-granted routines that mediate between an organization’s explicit goals and the situation in the world on the one hand and what the organization does on the other hand. Sociologists have highlighted how aspects of the practical organization of work in organiza- tions shape organizational output (Cohen, March, and Olson 1972; Molotch and Lester 1975; Fishman 1978; Becker 1982; Vaughan 1996; Desmond 2007; Scheffer 2010; Medvetz 2013; Krause 2014).

Some work in the sociology of organizations has focused on how dynamics internal to one individual organization shape outcomes. Some work in the literature on international NGOs, on the other hand, has usefully drawn attention to what international NGOs share with all other organizations—including for-profit firms—in order to move beyond idealized conceptions of NGOs (Lindenberg and Bryant 2001; Cooley and Ron 2002; Sim�eant 2005; Bob 2010; Prakash and Gugerty 2010).

Here I adopt a third route: It is useful not only to ask about what all organizations share but to ask about specific organizations and specific fields of organizations. Field theory encourages hypothesis about mediating practices that are shared across a set of organizations that see each other as relevant peers (Bourdieu 1995; Fligstein and McAdam 2012). Because of considerable uncertainty in terms of knowing and predicting their environment, organizations often look to peer organizations (Fligstein 2001) to develop a response (Meyer and Rowan 1977). This mutual adjusting of organizations who see themselves as peers is what DiMaggio and Powell (1983) called “institutional iso-morphism.”

170 M. KRAUSE

This article focuses on what de Waal (2003) has called “secondary human rights organ- izations,” which he distinguishes from primary mobilizations and local activist organizations. Secondary human rights organizations operate in different contexts across the globe, and they self-identify as human rights organizations rather than primarily or only as part of a specific social movement. International human rights organizations of this kind are today to some extent engaged in mutual referencing, as we would expect in a field of organizations—that is, they rec- ognize each other as relevant peers (Fligstein 2001; Dezalay and Garth 2006).

In any field of practice, we expect some specific shared assumptions or doxa about “how things are done,” which are usually tacitly accepted. I draw attention to two features shared among human rights organizations in this context: First, human rights organizations have a rep- ertoire of practice. The idea of repertoire conveys that there is choice among acceptable ways of framing and responding to the world but the choice is not unlimited (Swidler 1986; Lamont 1992; 1995; Swidler 2001; Silber 2003). Repertoires tend to be specific to a specific social group (Lamont and Th�evenot 2000) or in this case a specific set of organizations. Second, international human rights organizations plan work using regional and thematic categories.

I suggest that organizational practices are shaped by the ways in which units of work and planning are construed. Units of work and planning function as candidates for the allocation of resources within organizations. Resource are not allocated directly to issues or causes, but rather resources are distributed on the one hand among a set of range of practices, such as reports and campaigns, and ways of responding, which are considered legitimate, and on the other hand among the thematic and geographical units that structure human rights organizations. The con- struction of units of work and planning is a precondition for factors and mechanisms, which shape what in the concrete instantiation of the unit is selected.

Data and methods

The article is based on 40 in-depth interviews with staff members who work on the programming side of Western international human rights organizations. Respondents are in charge of either a specific country or a number of countries or work on a specific thematic area. Respondents worked for 19 different organizations, which were sampled to include diversity within the particu- lar group of NGOs I targeted. Respondents worked for the largest and most prominent inter- national human rights NGOs and organizations that introduce variation in term of size, national origin, political orientation, funding source, religion, and thematic focus. A list of organizations is included1; I spoke to one to three people within each organization. Interviews lasted about an hour and were conducted in person whenever possible (n¼ 31). Research was conducted between 2013 and 2017.

I interviewed program officers because they play a key mediating role between strategic plan- ning in the organizations’ senior leadership team and the day-to-day implementation of projects. Program teams are the center of the organizations’ outgoing flows. Decisions are prepared here and they are implemented here and the most detailed knowledge of internal structures and events is located here, and not at the highest level in the organizational hierarchy. Program staff mem- bers already have a number of years of experience to look back on and hold significant responsi- bilities but are still involved in the everyday business of “doing human rights work.”

With my research design and interviewing technique, I stand in a specific tradition of expert interviewing, a tradition of interviewing influenced by the sociology of knowledge (Berger and Luckmann 1966; Bogner, Littig, and Menz 2009; Pfadenhauer 2009; Gl€aser and Laudel 2004). Respondents are not interviewed primarily in the context of their biography, but in the context of their work and their membership in a specific group of experts. The expert, in this tradition, is not interviewed to give information about a subject area that he or she is knowledgeable about as

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 171

an observer, but rather his or her practical knowledge of organizational processes, which he or she is involved in, is the target of the investigation.

My questions aim to target the practical knowledge and experience of professionals because it has consequences in the world. I asked my respondents about their everyday work. I asked what a typical day in the office looked like, how priorities are set, about debates they had with col- leagues about priorities, and about work they were especially proud of and work that raised ques- tions for them.

In analyzing the interview transcripts, my aim was to identify shared categories and assump- tions. Each interview is first analyzed with regard to codes or headings emerging from it. While in the narrative interview the priority is on sequence or the inviolable logic of the single inter- view, here the focus is also on the search for common themes, unifying codes, and headings. Results of thematic comparison are tested against the text and the full data set. Commonalities are probed, but deviations, contradictions, and particulars are also identified.

In interpreting interview data, we need to consider the artificiality of the interview situation and the possibility of a bias towards socially desirable responses. I would suggest that the problem of validity presents itself in a different form for interviews targeting practices as opposed to inter- views targeting facts, values, or attitudes, which seem to be the targets of most critical discussion of interview research (e.g., Jerolmack and Khan 2014). My research design targets practices through questions that ask for stories about concrete instances of their everyday work life, look- ing for frames of reference that can be expected to remain intact even in attempts to present a selective and sanitized picture of their work.

In this research design, validity and reliability depend on the assumption that respondents share a social space with some shared assumptions. If the respondents’ answers are strongly divergent, if they do not reveal shared assumptions about routines and procedures, or if the terms of the questions do not make sense to respondents, these assumptions would be falsified.

I complement the evidence produced in these interviews with other sources of evidence about what it is that organizations do and do not do, such as campaign publications, annual reports, other academic work, and published reflections by professionals and debates among them. All quotes from interviews are anonymized; if I mention the names of specific organizations I am drawing on publicly available information.

This article looks at practices and routines inside NGOs. The research design directly targets a key site of resource allocation in human rights work, the program management offices of inter- national NGOs; the data do not allow me to quantify the effects of the observations about manag- ers’ practices, which I collect. The data do allow me to conceptualize mechanisms that affect the distribution of resources based on close examination of practices in this site.

Repertoires of practice

Human rights organizations share a set of assumptions about a set or repertoire of practices, which are considered legitimate as “human rights work”; resources, such as staff time, are distrib- uted across these practices, not others. Previous work has highlighted the fact that human rights organizations, such as very prominently Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, accord a central role to the “report” as a product of their activity in the planning of their work and the accounting for their work (Cohen 1996; de Waal 2003; Dudai 2012; Moon 2012). In what follows, I build on this observation about the report but suggest that we should not overlook “the campaign” as an element of the repertoire of practice, as well as the more narrowly legal aspects of human rights work.

As de Waal (2003) has pointed out, research and reporting has been a major activity for human rights organizations. He argues that secondary human rights organizations “use research, documentation and publication combined with the skilled use of the media and lobbying of

172 M. KRAUSE

politicians to make their concerns known. Their basic premise is that if people know about an abuse they will be moved to want to stop it.” This is a premise that is not as often reflected as it could be (de Waal 2003: 239). Human rights organizations have developed a particular notion of “research,” one that is heavily influenced by legal notions of research. In many organizations, researchers are looking to interview individual victims of human rights violations, and they are looking to establish facts by looking for corroborating evidence from different sources.

The information in human rights reports is heavily fact-checked. Several respondents have had the experience of research not being published because a superior in the organization judged that the information they had collected was not good enough or because there were not enough testi- monies from individuals directly affected by a violation of human rights.

Human rights organizations have a repertoire of practices, which goes beyond research in this sense of “information for the public.” “Campaigns” and “projects” are also important units of human rights work with potentially different implications for how work is organized: Campaigns emphasize an issue, a strategy, and a goal, rather than necessarily “new” information; projects can consist of a range of activities. Practices, such as writing a press release, sending advocacy letters, conducting research, or releasing extended pressers, are sometimes part of producing one of such units, but can in principle stand on their own.

A singular emphasis on reports or on information as products of human rights work would lead us to underestimate the legal aspect of human rights work, or at least would reduce what is particular about information when it is woven into particular legal and institutional contexts: Human rights organizations are regularly involved in writing briefs for court cases (see Van der Vet 2012; Van den Eynde 2013; Van der Vet 2014) or providing legal advice. Some human rights organizations have whole projects or units devoted to servicing particular legal instruments, such as the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review or the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture.

Human rights NGOs also send observers to court cases, do monitoring visits, or send someone to accompany someone deemed at risk. “Training” is an important area of activity for human rights organizations. International human rights organizations provide training to human rights defenders and to activists working with local human rights organizations. They also organize workshops for teachers, police officers, and judges.

Though the repertoire has diverse elements, it still acts as a preselector among practices, and much of this preselection work is implicit in expectations about what is and what is not profes- sional human rights work: When we compare international human rights NGOs to primary mobilizations, as de Waal (2003) has done, we can note the restrictions of the repertoire of prac- tice by noting some of what human rights NGOs do not do: As secondary human rights NGOs, these organizations do not tend to provide long-term social services combined with public educa- tion in a place; they do not tend to turn out people for rallies, or invest significant staff resources in long-term organizing in particular communities, though they may work closely with organiza- tions which do do that kind of work.

Thematic and regional divisions

Alongside a process that distributes resources among elements of the repertoire of practice, resources are distributed across geographical and thematic areas. Most international human rights organizations have both regional and thematic divisions: Regional programs cover large geograph- ical areas, such as Africa or South East Asia. Within that, or standing on their own, organizations might create units focusing on specific smaller regions, such as the Caucasus or the Horn of Africa, or on individual countries. Human Rights Watch, for example, has regional programs as well as the following focus themes: children, migration, refugee rights, terrorism/counterterrorism environment, disability, United Nations, women’s rights, business and human rights, lesbian, gay,

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 173

bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights program, health and human rights, free speech, torture, arms, and international justice.2

Another organization, the International Commission of Jurists, has a program that covers Europe and the Former Soviet Republics, a program for the Middle East and North Africa, a pro- gram for Asia, a program for Africa, and a regional office in Central America. The organization also has a program on the independence of judges, on the United Nations, on business and human rights, on Economics, Social and Cultural rights, on sexual orientation and gender iden- tity, on women’s human rights, and on global security and on the rule of law.3

The themes that structure human rights work have a history, in the sense that they emerge and change over time. They may rise in prominence and also sometimes fall again. They also have a politics, which means they are championed by specific actors and coalitions relatively independently of the law (Carpenter 2007a, 2007b; Bob 2008; Carpenter 2010, 2014). Though the Convenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights was passed in 1966, for example, human rights organizations were initially associated with a focus on civil and political rights (de Waal 2003). Amnesty International, for example, started to embrace reporting on economic and social rights in the early 2000s (Goering 2006; Hertel 2017).

The increasing attention to LGBTQ rights provides another example of historical change. LGBTQ rights are today not only the focus of specific LGBTQ organizations, but have come to be included as an explicit focus by many mainstream international human rights organizations. This is the result of intense pressure and a long struggle by social movement actors (Mertus 2008).

Within themes, organizations put distinctive emphases. One respondent who worked for an organization focused on civil and political rights, for example, explained how they had not histor- ically worked on freedom of religion, and have not engaged in the observation of elections; another respondent explained that she had a focus on LBT (lesbian, bisexual, and transgender) rights in her projects, a focus chosen to “highlight that gay men are often over-prioritised in projects.”

Countries and focus countries

Human rights law applies across all signatory states. For some human rights professionals, “universalism” has meant that they aim to monitor the human rights situation in the entire world, and in each and every country. In reality, most organizations today have focus countries. One respondent from an American NGO, for example, explained a shift in her organization as follows: “It was felt that the list of countries or list of issues in the old days, five or more years ago only, was firstly too long but it was spread too thinly and also that it would chop and change too often, so just be too reactive. And so the idea is that we pick a few countries and really we stick with them for four years and then have a review. So I’ve been doing Bahrain and Egypt. Two and a half years ago I started with those. Indonesia too to some extent, and I got some extra staff so I may add another country or possibly even two next year.”

When countries are units of intervention, they can become units of strategic reflection, that is organizations, like the one just referenced, can think about how many and which it might be best to include in their programming. Organizations can try to create focus by limiting the number of countries, such as described in the preceding, or they can try to expand. One respondent, for example, spoke of her ambition to take a program focused on Russia as a basis for a larger pro- gram also involving Armenia, Belarus, the Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan: “So it’s regionalizing it, and upscaling it, so that we’re now dealing with many more stakeholders, many more activists, many more countries.”

One program officer has described to me how the formal focus on specific countries affects the way she “distributes” human rights: She4 said, “If there is a lawyer arrested in Azerbaijan,

174 M. KRAUSE

because we have the project on Russia we will raise that issue, and probably the Azerbaijan lawyer won’t be … we won’t do anything about that Azerbaijan lawyer, even though for us from the objective point of view it doesn’t matter. But then that’s why I am saying there is a subjective fac- tor with that, we have to … we are limited sometimes by the projects that we are implementing.”

The fact that human rights organizations have themes and focus countries means that it mat- ters, for individual victims of human rights violation, which aggregate their violation is a part of. This is true in other contexts, where suffering meets response. Individual illness, for example, becomes part of an “emergency” that qualifies for humanitarian relief based on aggregate counts of cases per population and over time (Krause 2014). There is inequality in provision across and within national states, but this kind of inequality is a little more paradoxical for international efforts, which came into being to respond to the failings of national states and focus on individu- als and their dignity.

Selecting among units of planning

Units of work constructed inside organizations shape the ground on which decisions are made. How do organizations decide among units of work? I next discuss a number of factors that come into view as program managers are charged with “making an impact.” It should be noted that, philosophically speaking, human rights thinking has often been in opposition to utilitarianism (Hart 1979), and the general demand to demonstrate impact and show results has faced much more opposition in human rights work than in development aid and humanitarian relief (Desormeau and Ignatieff 2005; International Council for Human Rights Policy 2012; Schlangen 2014). There is a long tradition of “trying to do the impossible” or “simply doing what is right.” Rhonda Schlangen quotes a human rights advocate she interviewed with a sentiment that expresses an important aspect of the anti-utilitarian culture of human rights NGOs. The advocate said: “I spent eight years defending political prisoners. There was no hope of their release. I lost every case. What was my [observable] impact? Zero. Should I have done it? I haven’t found one person who says no” (Schlangen 2014: 6). Some of my respondents echoed a similar sentiment: “We would not say that, ‘Okay, let’s work in Georgia because that’s where we can see progress instead of Uzbekhistan.’ No, that is not how we are thinking. That’s development thinking.”

But managers in human rights organizations do talk about impact all the time when discussing their own projects and programs. The respondent quoted earlier as contrasting “development thinking” with practices in human rights work, also said that she had “successfully argued to the management team that we should not focus on fundraising for these two regions for the coming three years because the impact we can have comparing to the work we would have to put into these regions is rather small.” Speaking of staff as a scarce resource, another country representa- tive told me, for example, “figuring out how to allocate that is a challenge, in a way that’s going to have as much impact as possible.”

Conditions of work and vulnerability of the target

Organizations do sometimes consider conditions on the ground that would make engagement meaningful or make success more likely. Countries differ in the ways in which they are hospitable to the repertoire of practice of human rights work. Ethiopia, for example, is very hard to access for foreign human rights workers. For that reason, it is difficult to produce reports in or about Ethiopia that hold up to the specific standards, which NGOs have developed based on their experience in other contexts.

The Association for the Prevention of Torture’s Guidelines on Country Engagement, for example, state that an engagement “should be capable of having an impact in the national

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 175

context. In particular there should exist the possibility to promote and pursue the three integrated elements for effective prevention of torture (transparency, legal framework, will and capacity to change).”5

In the pursuit of impact, managers consider whether or not the responsible party or the “target of advocacy” is vulnerable to advocacy. In this logic, it was explained to me, it is difficult to make the case for a report on Ethiopia or Iran because this work would likely have no impact, given the intransigence of these governments.

One respondent explained how this discussion of vulnerable targets affects how his organiza- tion distributes attention among actors within Afghanistan. He explained that in Afghanistan there are three main actors engaged in human rights abuses: the Afghan government, the inter- national community, and the Taliban. “So who are the worst of those three groups?” he asked. “Well, probably, arguably the Taliban. The Afghan government and the international troops and international embassies are not targeting large groups of civilians and intentionally blowing them up, but does the Taliban care at all what [my organization] says? We certainly haven’t seen the evidence that they do.”

This focus on likely success is in tension with proportionality of attention to all cases: “This is kind of an ongoing argument I have with my boss because honestly I think we should be focus- ing more attention on the Taliban, I think that we have to keep talking about, out of a sense of proportionality, out of a sense that if you’re committing human rights abuses we care and we’re paying attention, even if, whether you’re in all this, I mean it begins to feel a little bit skewed sometimes because, so the Taliban doesn’t seem to care at all what we think. The Afghan govern- ment cares a little bit and the international community, particularly the US government is quite susceptible to embarrassment by a group like [my organization] because they take us seriously and they don’t like to be spoken of badly by us. But we have to make sure that that doesn’t mean that we spend all of our time shouting at the US government and none of our time talking about the Afghan government or the Taliban so it’s very difficult, but should we spend a third a third a third of our time no probably not, so it’s sort of a constant struggle I think to figure out how to balance that right. Yes, and I definitely try and advocate for a more frequent focus on the Taliban and I don’t win that battle.”

Levers of change and measurable results

Vulnerable perpetrators of human rights violation are a “lever” of some kind: something that can be used to have an impact. Levers attract resources toward them. Western governments and the law are also considered a lever within international human rights organizations, a tool that, prop- erly influenced and used, can effect change in the whole world.

Several human rights organizations based in the United Kingdom have officers focused on the UK government. One program officer I spoke to had a focus on the UK Foreign Office as part of her job description. The US-American organization Human Rights First, for example, is a (uni- versalist) human rights organization geared around a single leverage. It aims to “challenge America to live up to its ideals.” This means that its unique strategy is to think about in which areas, on which issues, and through which means pressure on the US government can make the most difference for improving human rights outcomes across the world.

The institutions and instruments of human rights law play a role as one lever among others. Like the US government, the instruments of international human rights law attract attention as levers, as possible reinforcers, and as routes to success. Legal instruments command resources, through defining roles, projects, and programs that serve them. The OHCHR’s Periodic Review Process relies on submissions by NGOs, including international NGOs on particular countries at particular times. The Association for the Prevention of Torture, for example, has a program

176 M. KRAUSE

servicing the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (OPCAT), which it also helped lobby for.

Legal processes also contain a promise to produce results, which are regarded as measurable results. The law, both national and international, emerges as a privileged result. The focus on results, defined in distinction to activities, has a long history in discussions of management across organizational sectors, dating back, for example, to progressive critiques of corrupt government, critiques of bureaucracies in the 1960s and the new public management of the 1980s and 1990s (see, e.g., Krause 2014). These discussions are also reaching human rights NGOs, particularly as they seek to access funds administered through governmental development agencies.

This pressure is brought to human rights work partly from donors, but it is not the same as donors’ geopolitical self-interest; it is pushed by internal reformers as well (Desormeau and Ignatieff 2005; ICHRP 2012; Schlangen 2014). An important way to show results in human rights work is to demonstrate legal change in one way or another. Legal change could be a policy change in a specific state, a new international instrument, or the text of a constitution.

One legal officer explained how after the uprising during the Arab Spring, donors and NGOs were very keen to intervene and influence the new constitutions: “Especially concerning Economic, Social and Cultural Rights we are very keen on having more and more constitutions recognizing or guaranteeing explicitly a whole catalogue of rights and bill of rights in line with what we have now in international law. So you think all the new constitutions have … a whole bunch of economic, social and cultural rights compared to older constitutions. Each time we have a constitutional reform process … everybody just jumps on the thing and that was quite impres- sive in Tunisia.” This respondent felt the attention on Tunisia was disproportionate.

Another respondent mentioned a pressure to focus on strategic litigation. “Some donors have discovered very much for themselves strategic litigation, so it means that they are very keen on seeing their money being used … [in this way] … because I guess it’s very concrete. You go and you have a case and this is a straightforward case and you have a decision, hopefully a good one and a very systematic and structural one … there is this transformative effect of this kind of litigation … I think it’s … quite a neat indicator if you get the decision.”

The legal focus of Western human rights NGOs has long been criticized in the debate on human rights (de Waal 2003; Shivji 2007; Moyn 2012; Hopgood 2013). The pursuit of both con- stitutional guarantees and strategic litigation can be in tension with what might otherwise be meaningful ways of organizing human rights work. This tension is highlighted in the account of the legal officer quoted in the preceding paragraph regarding the Tunisian revolution: Western NGOs, in accordance with their programming routines, had planned an orderly consultation meeting among “civil society representatives.” Activists on the ground invited people via Facebook and the meeting was rather more tumultuous than expected.

Litigation involves building a relationship with possible clients, which can take many years and involves personal investments on all sides. This is in tension with the time frames in which donors usually expect NGOs to develop strategic litigation. While it is relatively easy to find funding for work that produces legal change, it is harder to find support for capacity building and training, to fund general operations, and to fund a capacity to give advice to people and react to current affairs.

Conclusions

This article has asked how international human rights organizations choose between the different things they could be doing, different things that could all be reasonably justified by reference to human rights and international human rights law. I have argued that underlying explicit discus- sions about priorities and strategies, the way in which “units” of work and planning are construed shape the distribution of resources. Resources are distributed on the one hand among a set of

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 177

acceptable practices and ways of responding, and on the other hand among the thematic and geo- graphical units, which structure human rights organizations.

The repertoire of practice includes very prominently reports but also campaigns, trainings, and legal briefs. This repertoire distinguishes international human rights NGOs from other sets of organizations, be it national armies, supermarkets, or humanitarian NGOs. It limits the way NGOs respond to the world, providing a measure of autonomy, for better or worse, vis-�a-vis both donor demands and pressure from social movements.

The way international human rights organizations distribute resources across themes and countries has important implications for the way resources are distributed across rights, right bearers, and violations. Units of work mediate between organizations and resources on the one hand, and rights and violations on the other hand. Though human rights are accorded to each and every individual, any individual’s rights or violation thereof becomes actionable for human rights NGOs as part of units tied to thematic or geographical aggregates. These units can become an object of organizational strategy, and rise and fall relatively independently of changes in the outside world.

The article has discussed some of the factors that shape how human rights NGOs select among the practices, countries, and themes that function as candidates for the distribution of resources: As human rights workers consider where their organizations can make a difference, conditions of work and the vulnerability of the target come into view, levers matter, and the way making a dif- ference can be demonstrated plays a role.

My analysis is not a basis for commenting on the effectiveness of specific interventions; indeed, examining the sum of practices employed by the field of human rights organizations as a whole should make us skeptical of efforts to maximize effectiveness on the level of a single pro- ject or intervention, as they can lead to collectively problematic outcomes. By considering the experience of practitioners across organizations, we can gain some insights into the collective response, how it is distributed, what is hard to get done (but might be meaningful), and what the trends are (which might not be as meaningful).

I focused here on Western international NGOs; further research could explore the fuller range of practices that the much broader set of organizations that are or could be called human rights organizations employ, including social movement actors in all regions of the world.

The research design of this project targets a key site of resource allocation in human rights, the program management offices of international NGOs; this allows me to conceptualize mecha- nisms that affect the distribution of resources based on close examination of practices in this site. The data discussed here do not allow me to observe the overall effects of the mechanisms thus identified, however. This research could thus be usefully complemented with data about the pat- terns of distribution that result from the practices we examine. Building on this research, scholars can collect and examine data on patterns of distribution across countries, within countries, across different types of activities, and across different types of themes.

Notes

1. Respondents worked for organizations including Amnesty International, Amnesty International Germany, Amnesty International Netherlands, Amnesty International UK, Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, Civil Rights Defenders, Equality Now, German Institute for Human Rights, European Center for Constitutional Rights, Gesellschaft fuer Bedrohte Voelker, Human Rights First, Human Rights Watch, Institute for Human Rights and Business, International Commission of Jurists, International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Foundation, Justice and Peace, Ludwig-Boltzman Institute for Human Rights, PEN International, and Women’s Commission for Human Rights.

2. See www.hrw.org, last accessed April 5, 2019. 3. Compare to https://www.icj.org/themes, last accessed January 5, 2018. 4. Male and female pronouns are used interchangeably in the interest of anonymization. 5. http://www.apt.ch/content/files_res/APTCountryEngagement_En.pdf, last accessed June 14, 2017.

178 M. KRAUSE

Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to respondents who generously donated their time to the project, as well as to three anonymous reviewers and to Katherine Robinson, Emily Barman, Debbie Becher, Craig Calhoun, Katherine Chen, Lilie Chouliaraki, Claes-Fredrik Helgesson, Jane Jones, Ella McPherson, Michael McQuarrie, Sibille Merz, Kate Nash, Shani Orgad, Christopher Roberts, Joachim Savelsberg, and Kate Wright.

Funding

This work was supported by the British Academy Small Grant Scheme (R1205) and a Future Research Leaders’ Grant from the Economic and Social Research Council (R116810) and the Helsinki Collegium of Advanced Study.

Notes on contributors

Monika Krause is an associate professor of sociology at the London School of Economics and co-directs LSE Human Rights. She is the author of The Good Project. Humanitarian NGOs and the Fragmentation of Reason, which won awards from the British Sociological Association, the American Sociological Association, and the Association for Research on Non-profit Organizations and Voluntary Associations. Her work has been published in British Journal of Sociology, Poetics, Public Culture, Sociological Review, European Journal of Sociology, European Journal of Social Theory, and European Journal of Political Theory.

References

BARNETT, Michael. (2002) Eyewitness to Genocide. The United Nations and Rwanda (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press).

BECKER, Howard. (1982) Art Worlds (Oakland, CA: University of California Press). BERGER, Peter L, and LUCKMANN, Thomas. (1966) The Social Construction of Reality (New York, NY: Random

House). BOB, Clifford. (2002) Globalization and the social construction of human rights campaigns. In Globalization and

Human Rights, Alison Brysk (ed.) (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press). BOB, Clifford. (2005) The Marketing of Rebellion: Insurgents, Media, and International Activism (Cambridge, UK:

Cambridge University Press). BOB, Clifford. (2008) The Struggle for New Human Rights (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press). BOB, Clifford. (2010) The market in human rights. In Advocacy Organizations and Collective Action, Aseem

Prakash and Mary Kay Gugerty (eds.) (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press). BOGNER, Alexander, LITTIG, Beate, and MENZ, Wolfgang (eds.). (2009) Interviewing Experts (London, UK:

MacMillan). BOURDIEU, Pierre. (1995) The Rules of Art. Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field Pierre Bourdieu (Stanford,

CA: Stanford University Press). BRENNAN, Richard J, and MARTONE, Gerald. (2007) The evolving role of relief organizations in human rights

and protection. In Fear of Persecution: Global Human Rights, International Law, and Human Well-Being, James D. White and Anthony J. Marsella (eds.) (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books).

CARPENTER, Charli. (2005) Women, children and other vulnerable groups: Gender, strategic frames and the pro- tection of civilians as a transnational issue. International Studies Quarterly, 49(2), 295–334.

CARPENTER, Charli. (2007a) Studying issue (non)-adoption in transnational networks. International Organization, 61(3), 643–667.

CARPENTER, Charli. (2007b) Setting the advocacy agenda: Issues and non-issues around children and armed con- flict. International Studies Quarterly, 51(1), 99–102.

CARPENTER, Charli. (2010) Forgetting Children Born of War: Setting the Human Rights Agenda in Bosnia and Beyond (New York, NY: Columbia University Press).

CARPENTER, Charli. (2011) Vetting the advocacy agenda: Networks, centrality and the paradox of weapons norms. International Organization, 65(1), 69–102.

CARPENTER, Charli. (2014) Lost Causes: Agenda-Vetting in Global Issue Networks and the Shaping of Human Security (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press).

COHEN, Michael D., MARCH, James G, and OLSEN, Johan P. (1972) A garbage can model of organizational choice. Administrative Science Quarterly, 17(1), 1–25.

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 179

COHEN, Stanley. (1996) Government responses to human rights reports: Claims, denials, and counterclaims. Human Rights Quarterly, 18(3), 517–543.

COOLEY, Alexander, and RON, James. (2002) The NGO scramble: Organizational insecurity and the political economy of transnational action. International Security, 27(1), 5–39.

DE WAAL, Alex. (2003) Human rights, institutional wrongs. In Rethinking International Organizations: Pathology and Promise, Dennis Dijkzeul and Yves Beigbeder (eds.) (New York, NY: Berghahn Books).

DESMOND, Matthew. (2007) On the Fireline: Living and Dying with Wildland Firefighters (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press).

DESORMEAU, Kate, and IGNATIEFF, Michael. (2005) Measurements and Human Rights: Tracking Progress, Assessing Impact [Online]. Available: https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/carrcenter/files/measurement_ 2005report.pdf [15 May 2018]

DEZALAY, Yves, and GARTH, Bryan. (2006) From the Cold War to Kosovo: The rise and renewal of the field of international human rights. Annual Review of Law and the Social Sciences, 2, 231–255.

DIMAGGIO, Paul J, and POWELL, Woody W. (1983) The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphisms and col- lective rationality in organizational fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147–160.

DOUZINAS, Costas. (2014) Human rights and the paradoxes of liberalism. In Liberalism in Neoliberal Times, Alejandro Abraham-Hamanoiel, Des Freedman, Gholam Khiabany, Kate Nash, and Julian Petley (eds.) (London, UK: Goldsmiths University Press).

DUDAI, Ron. (2012) ‘Can you describe this?’ Human rights reports and what they tell us about the human rights movement. In Humanitarianism and Suffering, Richard Ashby Wilson and Richard D. Brown (eds.) (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

FISHMAN, Mark. (1978) Crime waves as ideology. Social Problems, 25(5), 531–543. FLIGSTEIN, Neil, and McADAM, Doug. (2012) A Theory of Fields (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press). FLIGSTEIN, Neil. (2001) Social skill and the theory of fields. Sociological Theory, 19(2), 105–125. FOX, Ren�ee C. (1995) Medical humanitarianism and human rights: Reflections on Doctors Without Borders and

Doctors of the World. Social Science & Medicine, 41(12), 1607–1616. FROHARDT, Mark, PAUL, Diane, and MINEAR, Larry. (1999) Protecting Human Rights: The Challenge to

Humanitarian Organizations [Occasional Paper 35] (Providence, RI: Thomas J. Watson Jr. Institute for International Studies).

GL€ASER, Jochen, and LAUDEL, Grit (2004) Experteninterviews und Qualitative Inhaltsanalyse als Instrumente Rekonstruierender Untersuchungen (Wiesbaden, Germany: VS).

GOERING, Curt. (2006) Amnesty International and economic, social, and cultural rights. In Ethics in Action, Daniel A. Bell and Jean-Marc Coicaud (eds.) (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

GOODALE, Mark, and MERRY, Sally E. (eds.). (2007) The Practice of Human Rights: Tracking Law between the Global and the Local (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

GUILHOT, Nicolas. (2005) The Democracy Makers (New York, NY: Columbia University Press). HAGAN, John. (2003) Justice in the Balkans: Prosecuting War Crimes at the Hague Tribunal (Chicago, IL:

University of Chicago Press). HAHN, Kristina, and HOLZSCHEITER, Anna. (2013) The ambivalence of advocacy: Representation and contest-

ation in global NGO advocacy for child workers and sex workers. Global Society, 27(4), 497–520. HART, Herbert. L. A. (1979) Between utility and rights. Columbia Law Review, 79(5), 828–846. HERTEL, Shareen. (2006) Unexpected Power: Conflict and Change Among Transnational Activist (Ithaca, NY:

Cornell University Press). HERTEL, Shareen. (2017) Re-framing human rights advocacy: The rise of economic rights. In Human Rights

Futures, Jack Snyder, Leslie Vinjamuri, and Stephen Hopgood (eds.) (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

HOPGOOD, Stephen. (2010) Dignity and ennui: Amnesty International Report 2009: The state of the world’s human rights, London: Amnesty International Publications. Journal of Human Practice, 2(1), 151–165.

HOPGOOD, Stephen. (2013) The Endtimes of Human Rights (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press). HOPGOOD, Steven. (2006) Keepers of the Flame: Understanding Amnesty International (Ithaca, NY: Cornell

University Press). HULME, David, and EDWARDS, Michael. (1997) NGOs, States and Donors: Too Close for Comfort? (New York,

NY: St. Martin’s Press). INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL FOR HUMAN RIGHTS POLICY. (2012) No Perfect Measure: Rethinking

Evaluation and Assessment of Human Rights Work [Online]. Available: http://www.ichrp.org/files/reports/68/ 181_evaluating_hr_work_report.pdf [29 March 2017]

JEROLMACK, Colin, and KHAN, Shamus. (2014) Talk is cheap: Ethnography and the attitudinal fallacy. Sociological Methods & Research, 43(2), 178–209.

KECK, Margaret E, and SIKKINK, Kathryn. (1998) Activists Beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press).

180 M. KRAUSE

KENNEDY, David. (2004) The Dark Sides of Virtue: Reassessing International Humanitarianism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press).

KILLANDER, Magnus, and ABEBE, Adem. (2011) Human rights developments in the African Union. African Human Rights Journal.

KRAUSE, Monika. (2014) The Good Project. Humanitarian Relief and the Fragmentation of Reason (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press).

LAMONT, Michele, and TH�EVENOT, Laurent. (2000) Rethinking Comparative Cultural Sociology (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

LAMONT, Mich�ele. (1992) Money, Morals and Manners: The Culture of the French and American Upper Middle Classes (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press).

LAMONT, Michele. (1995) National identity and national boundary patterns in France and the United States. French Historical Studies, 19(2), 349–365.

LINDENBERG, Mark, and BRYANT, Coralie. (2001) Going Global: Transforming Relief and Development NGOs (Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press).

McPHERSON, Ella. (2012) How editors choose which human rights to cover: A case study of Mexican newspapers. In Media, Mobilization and Human Rights: Mediating Suffering, Anne Tristan Borer (ed.) (London, UK: Zed Books).

MEDVETZ, Tom. (2013) Think Tanks in America (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press). MERRY, Sally E. (2003) Rights talk and the experience of law: Implementing women’s human rights to protection

from violence. Human Rights Quarterly, 25(2), 343–381. MERRY, Sally E, and LEVITT, Peggy. (2009) Vernacularization on the ground: Local uses of global women’s rights

in Peru, China, India and the United States. Global Networks, 9(4), 441–461. MERTUS, Julie. (2008) Applying the gatekeeper model of human rights activism: The U.S.-based movement for

LGBT rights. In The Struggle for New Human Rights, Clifford Bob (ed.) (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press).

MEYER, John W, and ROWAN, Brian. (1977) Institutionalized organizations: Formal structure as myth and cere- mony. American Journal of Sociology, 83(2), 340–363.

MEYERS, Stephen. (2019) Civilizing Disability Society: The UN Disability Convention and Grassroots Disabled Persons Organizations. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press).

MILLER, Hannah. (2010) From ‘rights-based’ to ‘rights-framed’ approaches: A social constructionist view of human rights practice. International Journal of Human Rights, 14(6), 915–931.

MOECKLI, Daniel, and NOWAK, Manfred. (2007) The deployment of human rights field operations: Policy, polit- ics and practice. In The Human Rights Field Operation: Law, Theory and Practice, Michael O’Flaherty (ed.) (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate).

MOLOTCH, Harvey, and LESTER, Marion. (1975) Accidental news: The great oil spill as local occurrence and national event. American Journal of Sociology, 81(2), 235–260.

MOON, Claire. (2012) What one sees and how one files seeing: Reporting atrocity and suffering. Sociology, 46(5), 876–890.

MOYN, Samuel. (2012) The Last Utopia. Human Rights in History. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press). MWAMBENE, Lea. (2018) Recent legal responses to child marriage in Southern Africa: The case of Zimbabwe,

South Africa and Malawi. African Human Rights Law Journal 18(2), 527–550. NASH, Kate. (2007) The Pinochet case: Cosmopolitanism and intermestic human rights. British Journal of

Sociology, 58(3), 417–435. NASH, Kate. (2012) Human rights, movements and law: On not researching legitimacy. Sociology, 46(5), 797–812. O’FLAHERTY, Michael. (2007) The Human Rights Field Operation. Law Theory and Practice (London, UK:

Ashgate). PFADENHAUER, Michaela. (2009) Auf gleicher Augenhoehe reden. In Interviewing Experts, Alexander Bogner,

Beate Littig, and Wolfgang Menz (eds.) (London, UK: MacMillan). PRAKASH, Aseem, and GUGERTY, Mary Kay (eds.). (2010) Rethinking Advocacy Organizations: A Collective

Action Perspective (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press). PRUCE, Joel R. (2015) The practice turn in human rights research. In The Social Practice of Human Rights, Joel

Pruce (ed.) (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan). PRUCE, Joel R, and BUDABIN, Alexandra Cosima. (2016) Beyond naming and shaming: New modalities of infor-

mation politics in human rights. Journal of Human Rights, 15(3), 408–425. SASSEN, Saskia. (2006) Territory, Authority, Rights. From Medieval to Global Assemblages (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press). SCHEFFER, Thomas. (2010) Adversarial Case-Making. An Ethnography of the English Crown Court (Amsterdam,

The Netherlands: Brill). SCHJOLDEN, Line. (2009) Sentencing the social question: Court-made labour law in cases of occupational acci-

dents in Argentina, 1900–1915, Journal of Latin American Studies, 41(1), 91–120.

JOURNAL OF HUMAN RIGHTS 181

SCHLANGEN, Rhonda. (2014) Monitoring and Evaluation for Human Rights Organisations: Three Case Studies [Online]. Available: http://www.evaluationinnovation.org/sites/default/files/CEI%20HR%20Case%20Studies.pdf [29 March 2017]

SHIVJI, Issa G. (2007) The Concept of Human Rights in Africa (London, UK: African Books Collective). SILBER, Ilana F. (2003) Pragmatic sociology as cultural sociology: Beyond repertoire theory? European Journal of

Social Theory, 6(4), 427–449. SIM�EANT, Johanna. (2005) What is going global? The internationalization of French NGOs ‘without borders.’

Review of International Political Economy, 12(5), 851–883. SMITH, Jackie, PAGNUCCO, Ron, and LOPEZ, George A. (1998) Globalizing human rights: The work of trans-

national human rights NGOs in the 1990s. Human Rights Quarterly, 20(2), 379–412. SWIDLER, Ann. (1986) Culture in action: Symbols and strategies. American Sociological Review, 51(2), 273–286. SWIDLER, Ann. (2001) What anchors cultural practices. In The Practical Turn, Theodore R. Schatzki, Karin Knorr

Cetina, and Eike von Savigny (eds.) (London, UK: Routledge and Kegan Paul). VAN DEN EYNDE, Lauren. (2013) An empirical look at the amicus curiae practice of human rights NGOs before

the European Court of Human Rights. Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, 31(3), 271–313. VAN DER VET, Freek. (2012) Seeking life, finding justice: Russian NGO litigation and Chechen disappearances

before the European Court of Human Rights. Human Rights Review, 13(3), 303–325. VAN DER VET, Freek. (2014) Holding on to legalism: The politics of Russian litigation on torture and discrimin-

ation before the European Court of Human Rights. Social and Legal Studies, 23(3), 361–381. VAUGHAN, Diane. (1996) The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture and Deviance at NASA

(Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press). WANYEKI, Muthoni L. (2003) Women and Land in Africa. Culture, Religion and Realizing Women’s Rights

(London, UK: Zed Books). WONG, Wendy. (2012) Internal Affairs: How the Structure of NGOs Transforms Human Rights (Ithaca, NY:

Cornell University Press).

182 M. KRAUSE

Information Effects and Human Rights Data: Is the Good News About Increased Human Rights Information Bad News for Human Rights Measures?

Author(s): Ann Marie Clark and Kathryn Sikkink

Source: Human Rights Quarterly , August 2013, Vol. 35, No. 3 (August 2013), pp. 539-568

Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/24518073

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

The Johns Hopkins University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Human Rights Quarterly

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY

Information Effects and Human

Rights Data: Is the Good News About Increased Human Rights Information Bad News for Human Rights Measures?

Ann Marie Clark* & Kathryn Sikkink*

ABSTRACT

Changes in quality and availability of information related to human rights violations raise questions about how best to use existing data to assess human rights change. Information effects are discernible both in primary sources of information and data coded by two prominent human rights datasets, the Political Terror Scale (PTS) and the Cingranelli-Richards Human Rights Data Set (C1RI). The authors discuss ways that human rights information has changed for the better, evaluate the scales and their primary text sources for countries in Latin America, and compare them with information drawn from regional truth commission data. Extra caution is advised when using summary data to make inferences about human rights change.

Ann Marie Clark is Associate Professor of Political Science at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana.

f Kathryn Sikkink is Regents Professor and McKnight Presidential Chair in Political Science at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. For comments we would like to thank David Cingranelli, Rosalee Clawson, Dara Kay Cohen, Yasmine Ergas, Ryan Goodman, Robert Keohane, Hunjoon Kim, Sophie Lelièvre, James A. McCann, Will Moore, David Richards, Kiyoteru Tsutsui, Jana von Stein, Geoff Dancy, and members of the Fall 2010 New York University Seminar on International Relations and International Law and Columbia University's Institute for the Study of Human Rights, where Ann Marie Clark was a visiting scholar in 2010-2011. Brooke Coe, Geoff Dancy, Raul Danyi, Andrew Grover, Julia Kaspar, Darrah McCracken, Claudia Munoz, and Carrie Walling provided research assistance.

Human Rights Quarterly 35 (2013) 539-568 © 2013 by The Johns Hopkins University Press

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

540 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

I. INTRODUCTION

Human rights have become a high-profile issue in global politics and inter national relations scholarship. Moreover, documentation of governments' human rights practices in recent decades has increased dramatically in quantity and quality. Recent reports from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) like Amnesty International (AI) and Human Rights Watch, among others, and governmental sources like the US Department of State (State Department) now typically contain much more and better information than earlier reports. More recent reports also tend to document a wider range of human rights violations. Therefore, social scientists are accruing ever more data on human rights, permitting a broader range of analytic techniques to be employed in causal studies. The increase in the quality and quantity of information about human rights violations around the world is good news for scholars and practitioners interested in the politics of human rights change. However, the varying availability and precision of country-specific information give rise to two major issues explored below: how information availability has changed; and the implications for how researchers should interpret such information, particularly when it is processed for secondary use in summary data sets.

The choice of data, the artifacts of data gathering, and the information environment within which human rights violations take place all potentially affect the ability to understand variation in levels of violations over time. As this area of research continues to grow, researchers should beware of pos sible "information effects": patterns in the data stemming from the process of information collection and interpretation, rather than the process that actually gives rise to human rights violations or their mitigation. This article brings four questions and related hypotheses to bear on the likelihood of information effects in the data. How good is the source information? Do changes in information supply impact data coding? Do the data sets suit ably register changes in type of repression, as reflected in the source reports over time? Do the data sets and their source reports register worsening and improvement adequately?

Much of the quantitative human rights research up to now has relied on two data sets, the Political Terror Scale (PTS)' and the Cingranelli-Richards Human Rights Data Set (CIRI).2 Both gauge countries' human rights perfor mance using the annual reports of AI and the State Department. Researchers using both quantitative and qualitative data should be on the lookout for

1. Political Terror Scale, available at http://www.politicalterrorscale.org. 2. CIRI Human Rights Data Project, available at http://www.humanrightsdata.org.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 541

information effects, but users of these summary databases face particularly acute issues of interpretation. Patterns related to information availability and how the scales deal with variation in the substantive nature of human rights violations can be embedded in the coding and therefore difficult to separate from patterns related to actual changes in violations.

This is not an arcane concern, because quantitative studies of human rights are one of the fastest growing fields in research on world politics. Between 1999 and 2011, ninety articles using either PTS or CIRI were pub lished in the top political science and human rights journals: eight appeared in Human Rights Quarterly.3 Many of these articles make important causal and theoretical claims on issues including globalization's effect on human rights, the impact of regime type on the use of torture, and hypothesized causal relationships between human rights and foreign aid allocation, de mocracy, transitional justice mechanisms, internal armed conflict, and treaty commitment and compliance. The information patterns and measurement issues have important implications for understanding the dynamics of human rights and how findings are evaluated.

In a recent review essay, Emilie M. Hafner-Burton and James Ron char acterized the results of quantitative human rights studies as "pessimistic" about human rights improvements, in comparison with more "optimistic" case study work, suggesting that mixed large-n-based results belie causal accounts of positive change based on case studies.4 While skepticism is healthy and desirable in all empirical research, the current availability of more informa tion complicates judgments for both case-study and large-n researchers as to the nature and direction of human rights change. In particular, greater awareness coupled with more information can make a phenomenon seem more frequent when its empirical frequency has not actually risen.

This question plagues research on crime rates and the prevalence of cer tain diseases and medical conditions. For example, while better availability of mammography screening for breast cancer is beneficially associated with earlier identification of the disease, higher rates of diagnosis and treatment in younger women,5 it is perhaps less beneficially associated with possible over diagnosis.6 After advances in diagnosis there is a period when increased

3. From top thirty political science journals, as listed in Micheal W. Giles & James C. Garand, Ranking Political Science Journals: Reputational and Citational Approaches, 40 PS: Pol. Sci. & Pol. 741, 743-44 (2007) (research assistance provided by Brooke Coe).

4. Emilie M. Hafner-Burton & James Ron, Seeing Double: Human Rights Impact through Qualitative and Quantitative Eyes, 61 World Pol. 360, 363 (2009).

5. Carol DeSantis, Rebecca Siegel, Priti Bandi & Ahmedin Jemal, Breast Cancer Statistics, 2011, 61 Cal. Cancer J. Clinicians 409, 411 (2011); G. Maskarinec, L. Wilkens & L. Meng, Mammography Screening and the Increase in Breast Cancer Incidence in Hawaii, 6 Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention 201, 201 (1997).

6. M. Kalager, et al., Overdiagnosis of Invasive Breast Cancer Due to Mammography Screening: Results From the Norwegian Screening Program, 156 Annals Internal Med. 491,491(2012).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

542 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

diagnoses cannot readily be linked to "true" increases in cancer rates.7 Therefore, with the improvements in technology and the ability to reach previously underserved populations for screening, the increase in diagnoses may or may not be indicative of an actual increase in breast cancer. Further investigation is required to assure valid conclusions. Cancer researchers believe that once monitoring capacity levels off in a particular population, it is easier to estimate and compare cancer rates and to understand the true causes of increases or decreases in frequency.8

Similarly in the human rights field, increased awareness coupled with better information can create a false perception that a phenomenon has increased in prevalence, or increased more than it really has. Keck and Sikkink identified the human-rights-information-related dilemma as the "information paradox."9 They suggested that new reporting on previously overlooked violations such as rape and other forms of violence against women may contribute to a picture of worsening human rights that may not always be related to worsening practices. Few human rights research ers have devoted sustained attention to how information effects could be

relevant to empirical findings. As research moves forward, it is worth tak ing a critical but constructive look at widely used data sources in order to sharpen awareness and move toward reducing the impact of information effects not systematically related to the processes that actually give rise to human rights violations or their mitigation. This would enable researchers to make better informed comparisons and conclusions using the important, but imperfect, data that we do possess.

The ways information changes have impacted reporting and coding can be identified and investigated from several different angles. A focus on Latin America, below, permits a closer evaluation of how reports have changed in length and scope for countries in this region, as well as whether and how the source texts and data series reflect known improvement. Since the inception of the PTS and CIRI datasets, Latin American countries have experienced severe human rights violations, and changes in the types of violations, as well as notable improvements. To get a general picture of how well cod ing corresponds with the worst physical integrity abuses—which they are intended to measure—PTS and CIRI coding is compared with data from five country-level truth commission investigations in Latin America. Two case countries, Guatemala and Brazil, provide further illustration.

7. E-mail from Sophie Lelièvre, Associate Professor of Cancer Pharmacology, Purdue Uni versity, to Ann Marie Clark, Associate Professor of Political Science, Purdue University (23 Apr. 2012) (on file with author).

8. Id.

9. Margaret Keck & Kathryn Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders 194 (1998).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 543

The comparison yields evidence of mild-to-moderate information effects. It was expected that the two different coding schemes—PTS and CIRI—might be susceptible in different ways to information effects. However, even though they employ different coding strategies, to a large degree they share similar problems. After controlling for variation related to systematic levels of abuse, the PTS and CIRI indices both correlate to some degree with the amount of information included in a report. The numeric scales tend to be "sticky," i.e., slow to change, after past periods of severe abuse. In Guatemala, increased attention to violations after a period of State Department bias seems to in tensify the human rights assessment, and this is reflected in the coding. In Brazil, increased reporting on new human rights claims related to different forms of violation such as political killings cause the data coding to reflect worse human rights on average for more recent periods.

Recognizing how information effects accrue due to variation in the availability and precision of country-specific information should lead re searchers to interpret study results with care. This becomes especially im portant when researchers make generalizations based on longitudinal and cross-sectional comparisons from data sets like PTS and CIRI, which are derived from contemporaneous reporting. If systematic information effects tend to register human rights deterioration more easily than improvement, as argued below, some of the pessimism that has been expressed about the differences between large-n and case study conclusions may be premature. Such effects could be relevant to causal and theoretical claims made in

dozens of human rights studies. This does not mean that researchers should stop using the data, but it does reinforce the message that researchers should use a variety of methods wisely and seek additional tests of hypotheses about cross-national and longitudinal human rights processes. Comparing the findings of both large-n research and case study work in a well-informed manner is essential for advancing and testing knowledge about the dynamics of human rights change.

SOURCES AND CODING: HOW PTS AND CIRI USE HUMAN RIGHTS REPORTS

The two major human rights data sets mentioned above, PTS and CIRI, rely on the same two sources: the Amnesty International Annual Report/0 and the State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices.11

10. Amnesty Int'l, Annual Report (1975), available at http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/ webbin/serial?id=aireport.

11. U.S. Dep't of State, Country Reports on Human Richts Practices (1979), available at http:// onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/serial?id=crhrp (hereinafter Country Reports [year]).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

544 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

PTS and CIRI assign numeric values to countries based on the AI and State Department annual report texts and now cover most countries of the world, although coverage has varied. CIRI coding begins in 1981.12 Complete PTS data begins in 1981 and now incorporates the coding that Steven C. Poe et al.13 extended from 1976-1980 for some countries.14 The advantage of sum marizing text reports through a coding scheme is that information can readily be compared and used to test causal hypotheses with statistical techniques in cross-national and longitudinal contexts. However, if artifacts of information effects are created by or embedded in the data, non-random sources of error may be introduced that can bias results and affect the descriptive validity of the comparison. The CIRI and PTS coding schemes are outlined only briefly below, since they are well described on the scales' own websites and have been discussed in print by the datasets' curators, David L. Cingranelli and David L. Richards15 and Reed Wood and Mark Gibney,16 respectively.

The Political Terror Scale (PTS). The PTS coding categories address how broadly state-based political violence, defined as threats to physical integrity rights, extended to a country's population in a given year.17 PTS character izes the content of report entries on a scale of 1 to 5. Each year yields two PTS codes: one assigned to the AI report, and one to the State Department report.18 A coding of 1 represents the prevailing rule of law, with no or very rare incidence of political violence, while 5 represents extended political violence in which "terror has expanded to the whole population."19 The PTS does not attempt to count incidents of repression.

Cingranelli-Richards Human Rights Data Set (CIRI). The CIRI dataset creates a separate score for four types of physical integrity abuse: political imprisonment, torture, political killing, and disappearances.20 It is not a strict count of violations against individuals—that would be impossible—but early coder guidelines indicated that, where possible, the coding should cor respond with reported frequency.21 Values are assigned from 0 to 2, based

The CIRI Human Richts Data Project, supra note 2. Steven C. Poe, C. Neal Tate & Linda Camp Keith, Repression of the Human Right to Per sonal Integrity Revisited: A Global Cross-National Study Covering the Years 7 976-1993, 43 Int'l Stud. Q. 291, 299 (1999). Political Terror Scale, FAQ available at http://www.politicalterrorscale.org/faq.php. David L. Cingranelli & David L. Richards, The Cingranelli and Richards (CIRI) Human Rights Data Project, 32 Hum. Rts. Q. 401, 409 (2010); see also David L. Cingranelli & David Richards, Measuring the Level, Pattern, and Sequence of Government Respect or Physical Integrity Rights, 43 Int'l Stud. Q. 407, 409-10 (1999). Reed M. Wood & Mark Cibney, The Political Terror Scale (PTS): A Re-introduction and a Comparison to CIRI, 32 Hum. Rts. Q. 367, 373 (2010). See Political Terror Scale, supra note 1. Political Terror Scale, About, available at http://www.politicalterrorscale.org/about.php Id.

CIRI Human Rights Data Project, FAQ, available at http://humanrightsdata.org/faq.asp. David L. Cingranelli & David L. Richards, The Cingranelli-Richards (CIRI) Human Rights Data Project Coding Manual at 8, 10, 13-14 (Version 7.30.08 2008), available at http://www. humanrightsdata.org/documentation/ciri_coding_guide.pdf.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 545

on whether violations are "practiced frequently" (or roughly 50 or more violations), coded as 0; "practiced occasionally" (or 1-49 violations), coded as 1; or "have not occurred," coded as 2.22 CIRI's Physical Integrity Index (CIRI-physint) adds the four categories, so its range is 0 to 8.23

III. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE REPORTS USED BY PTS AND CIRI

The AI and State Department reports are issued annually within a year of the events they cover, and the two document series are the closest thing available to ongoing human rights reports of record. AI draws on material collected by AI researchers from domestic human rights organizations, other observers, and sometimes on-site missions.24 The State Department draws on in-country embassy staff reports in addition to information generated by NGOs and other observers.25 Further attention to how the reports are produced, before they are coded numerically, helps to contextuaiize the advantages and disadvantages of the associated data indicators.

All social science data sources come with caveats. Several are specific to human rights data. In the midst of major episodes it can be difficult to identify precisely what is occurring and how many people have fallen vic tim to human rights violations. External human rights monitoring may be hindered by repressive governments that try to hide, downplay, or dismiss information. Widespread repression can also shut down domestic NGOs, keep them from organizing, or block their links to outside contacts. Ftowever imperfect, contemporaneous reports of knowledgeable outside monitors are likely to be better than the self-representations of states at revealing the nature of repression, but under repressive circumstances even the best investigators will produce imperfect reports. The imperfections stem from the nature of the enterprise.

The history of how and why the reports have been produced is also relevant for the detection of information effects in the data. The reporting organizations have not necessarily followed the same formula over the years,

Id.

David L. Cingranelu & David L. Richards, Short Variable Descriptions for Indicators in the Cincranelli-Richards (ClRI) Human Rights Dataset, 3 (Version 11.22.2010 2010), available at http://www.humanrightsdata.org/documentation/ciri_variables_short_descriptions.pdf. in Figures 1-6, the CIRI values are reversed for ease of visual comparison, so that lower scores on the graphs represent less severe violation levels for both scales. Amnesty Int'l, Frequently Asked Questions: How does Amnesty International get its information?, available at http://www.amnesty.org/en/who-we-are/faq#how-ai-gets information.

The State Department outlines how each annual report is prepared in the Overview and Acknowledgments section. See, e.g., U.S. Dep't of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2012: Overview and Acknowledgments (2012), available at http://www. state.gov/documents/organization/204296.pdf.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

546 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

nor has the level of information remained constant.26 Contingencies such as variation in personnel, available sources, and resources devoted to any given country from time to time also give rise to variation in coverage. All of this becomes especially apparent when comparing more recent annual reports with early ones.

The early reports of both AI and the State Department covered fewer countries. ATs annual report began as a summary of its activities for its mem bers, and the earlier reports are more limited in scope when compared with today's reports. For example, earlier reports tended not to include countries with less problematic human rights records.27 The US Congress called for human rights evaluations on countries receiving US aid in the 1970s, and the reports before 1980 only covered countries receiving US aid.28 The number of countries covered did grow, but incrementally.

Later AI and State Department reports also discuss more forms of viola tions, something that is rarely noted. ATs substantive focus has expanded,29 and State Department reports regularly incorporate new mandates originat ing from Congress and the executive branch.30 Although coverage of physi cal integrity violations (the major focus of the PTS and of some of CIRI's measures) has been a relative constant, the definition of what constitutes torture or state-sponsored killing has expanded over the years. For example, previously, "political killings" referred mainly to situations when the govern ment killed its political opponents on a large scale.3' Today, the concept of political killing or "extrajudicial, summary, or arbitrary executions" extends to police use of excess lethal violence and cases when private actors kill their political opponents and the state fails to stop or punish them.32

Perhaps least apparent to potential data set users is that later reports likely contain more and better information. The bureaucratic and human rights research capabilities of both AI and the State Department have

SD procedures are detailed in an appendix to each recent report. See, e.g., U.S. Dep't or State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2012: Appendix A – Notes on Prepara tion of the Country Reports and Explanatory Notes (2012) available at http://www.state.gov/ documents/organization/204698.pdf. Al's website has a brief discussion of its sources and procedures in Amnesty Int'l, Frequently Asked Questions, supra note 24. Poe, et al., supra note 13, at 298. Id. at 300.

Peter R. Baehr, Amnesty International and Its Self-Imposed Limited Mandate, 12 Neth. Q. Hum. Rts 5 (1994); Ann Marie Clark, Diplomacy of Conscience: Amnesty International and Changing Human Rights Norms (2001 ); Stephen Hopgood, Keepers of the Flame: Understanding Amnesty International (2006).

Interview with State Dep't official (anonymous at interviewee's request), in Wash., DC (11 May 2011). Clark, supra note 29, at 102. Id.; UN Office or the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Fact Sheet No. 11 (Rev. 1), Ex trajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions, 7 (1997), available at http://www.ohchr.org/ Documents/Publications/FactSheetl 1 rev.1en.pdf.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 547

grown markedly since they began their annual reports. In the early 1970s, before reports were issued, only one person in the State Department had responsibility for human rights.33 At the close of the Carter Administration in 1980, there were twenty professional human rights staff positions in the State Department.34 At the end of the Clinton Administration twenty years later, the State Department's Human Rights Bureau had more than 100 staff members.35 Al's staff doubled between 1975 and 1985 to 205 members.36 In

addition, both organizations now use more information from other sources, especially domestic NGOs. A present-day State Department official described regular communication with NGOs before, during, and after each annual report is issued.37

Finally, a question commonly posed by newcomers to the data when they learn that CIRI and PTS are based on State Department and AI reports is whether the organizations' reports are biased toward political or orga nizational points of view. Bias is sometimes evident, but it has not been constant over time. Political bias in favor of US allies was pronounced in some cases covered by early State Department reports, as illustrated by the case of Guatemala in the early 1980s.38 Al's reports do not evidence similar organizational bias, but the organization is committed to a human rights ethos that places high value on the life of every individual whose rights are violated. Therefore, its reports do sometimes discuss improvement or deterioration, but might be less attuned to numeric reductions in political killings, for example, that would be relevant in a scholarly research context.39 With Al's growth in resources and the State Department's reporting reforms discussed below, organizational biases and differences in information access have diminished. However, any early biases that do exist will be reflected in the databases, since the coding schemes address the textual content of the country reports as written.

Interview with State Department official, supra note 30. Jo Marie Griesgraber, Implementation by the Carter Administration of Human Rights Legislation

Affecting Latin America 103, 106 (Ph.D. dissertation, Georgetown University. 1983). Kathryn Sikkink, Mixed Signals: U.S. Human Rights Policy and Latin America 206 (2004). Stephen Hopgood, Amnesty International's Growth and Development since 1961, in Amnesty International 50 years: Reflections and Perspectives 75, 90 (Wilco de Jonge, Brianne McGonigle Leyh, Anja Mihr & Lars van Troost eds., 2011). Interview with State Dep't official, supra note 30. Country Reports (1982), supra note 11, at 516; Country Reports (1984), supra note 11, at 541.

Because early AI reports concentrated on the worst violators, the global cross-national means of the data sets' coding values are likely to be biased toward worse violations in early years, as discussed by Poe, et al. supra note 13, at 300; see also Steven C. Poe, Sabine C. Carey & Tanya C. Vasquez, How Are These Pictures Different? A Quantita tive Comparison of the US State Department and Amnesty International Human Rights Reports, 1976-1995, 23 Hum. Rts. Q. 650, 655-57 (2001).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

548 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

The bottom line is that interpretations of the data should be made in line with the limitations of the original sources and, if possible, go some way toward improving upon rather than exacerbating those limitations. Neither AI nor the State Department constructs the reports with the intent of pro viding a basis for quantitative indices. Accordingly, knowledge of the data's cross-national and temporal characteristics is essential for the interpretation of study results based on such comparisons.

QUESTIONS TO BE ADDRESSED

In light of the general reporting changes and coding approaches described above, four general questions related to information effects are outlined below. Hypotheses are summarized in Table 1.

1. How good was information about past violations? The quality of reporting has improved over time so that reports reflect better information on human rights violations. The longitudinal variability is a form of mea surement error with its source in the report texts themselves. If AI and State Department reports now document violations that would previously have been hidden, errors in comparability within single countries over time could be introduced for both scales. (See row 1 of Table 1). Not every country has been equally accessible, so information quality has also varied by country. As noted above, AI and the State Department have devoted differing levels of critical attention to particular countries in their annual reports at differ ent times. Where they exist, these biases are likely to enter the databases, since the databases emphasize that coding should be consistent with the textual content of the country reports and not attempt to filter the informa tion. This kind of information effect could occur for both PTS and CIRI.

However, because PTS codes the AI and State Department reports separately while CIRI does not, one can better understand relative differences in the reporting sources by scrutinizing PTS-Amnesty International (PTS-ai) and PTS-State Department (PTS-scf) scores within countries. To gauge the differ ences, we elaborate on informational access and reporting issues below, as well as the State Department's early political bias as reflected by its reports on Guatemala in the 1980s.

2. Does greater quantity of information affect coding? Researchers have more information and, often, access to more detailed information about human rights violations now than in the past. If more detailed information drives harsher coding, a correlation between harsher coding and longer re ports after controlling for actual change in repression should be observable. Studies of human information processing suggest that coders may be sensi

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 549

tive to longer and more complex arguments, especially when deductively relating information to categories.40

If information was just as accurate in the past about the general nature of repression, but there is more detail now, there may be variation in how the two scales process these differences. (See row 2 of Table 1). The PTS does not count numbers of violations, but instead characterizes their scope. While its general focus on scope may limit the scale's ability to be specific about amount and types of violations, it also may be less affected by more detailed reports. Conversely, because the CIRI index has some (at least im plicit) count criteria, it may be somewhat more susceptible to information effects based on amount of information or level of detail. To gauge these issues, word counts of AI and State Department reports by country entry and year for the Latin American region were gathered for AI from 1976-2006 and for the State Department beginning in 1981, and for all countries glob ally from 1994-2006. While report length is only a rough proxy for more information, no other study has examined this aspect of the original report texts. Changes in report length serve as an entry point for analysis.

3. Do the scales detect changes in type of repression? PTS and CIRI dif fer in how and whether they record variation in type, scope, and intensity of repression. (See row 3 of Table 1). One would expect PTS to be stronger than CIRI in its resistance to information effects related to the source texts'

reporting length and detail, because its coding scheme is not as related to frequency. However, unlike CIRI, the PTS does not differentiate among types of violations that would be coded in the aggregate at similar levels. Without extended in-depth textual analysis, a comprehensive evaluation of whether and how the types of violations reported have varied is not possible, but differences are illustrated by discussing coding in two Latin American cases: Brazil and Guatemala.

4. How well do the scales register worsening or improvement? Is there evidence of a ceiling effect? For both scales, a ceiling effect would be observed if the scaling is not as sensitive to changes at higher levels of repression as it is to low level changes. (See row 4 of Table 1). It is hypothesized that a ceiling effect will be most relevant to the CIRI data, since the "frequent" violations category of the scale covers a very wide range, and the PTS seems to allow for intermediate variations in scope and intensity. To acquire an independent source of human rights data for comparison, information on deaths and disappearances compiled by national truth commissions of five

See Michael D. Cobb & James H. Kuklinski, Changing Minds: Political Arguments and Political Persuasion, 41 Am. J. Pol. Sci. 88 (1997); Daniel N. Osherson, et al., Category Based Induction, 97 Psychol. Rev. 185 (1990); Caren M. Rotello & Evan Heit, Modeling the Effects of Argument Length and Validity on Inductive and Deductive Reasoning, 35 J. Experimental Psychol.: Learning, Memory, & Cognition 1317 (2009).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

550 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

44

Latin American countries—Argentina,41 Chile,42 El Salvador,43 Guatemala, and Peru45—is referred to and organized by year for each country to match the organization of the CIRI and PTS data.46

V. ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION

A. Information quality

The first question asks whether and how variation in quality of information enters the texts and affects the coding. It is never easy to collect informa tion on human rights violations, but reporting and information quality have improved since the reports began. Other things being equal, more recent violations are less likely to be hidden from outsiders. These issues, which were exacerbated by early State Department political bias, are apparent in early reporting on Guatemala, as discussed below.47

Repression in Guatemala was at times so severe that it eliminated or silenced any human rights movement, and thus eliminated the information that would have been generated by this movement activity. The worst period of killings and disappearances in Guatemala occurred in the early 1980s:

On Argentina, see National Commission on Disappeared Persons (CONADEP), Nunca Mas (1984), available at http://www.desaparecidos.org/nuncamas/web/english/library/nev again/nevagain_001 .htm. On Chile, see Truth and National Reconciliation Commission, Informe Rettig: Informe de la Comisiön de Verdad v Reconciliaciön (1991). On El Salvador, see From Madness to Hope: The 12-Year War in El Salvador: Report of the Commission on the Truth for El Salvador, U.N. SCOR, The Commission on the Truth for El Salvador, U.N. Doc. S/25500 (1993), available at www.usip.org/files/file/ EISalvador-Report.pdf. On Guatemala, see Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH), Guatemala: Memory of Silence (1999), available at http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/357870-guatemala memory-of-silence-the-commission-for.html; Patrick Ball, Paul Kobrak & Herbert Spirer, Am. Ass'n for the Advancement of Science & Ctr. Int'l por Investicaciones en Derechos Humanos

(CIIDH), State Violence in Guatemala, 1960-1996: A Quantitative Reflection (1999), available at http://shr.aaas.org/guatemala/ciidh/qr/english/en_qr.pdf. In the Guatemalan case, the CIIDH (above) breaks down data by year, using the documentation standards that had been established for the truth commission work but with information pooled from the press and from testimony provided to human rights organizations. We use Ball, et al.'s yearly data, which can be compared more directly to the PTS and CIRI scales. The total number of state-sponsored deaths and disappearances documented by CIIDH for the period 1959-1995 is comparable to that registered by CEH, the UN-organized truth commission.

On Peru, see Comisiön de la Verdad y Reconciliaciön, Informe Final (2003). Data adapted and extended from Sikkink, supra note 35. Stephen C. Ropp and Kathryn Sikkink, International Norms and Domestic Politics in Guatemala, in The Power of Human Rights: International Norms and Domestic Change, 188-9 (Thomas Risse, Stephen C. Ropp, and Kathryn Sikkink eds., 1999).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 551

Table 1: Information Effects and Data Set Differences: Hypotheses

Information Effects and Data Set Differences: Hypotheses

Information component PTS CIRI 1. Quality of information, Improvements since early reports (better coverage, Improvements since early reports (better coverage, retrospective: how good was less bias) mean that coding may not be equivalent less bias) mean that coding may not be equivalent information about past violations? over time across countries; State Dep't bias expected over time across countries; expect difficulties with

to be mitigated by PTS's separate coding of AI and early State Dep't bias. State Dep't reports.

2. Quantity of information and Longer and more detailed reports not expected CIRI's count-related coding may render it sensitive detail: does more information to affect coding because of PTS's standards-based to provision of more detail; expected to be more correlate with harsher coding? criteria. vulnerable to false precision. 3. Amount of information, new Measure may not respond well to changes in context Coding subdivided by type of violation; may types of violation: what happens or violations. respond better to changes in form and intensity of when type of violations changes? violation. 4. Degree of violation: how well Fewer problems with ceiling effect expected in upper May not reflect change in high abuse, again does coding respond to extreme levels than with CIRI. because of implicit frequency count (ceiling effect). worsening or improvement?

Uj

vP

DC CD ~ •— w 2 m 5 ~ o

ora~Q_ re" g- >io _c g-E g Ecud ^ c *- 00 DC— O 0) F

5 >-£ $ .En« Q- $ S 3 r~i m ~R '£ "5 CD 'u DC O" ° 58c ; °"o p gj<u

o E

CD CD Q_

O

i i! i v S o ■ -S u ^ "J 8 >.£ 73 j" ^ 2"° o

<= g "O Q. O™ c Sracojaj p.E ^ . c S u n ■- "O re" o £ w 3j— -o o rc E _ o '-o O- c u fc .2

C m 2 C p ID ^ > "! t En u.Um b=J2 o 'o '■= cd •- =5 75 2 -° . a> q» So5J= J» £ • Q_ ^ OD -Q ■*-; C ^ B m> £ o sx 3°b So

C DC

u F — ^ _o £ •& fo •— . QJ 3 :£ c c oc— CD CD .y 1- o p — n3 CU K-QSC -K " 0"° ofiC fl) _ T3"0 •— C B £0"° c J) «ra

l/> *->

3 c -Q 3

Soo "o <-> _ „ | ~ _ Jre E -go u ̂D

c £ u Q 5 ° b _b t i.i« -§.g . ^ 8 > .2 .1 £ 8 I 2 ^2 I " " S-o">. -"2fc .Eos 3

I fill Sfl 211 If I _ .

~a x <d v5 „ ^ B T, B ° U B, C B C "O C 9" c SP-2 n « (DO 3 5 Ere g-_ "OS u c | £|*< .E ^ g u o-re o o-o jg 2 ^ i- DC X OC B •s s_o–~ s £. $ ®"f °-"9 o S -C g a 5S§8 °2 -5 « o ~ <d 2 t: -1" ° ,2

1. Mii f£ 1 I "3 »- DC • – qj ^ > <~ ^ g- c & S(

c 2 ^ ^ Qj

w-fi ^ C « III 11 .li Ml C^'S Org 5"®^ – °T?.C <s E ° .2-t;». *oE

§ !&& ill 111 lil E ||| Igl 111 1|| O .= -O e >e — Z ■* > 9J **•

c ° > c >-5ri o 05?® ■S ill lis I;I sit ro 5 »5 *- O ?2 r- rt5Q.g W .. -Sf OO*- bjq2?

I all 511 ly ^ • Id c . « o . >"^ . ^ § ■E 1-2: .5 CN -O U rf^S

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

552 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Guatemala logged 25,928 identified and unidentified deaths and disap pearances in the years 1980-1983, or roughly 79 percent of all deaths and disappearances that occurred between 1970-1995 (see Table 3). This figure, large as it is, is likely to be an undercount. In the mid-1980s, human rights organizations did begin functioning again in Guatemala, although they still faced profound repression.48 The process of re-democratization in Guatemala after 1985 contributed to a more information-rich environment.49

Al's reporting during the most repressive period attributed most human rights violations to state officials or government-sanctioned death squads.50 Although details may not have been available contemporaneously, it is clear that AI fully understood the extreme seriousness of the situation in Guatemala at the time. Its reports highlight the movement of repression into the rural provinces where indigenous Mayans lived. In 1980, AI wrote that "hundreds" had been "held, interrogated, tortured and eventually murdered," and "an estimated 1,800 people" had been "'disappeared' and killed."51

AI reported a worsening situation in 1981 and 1982.52 However, in 1982, the year for which truth commission reports retrospectively revealed the highest levels of state-sponsored deaths and disappearances ever reported in any country in the hemisphere, the State Department dramatically under reported the scale of killing and suggested that it was impossible to know who was responsible for the killings—the government of General Efrafn Rfos Montt, right-wing groups, or the guerrillas.53 The State Department reported:

In Guatemala's cities there has been a marked decrease in killings and disap pearances since Rfos Montt came to power, although some abuses continue to be reported. . . . The situation in the countryside, on the other hand, remained unclear for several months. . . . During this period it is believed that members of both the army and the guerrillas were responsible for killings of civilians. . . . Although there continued to be credible reports of human rights abuses by some military units, the overall conduct of the armed forces had improved by late in the year.54

The difference between the State Department's biased reporting and Al's more accurate reports on Guatemala is reflected in the PTS coding. AI reports painted a different picture, and were much closer to the retrospective truth

Americas Watch, Helsinki Watch, & Lawyers Committee for International Human Rights, Critique: Review of the Department of State's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1982 43-^14 (1983). See, e.g., CEH, supra note 44. Amnesty Int'l, Amnesty International Report 1980 139 (1980). Id.

See Ann Marie Clark, "A Calendar of Abuses": Amnesty International's Campaign on Guatemala, in NGOs and Human Rights: Promise and Performance 55, 63 (Claude E. Welch, Jr. ed., 2001). Country Reports (1982), supra note 11 at 516. Id.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 553

commission reports. The PTS coding scheme assigns Al reports (PTS-a/) the worst score, 5, for the deepest period of the genocide (1980-1983), but also for the entire period around that time, 1977-1985, and again in 1990. The PTS-sd value, based on the texts of the contemporaneous State Department reports, remained at 4 (instead of 5, the worst score) throughout the 1980s.

It is now known that embassies were expected to shape their reporting to the overall policy the Reagan Administration was pursuing in Guatema la,55 and the tone of the State Department's 1982 report appears to reflect that policy. Although the State Department human rights reports expressed uncertainty about who was responsible for deaths and disappearances, a confidential CIA cable from the embassy at the same period did not:

Commanding officers . . . have been instructed to destroy all towns and villages which are cooperating with the EGP [Ejército Guerrillero de los Pobres (Guer rilla Army of the Poor), the main guerrilla organization in Guatemala at the time] and eliminate all sources of resistance. . . . When an army patrol meets resistance and takes fire from a town or village, it is assumed that the entire town is hostile and it is subsequently destroyed.56

In the late 1980s, Congress directed the General Accounting Office (GAO, now the Government Accountability Office) to examine the State Depart ment's human rights reporting practices, including policies and procedures for report preparation, whether the reports were accurate and unbiased, and whether State Department staff possessed the resources and training they needed to prepare the reports.57 The GAO concluded that the reports on El Salvador, Guatemala, and the Philippines had "excused these governments from responsibility for abuses based on their promises of corrective action."58 In Guatemala, even US embassy officials acknowledged past bias.59 As a result of such scrutiny, by the mid-1980s reports became more fact-based, as State Department report preparers were "increasingly willing and able to resist pressures to slant the Reports for political purposes."60 According to the GAO, the 1989 State Department report reflected a more "objective and frank" critical approach that evidenced a break from past policies.61

Interview with F. Allen Harris, Diplomat, U.S. Dep't of State {by Kathryn Sikkink), in Washington, D.C. (5 Mar. 2003). U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Secret Cable: Counterinsurgency Operations in El Quiché (1982) available at http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBBl 1/docs/doc 11 .pdf. U.S. General Accounting Office (CAO), GAO/NSIAD-90-224, Human Rights: State Depart ment's Commitment to Accurate Reporting Has Increased 2 (1990), available at http://www. gao.gov/assets/150/149785.pdf. Id. at 13. Id. at 3.

Judith Innés de Neufville, Human Rights Reporting as a Policy Tool: An Examination of the State Department Country Reports, 8 Hum. Rts. Q. 630 (1986). See also Poe, et al., supra note 39. GAO, supra note 57, at 15.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

554 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

The increased reliability of State Department reports since those early years means that in addition to changes in information access that impacted the quality of human rights reporting in repressive circumstances, the levels of violations reported for US allies may also be biased downward for political reasons at the beginning of the State Department data series.

B. Information supply

Given that the overall quality and amount of human rights reporting has improved, how might coding data be affected? Figure 1 charts average lengths of Latin American AI reports from 1976-2006 and State Department reports from 1981; global average report lengths (including Latin America) are shown separately, from 1994-2006. The average State Department report entry on a given country has grown longer over the years, and average AI entries have also increased slightly in length. The changes in average report length may reflect a true increase in number of human rights violations, but report length could reflect either knowledge about violations that might have remained hidden previously or more detail about violations that would have been known in the past. If known violations (but not the "true number") are growing, one would expect worsening data scores over time apart from whether more or worse violations are occurring. Longitudinal comparisons would be statistically biased due to better information rather than actual increases. In addition, the question must be asked whether coding scales are vulnerable to effects related to length but possibly unrelated to actual severity of violations.

Existing reports can be used to check for correlation between length and how the data sets have interpreted the reports. This section presents a mini-analysis of the effect of report length on coding, focusing on the Latin American country reports from 1981-2006. To control for systematic, violation-related variation in human rights levels, when testing for effects of AI report length, the State Department's PTS score (PTS-sd) serves as a control variable, and vice versa, and both AI and State Department values serve as controls for CIRI.62 Because the scales differ in range and direction, for this analysis the values for CIRI and PTS were transformed to a zero-to one scale, with zero representing the best human rights performance and 1 representing the worst. A lagged dependent variable controls for the previ ous year's score. The values of the word-count variable are logged due to their distribution.

62. The assumption in this design is that factors that would make a State Department report entry longer or shorter due to a measurement artifact are unrelated to those factors that would affect the length of the same year's AI report, and vice versa.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 555

15000

A • Al, latin America mm. mm. — so, Latin America

8 8"

— Ai, Global SD, Global / v* /

* x

«

ooos /*-**

jf -«% ^ X,-"*

o –

^*•»

1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 UQEir ycaf

Figure 1. Mean Word Count, per Country, of AI and State Department Re port Entries

Estimates are derived using the following equations. For the PTS-a/' score:

(1) PTS_aij( = ß, PTS_ai.fMj + ß2 ln(AI_wordcounti() + ß^ PTS_sdi( + constant., 7

+ u. + e,

For the PTS-sd score:

(2) PTS_s<±( = ß( PTS_sd(ï( I) + ß2 ln(SD_wordcountf[)+ ß2 PTS_a/'.(

And, since CIRI coders use both primary texts, for CIRI-p/rys/'nf:

(3) CIRI_physint.( = ß, CIRI_physint.ft_v + ß2 ln(SD_wordcount(() + ß^ PTS_a/;t + constant., + u + e.

(4) CIRI_physint( = ß( CIR1 _physint/ff J; + ß, ln(AI_wordcount([) + ß3 PTS_sdf constant., + u. + e,

For all, u. refers to country-specific fixed effects and e.(represents the error term.

The results are reported in Table 2. For the Latin American countries, there is evidence of a small but statistically significant effect on coding levels relative to report length. On average, as length of a country's report entry grows, the associated PTS-a/, PTS-sd, or CIRI-phys/nf score is slightly worse, after roughly controlling for severity of violation. The estimates suggest that an increase in the length of an AI report entry from 1200 words to 1900 words (approximately one standard deviation) corresponds to a rise in PTS-a;

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

556 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Table 2: Effects of report length on PTS and CIRI coding, Latin America

0) (2) (3) (4) PTS_ai PTS_sd CIRLphysint CIRLphysint (1976-2006) (1981-2006) (1981-2006) (1981-2006)

PTS_ai,, **.3494 (.0249)

PTS_sdM **.3764 (.0504)

CIRI-physint,, **.3437 **.3193 (.0702) (.0556)

Al word count, **.0820 **.0835 logged (.0159) (.0182)

SD word count, **.0437 .0040 logged (.0121) (.0133) PTS_ai **.3499 **.3450

(.0458) (.0607)

PTS_sd **.3636 **.3123 (.0473) (.0408)

Constant **-.4165 **-.2780 **.1070 **-.4071

(.1130) (.1012) (.1214) (.1251)

observations: observations: observations: observations: 641 597 515 545

groups: 30 groups: 30 groups: 25 groups: 26

: = significant at p<.01; *=significant Results based on pooled cross-national time series regression with fixed effects and robust standard errors.

Note: CIRI coding is inverted for comparability with PTS.

of approximately .04 on average on the 0-1 scale; a rise in the State Depart ment report length of one standard deviation, from 6100 to 11,100 words, corresponds to an estimated .03 increase in PTS-sd. Our initial expectations were that CIRI-pbys/nf would not be as vulnerable to length because it is more event-based, but CIRI also requires coder judgment when frequency is not clear-cut.63 CIRI-pbys/nf is as responsive to Al's report length as PTS-a/': a rise in AI report length of 700 words corresponds to a CIR-physint score also worse by .04 on average. The coefficient for the association between

63. See Cincranelli & Richards, supra note 22, at 18.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 557

CR-physint and the widely varying word count of State Department reports is not statistically significant.64

In summary, an effect on coding related to the amount of reporting on each country is apparent. An effect like this would result if inter-subjective coders respond in part to length and level of detail as an indication of in tensity of violations.

C. Changes in Types of Violations, and new Kinds of Violations

The third question is whether the coding approaches adequately deal with on-the-ground changes in types of violations. To explore this question, dif ficulties posed by changes in the nature of repression in Guatemala and Brazil are brought to bear below.

As mentioned above, CIRI-phys/nf adds scores for four different types of violations (political killings, disappearances, political imprisonment, and torture). Torture, or any of the other categories, can only be registered on its own three-point scale, which becomes an additive component of CR-physint. CIRI scores for the more lethal violations, disappearance, and extrajudicial execution range from 0-4 when added together. These two components register the worst possible scores from 1981-1986 for Guatemala, but at the same time CIRI-pbys/nf shows a slight improvement in 1982 and 1983, the most acute period of political killing and disappearances as shown by truth commission data. (Table 3 and Figure 5 display scores for Guatemala.)

The lethal nature of the repression (along with the State Department reports' political bias) may help explain why. In 1982, CIRI gives Guate mala an intermediate score for torture, and in 1983, assigns an intermediate score for political imprisonment, before returning to the worst scores for 1984-1986. CIRI-phys/nf may underrepresent the severity of human rights when egregious violations are located in fewer than all four categories. Later in time, information about somewhat less lethal violations produces some surprising equivalencies in coding. By the 1990s, a larger and more diverse set of human rights organizations operated inside Guatemala.65 A milestone was reached in 1990 when the Roman Catholic Church opened the Archbishopric of Guatemala's Office of Human Rights (ODHAG) in 1990, "after years of silence."66 In the intervening years, ODHAG has be come one of Guatemala's most prominent, professional, and internationally well-connected human rights organizations.67

Due to varying Congressional mandates, more thematic sections have been added to the reports over time, but recent SD country entries have shortened on average since 2000, as Figure 1 reveals. Ropp and Sikkink, supra note 47, at 188-9. Id. Id.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

558 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Table 3: Guatemala, PTS and CIRI Values with CIIDH Data, by Year

CIIDH PTS CIRI

CIRI, CIRI, CIIDH, Political Disappear

CIIDH, Identified Integrity ances and Full Victims PTS-AI PTS-SD Index Killing

Year Count* Only* (scale: 1-5) (scale: 1-5) (scale: 0-8) (scale: 0-4)

1970 301 214

1971 410 263 1972 355 266 1973 286 197 1974 139 79

1975 63 49

1976 173 110 4 4

1977 227 155 5 3

1978 203 27 5 3

1979 181 70 5 3 1980 2,349 804 5 4

1981 3,736 866 5 4 8 4

1982 17,953 2,265 5 4 7 4

1983 1,890 734 5 4 7 4

1984 869 420 5 4 8 4

1985 501 224 5 4 8 4

1986 296 176 4 4 8 4 1987 392 224 4 4 4 2 1988 352 247 4 4 7 3 1989 409 290 4 4 6 4

1990 598 345 5 5 7 4

1991 354 248 4 4 6 4

1992 326 179 4 4 6 3 1993 160 122 4 4 4 3 1994 250 135 4 5 6 4

1995 95 45 4 5 6 4

TOTAL 32,868 8,754

* Yearly CIIDH information comparable to truth commission data, from Ball, et. al., supra note 44, at 119. Note: Cl Ri coding is inverted. PTS: 5-worst; 1=best; CR-physical integrity. 0=best, 8=worst; CIRI-cfoap (disappearances) added to CIRI-kill (extrajudicial killings), 0=best, 4=worst.

More information was available, and both AI and State Department were reporting on the range of ongoing human rights problems in this period. Guatemala demonstrates that once attention is focused on a human rights situation, the attention is often sustained over time. NGOs may devote more staff time to that country, developing expertise and contacts that increase their knowledge of human rights conditions. The attention is welcome from a human rights standpoint, but this reputational dynamic could lead to measurement bias across countries or years.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 559

A second case, Brazil, illustrates further how changes in type of repres sion interact with changes in the reporting capabilities of NGOs. By way of background, the substantive view of human rights practices under Brazil's authoritarian military regime (1964-1985) is very different from that of post democratic transition Brazil. To simplify a complicated political story, Brazil experienced authoritarian rule in the 1970s, a transition towards democracy in the 1980s, called the abertura, or "opening," and democratic rule in the 1990s and later. Human rights violations were most severe during the pe riod when General Emilio Médici held power (1968-1974) and improved somewhat during the period of abertura.bS Brazil's complete transition to democracy dates from 1989, when the first elections were held to elect a president by direct popular vote since before the military coup.

Researchers generally agree that Brazil's human rights situation has improved in the democratic period, particularly since the mid-1990s.69 The PTS and CIRI scores, surprisingly, indicate that respect for human rights under the military government was better on average than in the democratic period. The full authoritarian period is not covered by the data sets, but Bra zil shows better average PTS and CIRI scores during the authoritarian and transition periods than for the fully democratic period (see Table 4). After the transition to democracy, serious human rights problems remained, but as described below, the report texts reflect violations of a different character than under the military regime.

Because CIRI compiles the physical integrity score by specific type of violation, one can see how different components of the index affect the scores. In the case of post-transition Brazil, the level of political killings and torture drive the poor CIRI-phys/nf scores (see Table 5). The democratic Brazilian governments have rarely practiced disappearances or held political prisoners, a problem during the earlier period, but the later scores on tor ture and extrajudicial killing reflect use of lethal force and torture by police against criminal suspects, detainees, prisoners and others. An authoritative 2007 Brazilian report listing all known cases of proven deaths and disap pearances before, during, and after the military government reveals that the worst period for deaths and disappearances was the period from 1971 to 1974, and that state killing and disappearing of political opponents was rare after 1979, with none after the 1985 transition to democracy.70

Carlos Santiago Nino, Radical Evil on Trial 33 (1996); Joan R. Dassin, The Brazilian Press and the Politics of Abertura, 26 J. Interamerican Stud. & World Aff. 385, 385-88 (1984). For example, the 2013 annual report by Human Rights Watch notes that Brazil is now "among the most influential democracies in regional and world affairs" but still faces "chronic" problems related to police treatment of criminal detainees. See Human Rights Watch, World Report 2013, Brazil, available at http://www.hrw.org/world-report/2013/ country-chapters/brazil. Secretaria Especial dos Direitos Humanos da PresidJncia da RepOblica, Direto A Memoria e A Verdade: Comissäo Especial sobre Mortos e Desaparecidos Pol(ticos (2007).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

560 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Table 4: Brazil, PTS and CIRI-Physint Averages, by Period

Brazil, PTS a CIRI-physfm averages, by period lAuthorttarlan and ltransitlon,197S-89 Democratic, 1990-2006

PTS-ai 3.43 4.12 PTS-sd 2.54 3.82 CIRI-p/ivsfnf 3.56 4.71

Note: CIRI coding is inverted. PTS: 5= worst; 1 =best; CRi-physint 0=best, 8=worst

The most plausible explanation for the appearance that respect for human rights was worse in the 1990s and 2000s than during the military regime is that human rights organizations have expanded their focus from a narrow concentration on direct government responsibility for death, disappearance, and imprisonment of political opponents to a wider range of rights. By look ing at the report texts this hypothesis can be further explored.

In its first entry on Brazil in the 1976 Annual Report, AI focused on gross human rights violations, especially political imprisonment, torture, and summary executions committed directly by state officials.71 The State Department's first section on Brazil in 1981 was short and largely positive, commending the government on improvements. Al's report on Brazil that year was less positive overall, but also mentioned "some improvement."72 The improvements noted in basic rights are consistent with the Brazilian report cited above,73 which shows no state-sponsored deaths and disap pearances in 1981.

By 1987, however, in the period of transition under the government of José Sarney, both AI and the State Department took a harsher tone. The AI report on 1986 mentions Al's investigations of rural killings and detainee mistreatment in prisons and police stations.74 This report reflects Al's move ment from a narrow focus on state-sponsored imprisonment, killing, and torture in Brazil to a focus on the state's failure to prevent, investigate, and prosecute rural killings, with added attention to police brutality and exces sive use of lethal force with criminal suspects. Further evidence of NGOs' expanded focus is evident in the 1987 State Department entry on Brazil, which reports that violent police treatment of criminals has "received con

Al reports mentioned in this and the following paragraph refer to the corresponding entries on Brazil in the yearly reports of Amnesty Int'l, supra note 10. Amnesty Int'l, Amnesty International Report 1981, at 118 (1981 ), available at http://www.am nesty.org/en/library/asset/POL10/001/1981/en/5e4bdcf6-0f75-4ec4-be19-ea619d7a229b/ POL100011981eng.pdf. Secretaria Especial dos Direitos Humanos da Presidència da Repüblica, supra note 70. Amnesty Int'l, Amnesty International Report 1986, 129 (1986).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 561

Table 5: Brazil, PTS and CIRI Values, by Year

Brazil, PTS and CIRI Values, by year PTS CIRI

Physical Political

Integrity Disappear Political Imprison Al SD Index ances Killings ment Torture

Year (scale: 1-5) (scale: 1-5) (scale: 0-8) (scale: 0-2) (scale: 0-2) (scale: 0-2) (scale: 0-2) 1976 3 2 1977 4 3

1978 4 (none) 1979 3 2

1980 3 2 1981 2 2 4 0 2 1 1

1982 3 2 4 0 2 0 2 1983 4 2 3 0 1 0 2 1984 4 2 4 0 2 0 2 1985 4 3 3 0 1 0 2 1986 3 3 3 0 1 0 2 1987 4 4 4 0 2 1 1

1988 3 3 3 0 1 0 2 1989 4 3 4 0 2 0 2 1990 5 4 5 1 2 0 2 1991 5 4 4 0 2 0 2 1992 5 4 5 1 2 0 2

1993 4 4 5 1 2 0 2 1994 4 4 4 0 2 0 2 1995 4 4 6 1 2 1 2 1996 4 4 4 0 2 0 2

1997 4 3 4 0 2 0 2 1998 3 3 6 1 2 1 2

1999 4 4 4 0 2 0 2 2000 4 3 6 0 2 2 2 2001 4 4 5 0 2 1 2

2002 4 4 4 0 2 0 2 2003 4 4 4 0 2 0 2 2004 4 4i 4 0 2 0 2 2005 4 4 4 0 2 0 2

2006 4 4 6 1 2 1 2

Note: CIRI coding is inverted. PTS: 5= worst; 1=best; CIRI physical integrity: 0=best, 8=worst; other CIRI scales: 0=best, 2=worst).

siderable public attention . . . due to the increasing assertiveness of local human rights organizations and the press, as well as growing public concern about criminal violence."75

From the point of view of human rights work, this is an encouraging development. For human rights measurement, the impression can be mislead ing if researchers only compare coding over time. A focus on police killings and torture prevails in reports on Brazil from the 1990s onward. This shift is also reflected in the work of Observatôrio das Violências Policiais (OVP,

75. Country Reports (1987), supra note 11 at 398.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

562 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Observatory of Police Violence).76 Based in Säo Paulo, Brazil's largest city, OVP gathers news reports and other comprehensive information on victims of police violence. In the 1970s and 1980s, it is likely that the Brazilian police were also very violent towards criminal suspects, but such violence was not documented or reported.77

To summarize, an increase in domestic human rights NGOs and increased attention to and scrutiny of State Department reporting led to the produc tion of more information about human rights abuses in Guatemala in the wake of the genocidal violence of the early 1980s. In Brazil, attentiveness to previously unreported abuses affected the level of coding after military rule concluded. This suggests that particularly after repressive periods, some systematic measurement error (rooted in both the coding schemes and con temporaneous texts) may be introduced that can impact accurate assessment of human rights processes.

D. Ceiling effects

The fourth question asks whether the PTS and CIRI scales are appropriately responsive when violations are severe. As a result of retrospective truth com mission investigations, more precise information on the nature, intensity, and scope of human rights violations is available today for the periods of intense violations in Argentina, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Peru. Figures 2-6 chart violations from these countries and compare them with CIRI and PTS data.76 On visual inspection, the truth commission numbers on the graphs are spiked, while the data sets' values are smoother and stay high over more than one time period. Data values cannot go higher in the most intense periods when violations go from bad to worse. Even after the most lethal violence has ended, the AI or State Department annual report entry may still qualify for the data sets' worst scores.

Observatörio das Violências Policiais-SP, available at http://www.ovp-sp.org. Police Brutality in Urban Brazil, Human Rights Watch (1 April 1997), available at http:// www. u nhcr.org/cgi-bi n/texis/vtx/refworld/rwmain ?page=printdoc&docid=3ae6a 7e74.

The truth commissions categorized information on states' lethal repression of individuals in different ways: either as deaths and disappearances combined (Chile, Guatemala, and Peru), just disappearances (Argentina), or just deaths (El Salvador). In Argentina, few people were killed directly before disappearance, so virtually all of the deaths documented during the period covered by the truth commission happened through disappearance. While the important factual distinctions between deaths and disappearances have been contested politically and legally, most people who study disappearances agree in their understanding that virtually all of the disappeared people in each of these countries were killed. For these reasons and for this limited purpose it is appropriate to consider a disappearance as equivalent to a death, in order to use all of the available truth com mission data here. Data in Figures 2-6 adapted and extended from Sikkink, supra note 35.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 563

4000

3500

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

J f

Truth

Commission, deaths and

disappearances

CIRI disap pearance & extrajudicial execution

-w-CIRI Physical Integrity Index

Note: CIRI scaling inverted for comparison Higher values correspond to worse human rights practices Range: PTS-AI and PTS-SD, 1-5; CIRI disappearance & extrajudicial execution, 0-4; CiRI-physint, 0-8.

Figure 2. Chile: Truth Commission, PTS, and CIRI Data

Countries falling in the scales' upper levels of repression may differ significantly in their actual levels of violence.79 In other words, there is a ceiling effect the scales do not go high enough to accommodate variation in the upper levels. CIRI's reaches its worst score at "frequent" violations. PTS offers more depth on the intensity dimension, but also has difficulties when violations are extreme. An artifact of the ceiling effect is "stickiness," especially at the high ends of the scales,80 limiting the ability to register improvement or deterioration when violations are severe.

VI. CONCLUSION: THE IMPACT OF INFORMATION EFFECTS

We hope to stimulate and advance a more systematic and focused discussion of how and why the data may be subject to measurement error, whether and how the data may give rise to biased inferences, and how such problems might be addressed. General findings related to each hypothesis are sum

79. Hafner-Burton & Ron, supra note 4, at 381. 80. Id. at 381-82; Todd Landman & Edzia Carvalho, Measuring Human Rights 90 (2010); Wood

& Cibney, supra note 16, at 379.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

564 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

s 5 I

4500

4000

3500

3000

2500

2000

1500

1000

500

0 -iR-fSHHlHH

Year

Truth Commission,

disappearances

CIRI Physical Integrity Index

—*~CIRI disap^ pearance & extrajudicial execution

•Note CIRI scaling inverted for comparison Higher values correspond to worse human rights practices Range PTS-AI and PTS-SD, 1-5; CIRI disappearance & extrajudicial execution, 0-4; CIRI-physint, 0-8.

Figure 3. Argentina: Truth Commission, PTS, and CIRI Data

4500

4000

3500

c

Jj 3000 § •5 2500 M

| 2000 <5

"Note CIRI scaling inverted for comparison Higher values correspond to worse human rights practices Range PTS-AI and PTS-SO. 1-5; CIRI disappearance & extrajudicial execution. 0-4. CIRI-physInt, 0-8.

Truth

Commission, deaths

~~#"~CiRi disap pearance a extrajudiaal execution

"***"" CIRI Physical Integrity Index

Figure 4. El Salvador: Truth Commission, PTS, and CIRI Data

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data

•"♦identified victims of death and

disappearance

AI-PTS

—#—CIRI disap pearance & extrajudicial execution

-*-CIRi Physical Integrity Index

Year

*Note: CIRI scaling inverted for comparison. Higher values correspond to worse human rights practices. Range. PTS-AI and PTS-SD. 1-5; CIRI disappearance & extrajudicial execution, 0-4; CIRI-physint, 0-8.

** Yearly data collected by CIIDH [see footnote 29. supra}.

Figure 5. Guatemala: Truth Commission, PTS, and CIRI Data

"Note: CIRI scaling inverted for comparison. Higher values correspond to worse human rights practices. Range: PTS-Ai and PTS-SD, 1-5; CIRI disappearance & extrajudiciai execution, 0-4; CIRI-physint. 0-8.

Figure 6. Peru: Truth Commission, PTS, and CIRI Data

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

566 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

Table 6: Information Effects and Data Set Differences, hypotheses and findings

c

£ a.

nj Q. — OJ d aj

i: O

>4

■£ "E DJO O o c

_p "3 Q

E _Q

o t/T <

tj E o

<-2 3 01 to

n3 >

fD QJ

E c 0) o "

o?co«o J? 2 1 s "5-S St.o^-5 3 £ y E 2 X -o ^S>a« .2 ^ " JS " .£ ,P 9 ™ E2 o^-< a op-p – « o S ? -Ex- ° !T. – ~ S a. $ X ai "a ^ "0 ™ -S 8 s G £ 2 9- o > B " a c-asc-s

5 ^ ™ 'o >2 3 u «£'s ® ? » •i f; o 001,1 8 B 1 s! g*2**i£ i-i^ | i! I°l-y ™e§b t= «s.i-s | <u ^ s.2! IB

»1§= §iS-g? 5E" 8.1 | eb| g-l Qc X ZZ U Q_ U CC 'ui .E 3! C1.2 "ui I— U U > .— d c

9 « cu 00 <" >. E ^ -E c Q_~0 r- • c Ti-m^^.2 ^ a; >- c E £ — u

"8 5f|l5>- s|dB^ i^Hl II ■a "S-soos -55 2–i ^ cn-n"^.— a; 4-^ C C ©-.</>> 9 'sSoSt^ X J| E -a -2 2 « Sk is ^ U-z C t <D <" >: d _Q > E SPo § cSo>o 5 ~ c- m E T3 .. « > §: V « " '5 8 .. ..• FIsSSJ -9 F

E -Q – < > . r t py a; n r x ■_ ^ </> t/i ^ 01 O Q- c • 13 O OJ |£

-r-* ■— — — i/> • — _ E i— ©~ i/> © <TJ o "O X —

^Bx^sb15 s s >" >-s ooj c 2 £ -a B & 3 £ £ B 2 = s> ~ Bs» c 9- « o ™ 1 8" ^ « af O S oBSB B 2 2 c o O uEEtjEq. Uoi3fB 3f 2

(D V) -pi <yi a 2 2 •- 2 -s £ ai ■■=;£—_ tr O dte > c S o « .£ n » o f O „ ^ oc " E O z o — e I 2 B 8- o ra £ 9 8" 8 s- 9 B -5 IB -2 u B 5 B 8-6s c £ p s I IB "O ^ U O -t— w 1_) —; p PL v/ -• i_ ~ nj

C .^Q.B^< _ T3 ^ £ O CO _C

I *iY*§ ^'fSD5 X< eBo |g^f.Eg fi-i.ll oc 1|! Jijjl Qiii filxlf lf| 'ill llfllM X XX 0> -Q U U LO _E E CO </> h UD > 1- ^ u

do Jr, © © Q_ S >* % – -a o -Q £ o ©

nj ^ n ^ a ^ — o ©

8 <*>3 c ^2 g-2 ?2r mir, ^"n|/1BI -% 5K Ei -D _ y > z 5 ~ ^ 22 5™ ,E o"£ .S c u i^-d 2da)"° oc « —

9 g~°| B. 8 £-£ 5 EsS"uJx7 e2»c g-c x £ 8 U tn E ^ 15 -Q^ T3 44 ,E ni c — _Qcu §■ F n n % co-o^ fc <D o —

>^1^11^ s|8gjS jr -| 18. a S- e S-s:1 8. g 8-12; .S | IS«EzDEuS °f«oii 22 iS.Eu

T3 S t; © V. 9 2 *E ,© a< DC © V5 -C

^ "8 % ■o 2 2

5 rz -§ §

i'i (V. </> C

-a M- C o Ib

O c .© c

£ S o 2

S-T ,_ Qj

>..0

S E B i 8.| <si -5

-2 .©

•- .2 1*^ S E

IV.

a o 2 jg H3

©.

a © © t: «+

.E ** ti

£ '£ «+

CN .E -2 P 8

® c 0 o

^ Qj (V. — 2P „ 1= g- 8 JS 2 .5 B -i ^ 91 .2 -eg

° = > g .2 >. c,= j B = c"|"S »■§ a.? S •2 = £. 0 -f g 3 •£ .2 £ Z s ■$ -2 5 g g « s S E _ p •— ^ o p t! O *, "tzj 5C S

| IIS-^-l SES^gF |l-||-2 $>*£>§£ I Co 2 <« u <J>§:-i q^^q. 8 xlaig. <N =■§ 8 8 ^ B 8 £ B Information PTS CIRI component hypothesized found hypothesized found 1. Quality of Improvements since early Higher quality information Improvements since early Higher quality information information, reports (better coverage, likely over time; Guatemala reports (better coverage, likely over time; retrospective: how good less bias) mean that coding example: early political less bias), so coding may Guatemala example: early was information about may not be equivalent over bias (State Dep't) when not be equivalent over time political bias (State Dep't). past violations? time across countries; State compared with AI report or across countries; expect

Dep't bias expected to be coding. difficulties with early State mitigated by PTS's separate Dep't bias, coding of AI and State Dep't reports.

2. Quantity of Longer and more detailed Some artifact of report CIRI's count-related coding Some artifact of length for information and detail: reports not expected to length for AI and State Dep't may render it sensitive CIRI measures, but only does more information affect coding because measures. to provision of more responsive to AI report correlate with harsher of PTS's standards-based detail; expected to be length. coding? criteria. more vulnerable to false

precision.

3. Amount of Measure may not respond Brazil example: scores Coding subdivided by type Brazil example: scores information, new types to change in context. similar although change in of violation; may respond similar although change of violation: what types of violations reported. better to changes in form in types of violations happens when type of and intensity of violation. reported; additive CIRI violations changes? physint less responsive

to extreme repression of single type.

4. Degree of violation: Fewer problems with ceiling Truth Commission com- May not reflect change in Truth Commission how well does in upper levels than with comparison: PTS responds high abuse (ceiling effect). comparison: hard for coding respond to CIRI. better than CIRI to acute CIRI to register extreme extreme worsening or violations. Still hard to violations and later improvement? register extreme violations improvements: ceiling

and later improvements: effect and stickiness, ceiling effect and stickiness.

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2013 Information Effects and Human Rights Data 567

marized in Table 6. Neither data set responds well to changes in types of violations over time. PTS is somewhat better than CIRI at registering changes in levels of violation in comparison with the independent truth commission data, but both PTS and CIRI are vulnerable to a ceiling effect. CIRI disag gregates measures of kinds of violations, which can be informative, but the structure of its physical integrity scale makes it difficult to register extreme violations of a single type and could be misleading for a researcher relying only on the physical integrity scale.

In conclusion, four additional points are worth noting. First, both indi ces register deterioration quickly when violations increase from previously infrequent levels. The restricted variation in the upper ranges of the indices also creates a ceiling effect, such that less-than-large-scale improvement or worsening will not be reflected when human rights violations are more intense, and they are "sticky," or remain high, when improvement may be occurring. The ceiling effect caused by restricted variation would in principle also prevent the scale from registering any worsening "above" the ceiling; however, human rights improvement is often more incremental than dete rioration. This is supported by the observation that the data set measures are responsive to a rapid deterioration away from a lower level of violations, as seen in the cases covered by truth commissions, but not as sensitive to reductions in severe physical integrity violations as measured by the truth commission counts.

Second, the texts of the reports probably contain more critical attention by observers once violations have been high and once NGO activity has increased in the country, contributing to the ceiling effect problem once the texts are translated to PTS and CIRI codes. On the coding side, addressing any added coder susceptibility to more length and detail would be desir able, but we would note that post-hoc adjudication of the data coding, such as non-independent arbitration procedures among coders, can introduce its own errors in validity.81 Efforts to prevent this kind of information effect prior to and during the coding procedure are more desirable than post-hoc adjustment.

Third, scholars should keep in mind that the data are based on con temporaneous documents and understand the changing characteristics of the source materials over time. Because of increased quality and quantity of information, the data may skew toward worse scores in later years. As Gary King, Robert O. Keohane, and Sidney Verba suggest, if the direction of bias is known, one can be more confident of inferences if they go against

81. Steven B. Rothman, Understanding Data Quality through Reliability: A Comparison of Data Reliability Assessment in Three International Relations Datasets, 9 Int'l Stud. Rev. 437, 443 (2007).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

568 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 35

the grain of probable bias—even if the precise extent of bias is not known —and levels of confidence in inferences that are consistent with bias should

be adjusted.82 Because of the probable bias toward worse scores over time, it will be more difficult in terms of inference to use these indices to test for

the causes of the kind of change that is occurring when human rights are improving than when they are worsening. Some statisticians assisting local NGOs and investigation teams have devised ingenious ways to accurately assess evidence of violations in the field,83 but some information effects rooted in the historical sources we are discussing may not be correctable.

Finally, it appears that the measures are not well suited to the examina tion of extreme episodes of human rights violations like genocide and mass killing or the relative improvements that happen after such extreme episodes. In general, a selection of individual cases should be studied with great care in addition to assessments based on summary data, for analysts interested in the factors contributing to human rights change. The ceiling effect in the data series and the nature of changes in the source texts may obscure a range of kinds of improvement that is important to the human rights researcher. It would be unfortunate if information effects present in summary data unduly contributed to pessimism about human rights change. We believe there will be many other creative ways to test and further evaluate the hypotheses we have proposed here, and we encourage other researchers to do so.

82. Gary King, Robert O. Keohane & Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research 188 (1994).

83. Making the Case: Investigating Large Scale Human Rights Violations Using Information Manage

ment Systems and Data Analysis (Ratrick Ball, Herbert F. Spirer & Louise Spirer eds., 2000).

This content downloaded from �������������24.254.82.142 on Fri, 17 Dec 2021 23:43:36 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

MORAL HAZARD, DISCIPLINE, AND THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS

Author(s): JACOB N. SHAPIRO and DAVID A. SIEGEL

Source: World Politics , January 2012, Vol. 64, No. 1 (January 2012), pp. 39-78

Published by: Cambridge University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41428372

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to World Politics

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

MORAL HAZARD, DISCIPLINE, AND THE MANAGEMENT OF

TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS

By JACOB N. SHAPIRO and DAVID A SIEGEL*

Introduction

FROM cable terrorist the mid-1990s foes, Abu through Hafs 2001 al-Masri two of and the Abu West Khabab, s most carried impla- cable terrorist foes, Abu Hafs al-Masri and Abu Khabab, carried on what appears to have been a long-running feud within al-Qaeda, a feud that came to an end only when Abu Hafs al-Masri was killed by the U.S. military. Abu Hafs joined al-Qaeda early on and served as the group's military commander from 1996 onward. Abu Khabab was a member of Egyptian Islamic Jihad who ran his own camps in Afghani- stan and began working closely with al-Qaeda in the late 1990s as an explosives expert. That two such individuals competing for prominence in a global terrorist organization would not get along is hardly surpris- ing. That their feud would entail lengthy arguments about reporting requirements, air travel reimbursements, and the proper accounting for organizational property does seem a bit odd. One does not usually think of terrorist masterminds writing notes like the one Abu Hafs sent to Abu Khabab in the late 1990s taking him to task for six specific errors including:

1. Regarding the tickets: I obtained 75,000 rupees for you and your family's trip to Egypt. I learned that you did not submit the voucher to the accountant, and that you made reservations for 40,000 rupees and kept the remainder claiming that you have the right to do so. We believe that you do not have the right to do

*The authors thank Scott Ashworth, Ethan Bueno de Mesquita, Adam Meirowitz, and Kris Ramsay for many helpful conversations. Our fellow panelists at the 2009 International Studies Association Meeting provided valuable feedback, and our anonymous reviewers improved the article immensely with their thoughtful comments. David Patel suggested the empirical approach we take in the first section. All errors are our own.

World Politics 64, no. 1 (January 2012), 39-78

Copyright © 2012 Trustees of Princeton University doi: 10. 101 7/S00438871 11000293

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

40 WORLD POLITICS

that and a brother should take only what he needs for the trip. I would like you to know that we have never given such an amount to any one else at all.1

The dispute is hardly unique. Substantial evidence indicates that members of terrorist groups are not uniformly motivated by the cause, are not equally willing to sacrifice for the cause, often disagree on what the cause is, and rarely see eye to eye on the best tactics to achieve their strategic ends. Scholars who have done extensive interview work with terrorists report that their organizations are torn by strife and disagree- ment.2 Supporting this view, internal documents from al-Qaeda are full of sometimes vitriolic letters flying back and forth as members of the group debate ideology, strategy, and tactics, including how much violence is optimal.3 Even when there is no observed conflict within groups, leaders often engage in costly efforts to monitor their agents, suggesting that the potential for disagreement exists.4 Indeed, groups as diverse as the Polish Underground in Warsaw, Red Brigades, Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (eta), Aum Shinrikyo, Fatah, al-Qaeda, and al-Qaeda in Iraq generated paperwork that, were it not for its violent subject matter, could have come from any traditional organization. This is all a bit puzzling in that covert organizations are commonly

thought to screen their operatives very carefully and pay a particularly heavy price for such record keeping.5 Qn November 5, 1986, for exam- ple, the French police captured a large cache of eta documents at the Sokoa chair factory. These documents provided a rich picture of ETAs

1 Harmony, AFGP-2002-001111. Throughout this article we refer to documents captured from al-Qaeda and other groups. These documents were originally in the United States Department of Defense's Harmony database, which contains more than one million documents captured during operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere. Roughly a quarter of these documents have been fully translated. The documents run the gamut from strategic policy studies, to accounting reports, to membership lists, to technical training manuals, to draft ideological screeds, to letters between family members. Originals and translations of the documents we refer to and many others are available at http://www.ctc.usma.edu/harmony_docs.asp. Documents from the Harmony database are referenced by their document number. The Conflict Records Research Center at the National Defense University has begun to make more of these records public and is tasked with assisting researchers in using these data.

2 Bowyer 1989; Crawford 2003. 3 Hassan al-Tajiki's Third Letter to the Africa Corps is typical. Hassan writes: "Here once again

I remind you of one of your fatal mistakes, which is the quick changing of strategic targets, whereby now every action is tactical and improvised"; AFGP-2002-600053, 25. See also Cullison 2004. The best analysis of leadership schisms in al-Qaeda is Brown 2007.

4 Some leaders in Jemaah Islamiyah (jl)> for example, required members to report their travel ex- penses to determine whether there was any corruption. That they never had problems with corruption could mean agents did not have different preference from the leaders, or it could mean the monitoring deterred corruption. Author interview, Jakarta, February 20, 2007. Al-Qaeda units operating in Africa in the early 1990s also had to file detailed expense reports. AFGP-2002-800573.

5 Chai 1993; Bueno de Mesquita 2005b.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 41

internal organization that proved extremely useful to both academics and Spanish and French police, who used them to conduct a series of damaging raids on the organization.6 One might have expected ETA to reduce its reliance on paperwork in light of such an incident but when one of eta's top leaders was captured by the French police in 1987, he was carrying a chart that nicely laid out the group's structure.7 Although organizational charts serve many useful purposes, in covert groups they are a clear liability.

In this article we provide an explanation for the seemingly odd facts that terrorist groups repeatedly include operatives of varying commit- ment and often rely on a common set of security-reducing bureaucratic tools to manage these individuals. Our core argument is that in small, heterogeneous organizations, longer institutional memory can enhance organizational efficiency for a variety of reasons.8

First, operations are difficult to monitor and the link between what leaders can observe and what their operatives actually do is often tenu- ous. The outcome of any single attack, for example, depends on a large dose of chance.9 Simply put, terrorist leaders and their agents are not always of one mind, so the greater the ambiguity about what the agents have done and whether failure is attributable to their shirking or to circumstances beyond their control, the greater the need for memory to establish a track record. Thus the monitoring problems following from the illegal and dangerous nature of the activities create the need for procedures that necessarily reduce security.10

Second, the set of possible operatives is often small – even among populations that believe deeply in a cause, few are willing to become terrorists – and recruiting new members entails additional security risks. This means that motivating agents requires both the ability to punish and the ability to employ disciplinary strategies that fall short of firing wayward operatives. As we will see, record keeping helps "man- agers" do both.

Third, managers themselves are at high risk for being killed or cap-

6 Zirakzadeh 1991, 277-78. 7 Llera, Mata, and Irvin 1993, 124. 8 We thank two of our anonymous reviewers for helping us articulate the clear and succinct state-

ment of our argument that follows. We have appropriated their language in several locations. 9 Had would-be LAX bomber Ahmed Ressam not caught malaria in Afghanistan, for example, he

may not have come to the attention of the United States Border Patrol agents who stopped him on December 14, 1999, because he was nervous, fumbling, and sweating profusely. Miletich and Carter 2001; Carter 2004.

10 Shapiro explores exactly this trade-off in greater detail using a set of models that abstract from many of the organizational processes we study here in order to concentrate on the different sources of divergent preferences between terrorist leaders and their operatives. Shapiro 2007; Shapiro 2008.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

42 WORLD POLITICS

tured, meaning that unless records are kept, institutional memory of past behavior is transitory. When past bad acts can be forgotten, incen- tives for good behavior are weakened as are incentives for leaders to follow consistent disciplinary strategies. Record keeping allows for in- stitutional memory in the absence of predictable personal relationships between principals and agents. We illustrate these arguments using a game-theoretic model of moral

hazard in a finitely sized organization. In this setting, the punishment strategies that allow leaders to extract greater effort from their agents are credible only when leaders can recall operatives' past actions and when operatives can identify and react to deviations from the leaders' equilibrium strategy.11 The intuition is that if leaders had a finite group of operatives, they would always want to use their best operative(s) ev- ery period unless by doing so they would weaken the long-term incen- tives for the operative(s) to put forth maximum effort. That long-term trade-off exists only when both sides have some knowledge of the orga- nizational history. Hence the incentives for record keeping. Moreover, the stochastic nature of terrorist operations means that small organiza- tions may periodically use problematic agents in equilibrium as part of a strategy that optimally motivates their best operatives. Our work contributes to the larger literature aimed at understanding

the sources of variation in terrorist activity. Within this literature the microdynamics and structure of groups have received relatively little attention, at least as compared with the attention devoted to country- level variables such as democracy, GDP, or degree of globalization.12 Yet organizational structure and internal constraints have an impact on both the efficacy of groups and the utility of counterterror strate- gies against them.13 Shapiro and Siegel, for example, illustrate how the moral hazard problem created when terrorist leaders delegate logistical tasks can lead to suboptimal funding of attacks, lower success rates, and a nonlinear response to counterterrorism.14 Though they cite the bureaucratization of al-Qaeda in the late- 1990s as evidence that terror-

11 The key difference between our model and the ones commonly used in the agency theory litera- ture is that we relax the standard assumption that principals have an infinite population of potential agents drawn from a known distribution. 12 Recent work that explores the microdynamics of terrorist organizations includes Abrahms 2008;

Weinstein 2007; Bueno de Mesquita 2005a; Siqueira 2005; Bueno de Mesquita 2008; Berman and Laitin 2008. A small sample of recent work exploring the impact of country-level variables includes Li 2005; Burgoon 2006; Bapat 2007; Wade and Reiter 2007; Neumayer and Plumper 2008; Walsh and Piazza forthcoming. 13 Shapiro 2007; Helfstein 2009. 14 Shapiro and Siegel 2007.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 43

ist organizations face problematic agents, the role of bureaucracy itself is left implicit. Other scholars likewise identify conditions that may affect how much hierarchy terrorist groups employ without explicitly modeling the internal conflicts that drive them to employ bureaucratic structures.15

Here we make those internal processes explicit, using a basic model in which a terrorist leader must employ an operative to accomplish some activities as a springboard. The main goal of the analysis is to illuminate a core reason why bureaucracy is used. We also derive some results about when it is likely to be used, although our ability to do so is limited by the inherent complexity of the strategic interaction. Impor- tantly, while we use the term bureaucracy throughout, this is really as a shorthand for a range of mechanisms that can enhance institutional memory.16 Maintaining a thorough oral history of the organization, for example, would serve similarly in helping organizations to reduce agency problems. Such a history, however, would also be security reduc- ing, as captured operatives carry information that intelligence services have historically been quite effective at eliciting. The article proceeds as follows. Section I takes a macrolevel ap-

proach, analyzing the set of ninety terrorist autobiographies available in English, French, and Spanish to show that security-reducing bu- reaucracy has been prevalent in a wide range of terrorist organizations operating from 1880 through the present. Section II takes a microlevel approach, reviewing a broad set of captured documents from al-Qaeda in Iraq to demonstrate, first, that agency problems bedeviled one of the most prominent modern Islamist terrorist groups and, second, that the group responded by adopting substantial record keeping. Section III presents a game-theoretic model that can help explain the patterns ob- served in the data by analyzing the challenges of maintaining discipline in small groups. The problem terrorist leaders face when operating with a finite pool of agents subject to moral hazard turns out to be quite complex, especially under conditions of limited organizational memory. We demonstrate two key facts about such organizations. First, under a broad range of conditions terrorist leaders have incentives to use agents who are less than fully committed, even when these agents are known to be strictly worse than other alternatives , because doing so allows them to

15 Helfstein 2009 is primarily concerned with the costs of nonmarket governance for groups. Enders and Jindapon 2010 follow an approach similar to Fearon 2008 by focusing on the risks of compromise created by network ties.

16 We thank our anonymous reviewers for asking us to be explicit on this point.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

44 WORLD POLITICS

motivate their best operatives to higher levels of effort. Not only does this help explain why terrorist groups seem to have so many problem- atic members, but it is also a novel finding for the agency-theory lit- erature, one driven by the finite pool of potential agents in our model. Second, there are conditions under which longer memory – and thus more bureaucracy – is favorable to the leaders. Section IV concludes by discussing the broader implications of this work. An online appendix17 contains proofs to all results in the article and discusses applications of extant principal-agent models to terror- ist organizations. These existing models provide a range of additional reasons why terrorist organizations would use bureaucracy and record keeping to solve their organizational challenges.

I. Terrorist Organizations: An Inside View

One of the key challenges in studying the internal dynamics of terror- ist organizations is the relative dearth of data on what actually goes on inside these inherently secretive institutions. Aside from a few highly salient examples (al-Qaeda, Fatah, al-Qaeda in Iraq), the internal cor- respondence of terrorist organizations has not been readily available to analysts and so it is hard to know how pervasive bureaucracy actually is in terrorist groups.18 We bring new evidence to bear on this question by analyzing all ninety memoirs we could find that were written by participants in terrorist organizations and that contained descriptions of individuals' activities in those organizations.19 We find that agency problems are pervasive in terrorist organizations and that security-re- ducing paperwork and bureaucracy were present in many of them.

For many terrorists, participation is a highly significant life event. Whatever their reasons for joining in the first place, terrorists by and large accept substantial risk in order to serve highly salient goals such as defending ones community, struggling for freedom from colonial rule, or transforming their country's economic system.20 A proportion of those who survive the experience naturally want to write about it,

17 See the online appendix, Shapiro and Siegel 2012. 18 For analyses drawing on the United States government s extensive collection of internal docu-

ments from al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda in Iraq, see Brachman and McCants 2006; Felter 2006; Shapiro 2007; Bergen et al. 2008.

19 For purposes of this exercise we define terrorist organizations as any whose use of violence regu- larly violated the principles of distinction and proportionality under the law of armed conflict for at least one year of their existence.

20 On reasons for joining, see the review of the psychological literature in Victoroff 2005. See also the explicit arguments about individual motivations in Pipes 2003; Reuter 2004; and Sageman 2008.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 45

and thus many terrorists pen memoirs. As terrorism is a fascinating subject, especially to those viewing it from afar, many of these autobi- ographies have been published and a large number have been translated into English.

One may rightfully be concerned that the characteristics of terrorists who write memoirs could bias inferences about bureaucracy in terror- ist groups. Two such biases deserve immediate attention. First, those who write memoirs have strong motivations to cast their actions in the most favorable light. We would therefore expect those who recall their participation favorably to minimize discussions of intraorganizational strife and discord and vice versa for those who were government agents. It is not clear, though, how this bias should affect the likelihood that they accurately recount the paperwork involved in participation. Sec- ond, bureaucracy is an inherently boring topic for the target audience of these memoirs (but, we hope, not for the readers of this article) and so we could expect these memoirs to underreport mundane organizational details and therefore underreport the extent of bureaucracy in their organizations. Since few memoir writers view their participation in a negative light (only eight in our sample), both of these selection effects should introduce a conservative bias into estimations of the prevalence of bureaucracy based on terrorists' autobiographies.21

Our data collection began with a survey of the secondary literature on terrorism and the historiography of specific groups to identify primary sources in English, French, and Spanish.22 We also consulted a number of prominent experts on terrorism and on specific terrorist conflicts. From this review we identified 122 potential autobiographies of indi- viduals involved in terrorist groups, which we define as violent covert organizations that engaged in nontrivial levels of violence that violate the standards of distinction and proportionality under the customary law of armed conflict. Of these, ninety carried descriptions of individu- als' activities in terrorist groups. The memoirs span the modern history

21 A related issue is that the sample is biased toward countries that have a tradition of autobiog- raphy or were colonies of countries that do. Few Islamist terrorists write memoirs, for example, while many Irish ones do. Any concerns that this would bias us toward finding high levels of record keeping should be allayed by the fact that the internal papers of at least two prominent Islamist organizations and one Arab organization have come to light (al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda in Iraq, and Fatah), and all show a keen affinity for paperwork during key moments in their histories. We elaborate further on al-Qaeda in Iraq in the next section.

22 We did not find any prominent Arabic sources that met our criteria; one prominent scholar attributed this to the absence of autobiography as a genre in jihadi writings. Private communication, Thomas Hegghammer, August 18, 2009. The documents closest to our criteria were written by mem- bers of al-Qaeda and are included in the Harmony database.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

46 WORLD POLITICS

of terrorism, from Marxist groups in Russia in the late nineteenth cen- tury to West European leftist groups in the 1970s to Islamist groups today. For each memoir we collected a variety of types of information, including the organizations the individuals were in, factors that could bias their memoirs including whether they were repentant or govern- ment agents, and a vector of dichotomous variables indicating whether they mention each of the following:

– disagreement over political goals – disagreement over tactics – disagreement over target – disagreement over money or logistics – problems maintaining discipline – multiple levels of hierarchy – operatives being punished by leaders – security-reducing monitoring23

The autobiographies contain hundreds of interesting stories, and while we cannot discuss all in the space of ajournai article, some specific ones are worth discussing. An excellent example of disagreements over money comes from the autobiography of Michael Baumann, a member of the Movement of the 2nd of June, a small leftist group operating in West Germany in the early-mid-1970s. In 1975 the group conducted a series of bank robberies and then split into two factions over disputes about how to spend the money.24 Bill Ayerss memoir Fugitive Days describes the fraught history of Weatherman, a leftist group operat- ing in the United States in the 1970s, offering up many examples of disagreements over tactics, most of them concerning how much energy to spend on military action relative to political organizing.25 Operatives being violently punished for various transgressions feature prominently in a number of the memoirs. One of the most striking examples comes from Baya Gacemis memoir of her time in the Algerian Islamic Group (gia); she tells of the time a fund-raiser named "Djamel" was killed. While the killers claimed it was because they heard he was informing, Baya reports that other members of the group thought he was killed to cover up the fact that his killers had been stealing from him.26

23 Defined as keeping records on paper or electronic media that could help government authorities kill or capture group members or significantly disrupt their activities. 24 Baumann 1979, 104-5. 25 See, for example, Ayers 2003, 197-98. 26 Gacemi 2006, 67.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 47

Four important facts became clear through this analysis. First, the majority of groups experience problems due to the heterogeneous pref- erences of their members – fifty-seven of the ninety memoirs report nontrivial agency problems. Second, most groups are decidedly hierar- chical – sixty-five of the memoirs discuss three or more levels of author- ity in the organization. Third, security-reducing monitoring of group members is common – twenty-five memoirs mention it. This monitor- ing ranged from the Warsaw Underground s audit department,27 to the Irgun's detailed tracking of weapons given to it by Jewish soldiers in the British Army,28 to the Mau Mau requirement that commanders provide village leaders with receipts for food expropriated during the Kenyan Emergency.29 Fourth, rates of record keeping are a bit higher in nationalist groups (seventeen of forty-four) than in social revolution- ary groups (ten of thirty-two). This last finding makes intuitive sense: because nationalist groups tend to be larger and more diverse, both ad- verse selection and moral hazard problems will be more challenging.

If we define bureaucracy as the combination of hierarchy and se- curity-reducing paperwork, then 28 percent (twenty-five of ninety) of the terrorists in our sample observed enough bureaucracy to report it in their memoirs. Interestingly, these memoirs were not unduly con- centrated in specific groups. Of the thirty-two groups represented in these memoirs, participants in twelve (37.5 percent) reported bureau- cracy, participants in twenty-four (75 percent) reported multiple levels of hierarchy, and the same number discussed specific agency problems. Overall the evidence is quite strong that bureaucracy has been present in a wide range of terrorist groups over a long period of time.

Despite these patterns, one might still be concerned that the orga- nizational problems terrorist groups have typically faced do not apply to the current threat from jihadi terrorist organizations. After all, our sample has only eight autobiographies from participants in such groups. Two points should allay these concerns. First, the Harmony documents consist largely of the internal correspondence of jihadi groups and they display plenty of conflict and record keeping. Second, a closer examina- tion of internal documents from one of the most deadly jihadi organi- zations, al-Qaeda in Iraq, reveals organizational phenomena that look strikingly familiar once we set aside the group's sanguinary purpose.

27 Korbonski 2004, 334-35. 28 Heller 1999, 254. 29 Itote 1971, 285-91.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

48 WORLD POLITICS

II. Inside al-Qaeda in Iraq: The "Sinjar Organization"

This section draws on a sample of 109 captured documents that provide a striking insider s view of the management challenges facing al-Qaeda in Iraqs (aqi) successor organization, the Islamic State of Iraq (isi).30 If Section I provided the equivalent of a cross-national evaluation of the level of conflict and record keeping in terrorist organizations, this section provides the equivalent of microlevel data. Overall these docu- ments portray an organization that required a great deal of reporting by its agents despite the fact that it faced an extremely competent counter- terrorism force with massive resources for document exploitation.31 The documents from what we call the "Sinjar organization" were captured by coalition forces in October 2007 in a raid near Sinjar, along Iraqs border with Syria.32 The majority of the documents (seventy) are typed or were found on computer files, and just over half of the docu- ments (sixty-one) are standardized forms or handwritten according to a common format. A number of the documents are actually blank stan- dardized forms for everything from tracking weapons,33 to receiving group funds,34 to swearing allegiance to the ISI.35 The combined documents cover a wide variety of institutional mi- nutiae including: 44 signed pledges by fighters agreeing to conditions for different activities; 43 managerial reports covering personnel, equip- ment, and finances; 10 internal receipts for funds disbursed to group members; 9 internal policy memos; and 4 press releases. While some of the documents are undated and the exact dates on many others remain obscure, the production dates for 37 can be identified with relative cer- tainty. These documents were produced during the eleven-month period from September 2006 through August 2007 and contain information about the Sinjar organizations finances going back to March 2006.36

30 For an analysis drawing on a much larger collection of captured documents from al-Qaeda in Iraq including the ones we use, see Bahney et al. 2010. 31 Record keeping and financial management practices in aqi receive extensive discussion in Bah-

ney et al. 2010. 32 Fourteen of the documents explicitly refer to the "Border Emirate" (Imarat al-Hudud) of the ISI.

It is not clear when this organizational distinction became official within the group, nor whether what would become the Border Emirate was recognized as a distinct geographical command within AQI. What is clear is that these documents were produced by a cohesive organization with shared personnel across "official" names, institutional memory, embedded management practices, and permanent sala- ried employees. We therefore refer to it as the Sinjar organization. For a more wide ranging analysis of these documents, see Fishman 2008.

33 NMEC-2007-657916. 34 NMEC-2007-657782. 35 NMEC-2007-637854.

36 The vast majority of the documents are from the "Border Emirate" of the Islamic State of Iraq

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 49

Understanding the situation in Iraq at this time period is critical for putting the documents into context. By many accounts AQl's relation- ship with the local population in Western Iraq began to sour in the summer of 2006.37 For the isi, carefully targeted violence and the ap- pearance of financial efficiency became critical elements in a struggle for legitimacy in the eyes of the locals.38 This meant the ISI had a double task: to control operations and to convince the locals it was doing so. In this light, seemingly obscure bureaucratic actions – having the group s financial administrator, Shahin, sign as a witness on the outgoing lead- er's summary of the group's activities in September 2006, for example – contributed to the iSl's ability to present itself as a disciplined, well-run, financially circumspect organization.39

Several patterns in these data are useful for thinking about why ter- rorist groups seem to have a fair amount of internal conflict and use bu- reaucracy to deal with it. First, we see ISI leaders discussing the political value of exercising control over their operatives and acknowledging that the communications required to do so create security risks. Second, we see a nontrivial level of bureaucracy in the Sinjar organization because (1) controlling violence is critical to its political mission and (2) it op- erates with a very diverse membership. Third, there is evidence of a steady trend toward greater bureaucratization in the isi, suggesting its leaders found it worth the inherent security cost. We will consider each pattern in turn.

The first pattern is highlighted by the fact that isi leaders repeatedly note that they must control their subordinates because engaging in too much violence and in inappropriate fund-raising efforts can damage their cause.40 It is instructive that the isi's midlevel managers, as well as those of aqi in earlier years, had repeated problems with personnel engaging in politically problematic fund-raising that hurt their rela- tionship with the locals.41 A December 2004 "Threat Announcement" from AQI highlights the political impact of such actions when it lists the names of those who took part in "mugging and looting" and disavows them in the following harsh terms:

(isi), though the earliest documents were completed shortly before aqi and its allies publicly declared the independent ISI across a swath of western Iraq on October 15, 2006.

37 Kagan 2007; Roggio 2007. 38 For an analysis of the ISI s "pitch" to Iraqis and the wider Arab world, see Fishman 2007. For a

discussion of the divisions and competition between Sunni insurgent groups, see Kohlmann 2008. 39 NMEC-2007-658016. 40 IZ-0603 16-02, NMEC-2007-637813. 41 Press reporting on coercive fund-raising by foreign fighters include Loyn 2008; Gordon 2007;

Arrington 2006; and Hendawi 2006.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

50 WORLD POLITICS

Due to the increase of illegal activities from theft and looting from those who claim to be part of Jihadi organizations and have committed such act in the name of their organization, let it be known [that] we at AI Qaeda organiza- tion in the land of two rivers are free from all their wrong doing and their acts we have sworn to expel those who allow themselves to exploit the blood or the money of the Muslims.42

The discussion of "expelling those who exploit" suggests that the ap- pearance of financial impropriety hurt AQ] politically. Indeed, concerns with public perceptions are implicit in a series of later ISI memos that lay down administrative rules with which leaders could monitor how their operatives spent money.43 Two requirements from these memos stand out:

1. "For every amount paid out of the Muslim people funds, the recipi- ent is required to provide two signatures, in his own handwriting, one for receiving the money and another one to show how the money was spent."

2. "All properties, small and large, will be inventoried, a report will be kept. We will keep a copy of the report, and all changes will be anno- tated from the previous report."

These are sensible requirements for almost any organization, but not for one that is ostensibly covert. For such an organization, record keep- ing of the type described presents dramatic security risks and makes sense only if the group s leaders were either (1) deeply concerned with the costs of operatives engaging in unauthorized behavior or (2) will- ing to give up a measure of security in order to be able to demonstrate financial propriety to a skeptical public. Both possibilities reflect a deep concern with the political impact of inappropriate behavior.

The leaders of the Sinjar organization are also keenly aware that they operate in an environment where becoming known to Iraqi or American government forces leads to operational failure.44 One Sinjar memo detailing standard reporting procedures specifically admonishes local leaders that

42 NMEC-2007-637813.

43 The list of rules appears in a series of three slightly amended memos, two of which have stan- dardized expense forms tacked on at the end, presumably to ensure that ISI operatives do their paper- work correctly. NMEC-2007-657945, NMEC-2007-657926, and NMEC-2007-657877.

44 This trade-off is especially stark for organizations such as the ISI whose enemy, the Coalition Forces, can strike anywhere without the constraints security forces face in traditional counterterror- ism operations. The British, for example, could not use indirect fire weapons against Provisional Irish Republican Army (p-ira) meetings in Belfast in the 1990s.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 51

[a]ll information is to be uploaded on a [flash usb], and sent every week to the administrator of the Emirate of Borders. Due to the security risk involved, do not keep any information.45

Despite such concerns, the Sinjar organization persists in using standardized forms,46 keeping lists of operatives and equipment,47 de- manding regular reports from lower-level units,48 and sending intraor- ganizational memos on everything from recommendations for a movie memorializing Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to a meeting agenda with a pro- posed organizational chart to be discussed.49 Put simply, these docu- ments show that for at least a one-year period, the Sinjar organization repeatedly sacrificed operational security for managerial control. In do- ing so, the group's leaders appear to have been motivated by a deep concern with managing public perceptions of their organization. With respect to the second pattern, the Sinjar organization's use

of bureaucratic tools is especially prominent in the group's "Fighter Registry Report[s]." These reports clearly provided a useful leadership tool.50 Each details the group's personnel in three categories: "incom- ing fighters," "permanent Emirate fighters," and "exiting brothers." For incoming fighters, the reports provide names, dates of arrival, the work they wiH do (martyr or fighter), and the assets they brought with them. For permanent fighters, the reports list individuals' names and gives information on "salary" and "work" for a number of them. For "exiting brothers," the report gives the individuals' "reason for leaving," who gave permission for them to leave, and their dates of departure. Any human resources manager would want to capture such information. For an organization whose members depend on anonymity for survival, however, such record keeping is a disaster waiting to happen.51

In many ways this kind of bureaucracy is exactly what we should ex- pect to see in the ISI. People who are good at violence – those who make ideal recruits as far as their eagerness and ability to conduct opera-

45 NMEC-2007-657926. « NMEC-2007-657694, NMEC-2007-658008, NMEC-2007-657694, NMEC-2007-658008. 47 NMEC-2007-658070, NMEC-2007-657674, NMEC-2007-657911, NMEC-2007-657921. 48 NMEC-2006-657777, NMEC-2007-657926, NMEC-2007-657945. 49 NMEC-2007-637123 and NMEC-2007-657738, respectively. 50 Chronologically these are NMEC-2007-657921, NMEC-2007-657680, NMEC-2007-

657775, and NMEC-2007-657927. 51 Other Islamist terrorist organizations use personnel tracking spreadsheets. At least one manager

in al-Qaeda (Abu Huthayfa) in the late-1990s called for the establishment of a database on al-Qaeda members and programs, the goal being to guide the organization and the broader jihadi movement by the study of its people; AFGP-2002-003251.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

52 WORLD POLITICS

tions – could be expected to have an underlying preference for violence that leads them to engage in more violence than is politically desirable. The I Si surely faced this dynamic. Most of the iSls fighters were for- eigners who had traveled long distances to kill and die for a cause they deeply believed in. These fighters came from many different countries and a range of socioeconomic backgrounds.52 They were exactly the kind of diverse, highly motivated group of operatives that should be expected to seek out violence and combat for its own sake. Outside of any other considerations, ISI leaders likely had a great need to exercise control simply due to the nature of their operatives. The third pattern is evident in that documents serving similar func-

tions become much more formal and detailed over time. There is an

illustrative contrast between two documents that report monetary income, expenses, personnel entering and departing, and equipment status for defined periods. The first document covers the two-month period from October 29 to December 21, 2006. 53 The second covers the fifteen-day period from January 27 to February 10, 2007.54The first difference between these two documents is the time period they cover. The later document is one of two bimonthly reports in the sample, suggesting the reporting frequency required in the Sinjar organization increased over time.55 The second difference of note is that the while

the first document breaks expenses down into large categories – "Guest houses," "Returnable debts," and "The brothers salaries," for example – the second document records each disbursement individually, noting the amount in dinars, recipient, and purpose for each, while summariz- ing the total amount disbursed to each individual in dollars.

A similar increase in bureaucratization can be seen in how the or-

ganization tracks its personnel. In October and November 2006 the Sinjar organization reports its personnel activities in relatively informal notes.56 In December the personnel memos are typed but still appear ad hoc.57 In January the first "Foreign Fighter Registry Report" appears with a standard format.58 These reports appear with the same format in February and March.59 Finally in May 2007 the "Islamic State of Iraq Salah al Deen Province Media Office" issues a memo that nicely

52 Felter and Fishman 2007. 53 NMEC-2007-657676. 54 NMEC-2007-657731.

55 The other such report is NMEC-2007-657680. 56 NMEC-2007-657696, NMEC-2007-657973. 57 NMEC-2007-657941. 58 NMEC -2007-65 792 1 .

59 NMEC-2007-657850, NMEC-2007-657775, and NMEC-2007-657927, respectively.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 53

illustrates the peak of the Sinjar organization's bureaucratization by di- recting all "sections and media personnel" to

Requesting [sic] an application for everyone of your soldiers in your district, if they have not done that before, please send them via postal service, in order for us to have all those who pledge of allegiance. If you did not have enough applications and if you don't have the capabilities for copying please inform our office to secure your needs.60

While it is certainly considerate of the "media office" to handle local cells' photocopying needs, the solicitousness seems a bit strange given the security implications. It makes sense only if the organization found some level of standardizing personnel records to be of great value. Two notes of caution must be sounded when deciding how much

weight to give these documents. First, they do not represent a random sample of all isi documents captured in Western Iraq from September 2006 on, much less a random sample of all isi correspondence produced during this time period. Thus we cannot be certain they are represen- tative of the group's internal correspondence. It may be that those isi operatives whose documents were captured have a particular taste for bureaucracy. Second, some of the staid managerial tone in the translat- ed documents may be due more to the translators' experiences in highly bureaucratic government organizations than to the original authors' af- finities for Western business jargon. These problems aside, the Sinjar documents examined above provide the best public evidence on the financing and management of one important terrorist organization.

III. Managing Moral Hazard in Small Organizations

A common assumption in the larger principal-agent literature is that the pool of theoretically available agents is effectively infinite. In such set- tings, a principal need not update his beliefs on the characteristics of the pool itself, just on the agents he draws from it. Further, it is often fair to assume that discarded agents are not used again. After all, if a new draw from the pool were better at the time the agent was discarded, surely this continues to be the case at any later time.61 Consequently, other than lack of knowledge about an agents quality, there is never any reason to suffer the use of a poor agent and certainly not more than once regardless.62

60 NMEC -2007-637927. 61 Banks and Sundaram 1993.

62 We discuss applications of extant agency theory to the problem of terrorist organizations in the online appendix, Shapiro and Siegel 2012.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

54 WORLD POLITICS

Yet it is clear that principals do not choose from an effectively infi- nite unknown pool in all cases. Often they are constrained for various reasons (for example, security, relevant knowledge) to use only a finite, potentially small number of people, and over time these people be- come quite well known. As we show in this section, a setting with finite choices of agents introduces significant new problems for a principal. Addressing these problems entails two induced incentives for princi- pals that are relevant for understanding terrorist organizations. First, terrorist bosses – the principals of our story – have a strong incentive to increase the level of bureaucracy in their organizations, in order to condition their agents to take more favorable actions. Specifically, bureaucracy makes punishment of agents feasible, and multiperiod punishments sustainable in equilibrium. In settings where principals receive imperfect signals of agent effort, as they surely do in covert organizations, having the ability to be lenient when good agents fail due to bad luck can improve long-term performance. Second, counter- intuitively, bosses have an incentive to deliberately and repeatedly use agents known to be bad. Even agents guaranteed to perform poorly can be used in equilibrium, despite the immediate cost to the boss, in order to ensure better outcomes when the better agent is used. In this section we illustrate both of these incentives via a game-

theoretic model. The model accommodates the substantial complexity arising from limiting agents to a finite pool by keeping everything else comparatively simple. Specifically, we limit the pool to two agents, one better and one worse, and build on prior work analyzing moral hazard problems in terrorist organizations. In that work, we analyze a model in which a terrorist leader, B, has the opportunity to engage his organiza- tion in a series of attacks. Because he cannot carry out the attacks on his own, he delegates to one or more terrorist middlemen, each denoted M. Each attempted attack requires one M and the attack is always attempted, though its likelihood of success can vary greatly.63 Due to security concerns and abundant outside options for the middlemen (for example, defecting in exchange for immunity), В has only two ways to condition an Ms behavior: he can alter the level of funding for Ms attack, or he can choose a different M. An M has even fewer options: he chooses how much of Bs funding goes to the attack and how much he skims off of the top. The likelihood of a successful attack increases

63 This setup effectively represents any set of actions with noisy observables. The choice of a binary signal for the model simplifies the analysis a bit, allowing us to focus in on the importance of organi- zational memory.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 55

with the amount M delivers to the attack. Middlemen are assumed to

vary in the degree to which they prefer skimmed money relative to suc- cessful attacks.

Due to the infinite pool of identical M, the optimal (stationary) strat- egy for В in this case is to retain the same M if an attack succeeds and choose a new M if an attack fails, never again using the failed middle- man. If the pool of middlemen were not identical but still infinite, then this same strategy would remain optimal for B. Only the best agents would ever be used, and no agent would be rehired after a failure. If the pool of agents were additionally finite, however, things would change substantially. And that is our jumping-off point.

Consider the following model of the interaction between one terror- ist boss, B, and two different middlemen, whom we'll call Шг and M2.64 Assume without loss of generality that is the "good" middleman, and M2 the "bad" one; we will explain the meaning of these adjec- tives shortly. These middlemen may represent operatives tasked with managing operations, or they may represent those directly tasked with operations.65

In each period, /, of an infinitely repeated game, the actors play a stage game that has two subperiods. In the first subperiod, В chooses an M = {Mp M2} of known type according to a decision rule and delivers to that M funds w.66

In the second subperiod, M chooses an action a e [0, w'y which is the amount of delivered funds put toward the attack.67 This action in part determines the likelihood of a successful attack, p{a^ 0); 0 is some array of parameters relating to the difficulty of the environment for the attack, dictated by contextual factors including but not limited to gov- ernment counterterror. Higher values of 0 indicate a more permissive

64 In addition to the finite pool of heterogeneous agents, this model differs from Shapiro and Siegel 2007 in its use of a constant wage, rather than a wage that is chosen by B. This is to keep the focus on the rehiring rule of the boss, rather than on his choice of funding level.

65 We retain the "middleman" label for comparability with earlier work and ease of exposition. 66 Note that we assume the choice of an M is cosdess regardless of Ms quality. Should there be a

cost to choosing a particular type of M due to government action, that M will be used weakly less often in equilibrium. A cost to the use of any M is weakly deleterious to В in equilibrium; however, whether such a cost renders the bureaucracy-inducing trigger equilibria we propose in this article less beneficial depends on which type of agents are more costly to use. If, as discussed in Shapiro and Siegel 2007, worse agents are potentially more cosdy to use as they are more easily bought off by government, then it becomes more costly for В to switch to them and trigger strategies are less beneficial. If, however, superior agents are more costly to employ, then things are more complex. Some trigger strategies may very well be more beneficial, as they enable В to pay the cost for the superior agent less often than in a simpler equilibrium, while still inducing M to take more favorable actions.

67 Shapiro and Siegel 2007 considered the variable x, the amount M skimmed from w. Here a = w – X.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

56 WORLD POLITICS

environment, and so more terrorist success for the same af. We assume that ; 0) is strictly increasing in at and 0 and, like all functions we will employ here, is twice-continuously-differentiable.68 We also as- sume that p(a ; 0) has increasing differences in at and 0. In other words, a higher 0, corresponding to a more permissive environment, not only directly increases the chance of success but also increases the efficiency of the agent's action in producing success.69 Importantly, we are agnostic as to the exact interpretation of p(a¿

0). Instead of the probability of "success" being the probability a bomb goes off or a rifle is fired, it can be understood as the probability the attack goes off without causing excessive, politically counterproductive violence. On November 25, 1993, for example, Egyptian Islamic Jihad (eij) set off a bomb in an attempt to assassinate then-Egyptian prime minister Atef Sidqi. The bomb missed its target but injured twenty-one bystanders and killed a schoolgirl named Shayma Abdel-Halim, caus- ing a major shift in public opinion against eij. In this case, the principal would have been uncertain about whether the agent shirked by being careless in setting up the attack or was just unlucky, but the attack was most certainly not a success. Between periods the attack is realized. Define a reward r as a ran-

dom variable that yields 1 if the attack at time / is a success and 0 if a failure; then p{a-y 0) implicitly defines the Bernoulli density function F{r I ¿r, 0). We assume that F is common knowledge and constant through time; prior assumptions imply trivially that F{rt I a¿ 0) satisfies the monotone likelihood ratio property (mlrp) for both at and 0, and therefore first-order stochastic dominance (fosd) as well: Vr e {0, 1} and a> a' F(r I a' 0) ^ F{r I a'' 0), and similarly for 0 and 0'.

M .s utility is

E[V(aij>qitt'Wy4i)' = ^ y Y^v(w- *¿/) + /(*;,/ ;0)^, (1)

68 This last is not necessary but makes the presentation simpler. 69 We assume as well that p(a¿ 0) is independent of the strategy В employs. That is, the chance

of success does not decrease in the complexity of B's strategy, given by the decision rule qt. This is a typical modeling assumption that is fair as long as the bureaucracy B's strategy entails does not ap- preciably worsen the operational security of the group going forward. Such will be the case when bureaucratic record keeping focuses more on the degree to which each M has hewed to B's preferences, and less on the operational details of past or future attacks. However, when such details are prevalent, we would expect a greater decrease in security the more complex is Bs strategy and, accordingly, that complex strategies would be employed less than seen in our model. Similarly, if control via bureau- cracy decreases innovation in agents' behavior, in turn decreasing the probability of successful attacks, then complex strategies entailing bureaucracy would also be employed less. We thank an anonymous reviewer for pointing this out.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 57

where qit is the probability M. is employed in any given period.70 This form captures Ms dual interests in material gain and in the success of the attack. We index agent type by the parameter y. e (0, 1]; higher values correspond to less greedy agents. The types of all agents are com- mon knowledge, so that there is no adverse selection problem.71 Thus the assumption that Mj is "good" and M2 "bad" means that y1 > yY We assume that v(-) is increasing so this portion of M's utility is increas- ing in the amount skimmed, and that v(0) = 0 so that being hired is at least as good as not being hired (with its utility of 0) in all periods.72 Note that for all у < 1, Ms preferences are not perfectly aligned with B's, leading to a potential moral hazard problem.

B's utility is

E[U(qt-, w)] = 5в i 0) – H(w)), (2)

capturing B's valuation of the attack and his opportunity cost for using money for the attack relative to other options. We assume that H(w) is increasing and convex. Let Htk = be the ¿-period history of the game where

each st e {{1, 2} X {0, 1}} indicates which agent was chosen (hired) and the outcome of the attack in period /. B's strategy is a rule for hiring based on the past history of the game, qt : H* – » [0, 1]. qt is in general stochastic.73 Note that its domain is a ¿-period history, where k < t, and thus not all previous periods' actions may affect it.74 M 's strategy consists of an effort level, a.f : Hf X qt^ [0, w]. Again, M is limited to condition his actions only on the previous k periods. A full strategy profile over all time is a(y, a).75 Best-response correspondences will be given by a*.

70 This differs from that in Shapiro and Siegel 2007 in the change in the definition of y. ((1 – y) there is y in this article, and vice versa) and in an affine transformation. All logic below also general- izes trivially to the case of a general utility function as long as v(w – a¿ у.) has increasing differences in a and y..

71 We briefly discuss the role of bureaucracy in the presence of incomplete information in the on- line appendix, Shapiro and Siegel 2012.

72 This ensures that individual rationality is always satisfied. 73 Strictly speaking, qt defines a mixed strategy in response to all possible histories of the game at

time t. The pure strategy this mixed strategy extends assigns a 1 (rehire) or a 0 (do not rehire) to each possible history; qt is a randomization over these pure strategies. To conserve notation, however, we do not introduce the pure strategies directly in the text.

74 We will use this to solve for best response functions that treat the continuation value of the game as fixed conditional on the outcome of a finite number of periods.

75 Notice that we have assumed В and all M have the same k. As a practical matter this may not be true, and a relatively straightforward extension of the model would relax this assumption.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

58 WORLD POLITICS

We consider only strategies that are anonymous and time consistent. Anonymity implies that all ex ante identical agents are treated identi- cally by B, and all agents with identical type pursue the same strategy. Time consistency implies that all strategies are optimal looking for- ward at every /, assuming the other player uses his equilibrium best response function. Each value of k defines a different level of organizational memory,

and increasing k requires increasing the level of bureaucracy necessary for the upkeep of this memory.76 If increasing k increases the utility of the boss, the boss may be willing to take on increased record keeping and oversight despite the inherent security risk. To illustrate the impact of organizational memory, we consider k = 0, k – 1, and k = 2 in turn and show that increased memory, and hence bureaucracy, can be ben- eficial. Of course, there are costs to bureaucracy as well, meaning there is surely an optimum level of bureaucracy for each group, which may very well be none. This optimum will decrease in costs and increase in benefits; thus, our illustration of when and under what conditions bureaucracy will prove positive for the organization speaks directly to the degree of bureaucratization a group acting optimally should under- take.77

No Memory

We begin with the trivial case in which no actor evinces any degree of memory and is therefore unable to condition actions on even the previ- ous periods outcome. With no memory all middlemen act myopically in each period, solving

1

arg max 11 ' У i

Since the equilibrium in each period reduces to a one-shot game, В simply hires the agent providing the greatest utility in every period. v'(0 > 0 provides the immediate monotone comparative static that a*

76 Note that even though the boss needs only ¿-period memory here, time may pass between peri- ods, implying the need for security-decreasing record keeping.

77 Though we could view the restriction to a specific level of memory, or equivalently, a specific degree of history dependence, as an equilibrium selection criterion, we choose to frame the argument instead in terms of a property of the actors: the level of memory they may employ. We do this to highlight more clearly the choice that В is making over bureaucracy in the larger, though not modeled, game in which В would first choose an optimal level of bureaucratization, and hence k , and then play the game we have described.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 59

is weakly increasing in у.78 В thus chooses every period in equilib- rium.

So under very general conditions the basic intuition applies that in myopic organizations better agents devote more of w to action and so В hires the best agent in every period.

Finite Memory

Finite memory expands the range of possible equilibria. We focus on subgame perfect Nash equilibria to show that greater memory allows В to achieve two important organizational goals: (1) more effectively condition the better agent and (2) find equilibria in which condition- ing is time consistent given a greater quality spread between the two agents.

Covert organizations face substantial costs for developing the bu- reaucracy to maintain organizational memory. Whether any particular group finds it worthwhile to create the memory required to sustain more complicated equilibria will depend on the nature of its opera- tion environment, here represented by the probability of success giv- en effort, parameterized by 0, and the characteristics of the agents; 5^, v'(')> and y.. This section simply shows that memory helps solve the problems which arise in organizations relying on a finite population of heterogeneous agents and identifies conditions under which this use of memory is more likely to be feasible.

We start by examining the game with 1 -period memory to lock in the key intuition. We then extend the results to 2-period memory, pro- vide an example of one set of conditions under which В can do better with 2-period memory, and construct an equilibrium that further uti- lizes the extended memory.

1 -period memory

Given all actors' inability to recall more than the ¿-period history of the game, actors can condition their behavior only on the visible outcomes of the previous k periods and on their expectations about future actions. Visible actions include only which agent was used and whether the ac- tion succeeded. For 1 -period memory, this implies in particular that all that matters at the start of time t are (1) who was in use in the previous

78 Applying reasonable conditions guarantees an interior solution so that a* is strictly increasing in y. Sufficient conditions for a unique interior solution are that,

p'w) < />'( 0) > – y^-v'(O) and 1- Lv/Z(zy – a) + p"(a) < 0 Va g [0, w ].

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

60 WORLD POLITICS

period and (2) what happened with the attack undertaken with that agent.79

Bs rehiring rule qt thus takes a particularly simple form: qt – (y/'1, qth0y q*'1, qt2'°)> where the first element of each superscript corresponds to the agent in use in period t – 1, who may or may not be rehired, and the second element corresponds to the success (1) or failure (0) of that agent s earlier attack. An equilibrium of the game defines all four ele- ments of this vector. We restrict attention to equilibria where Bs hiring rule satisfies the following reasonable criterion: В is weakly more likely to rehire all agents after a success, that is, q ^ qth°y /.

Though qt has four elements, from Bs perspective only one of them is relevant at the beginning of each period t – the one corresponding to the appropriate outcome of the previous period. In order for Bs actions to be time consistent, this element must maximize Bs utility looking forward, conditional on both M.s action that period, a{t, and the ex- pected outcome of the game looking forward. Under 1 -period memory there are only four unique ways to begin a period and so four different continuation values of the game. In analogy to the notation introduced for the rehiring rule q¿, we denote these for B: t/+1 = ^+i°> Utlf). Define Vt+1 similarly for M. Only some of these elements may come into play, depending on the outcome of the previous period. Also note that these continuation values do not depend on actions in the previous periods, though they do depend on expectations about future periods and the parameters of the model.

Any M. in use faces a similar problem to B. The major difference is that, while В chooses a qt to affect which a will be used in the present period, at is chosen with an eye to maximizing a linear combination of present rewards and M.s rehiring in the next period. M.s action, я , therefore depends on the likelihood that it will result in an additional use ofM. in the future, which is a function both of p(a¿ 0) and q . The former is common knowledge given ap while the latter is a function of the equilibrium strategy В plays and Ms expectations thereof.

Unlike B, with 1 -period memory no M cares what happened last period. By the time he is hired in period /, В has already used that information. 1 -period memory thus affects M only indirectly, through its impact on Bs ability to remember one past action and rehire or not

79 Extending memory by M to include memory of his own actions would enable M to play more damaging trigger strategies against В (for example, resort to myopic play forever if В ever fails to pun- ish). Since this would make it easier to sustain punishment by В in equilibrium, we analyze the hard case in which M remembers only the outcome of his past actions.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 61

accordingly. If the equilibrium qt were stationary – a reasonable class of equilibria to explore under 1 -period memory, due to the sameness of each period – then any hired M. would take the same action in every period as well.

These insights allow us to derive a few usefid properties of the best response functions of all actors in the model. We begin with the agents. In general, each M. chooses a level of action, at, to maximize his ex- pected utility looking forward:

E[V¡a}= – – – v(w-ä,) + р(а,;в)+ 5дНРгоЬ (Hired/+i 'at)V^{ У i

+ (1 – Prob (Hired, +i 'a<)V¡'°). (4)

We can expand the probability of being rehired according to the logic above and rewrite M.s problem in the particularly simple form shown in the following equation, which leads directly to lemma l:80

i 1 – У i arg max E[V¡' i ] = arg max * a У i

+ 8M([?;;Ì -v$)

+ ¿í (ČI К:")- (я

Lemma 1. M.s best response, л*(*) is weakly increasing in q £ J and and weakly decreasing in qt& and Consequendy, Ms best response is also weakly increasing in the difference between the continuation value if rehired or

not, V¿' – and the difference in his rehiring probabilities after a success

and a failure, qt^' – qtfv

Lemma 1 is intuitive; increased rewards for success and decreased rewards for failure can induce a middleman to take (weakly) higher actions. We might think that other intuitive results should fall easily from the form of M.s utility, for example, that better agents always take higher actions or that a more permissive environment might always lead to higher actions. However, these statements do not follow from the agent s utility because Ms optimal actions depend on Bs choices. For example, it is entirely possible that a worse agent, maximally con- ditioned by Bs hiring rules, will perform better for В than a better

80 All proofs are in the online appendix, Shapiro and Siegel 2012.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

62 WORLD POLITICS

agent who is not conditioned at all and so plays the myopically optimal strategy of the no memory case.81 To see when В will use strict hiring rules, we need to consider Bs

problem in more detail. Assume that player i was used in the last period, with attack outcome rf_v and player -i was not used. Let is equilib- rium action given expectations on future rehiring rules be я *(y., 5M, 0, q v ^+1). We will leave off the functional dependence of the equilib- rium action for readability. Note however that Ms equilibrium action at time t does not depend at all on the rehiring rule at time /. Bs best response correspondence is then

q*(-) ее arg max '_1 (/>(я*, ; 0) + òB '^(а^ ; &) Uj'+' + (1 -/>(**, ; 0)) ]) ?/(■)

+(1 )(/>«;, ;0)

+ ÒB 'p{a*_u ; 0) U~'{ 1 + (1 – p{a*_ht ; 0)) U^0]) . (6)

Bs continuation value clearly depends both on whom he hires in the present period and whether or not that agent succeeds, because both influence the probability of getting a given middleman in the next period. With Bs expected utility in hand we can directly examine the power of conditioning via hiring rules by constructing an equilibrium of the repeated game.

Consider the intuitive strategy profile in which В rehires the good M when he succeeds but fires him when he fails, and only ever uses the bad M for one period regardless of the outcome of that period of use. In this equilibrium M2 receives no conditioning; he cannot reearn his job via his actions and thus has no incentive to do anything other than take his myopically optimal action in every period he is used. We denote this action a2 and, for shorthand, the probability of success this induces as^ .

The use of M2 in this 1 -period trigger strategy is as a pure punish- ment to for his failure in the previous period. With only 1 -period memory, all such triggers must be of a harsh form – В cannot give Шг the benefit of the doubt for a period after a failure, because the failure will have been forgotten by В by the next rehiring decision. Only when multiperiod memory is in use will such "gentle" triggers become pos-

81 Rules that always rehire after a success and always fire after failure achieve maximum condition- ing according to lemma 1. Rules that rehire and fire at the same rates after success or failure achieve no conditioning by lemma 1.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 63

sible. Note that in this equilibrium, unlike in our previous work or in any other model utilizing an infinite pool of agents, our trigger strategy keeps the better agent out of service for only one period. This is due not only to the 1 -period memory structure but also to the finiteness of the pool.

We postulate a stationary equilibrium hiring strategy q* = (yu = 1, = 0, q1'1 = 0, q2'0 = 0). This implies (under 1-period memory) stationary actions by each M as well. We have already defined a2 as the equilibrium action for the bad M. The good M, by contrast, does con- dition its behavior on B's actions. We postulate that Mt optimizes his expected utility £[^1Д] as per normal whenever В plays his equilibrium hiring strategy but reverts to myopic behavior (which is better for it) in any period that В fails to punish when he should.

Formally, Mj maximizes equation 3 when В goes off the equilibrium path. This is a strictly beneficial deviation in the short term. It is also a sensible one, as Mj now has evidence that B's threat to fire is not credible.82 We denote this myopic best response av and its associated success probability/^. Note that, because of the strictures of 1-period memory, M cannot revert to this strategy for all time. Mj acts myopi- cally in one period because he remembers he was in use and failed last period and yet is rehired this period. This is strictly better for Mj in the current period than playing as if В were on the path. However, if he is treated appropriately (that is, according to equilibrium play) by В following his punishment period, he no longer remembers why it was necessary to punish.83

On the equilibrium path, Mj maximizes £[FU], To determine this, start with equation 6 and equate £[ F1,1] with £[ V^] due to station- arity. Then write an equivalent equation for ^[F1,0], which is equal to

because the better agent is always rehired after one period out of use. After some algebra, these equations yield:

£[FU]= ^lzJiv(w_ -) + ^(1_82f _8aí(1_8aí)^)-1( (7)

82 A straightforward extension of the game would introduce uncertainty for M over whether В is a "tough" type or a "wimpy" type. Since M remembers only one period back, Bayesian updating would take a very simple form.

83 While he may remember being fired, he does not remember if this was deserved or not. This may be a poor assumption for participation in spectacular attacks, but there are many observable actions that generate noisy signals of effort but are less memorable. An alternative specification would allow M to condition current actions on the previous k-periods' actions, which would make a permanent deviation to myopic play possible; that is, Mj knows it played myopically in the previous period and so В must have failed to follow through with his firing threat at some point in that past. In that alternative

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

64 WORLD POLITICS

where аг is the conditioned action of the better agent and fi is its as- sociated probability of success. Lemma 1 guarantees that ax ^ In periods while the better agent

is in use, this equilibrium makes В weakly better off than the case with- out memory. We just need to ensure that all actors want to play this equilibrium. We have already seen that both types of M have no benefit from a deviation. On the equilibrium path both are maximizing the ap- propriate utilities given the rehiring rules. Off the equilibrium path the better agent forms the belief that his actions are now uncorrelated with the rehiring rule and so maximizes the appropriate utility in this case. That leaves Bs incentives. For Bs threat to be credible and thereby

serve to condition it must be the case that the value of the game going forward from punishing the better agent exceeds the value of the game going forward from simply rehiring the better agent after a failure given his off-the-path beliefs. Solving for the difference in ex- pected utilities arising from each of these actions allows us to generate conditions on how much the threat of punishment has to condition M1 in order for the threat to be credible.

Proposition 1. If Mj s myopic strategy is sufficiently bad for В relative to his conditioned strategy, then В can sustain a 1 -period trigger strategy in equilib- rium regardless of the bad agent s type. The greater the value of the future to В (ÔB), the stronger the conditioning effect (the greater д ); and the better the worse agent performs (д ), the more likely it is that a 1 -period trigger strategy can be sustained.

Proposition 1 encapsulates the value of organizational memory in this setting. Without memory, the boss must rely upon his agents' myo- pic best interests, which may be very bad. With this simple 1 -period memory the boss is able to motivate his agents to do better than they would if unconditioned. Though В cannot make credible claims about hiring rules ex ante – because of a lack of enforceable contracts for ter- rorists and the necessity of time consistency – past history provides a guide to Bs future actions. M can determine if В has left the path and punish him if he has. Importantly, Ms punishment is time consistent: the agent wants to punish whenever he can get away with it.

The conditioning made possible by this can lead to significantly bet- ter outcomes for the boss. The following simple numerical example makes the point clearly. Consider a fairly good agent, у = у, and let

memory structure В does worse after a deviation and so an equilibrium is easier to obtain. We are thus dealing with the hard case in justifying bureaucracy.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 65

the bad agent be horrible, y2 = 0. Using reasonable functional forms and parameters it turns out that no matter how much money В pumps into attacks, even the good M skims it all in the case of no memory.84 But if В plays the 1 -period trigger strategy of proposition 1, then M^s best response yields an equilibrium success rate of 87.8 percent, which is almost, though not quite, as good as that obtained with an infinite

population of identical agents who have Y = у • Conditioning therefore clearly works on the better agent, even when

only small levels of organizational memory are in effect, but is it useful to the boss? The answer to this question depends on the frequency with which the better agent is used, since in this example using the worse agent is just a wasted period. To get at this, we note that the combina- tion of equilibrium success probabilities and hiring rates produces a Markov chain in equilibrium, with a well-defined transition matrix. For our 1 -period trigger equilibrium, this matrix T, where T.. is the prob- ability of transitioning from M. to M., is

(<■ '"Z). №> In the steady-state, Мг is thus used a fraction of the time equal

to 2 – f" ^or parameter values used in our previous numerical example this implies that Mt gets used about 88.5 percent of the time in equilibrium, so that В effectively wastes a period on average once every ten periods by using agent 2 to condition agent 1. Despite this, the expected overall success rate is 78 percent given this frequency of use, clearly superior to the 0 percent В gets in the absence of condi- tioning.85

Thus we see that the boss does substantially better in this example by constructing a level of organizational memory, supported in practice by a certain level of security-decreasing bureaucracy, as compared with the no-memory case. Organizational memory (that is, record keeping) supports equilibrium punishment strategies that are time-consistent given a finite pool of known agents.

ßU-a)

84 We use v = b{w – a),H= cwy p – e a, 1 + a, ~a>

and с = .0004167. These parameter values were used and justified in Shapiro and Siegel 2007. 85 If В can set wages, then no money is wasted here either: the better agent does not skim, tak-

ing the highest action possible, and the worse one does not get funded. If В cannot do so, as in our analytic simplification, money will be wasted, as the worse agent will take no action and abscond with the funding.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

66 WORLD POLITICS

1 -PERIOD MEMORY VERSUS NO MEMORY

What about in general? Can we determine when the boss will do better with the 1 -period trigger equilibrium and so choose more bureaucracy? Without using specific functional forms as in the previous example, this is difficult, as the decision involves numerous trade-offs that are

likely to be situation specific. However, we can make some progress toward a general welfare result by considering the steady state behavior of the actors.

As noted above, in the steady state of the 1 -period trigger equilib- rium, has a success rate of Д and is used a fraction of the time equal 1 ^ , 1 t° 2 ч ~ j>y while ML 2 has a success rate of ^ ri p~ and is used , 1 – ~ 2 ~ x fraction 2 ч ~ P' j>y 2 ri 2 ~ P' of the time.86 In the no-memory case, M1 is always used, with a success rate of д . Bureaucracy is beneficial whenever the expected value of the 1 -period trigger to В exceeds that of the no-memory equilibrium, or when

< 2 -/ì [^2+ ^ ' After some algebra, this reduces to:

ft > . 1 + />1 – pi

On one level, this condition is fairly clear. The bigger is the condi- tioned probability of success for , the better В does with 1-period memory, as В does better from each period that Ыг is in use. Similarly, the greater is the myopic probability of success for M2, p2 , the better В does with the 1-period trigger, as В does better during the punish- ment periods when M2 is in use. By contrast, the larger is pv the better В does in the myopic equilibrium, leaving less reason to add on costly bureaucratic layers to Bs organization.

Ideally, though, we would like to know how the likelihood of this inequality's holding varies with the parameters of the model. For its dependence on most parameters, however, even the functional forms used in our numerical example do not provide insight. There are simply too many trade-offs involved to derive a result not dependent on the

86 We use the steady state to avoid the combinatorics arising from B's always choosing M1 first in equilibrium.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 67

specifics of the situation. Despite this, there is one comparative static we can state.

As noted in the discussion in the no-memory subsection, the myopic equilibrium action is increasing in y . so that the probability of success is also increasing in y.. Consequently,/^ is increasing in y2, and the 1 -trig- ger equilibrium becomes more beneficial the less greedy the worse agent is. Substantively, this implies that the bureaucracy a 1 -trigger equilib- rium entails is likely to be more worthwhile the better the second-best agent is. In other words, a reduction in the quality of alternative agents by government, even though these agents may not be presently in use, should result in less incentive for В to bureaucratize and necessarily a worse outcome for B, since the better agent in use stays the same. Conversely, if, as suggested by Shapiro and Siegel,87 government action often first removes the worse agents, potentially driving up the quality of the next best agent due to search processes, В becomes more likely to bureaucratize and achieves a better outcome.

Of course, some organizations may benefit from a wider range of pos- sible equilibria and so may value longer memory. We examine the case of 2-period memory to show that the results extend quite naturally.

2-period memory

The existence and potential benefit to the boss of the 1 -period trigger equilibrium tells us that memory, and so bureaucracy, can be useful to an organization employing a finite group of agents. It does not, how- ever, indicate how much memory might be useful or exactly why more memory is useful. Constructing an equilibrium that takes advantage of 2-period memory gets at these complementary questions. The boss's motivation for doing so is simple: in some settings В can gain strictly better outcomes by employing strategies not available with 1 -period memory. The intuition is that even good agents will sometimes have a bad outcome due to chance. Organizations can do better if they can be lenient as well as strict. Being lenient with good agents, however, requires that organizations record behavior over multiple periods for both the obvious reason and to make it possible for principals to play time-consistent strategies that permit forgiving occasional failure and still incentivize good agents. When it is beneficial to have longer orga- nizational memory, terrorists have an incentive for more bureaucracy.

With 2-period memory the players' maximization problems become more complicated because В can condition his hiring choice in period

87 Shapiro and Siegel 2007.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

68 WORLD POLITICS

t + 1 on the outcomes both in the current period and in period t – 1. Moreover, while an M who is fired obviously receives nothing in period t + 1, the probability that M is hired in period t – V 2 can depend on the outcome in period t and so the continuation value of being fired depends on the current period s outcome. In other words, Ms decision affects not only whether or not he is rehired but also the value he gets for being rehired or for being fired. Formally, we must keep track of four continu- ation values, rather than the two in the 1-period memory case. The same increase in complexity is true for В as well, and Bs prob-

lem is harder than Ms because of the fundamental asymmetry of the problem – В must always keep track of events one period further back than M does because of the order of actions in the game. So whereas in the 1-period memory case, Bs rehiring strategy had four elements, now a minimal strategy has eight. We define this new strategy as qt = {q^xly Ç,1X0> Çt1,0y0y Çt2X1y y/'1,0) Çt2,0,l> where the first element of each superscript corresponds to the agent in use in period t – 1 who may or may not be rehired, the second element corresponds to the suc- cess (1) or failure (0) of that agent s attack in period t – 2, and the third element corresponds to that agent s results in period t – 1. We define 2-period memory analogues to U and V in the same way. In the 1-period case, we postulated a stationary 1-period trigger

strategy. While not the only equilibrium possible for all parameter val- ues, this had the nice properties that it (1) strongly conditioned the better agent, (2) used the better agent often, and perhaps most impor- tantly (3) was extremely easy for a boss to use. We want to keep these properties under 2-period memory, while making use of the expanded set of strategies afforded by extra memory. In particular, we can easily imagine a situation in which the operational environment is so hard that even highly motivated Ms fail fairly often. In such settings В can still benefit from conditioning the M but would want to have the op- tion of employing a less drastic strategy to do so, especially if the worse agent had a very low y. An intuitive strategy profile to consider in a setting where a bit of

leniency can help is a "gentle trigger" strategy in which В fires the good agent only if he suffers two failures in a row and never uses the bad agent for more than one period. This strategy has the nice qualities of the 1-period trigger equilibrium but makes use of the extra memory. Formally, q* = (1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0). To help keep down notational complexity, we define M.s stage game payoff as v. (a) = 1 ~ Y- v(w – a.) + Y<

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 69

The gentle trigger strategy reduces the complexity of the problem somewhat, leaving three relevant states of the world. The first state oc- curs when the good M is newly hired or when the good M succeeded in the previous period. In equilibrium the good M will not be fired in the next period in either case regardless of the outcome of his attack. Be- cause memory is limited to two periods the game looks the same going forward to the good M (and B) in both cases. To keep notation simple, we call the expected utility of the game to in this state Vs, to В Us, and the equilibrium action Mx takes is as, which we define below. The second state occurs when Mx failed in his previous attack but succeeded in the one before that. Now he may be fired in the next period, which may produce different incentives to him. We define analogous notation: Vf, Up, and ap. Finally, the third state occurs when M2 is in use because Mj has been fired. Because the bad M's incentives remain the same as in the 1 -period trigger equilibrium, M2 takes the same myopic action as before, a2 . The corresponding expected utilities for M and В are V2 and U2 respectively. ( V2 defines Mj s utility when not in use, not M2's utility.) We define p = p{a¿fi), vs = v(a¿) , and so on for convenience.

This specifies the equilibrium path of play. Off the path, we assume that Mj plays his myopic strategy, av for as long as he realizes that В has deviated from equilibrium play. There are several ways in which В could deviate. He could (1) fail to fire Mj after two failures; (2) fire Mj after one failure; (3) fire Mj after a success; (4) fire after two successes; or (5) rehire M2 at any time. Given the equilibrium strate- gies of both Ms, it clearly cannot pay for В to deviate in the last three ways. We will see by lemma 2 below that the second never pays either and, in proposition 2, that while the first deviation pays sometimes, it does so under well-defined conditions that produce results similar to proposition 1.

Transitions based on B's hiring rule and Mj s actions define the fol- lowing three linked expected utilities for Mj:

Vs = vs + 8 Mips Vs * (1 -ps)VF) (9)

VF = vF + 8M (pF Vs*(l- pF)V2) (10)

V2=0+0MVs. (11)

Some algebra produces the following decision problem, which im- plicitly defines both as and ap on the equilibrium path:

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

70 WORLD POLITICS

' y S _ S _

as , aF = arg ma x <

s ' F y F vf + 8m^(8m + pF – &Mps) – 8 mvfPs ш < F 1 – $M¡ps – 8м (1 – ps)($M – (1 – Sm)Pf)]

(12)

Informally we would think that the equilibrium would be sustain- able only if Bs threat conditions M. This turns out to be true. Lemma 2 formalizes this "boss pleasing" condition that follows from equations 9-12 and is an analogue to lemma 1.

Lemma 2. In a gentle trigger equilibrium tries weakly harder after both failure and success than in the myopic equilibrium. Further, Mj tries weakly harder after failure than after success. That is, Mj s actions are ordered in equi- librium: af ^ as ^ .

Lemma 2 basically states that in the 2-period memory case some conditioning is never worse for В than none in terms of the good agent s actions. It also indicates that no 1 -period deviation can be profitable for В after one failure, since by rehiring he would be trading weakly greater effort in the next period (aF) for the weakly lower myopic effort

). Lemma 2 thus reduces the qualifications necessary for the gentle trigger equilibrium to hold. As long as В has no incentive to rehire M1 after two consecutive failures, Bs hiring strategy will be credible to the agents. Proposition 2 provides the condition for this to be the case and illustrates how this condition varies.

Proposition 2. If Mj's myopic strategy is sufficiently bad for В relative to his conditioned strategies, then В can sustain the gentle trigger strategy in equi- librium regardless of the bad agent's type. The greater the value of the future to В (ÔB), the stronger the conditioning effect (the greater p and />F), and the better the worse agent performs {p¿ ), the more likely it is that the gentle trigger strategy can be sustained.

Proposition 2 defines when a gentle trigger equilibrium can be sus- tained; whether that is better for В than a 1 -period trigger depends on the parameters of the model. Consider the following simple numerical example where the good agent puts forth little effort off the path, so

is very small. Suppose the models parameters are such that p = .3, ps = .5, px = .65, and pF = .7. Under these conditions both the 2-pe-

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 71

Figure 1 1-Period Trigger versus Gentle Trigger

riod gentle trigger and the 1-period trigger strategies can be sustained in equilibrium for ôB > .86. Figure 1 shows B's expected utility at the start of the game fixing ÔB > .9 and varying^ from 0 to .3. This en- compasses the range of possibilities from the worst possible bad agent to the situation where both agents are identical: y2 = 0 to y2 = yv

Figure 1 illustrates the fact that the loss of conditioning in the gentle trigger is more than offset by the loss of utility from using the worse agent more often in the 1-period trigger when M2 is sufficiently bad. However, as M2 gets closer in performance to the myopic good agent, the lost conditioning value outweighs the value of avoiding the bad agent and В does better with a 1-period trigger strategy. One can easily imag- ine the situation in which В would do better by switching to 2-period memory if bureaucracy were free but would not do better if the security costs of greater memory outweighed the expected value from employ- ing more nuanced disciplinary strategies. This, of course, is exactly as it should be. Not all terrorist groups employ extensive bureaucracy.

Extensions

Before concluding, it is worth noting that we have assumed that the history of the game contains only the outcome of attacks and the agent in use for each attack; thus В can base rehiring decisions only on these two factors. We view this as the starkest setting to provide the key intu-

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

88 We explicitly use this setup in a slightly different model in section 2.1 of the online appendix, Shapiro and Siegel 2012.

72 WORLD POLITICS

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 73

IV. Conclusion

Prodigious levels of disagreements and bureaucracy in conventional, licit organizations are hardly surprising. Almost all organizations need to control agents with diverse preferences who operate in environments in which observable outcomes provide only noisy signals about actions. Bu- reaucracy eases this challenge by structuring interactions within the or- ganization, defining standard operating procedures, delivering organiza- tional goals, and reinforcing organizational culture. Though bureaucracy carries inefficiency costs, it is necessary. Illicit organizations, including terrorist groups and insurgent armies, face many of the same institutional requirements as their legal counterparts – agents must be directed, indi- viduals must communicate, and so on – but pay particularly high costs for bureaucracy in the form of reduced security and the concomitant risk of incarceration or death. Despite these potent costs, some terrorist orga- nizations demonstrate substantial levels of bureaucracy.

Formally analyzing the specific managerial challenges inside terror- ist organizations helps explain this variation by identifying motivations for bureaucracy and record keeping in terrorist organizations. In ad- dition to the typical role assigned to bureaucracies of providing lead- ers with better signals of their agents' efforts and quality, and so ame- liorating moral hazard and adverse selection problems, we identify a novel use for bureaucratic record keeping: in small organizations facing moral hazard problems, longer institutional memory enables leaders to employ equilibrium disciplinary strategies that are forgiving (that is, they allow for the inevitable failures that come with a hard operational environment) and credible (that is, time consistent) given a finite pool of known agents. Counterintuitively, creating organizational structures that help operatives know when leaders are not following disciplin- ary rules can make it possible for leaders to employ a wider range of punishment strategies to condition agents. Such strategies can enhance organizational efficiency for terrorist groups, despite the gains to coun- terterrorism from enhanced record keeping. Further, employing these disciplinary strategies in difficult operational environments where oc- casional failures are inevitable entails the repeated use of agents known by terrorist leaders to be suboptimal, improving our understanding of seemingly questionable personnel choices by these groups.

From this perspective the fact that al-Qaeda in Iraq's successor or- ganization, the Islamic State of Iraq (isi), used standardized forms to track spending should not be surprising.90 Illicit organizations will em-

90 isi administrative memos written in 2006 lay down administrative rules and provide standard-

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

74 WORLD POLITICS

ploy bureaucracy when they find the cost in decreased security out- weighed by the benefits in organizational efficiency. As our analysis of ninety terrorist memoirs in Section I demon-

strated, while internal conflict and bureaucracy are not uniform in all terrorist organizations, they are quite common across a wide range of groups over many years. Section II provided a more refined view of the internal workings of one of the most prominent modern groups, al- Qaeda in Iraq, showing that dealing with internal conflict continues to be a challenge for even the most deadly terrorist organizations. Section III presented a new approach to modeling small organizations facing moral hazard problems with limited institutional memory. In this set- ting, longer institutional memory serves an important role by enabling leaders to employ more refined equilibrium disciplinary strategies given a finite pool of well-known agents. Additionally, one stylized fact about terrorist organizations is that they become flatter and less bureaucratic as they come under greater pressure. Our model is consistent with this finding, in that it becomes less likely that equilibria which make use of organizational memory can be sustained when (1) the value of the fu- ture to terrorist leaders declines (perhaps because counterterrorism ef- forts increase and so the leaders' chances of surviving drop) and (2) the quality of the worst agent in a terrorist group declines (perhaps because counterterrorists target better agents first).

While the model in Section III could be extended in several di-

rections, we are confident it taps into a basic challenge for terrorist organizations. In our model the punishment strategies that allowed leaders to extract greater effort were credible only because operatives were able to identify and react to deviations from the leaders' equi- librium strategy. As a practical matter, such a reaction requires clearly established disciplinary standards that are understood throughout the organization, something not unlike corporate culture.91 Given this re- quirement, we should not be surprised to see the urban branch of the Kenyan Mau Mau insurgency (the Land and Freedom Army) keeping minutes of the meeting at which it laid out punishments for a variety of rules violations.92 Two rules from the minutes stand out. First, the

Land and Freedom Army (lfa) implemented a very clever rule that

ized expense forms, presumably to ensure that ISI operatives do their paperwork correctly; NMEC- 2007-657945; NMEC-2007-657926; and NMEC-2007-657877.

91 Kreps 1990. 92 The Land and Freedom Army operated a combination of an urban terrorist group and logisti-

cal support organization for the Mau Mau forest fighters during the Kenyan emergency, 1952-54. Mohamad 1974, 21.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 75

created incentives for operatives to exert maximum effort: "3. If any fighter was arrested while he still had ammunition in his gun, he would not be given legal assistance by the Committee.,, Second, the lfa used a type of gentle trigger strategy: "The punishment for violating these rules was simple. For the first offense, a man would be warned. Second offenders would be killed."

These rules highlight two important facts. First, terrorist organiza- tions take seriously the incentives created by their internal disciplinary rules. Second, terrorist organizations sometimes see value in being able to employ the kinds of more forgiving rules made possible with institu- tional memory. This is not always the case. The Greek Cypriot organi- zation EOKA, for example, had remarkably strict rules which mandated death for failures that many organizations forgive, such as breaking un- der torture.93 Our analysis, however, does not predict that we should always see one kind of rule or another. Rather, we argue that while terrorist organizations almost always face agency problems, whether or not bureaucracy will emerge as the solution depends in clearly identifi- able ways on the organizations' operational environments.

Specifically, we expect to see more bureaucracy in terrorist groups when three conditions obtain. First, a group s chosen uses of violence entail substantial risk of operational failure, meaning even the best operatives supported by hard-working middlemen will still fail quite often. Second, a group has a reasonably secure location from which organizational tasks can be conducted, meaning the security costs of record keeping are relatively low. Third, a group has a fair number of high-quality operatives but those operatives are not fanatically com- mitted, meaning the value of conditioning them is substantial but the costs of punishing the best are not so severe as to make their myopic behavior preferable.

Testing this prediction is a goal for future research. This will require case studies that make nuanced assessments of groups' internal organi- zational characteristics. For now, the critical point is that terrorist orga- nizations face strong incentives to keep security-reducing records. This is a good thing: it provides grist for the government counterterrorism mill and should dispel any notion that these groups present a uniquely deadly threat. They face the same challenges and constraints as other organizations and should be treated as such in both the political science literature and in policy debates.

93 Grivas 1964, 49, 157-59.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

76 WORLD POLITICS

References

Abrahms, Max. 2008. "What Terrorists Really Want: Terrorist Motives and Counterterrorism Strategy." International Security 32, no. 4: 78-105.

Arrington, Vanessa. 2003. "Most Likely Kidnap Victims in Iraq Are Iraqis." As- sociated Press , March 30.

Ayers, Bill. 2003. Fugitive Days: A Memoir. New York: Penguin. Bahney, Benjamin, et al. 2010. An Economic Analysis of the Financial Records of al-

Qaida in Iraq. Santa Monica, Calif.: rand Corporation. Banks, Jeffrey S., and Rangarajan K. Sundaram. 1993. "Adverse Selection and

Moral Hazard in a Repeated Elections Model." In William A. Barnett, Melvin J. Hinich, and Norman J. Schofield, eds., Political Economy: Institutions, Compe- tition , and Representation. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Bapat, Navin. 2007. "The Internationalization of Terrorist Campaigns." Conflict Management and Peace Science 24: 265-80.

Baumann, Bommi. 1979. Terror or Love? Bommi Baumanns Own Story of His Life as a West German Urban Guerrilla. New York: Grove Press.

Bell, J. Bowyer. 1989. "Aspects of the Dragonworld: Covert Communications and the Rebel Ecosystem." International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelli- gence 3, no. 1: 15-43.

Bergen, Peter, Vahid Brown, Joseph H. Felter, and Jacob N. Shapiro. 2008. Bomb- er s> Bankers , and Ble e dout: Al- Qa 4da 's Road In and Out of Iraq. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Berman, Eli, and David D. Laitin. 2008. "Religion, Terrorism, and Public Goods: Testing the Club Model." Journal of Public Economics 92, no. 10-11: 1942-67.

Brachman, Jarret, and William McCants. 2006. "Stealing al-Qa'idas Playbook." Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 29, no. 4: 309-21.

Brown, Vahid. 2007. Cracks in the Foundation: Leadership Schisms in al-Qa ida from 1989-2006. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Bueno de Mesquita, Ethan. 2005a. "Conciliation, Counterterrorism, and Patterns of Terrorist Violence." International Organization 59, no. 1: 145-76.

no. 3: 515-30.

399-418.

Burgoon, Brian. 2006. "On Welfare and Terror." Journal of Conflict Resolution 50, no. 2: 176-203.

Carter, Mike. 2004. "Clark Book Has Errors about Arrest of Ahmed Ressam." Se- attle Times, April 12.

Chai, Sun-Ki. 1993. "An Organizational Economics Theory of Antigovernment Violence." Comparative Politics 26, no. 1: 99-110.

Crawford, Colin. 2003. Inside the UDA : Volunteers and Violence. Ann Arbor: Uni- versity of Michigan Press.

Cullison, Alan. 2004. "Inside al-Qa'idas Hard Drive." Atlantic Monthly, Septem- ber.

Enders, Walter, and Paan Jindapon. 2010. "Network Externalities and the Struc- ture of Terrorist Networks. 'Journal of Conflict Resolution 54, no. 2: 262-80.

Fearon, James. 2008. "Economic Development, Insurgency, and Civil War." In

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

THE MANAGEMENT OF TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS 77

Elhanan Helpman, ed., Institutions and Economic Performance . Cambridge: Harvard University Press: 292-328.

Felter, Joseph H., Jarret Brachman, Jeff Bramlett, Brian Fishman, James Forest, Lianne Kennedy, Bill Perkins, Jacob N. Shapiro, and Tom Stocking. 2006. Harmony and Disharmony: Exploiting al- Qa idas Organizational Vulnerabilities. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Felter, Joseph H., and Brian Fishman. 2007. "Al-Qaida s Foreign Fighters in Iraq: A First Look at the Sinjar Records." Report, Combating Terrorism Center. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Fishman, Brian. 2007. "Fourth Generation Governance: Sheik Tamimi defends the Islamist State of Iraq." Report. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Fishman, Brian, ed. 2008. Sinjar Two : al-Qaida in Iraq's Foreign Recruiting, Fi- nances , and Future. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center.

Gacemi, Baya. 2006. 1 Nadia> Wife of a Terrorist. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Gordon, Michael R. 2007. "G.I. s Forge Sunni Tie in Bid to Squeeze Mili- tants." New York Times , July 6.

Grivas, George. 1964. Memoirs of General Grivas. New York: Praeger. Helfstein, Scott. 2009. "Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the

Evolution of Terrorist Organizations." Public Administration Review 69, no. 4: 727-39.

Heller, Tzila Amidor. 1999. Behind Prison Walls. Hoboken, N.J.: Jabotinsky Press.

Hendawi, Hamza. 2006. "Kidnappings Fund Insurgent Attacks." Houston Chron- icky February 8.

Itote, Waruhiu. 1971. Mau Mau General. Nairobi: East African Institute Press. Kagan, Kimberly. 2007. "The Anbar Awakening: Displacing al Qaeda from Its

Stronghold in Western Iraq." Iraq Report. Weekly Standard ' April 5. Kohlmann, Evan F. 2008. "State of the Sunni Insurgency in Iraq." Report, nefa

Foundation.

Korbonski, Stefan. 2004. Fighting Warsaw: The Story of the Polish Underground State , 1939-1945. New York: Hippocrene Books.

Kreps, David M. 1990. "Corporate Culture and Economic Theory." In James Alt and Kenneth Shepsle, eds., Perspectives on Positive Political Economy. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Li, Quan. 2005. "Does Democracy Promote or Reduce Transnational Terrorist Incidents?" Journal of Conflict Resolution 49, no. 2: 278-97.

Llera, Francisco J., José M. Mata, and Cynthia L. Irvin. 1993. "ETA: From Secret Army to Social Movement – the Post-Franco Schism of the Basque National- ist Movement." Terrorism and Political Violence 5, no. 3: 106-34.

Loyn, David. 2008. "Iraqs Migrants from Violence." ввс News. January 10. Mathu, Mohamed. 1974. The Urban Guerrilla: The Story of Mohamed Mathu (Life

Histories from the Revolution ). Richmond, B.C.: LSM Information Center. Miletich, Steve, and Mike Carter. 2001. "Malaria May Have Unmasked Res-

sam." Seattle Timesy June 1. Neumayer, Eric, and Thomas Plumper. 2008. "International Terrorism and the

Clash of Civilizations." Working paper, London School of Economics.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

78 WORLD POLITICS

Pipes, Richard. 2003. The Degaev Affair: Terror and Treason in Tsarist Russia. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Reuter, Christopher. 2004. My Life Is a Weapon: A Modern History of Suicide Bomb- ing. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Roggio, Bill. 2007. "Securing Eastern Anbar Province." Long War Journal. At http://www.longwarjournal.org, June 15.

Sageman, Marc. 2008. Leaderless Jihad: Terrorist Networks in the 21st Century. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Shapiro, Jacob N. 2007. "The Terrorists Challenge: Security, Efficiency, Control." Ph.D. diss., Stanford University.

Princeton University. Shapiro, Jacob N., and David A. Siegel. 2007. "Underfunding in Terrorist Orga-

nizations." International Studies Quarterly 51, no. 2: 405-29.

piro_Siegel_WP_2012_appendix.pdf. Shapiro, Jacob N., and Clinton Watts, eds. 2007. Al-Qayidas (Mis)Adventures in

the Horn of Africa. West Point, N.Y.: Combating Terrorism Center. Siqueira, Kevin. "Political and Militant Wings within Dissident Movements and

Organizations." Journal of Conflict Resolution 49: 218-36. Victoroff, Jeff. 2005. The Mind of the Terrorist. Journal of Conflict Resolution 49,

no. 2: 3-42.

Wade, Sara Jackson, and Dan Reiter. 2007. "Does Democracy Matter? Regime Type and Suicide Terrorism .n Journal of Conflict Resolution 51, no. 2: 329-48.

Walsh, James I., and James A. Piazza. Forthcoming. "Why Respecting Physical Integrity Rights Reduces Terrorism." Comparative Political Studies.

Weinstein, Jeremy M. 2007. Inside Rebellion: The Politics of Insurgent Violence. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Zirakzadeh, Cyrus Ernesto. 1991. A Rebellious People : Basques , Protests , and Poli- tics. Reno: University of Nevada Press.

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:08 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

The Charitable Activities of Terrorist Organizations

Author(s): Pierre-Emmanuel Ly

Source: Public Choice , Apr., 2007, Vol. 131, No. 1/2 (Apr., 2007), pp. 177-195

Published by: Springer

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27698091

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

Springer is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Public Choice

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 DOI 10 1007/slll27 006 9112 2

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

The charitable activities of terrorist organizations

Pierre-Emmanuel Ly

Received 10 March 2006 / Accepted 3 October 2006 Springer Science + Business Media B V 2006

Abstract Violent groups sometimes invest significant resources in social work, notably in the form of chanties and NGOs The present paper models a terrorist group's chanties as a means to advertise its cause in order to raise popular support The analysis explains how different types of organizations anse m equilibrium, depending on government policies Then, the interaction between a purely terrorist group and an independent local NGO is examined It is shown that a purely terrorist group always invests in more attacks than an integrated terrorist-chanty organization Furthermore, the latter may have more NGO activity than a separate local NGO

Keywords Terrorism NGOs Chanties

1 Introduction

The war on terror launched by George W Bush in 2001 has generated interest in the pro files of organizations and individuals who engage m terrorist activities Anti-terrorist poli cies worldwide have exhibited particular efforts to detect and destroy the organizations' financial resources These efforts have revealed the highly diversified nature of terrorists' asset portfolios In particular, it is now well known that some violent groups receive money from charitable and humanitarian organizations Several important international Non Gov ernmental Organizations (NGOs) had to cease their activities because they were suspected of transferring funds to terrorist groups For example, the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development was closed in December 2001 when the FBI discovered it was funding the Palestinian Hamas (Levitt, 2003) Levitt (2002) reports that "the US government estab lished that funds were used to support schools and indoctiinate children to grow into suicide bombers" Then, the author criticizes the European Union for drawing "a fallacious distinction between the nonviolent activities of terrorist groups and the terror attacks that

P-E Ly Universit de Toulouse 1 (ARQADE), 21 All es de Bnenne, 31000 Toulouse France email pierremly @ yahoo fr

; Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

178 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

they carry out" This debate is taking place in the context of the fight against terrorism fi nancing Indeed, some groups classified as terrorist undertake very efficient relief operations and development programs for the poor, and in addition to the fund-raising motive, these programs enhance the welfare of thousands of people in need In his work on Islamic NGOs, Ghandour (2002) reports that The Palestinian Hamas1 devoted 95% of its budget to maintain an important network of local NGOs, which makes it one of the most important actors in the local development community Furthermore, he argues that in Algeria, after an earthquake in October 1989, NGOs affiliated to the Islamic Salvation Front provided aid to the victims

more efficiently than the government Such examples show that an important purpose of these charitable initiatives is to gain support from the local population, and that the analysis has to go beyond the issue of money laundering

This paper considers charitable investments by terrorist groups as a way for them to advertise their ideals among potential sympathizers Indeed, charities not only provide a conduit for money laundering, they also truly benefit people in need As a result, those who at least partly share the goals of the terrorist group are likely to be more willing to make their contribution to the fight The analysis uses a simple theoretical model where the terrorists' chanties are assumed to have an advertising effect on people's preferences Then, it is shown how different types of activist organizations may arise, ranging from those specializing in charity to those which only produce terrorist attacks The interaction between terrorists and local chanties is also examined

The term "terrorist" for the purpose of this paper will refer to any violent, primarily domestic group in a country, that is not part of the government and has a political agenda Such groups are often termed "terrorist" by some while being classified simultaneously as rebels, guerrilla fighters, etc The paper is partly inspired by the wider conflict literature where groups are often termed rebels The basic idea presented here also comes from Che Guevara (1960)'s theory of guerrilla warfare, where he underlines the necessity for a rebel group to help the local population, not only to get food and clothes from them but also because the guerrilla is supposed to represent the people's aspirations

To sum up, the term used in the present analysis will be "terrorists", since the paper's motivation comes from the observation that groups often classified as "terrorist" provide charitable services for the poor, and the organization's objective function is modelled fol lowing recent economics models of terrorism However, the paper aims at providing more general insights on various kinds of violent groups for which support from the population may matter

The model presented here belongs both to the literature on the economics of conflict and to the strand of formal papers dealing more specifically with terconsm Azam (2005) assumes that agents care about the welfare of their descendants who might benefit from a public good

with some probability The latter can be increased by engaging in bombing, and agents are willing to give up some of their consumption today and contribute resources in favor of the next generation

Bueno de Mesquita (2005) presents a model where a terrorist group screens applicant volunteers and only recruits the best ones The author argues that people with little educa tion, few economic opportunities and anti-government feelings, are more likely to volunteer The model establishes a link between poor economic conditions and mobilization in favor

1 The Hamas won democratic elections in the Palestinian Territories in January 2006 While the group's change in status raises issues that are outside the scope of this paper, the election is clear evidence of the group's popular support The information provided about Hamas in the rest of the paper is based on its activities prior to being elected

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 179

of terrorist groups, while explaining why some recent data (Krueger & Maleckova, 2002) suggested that actual terrorists are relatively less poor and more educated than the average

member of the population According to the author, this is due to the screening of applicants by terrorist organizations, which makes the latter recruit people whom they think will be more qualified to follow instructions As a result, even if poor people have lower opportunity costs of participation and may support the terrorists, the screening process selects those who are more educated (and richer) to ensure the efficiency of attacks

Bueno de Mesquita and Dickson (2005) analyze a signaling model where a terrorist group cares about the level of support it gets from the population By engaging in a form of countert erronsm that may or may not be damaging to the local population, the government signals the extent to which it cares about its people's welfare After observing the government's policy, people decide whether to support the terrorist organization Then, in this model, the latter tries to provoke hard government crackdowns in order to increase people's involvement in terrorism Thus, in their paper, signaling comes from the government's crackdowns while, in the present paper, the ("advertising") signal comes from the terrorists, since their charitable activities allow them to promote their ideas among potential sympathizers

Farm and Arce (2005) propose a dynamic model where the number of new terrorist recruits

depends positively on the level of social support for terrorism Like in the present paper, the terrorists benefit from popular support, but the latter is assumed to depend positively on past levels of terrorist activity and on some exogenous underlying support However, the analysis in Bueno de Mesquita and Dickson (2005) shows that the population might also blame the terrorist group for the increased damage it suffers Therefore, the positive link between violence and social support for terrorism assumed in Farm and Arce (2005) seems questionable without further explanations, since the sign of this correlation clearly depends on various factors

Recent papers have investigated the case of extremist groups that contribute to local pub lic goods Berman (2003) adopts a club good approach to model groups like the Palestinian

Hamas He argues that "exclusion from access to the local public good [ ] is a common, viable form of enforcement" of various kinds of prohibitions and sacrifices However, even if such requirements do exist, extremist groups also provide their charitable services with out requiring contributions in return Berman and Laitin (2005), who use Berman (2003)'s club good model to rationalize the use of suicide bombing, acknowledge that their analy sis does not explain cases where public goods are provided in a nonexcludable way The present analysis is therefoie a useful complementary step toward the understanding of such phenomena

As mentioned above, the idea that politically motivated groups provide services to the population to advertise their cause is not limited to terrorism, and can be applied to many insurgent or revolutionary movements Ferrero (2004) models a two-product political cooper ative that produces both revolution and reform In his paper, reform consists of the production of a commercial good in addition to the group's political good Commercial production helps to build trust in the cooperative among customers, which improves the credibility of revolu tionary promises and thus enhances people's willingness to pay for the political good This is similar to the idea of advertising presented in the present paper The author uses his model to explain the "divergent national development within the socialist movements of the 20th century", some of which having focused on reform more than others Another interesting paper is Azam (2006) which aims to explain why some rebellion leaders are regarded as thugs while others are considered heroes The author points out the example of the Entrean People's Liberation Front, which "was going out of its way in order to gain popular support in the liberated areas by engaging in various forms of social spending"

& t Sponger

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

180 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

This paper also relates to the economics literature on NGOs The organizations' major characteristic in this literature is their relatively higher altruism and commitment to the beneficiaries compared to private for-profit firms and the government This is the basis of the analysis in papers like, Besley and Ghatak (2001), Jack (2001), and Hopkins and Scott ( 1998), among others There is also an older literature on the nonprofit sector and chanties, for

which (Rose Ackerman, 1996) provides a good survey A signaling explanation for charitable contributions can be found in Glazer and Konrad (1996), where people voluntarily contribute to private chanties to signal their wealth In the present paper, the motivation of the terrorists to invest in chanties comes from their willingness to contribute to public goods and to advertise for their cause

Section 2 presents some examples that have motivated the paper In particular, they suggest that violent groups often care about popular support and make significant efforts to increase it In Section 3, the basic model is developed It starts by assuming that the terrorists' chanties allow them to advertise for their cause It is shown that agents' voluntary contributions to the terrorist group may increase or decrease as a result of a higher level of terrorists' chanties Furthermoie, studying the terrorist group's investment decisions shows how different types of organizations arise as a result of exogenous parameters representing the government's development and counter-terror policies

Then, in Section 4, a violent group (specialized in terrorism) and a local NGO (specialized in charity) are modeled as separate, independent entities, whose respective activities impact each other's costs More precisely, it is assumed that tenonst activity increases the cost of NGO operations, while charity work by the NGO has an advertising effect that may benefit the terrorist group by increasing its support base but also by reducing its costs The Nash equilibrium level of NGO and terrorist activity is analyzed, and potential effects of international aid to the local NGO are discussed Finally, the analysis goes back to the case of an integrated terrorist-chanty, as described in Section 3 It is shown that the integrated group (maximizing the joint surplus of the NGO and the terrorists) always produces less terrorist attacks than a terrorist group acting independently of local NGO activities The comparison is more ambiguous for the level of charity, so that the joint surplus maximizing level of NGO activities may be higher or lower in the Nash equilibrium

2 Evidence of violence/charity mix by activist groups

There exist many examples of organizations which, in addition to their violent activities, devote significant time and resources to take care of the poor in a more or less institutionalized way In his theory of guerrilla warfare, Che Guevara (1960) underlines the social role of "guerrilleros" He argues that rebel groups must represent the aspirations of the people, and that the fighters' mission includes taking care of the local population, notably in rural areas He explains that rebel groups should always try to help villagers to solve their social and economic problems Good relationships with the locals should be established so as to initiate voluntary contributions to the guerrilla Such contributions can be donations of food and clothes, allowing some wounded fighters to stay at one's house, or even volunteering as a soldier The author insists on the importance ofthat help from local people for the rebellion to survive and to enhance its efficiency Such a theory of guerrilla warfare exhibits the main idea of the present paper, namely, that rebels (or whatever such groups are termed) can get closer to the people to signal that they care about them, thereby initiating more popular support for the fight

A Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 181

Closer to the inteipretation in terms of chanties and NGOs, extremist Islamic political groups have been investigated by Ghandour (2002) in his work on Islamic NGOs The Hamas is one of the most important Palestinian political organizations It is classified as "tenonst" and has been involved in 115 attacks between 1989 and 2002, including 40 suicide bombings 2 Bueno de Mesquita (2005) points out the very high popularity of this group, which was ecently confirmed by the electoral victory of the group's political wing

The Lebanese Hezbollah is a very popular group which has gained people's support thanks to various activities (Ghandour, 2002) First, it has been known as the major military force that finally made the Israeli aimy leave southern Lebanon Second, it is a political party

with elected representatives at the Lebanese Parliament Third, it has a wide netwoik of chanties and NGOs In her study of Islamic NGOs in Beirut, Fawwaz (2004) even defines the Hezbollah as one of the major Islamic NGOs She criticizes the development literature that defines NGOs as necessarily non-political organizations, and she further aigu s that political ideology enhances the efficiency of NGOs such as those affiliated to the Hezbollah

According to Ghandour (2002), sustained efforts put in social welfare activities have allowed groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah to gain and maintain an impoitant support base in local populations, while groups that focus on violence have not managed to establish such legitimacy

In Sri Lanka, The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is another example of a group classified as terrorist that is also well known for its investment in NGO activities, as underlined by Berman and Laitin (2005)

Finally, it is important to point out that violent political groups in developing countries aie not the only users of charitable investments as a strategic advertising tool Rich governments involved in war zones in poor countries may also use foieign aid, channeled by international development organizations, to improve their political influence Burnett (2004),3 a former employee of the World Food Program, reports his experience in Somalia "[W]e distributed 50-kilogram sacks of grain emblazoned with the American flag and 'Gift of the People of the United States of America ' Somalis readily accepted the aid but it was clear that our professed neutrality was suspect " Further, he reports words of the US Secretary of State Colin Powell, to NGOs in 2001 "just as surely as our diplomats and military, American NGO's are out theie serving and sacrificing on the front lines of freedom NGO's are such a force multiplier foi us, such an important part of our combat team" Investigating such cases would necessanly lead to a discussion of the importance of NGOs' neutrality in places where they opeiate, but this is outside the scope of the present paper

The next section develops a simple foi mai model to show how different types of violent organizations can arise

3 The model

Assume that a tenonst group is involved in two activities, organizing attacks against the government and providing public goods to the local population in the form of NGOs oi chanties It invests T directly in tenonst attacks and s in chanty sei vices The cost function of the group's tenonst wing is given by CA(T, s), while that of its charitable wing is given

1 Source The Institute for Counter Tenonsm at the Interdisciplinary Institute at Hertzhya, http //www ict org ii

1 John S Burnett New York Times, August 4, 2004, available at http //www globalpolicy org/ngos/credib /2004/0804fire htm

A Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

182 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

by CNis, T) These cost functions assume that the group's terrorist and charitable activities affect each other, in the way described as follows

First, it seems reasonable to assume that the existence of terrorist activity increases the

cost of charity operations, so that C^T(s, T) > 0 Indeed, chanties whose ideology resembles that of violent groups aie more likely to face investigations, and temporary or permanent shut

downs Moreover, this certainly impacts their fund raising abilities negatively Furthermore, CN is, T) is assumed increasing and convex in s, as well as increasing and convex in T

Second, the existence of the group's chanties is likely to facilitate the organization of attacks Thanks to its network of chanties, the group can rely on a more favorable environment and even use the chanties as place to hide fighters or weapons Then, it seems realistic to assume that Cfs(T, s) > 0 In addition, CAiT, s) is assumed increasing and convex in T, as well as decreasing and convex m s

Furthermore, the terrorist group is altruistic, in the sense that it cares about the total quantity

of development programs available to the population, g + s, g being the part provided by the government (whose behavior is taken as exogenous) These programs may include the provision of various private and public goods, such as credit, education and health centers But the key feature here is that the benefit from these programs is a public good (as in Besley & Gathak, 2001), so that the terrorist group derives utility not only from its own contribution but also from the government's Formally, this part of the group's utility function is given by Ojvig + s), where the parameter 6j reflects the group's valuation for public goods, and i>( ) is an mci easing and concave function

Then, let the increasing and concave function B(T) reflect the damage caused by the terrorists' direct attacks As in Bueno de Mesquita (2005), the group also caies about popular support for its cause, b This comes from sympathizers in the population who each voluntarily

contribute time b, in favor of the group's interests, and b = ^T,lbl is the total contribution These contributions in time may be thought of as various types of activities, i anging from participating in demonstrations to hiding weapons and wounded fighters in one's house, or even training to commit future attacks Then, the overall impact of the terrorist gioup is the sum of its direct attacks and popular support, given by B(T) + /b, where the positive parameter i/r captures the relative importance of popular support for the group In addition, it is affected negatively by the government's counter terror operations K, so that the net terrorist impact of the group is co(K)(B(T) + rb), where coiK) is a decieasing function

To sum up, the terrorist group's net utility function is given by

VT = 0Tvig + s) + cuiK)iBiT) + irb) – CA(T, s) – CNis, T) (1)

Assume that the population of potential teironst sympathizers is made of identical indi viduals who dei ive utility from their private consumption c and norn then contribution b, to the terrorist group which claims to repiesent their interests Each agent's time endowment is L and by spending some time / working, she dei ives an income (g + s)l Recall that g + s is the total amount of development programs, and it is therefore assumed that they increase people's marginal productivity of time at work In other words, these development programs can be thought of as productive social expenditures, in the spirit of Barro's (1990) productive government expend tuie

The representative agent j's utility function is given by

c, +a(s)w(fc,) (2)

where u(b,) is increasing and concave in b, and a(s) is mci easing in s

y Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 183

This requires further explanation First, u(bt) is the utility derived from fostering the tenonst group's goals Second, the tenonsts' charitable investments have two goals The first, because the group is altruistic, is to improve the productivity of people in the economy The second is to advertise the group's values and objectives, in order to gain people's support This is reflected in the function afs), the value attached to participation in the agent's preferences,

which is increasing in the tenonsts' investment in chanties Formally, the key feature in (2) is that the marginal utility of bt is increasing in s, that is, people's preferences are such that chanties (advertising) act as a complement to their individual contribution to tenonsm This aspect of the present paper is inspired by Becker and Murphy (1993) who model advertising as a good consumed by agents This way of considering advertising is particularly relevant in the present paper, since people benefit from (consume) the services provided by chanties,

while at the same time being exposed to the terrorist group's values For example, a school might be named after a martyr, or strong ideological bias can be introduced in teaching some subjects More generally, the chanties' staff can promote the cause that the terrorist group claims to fight for, like the right of a people to have its own land, or freedom from occupation by foreign military forces

Note that, while operating local chanties can be a very efficient conduit for promoting the ideals of violent extremist groups, the idea of an advertising effect of charity is not limited to the activities of such violent groups Many development NGOs invest in advocacy and not only in service provision For example, environmental NGOs not only finance programs to save animals and forests, but also aim to educate people around the issues involved

Azam (2005b) assumes that education changes people's "world view", in the sense that it changes the value they attach to tenonst activity This is in line with his previous paper on suicide bombing (Azam, 2005a) where tenonst attacks aim to increase future generations' welfare, and the author argues that more educated people are likely to be more sensitive to the fate of the next generation These papers underline the importance of people's perception of the tenonsts' cause In the present model, people are exposed to the group's advertising when they come to affiliated chanties, and this is assumed to affect positively their valuation for the cause

Furthermore, note that Equation (2) implicitly assumes that people only derive utility from their own contribution to tenonsm and not from the resulting impact of the group, oj(K)(B(T) + i/sb), which implies that their decision is not directly impacted by the level of government counter tenor K This is equivalent to assuming a warm glow type of altruism However, it will be shown that K affects the equilibrium level of support, via its effect on the tenonst's investment in chanties

The timing of events is as follows First, given the (exogenous) government policies K and g, the tenonst group chooses its direct investment in attacks, T, and its investment in chanties, s

Then, taking s as given, agent i maximizes her utility given by (2), subject to her budget and time constraints

(g + s)l = ct (3)

bt+l<L (4)

The budget constraint assumes that development programs are provided for free As far as the chanties operated by tenonst groups are concerned, previous literature has argued that they are not equally available to all members of the population More specifically, services are sometimes provided conditional on some level of involvement in the group's

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

184 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

ideology and activities (Berman, 2003, Berman & Laitin, 2003) However, even if such requirements do exist, extremist groups also provide their charitable services without requiring contributions m return

Using the constraints (3) and (4), the agent's optimization problem is solved by choosing bt so as to maximize the following

(L-bt)(g + s) + a(s)u{bt) (5)

subject to the constraints bt < L and bt > 0 The model is solved by backwards induction, starting with the agent's utility maximization

for a given level of terrorist chanties For simplicity, all agents in the population of potential terrorist sympathizers are identical, and the size of the population is normalized to one, so that the contribution of representative agent i is also the total (i e bt = b) The focus, then, is on the main goal of the present analysis, namely, to show how different types of tereonst groups arise

3 1 Popular support for the terrorists

The following proposition establishes the representative agent's voluntary supply of time in favor of the terrorist group

Proposition 1. (i) The agent supplies a positive amount of time in favor of the group's cause if

(8 + s)<a(s)u'(Q) (6)

(u) She becomes a full time supporter if

(g + s)<a(s)u'(L) (7)

Proof: This is obtained by solving the agent's utility maximization problem, using the Kuhn and Tucker theorem and the complementary slackness conditions D

Proposition 1 points out the fundamental role of government's development policy as a determinant of people's voluntary support to terrorism The role of poor economic opportu nities in people's decisions to join terrorists or rebellions has been emphasized in previous literature In a model where people choose between terrorism and an economic activity,

Bueno de Mesquita (2005) shows that economic downturns increase mobilization in favor of the terrorists Finally, in the civil war literature, Azam and Mesnard (2003) argue that potential rebels are more likely to go to war the lower the probability of benefiting from future government spending Since the present analysis assumes that potential supporters are rational, they compare the utility gain from participation with the opportunity cost, namely, the forgone income due to time spent away from their economic activity The latter cost is increasing in g, since development programs such as health, education or improved local infrastructure, improve people's marginal productivity at work (and hence their income), thereby making it more costly to spend time contributing to terrorism

The next proposition characterizes the interior solution to the agent's utility maximization problem, that is, where 0 < bl < L

A Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131:177-195 185

Fig. 1 Agent's voluntary supply of time

Increase in s

g+s

Proposition 2. At an interior solution, the volunteer supply of terrorism by agent i is given by be such that:

(g + s) = a(s)u'(be) (8)

The right hand side is the marginal utility of participation. It is increasing in s, since the tenorists' charities allow them to advertise their cause, thereby raising the value potential supporters attribute to contributing to the cause. The marginal cost of participation is re flected on the left hand side by the marginal productivity of agent i, that is, the marginal increase in income due to an extra unit of time spent in her economic activity. As al ready mentioned above, government development programs increase this opportunity cost of tenorism.

Interestingly, the tenorist's charitable investments, s, increase both sides of Equation (8). This gives rise to a fundamental trade off for the terrorist group that needs volunteers for its attacks: on the one hand, more charity services make it more efficient at convincing people that its fight aims to improve their fate, which raises a(s), the value agents attach to their participation in tenorism; on the other hand, a higher value of s makes people's economic activity more productive, which increases the opportunity cost of volunteering for the group. Figure 1 represents the interior solution defined by (8).

The diagram makes it clear that an increase in s has an ambiguous effect on the voluntary supply of time be by the representative agent. On the one hand, it makes the a(s) u'(b) curve shift upward, which is the advertising effect; but on the other hand, it raises the line g + s,

which is the opportunity cost effect. Depending on the relative size of these two shifts, be may either increase or decrease.

This ambiguous effect is not limited to terrorism and can be applied to many insurgent and revolutionary movements. As mentioned in the introduction, Fenero (2004) models a political cooperative that, in addition to engaging in revolution, produces a commercial good. The author points out that the commercial sector may represent a "temptation away from revolution" if it becomes profitable enough.

Formally, the impact of s on be is obtained by totally differentiating (8) with respect to s:

be'(s) [1 -a'(s)ube)]

[a(s)u"(fr')] (9)

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

186 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

Therefore, the agent's voluntary contribution will rise with the terrorist's investment in de velopment programs if a'is)ubc) > 1 In words, this is the case if the advertising effect, that is, the increase in the marginal utility of bc following an increase in s, dominates the opportunity cost effect, that is, the fact that an extra unit of s increases the marginal return to time in the economic activity by one Note that if ais) were assumed linear, this would correspond to a constant marginal advertising effect of charity expenditures However, the concavity of ais) would assume a decreasing marginal advertising effect of s In this case, the sign of (9) would be more likely to be positive for low values of s On the other hand, the advertising effect is more likely to dominate for high values of s ais) is assumed to be convex

Next, the terrorist group's investment decision is analyzed

3 2 The teironsts' investment in chanties

In this section, for simplicity, the cost functions of the group's terrorist and charitable activities

are assumed to be linear and the cost interactions between activities are ignored, that is CAiT,s) = T and CN(s, T) – s In addition, in this section as well as in the rest of the paper, I focus on the case where bc"(s) < 0, that is, the marginal impact of chanties s on popular support for the tenonst group is decreasing Note that this marginal impact, bes), can be either positive or negative depending on whether the advertising effect dominates the opportunity cost effect

The terrorist group chooses its investments s and T in order to maximize its utility, taking into account the representative agent's reaction function beis) The following proposition states conditions under which the terrorist's investments in chanties and attacks are positive

Proposition 3. (i) The group invests a positive amount in charities if

6Tv'(g) + coiK)x/fbe,iO) – 1 > 0 (10)

(u) It invests a positive amount in attacks if

oj(K)B)- 1 >0 (11)

Proof: By solving the utility maximization problem of the tenonst group, the discussion of the complementary slackness conditions leads to (10) and (11) D

Since oj'iK) < 0, condition (11) defines a threshold Kmm for K, the level of govern ment crackdowns, above which the group does not invest anything directly in attacks In addition, since v"i) < 0, condition (10) characterizes a threshold level of government de velopment programs, gmm, below which the terrorists become active in the charity/NGO sector

Using the previous result, Proposition 4 summarizes how various types of terrorist groups arise, depending on government policies K and g 4

4 In his model of a two-product political cooperative, Ferrero (2004) studies the group's optimal allocation of effort between revolution and reform He argues that the relative size of the group's two wings depends on trust and credibility constraints vis- -vis its customers and workers, as well as on a liquidity constraint on its operations

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 187

Fig. 2 Different types of 'terrorists

K

Proposition 4. (i) If K < Kmm and g > gmm, the group is a "pure " terrorist organization, in the sense that they invest in attacks but not in charities

(u) If K < Kmin and g < gmin, the group is a "hybrid" organization that invests both in attacks and charities

(in) If K > Kmin and g < gmm, the group is directly active only in the charity sector, and attacks result solely from the voluntary supply of time by its supporters

(iv) If K > Kmm and g > gmin, the group is inactive

Figure 2 presents this typology of gioups in a more visual way Note that gmin is a function of K, but may be increasing or decreasing This depends on the sign of bc'(0), which in turns depends on whether the advertising effect of the tenonst chanties dominates their oppoitunity cost effect, as shown in the previous section For example, if the former dominates,s then, (10) and (11) give rise to the case depicted on Figure 2 Some simple comparative statics are woith examining First, an inciease in 9T, the valu

ation of the group for public goods (i e its "altruism"), shifts the gmm curve upward, thereby enlarging the range of parameter values for which the terrorists are active in the NGO sectoi This is perfectly intuitive and similar to many models of voluntary contributions to public goods

Clearly, case (iv) may represent the goal of government policy m this simplified frame work It suggests that an appropriate balance of social programs and counterterronsm is necessary to achieve this situation The role of social programs is not only to improve eco nomic conditions, but also to reduce the opportunity for tenonsts to advertise their goals through chanties Given the recent empirical evidence that poor people are not moie likely to become tenonsts (Krueger & Maleckova, 2003), the prevention of such advertising is probably where government's social expenditure can play a role

Furthermore, one may argue that case (m) can be another goal of government policy Indeed, a pure charity poses no security threat and even contributes to public good provision Note that if both K and g are costly foi the government, investing K = Kmin and g = 0 is a cost-minimizing strategy to eliminate direct attacks T, and results on the group being a puie charity However, this does not eliminate the advertising effect of charity and the government may dislike this pure charity because of its political values In particular, if b' > 0, the charity's activity s leads to an increase in popular support for the group's political values, which might translate into the voluntary supply of terrorist acts by the population Finally, even if this does not result in such extreme behavior, it may still have a impact on future

Pure charity

5 One could graph the case where the opportunity cost effect dominates, and then gmin would be a decreasing function of K However, this would not change the intuition for the following result The relevance of the distinction between the two cases will become clear shortly

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

188 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

voting choices, another influence that the government may not like (though this is outside the scope of the present papei)

Several well known extremist organizations fit among the first three categones Fnst, a group such as the Basque sepaiatist organization ETA belongs to type (i) Founded in 1959 by a group of student activists, ETA's goal is the independence of the Basque country from France and Spain The group is well known for its assassinations and bombing in both countnes Although it does have an official political blanch, it does not mn any noticeable charitable wing, and the group's base of supporters is believed to be small (no moie than several hundred) 6 The Corsican Aimata Corsa, as well as the Front de Libeiation Nationale de la Corse, aie among other examples that fit in case (i) Such gioups, opeiatmg in developed countries with relatively good access to public goods, were indeed unlikely to have much opportunity to seek suppoit by developing chanties Of course, their political wings ti y to promote then nationalist ideals, but they are far less convincing in such contexts than organizations of type (ii), which benefit from a stiong social base, thanks to their active involvement in chantable woik

Three examples, which have already been intioduced in Section 2, fit paiticularly well in the "hybrid" second categoiy The first is the Palestinian Hamas, whose ecent electoial victory shows how strong a popular base it has established over the years, notably thanks to its very efficient netwoik of local NGOs throughout the West Bank The second is the Lebanese Hezbollah, whose network of Islamic NGOs is well known by its supporters as well as by its enemies As reported in its profile by the Institute for Countei Tenorism, "the puipose of the aid was to gain the support of the oiganization's activities" 7 Recent studies (Ghandour, 2002, Fawwaz, 2004) show that it has maintained a high level of popular support Finally, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam also have connections with the most important Tamil NGOs Although they are separate bodies, The Libeiation Tigers' web page provides a link to that of the Tamil Rehabilitation Organization, and relayed the appeal for donations aftei the tsunami in 2004

These three prosperous hybrid organizations can take advantage of the pool economic opportunities available to a laige part of their espective local populations Of course, in the same countries, terrorist groups claiming to represent the same ideals are only involved in violent activities, and therefore belong to type (i) The above formal analysis suggests that such gioups are characterized by a low valuation foi public goods (0t in the model) so that, even in the presence of poor economic conditions, they are less likely to entei the local NGO sector to gam populai support For example, this may explain the diffeience between the two main tenonst groups in the Palestinian territories, the Hamas and the Islamic Jihad The formel, as seen above, has a strong commitment in social welfaie programs, while the lattei seems to have focused on violence Thus, the second group may be characterized by a veiy low level of the exogenous paiameter 0T Fuithermore, Ghandour (2002) aigu s that the

Algenan Islamic Salvation Front lost a laige pait of its populai base when it decieased its involvement in chanties and specialized in violence According to this example, 0T could be thought of as the outcome of changes in the gioup's stiategy designed by its core membeis

Type (in) is probably the most surpnsing Although the label "tenonst" has been used in the papei so far, it is impoitant to point out that this categoiy coriesponds to non violent activist gioups who are then clearly not tenonsts This leflects the case of gioups which, despite then sharing some of the goals of violent oigamzations, have decided to mobilize suppoit at the

6 The Institute for Counter Terrorism, http //www ict org ii/

7 Ibid

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 189

grassroots level without promoting violence The Egyptian Muslim Biotherhood is a good example of such a strategy Founded in 1928, it remains the most popular opposition group in Egypt, and is committed to a "non violent, reformist appioach to slamism" 8 Despite having been banned several times,9 it operates many chanties and has a strong support base among the poor and most industries' trade unions (Ghandour, 2002) But this non violent approach to the promotion of radical religious ideas, combined with its widespread presence in Egyptian society, have made it subject to many legal restrictions on its activities In the

words of the present formal model, it faces a high level of K, while operating in segments of the population that face poor economic conditions These characteristics, as well as a high

willingness to contnbute to public goods, help to explain why it falls in the "puie chanty" category

Finally, it is interesting to comment on the inteiior solution, that is, on the investments in attacks and chanties made by a hybrid organization In the special case of linear cost functions used in the piesent section, the first order conditions are given by

0Tv'(g + s) + irba(s)co(K) = 1 (12)

oj(K)BT) = 1 (13)

The effect of policy parameters K and g on the group's charitable investments s, can be investigated by totally differentiating (12) with espect to K and g, espectively Then, by rearranging both sides of the esulting equations, one can obtain the following

ds [lfbu(s)a)'(K)} – = —y-L-J-Z – (14) dK [-6Tv"(g + s)-ifb "(s)co(K)] v

ds = l-0Tv"(g + s)] dg [6Tv"(g + s) + iffr"(s)o(K)]

Then, since v"(g + s) < 0, co'(K) < 0 and ba'(s) < 0, the sign of (14) depends on that of bc'(s), while (15) is always negative

In the case where the adveitising effect of chanties dominates the opportunity cost effect (i e when b(/(s) > 0), for a given level of g, (14) shows that an increase in government crackdowns K leads to a decrease in s, which in turn decreases the voluntary supply of time to tenorism

If the opportunity cost effect of chanties dominates, more government crackdowns make the tenonsts increase their investment in chanties, but since in this case, bc'(s) < 0, this also leads to a decrease in the voluntary supply of tenorism In addition, egardless of the sign of bif(s), since B"() < 0, an increase in government

crackdowns reduces direct attacks F

Fuitheimoie, since (15) has a negative sign, an inciease in g i educes the gioup's chai liable investments s, which in tuin leads to a deciease in populai suppoit if bc '(s) > 0, or an increase in popular suppoit if bc'(s) < 0 Therefoie, the negative effect of crackdowns on the overall impact of the group can be reinforced by an accompanying increase in g if bc'(s) > 0, or a decrease in g if bc'(s) < 0 Note that, in practice, it is difficult foi the government to know the sign of bc/(s), that is, to know whether the advertising effect of chanties s dominates

8 Article in Wikipedia, available at http //en wikipedia org/wiki/Muslim_Brotherhood 9 Ibid

A Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

190 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

their opportunity cost effect If the government lacks this infoimation, the manipulation of g may undermine counter terrorism efforts Foi example, when bcs) > 0, the efficiency of an increase m crackdowns K would be reduced if, at the same time, the government provided less social programs g

4 The interaction between terrorists and local charities

4 1 NGO independent of tenonsts

So fai, the analysis has consideied that the adveitismg effect comes from the tenonst group's investment in chanties Howevei, in many cases, local NGOs are likely to shaie the values of violent organizations without necessarily being related to them Foi example, the Palestinian NGO netwoik, an umbrella oigamzation compnsing 92 local NGO members, states the following as pait of its mission statement "conti lbute to the national esistance to end occupation" and "advocate for the lights of the Palestinian people locally, legionally, and globally" 1()

This suggests that local tenonst gioups, even when they do not invest in chanties them selves, benefit from some level of nee adveiusing foi then cause, which, following the pievious section, can mci ease populai suppoit Meanwhile, tenonst opeiations are likely to impact local (non tenonst) chanties

This section examines the intei action between a pui ely charitable oigamzation and a tenonst gioup, when both actois share the same political values but make then decisions non coopeiatively Assume that a local NGO, indexed by N, chooses its chantable investment s to maximize the following

0Tvig + s)-CNis,T) (16)

Following the arguments presented at the beginning of Section 3, the NGO is impacted by tenonst activities thiough its cost function Then, the existence of tenonst activity mci eases the cost of charity operations, so that C^T(s, T) > 0 Indeed, as aigued above, chanties whose ideology resembles that of violent groups are moie likely to face investigations, which may esult in restrictions on their activities and theil fund raising ability It is impoitant to point

out that all local chanties are likely to face such restnctions, whether or not they are related to tenonst gioups, since the link between tenonsts and their chanties is very often hard to establish Furthermoie, recall that CNis, T) is assumed increasing and convex in s

Then, assume that a local tenonst gioup, indexed by A, invests 7 to maximize the following

coiK)(BiT) + irb(s)) – CAiT, s) (17)

Note that (1), the utility of the teironst-chanty group descnbed in Section 3, is simply the sum of (16) and (17) That is, the group analyzed in the pievious section can be interpieted as an integrated organization comprising both an armed and a chantable wing Now, while they shaie the same political aspirations for their people, the tenonst group and the NGO aie considered sepaiate, independent actors

1 http //www pngo net/pngo htm

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131:177-195 191

Again, as argued at Section 3, the advertising effect induced by the NGO's activity facil itates the organization of attacks, so that CAS(F, s) < 0. In addition, recall that CA(F, s) is increasing and convex in T.

Finally, assume that both actors make their investment decisions simultaneously. Then the Nash equilibrium levels of s and F is analyzed.

The NGO's best response to any level of F is given by the first order condition:

eTv'(g + s) = C?(s,F)

The terrorist's best response to any level of s is given by:

co(K)B'(F) = CA(F,s)

(l8)

(19)

Lemma 1. Fhe NGO's best response is decreasing in F, and the terrorist's best response is increasing in s.

Proof: Total differentiation of (l8) with respect to F yields:

(C?T(s, F)) s'N(T) ?

(6Tv"(g + s)-C?s(s,F))

Since v(.) is concave, C^s(s, F) > 0, and C^T(s, F) > 0, (20) has a negative sign. Similarly, totally differentiating (19) with respect to s yields:

K(s) (CA(F,s)) (o(K)B"(F)-CAT(F,s))

Since B(.) is concave, CAT(F, s) > 0, and CAS(F, s) < 0, (19) has a positive sign.

(20)

(21)

D

Note that Lemma 1 also holds in the special case of constant marginal costs investigated at Section 3.2, i.e. with C% = 0 and C$T = 0. The Nash equilibrium is represented on Figure 3. The next section investigates potential effects of international aid received by the local

NGO on the Nash equilibrium levels of tenorism and charity.

Fig. 3 Nash equilibrium levels of NGO and terrorist activity

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

192 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

4 2 Potential effects of international aid

For the sake of simplicity, international aid is modelled as a downward shift of the NGO's cost function Consequently, when the NGO receives aid, its best response function, depicted on Figure 3, shifts upward

International aid becomes a hot topic when discussed in contexts where the interactions between tenonst groups and local NGOs are hard to assess For example, since the end of 2002, the United States Agency for International Development (US AID) "requires Palestinian NGOs receiving US aid to sign a pledge that they do not 'provide material support or resources to any individual or entity that advocates, plans, sponsors, engages in, or has engaged in tenonst activity' "11 Members of the Palestinian NGO network have refused such a procedure, arguing that this is too broad a definition of support to terrorism

The present model assumes that the local NGO's activity implies some degree of adver tising for goals shared by the tenonst group, and this may or may not translate to increasing voluntary involvement in tenonst activities, independently of the NGO's will Therefore, the advertising effect is assumed to be driven by the convergence of both actors' political views, without any intention of the NGO to make people become terrorists

As explained above, here, international aid to the local NGO is studied as a comparative statics exercise using Figure 3 When the NGO receives aid, its best response curve shifts upward so that, at any level of T, the NGO increases its investment in charity All things being equal, this raises the equihbnum values of both s and T This undesirable positive effect on attacks T can be mitigated by an increase in military assistance in order to lower coiK), thereby shifting the tenonsts' best response function downward

Furthermore, using the results of the previous section, an increase in s may increase or decrease popular support (/?) for tenonsm If the advertising effect dominates (i e if bes) > 0), then b increases, but it decreases if the opportunity cost dominates Then, note that aid leads to an increase in the overall impact of the group (i e direct attacks T plus popular support bis)) unambiguously only if bes) > 0 In the case where bc'is) < 0, the increase in T may be outweighed by the decrease in b

Distributing aid directly to the government in return for increased social expenditures g would increase the opportunity cost of supporting tenonsm However, since local NGOs often have more efficient ways to reach the population, they cannot be ignored by aid disbursements

Finally, one may argue that aid can be used for "counter-advertising" purposes The example of American aid through the World Food Program mentionned in Section 2 certainly fits with this principle In the present model, a simple way to capture such effects is to make the value of one's contribution to tenonsm a decreasing function of the aid received, that is, uib, a) with duib, a)/da < 0 Such aid would make participation less attractive The question of whether this kind of policy is likely to work lies outside the scope of this paper, since a proper treatment of the issue would have to deal with other factors, such as the role political neutrality plays in international NGOs' activities

4 3 Back to an integrated tenonst-chanty organization

Sections 4 1 and 4 2 have investigated the case where the terrorist group and the NGO are independent bodies, but that affect each other's activity through their respective cost functions

The key assumptions were that tenonst activity increases the cost of NGO operations, while

1 ' Ibid

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 193

charity work by the NGO has an advertising effect that may benefit the terrorist group by increasing its support base but also by reducing its costs The idea behind the latter effect is that the influence of an NGO which shares the values and goals that terrorists claim to fight for creates a more favorable environment for the group to organize their attacks

The present section goes back to the case of an integrated terrorist-chanty organization, as in Section 3, in order to compare the investments F and s of the integrated structure with those of the independent actors described in Sections 4 1 and 4 2 Therefore, the following is a kind of welfare analysis which aims to derive the levels of charity and terrorism that

maximize the joint surplus of the terrorist and the NGO, and to compare them with their Nash equilibrium levels given by (l8) and (19)

The integrated tenonst-chanty chooses s and F to maximize its objective function, given by Equation (1) In the following analysis, it will be useful to keep in mind the following properties of the functions entering the organization's objective, stated at the beginning of Section 3 First, recall that CN(s, F) is increasing and convex in s, and CA(F, s) is increasing and convex in F Moreover, Cj(s, F) > 0, CA(F, s) < 0, which is in line with the intuition developed previously, namely, the fact that tenonst attacks increase the cost of NGO activities

and charity work reduces the cost of terrorist operations In addition, CjT(s, F) > 0 and CA(F, s) > 0 further ensure the convexity of the cost functions Finally, recall that v( ) and B( ) are increasing and concave, that b'(s) may be either positive or negative depending on whether the advertising effect dominates the opportunity cost effect, and that b"( ) < 0

Then, focusing on the interior solution, the first order conditions for s and F axe given by

QTv'(g + s) = C?(s, F) + CA(F, s) – co(K)x/fbs) (22)

oj(K)B'(F) = C?(s, F) + CA(F, s) (23)

Comparing (22) with (l8), since CA(F,s) < 0, the compansion between s in the integrated and disintegrated cases depends on the sign of b'(s) If the advertising effect dominates, b'(s) > 0, and then, more charity is provided by the integrated organization than by the NGO alone Indeed, the fact that b is increasing in s is a positive externality of NGO activity on the tenonst objective A separate NGO entity only provides charity based on its altruistic

motivation, but does not internalize its impact on popular support for the cause However, if the advertising effect is dominated by the opportunity cost effect, more charity

leads to a decrease in active popular support b (i e b'(s) < 0) This negative effect of charity may or may not offset the fact that this activity also lowers the cost of any given level of attacks, that is, the fact that CA(F, s) < 0 In this ambiguous case, the integrated organization provides more charity compared to the Nash equilibrium if the following condition is verified

CA(F, s) – co(K)irb'(s) < 0 (24)

Indeed, if it holds, the benefit in terms of a reduction in the cost of terrorist attacks outweighs the decrease in popular support This is more likely if // is small, that is, if the group cares little about popular support

What about the level of terrorist attacks F^ Comparing (23) and ( 19), given that Cj (s,F) > 0 and B is concave, the integrated group always performs fewer attacks This is because terrorist attacks increase the cost of NGO activities, and this adverse effect is internalized

when both components (charity and terrorist) are integrated Thus, the above analysis suggests that when local NGOs clearly state their political values,

the perpetration of tenonst acts by independent but like-minded violent groups may affect

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

194 Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195

their activities negatively The model has not considered the role of contributions by politically neutral local NGOs in such contexts, and this is an interesting avenue for future research

5 Conclusion

Violent groups, such as terrorist and rebel organizations, sometimes invest significant re sources in social work, notably in the form of chanties and NGOs For example, the Pales tinian Hamas is reported to devote more than 95 percent of its budget to social welfare programs Recent papers have investigated the case of extremist groups that contribute to lo cal public goods Berman (2003) and Berman and Laitin (2005) model these organizations as clubs which provide social welfare only to their members Their analysis helps to understand how these groups manage to enforce apparently inationnal levels of sacrifice among their members The present paper is a useful complement to this emerging literature By modelling a terrorist group's chanties as an advertising device, the analysis explains how different types of organizations arise in equilibrium, depending on exogenous levels of government policies Some may specialize in tenonsm, others may be of a "hybrid" type, mixing tenonsm and charity Some do not even engage in tenonsm, and focus entirely on public good provision Then, it is acknowledged that in many cases, local NGOs share the political values of violent organizations without necessarily being related to them This allows a fully tenonst group to benefit from some free advertising for its cause It is assumed that terrorist activity increases the cost of NGO operations, while charity work by the NGO has an advertising effect that

may benefit the terrorist group by increasing its support base but also by reducing its costs The Nash equilibrium levels of charity and tenonsm chosen by the separate NGO and

tenonst entities are compared with those invested by an integrated tenonst-chanty organi zation Since the integrated terrorist-chanty internalizes the additional benefits of charity in terms of popular support and reduced cost of attacks, it may have more NGO activity than an independent NGO

Furthermore, the Nash equilibrium level of tenonst attacks by an independent terrorist group is always higher than that of an integrated tenonst-chanty because the integrated organization internalizes the negative impact of terrorist activity on NGO operations This result suggests that recent requirements imposed by the US and the EU, that local NGOs commit to be unrelated to terrorist groups, might result in more tenonsm rather than less

Acknowledgements I thank Jean Paul Azam and Cynthia Howson for helpful comments and discussions I am especially grateful to two anonymous referees whose extensive comments have helped to improve the paper significantly

References

Azam, J -P (2006) On thugs and heroes Why warlords victimize their own civilians7 Economics and Gov ernance 7(1), 53-73

Azam, J -P (2005a) Suicide bombing as inter-generational investment Public Choice, 122(1), 177-198 Azam, J -P (2005b) How to curb "high quality" terrorism7 A case for boosting aid, working paper, University

of Toulouse, mimeo Azam, J -P, & Mesnard, A (2002) Civil war and the social contract Public Choice, 105(3), 455-475 Barro, R (1990) Government spending in a simple model of endogenous growth Journal of Political Economy,

98(5), S103-S126 Becker, G S ,& Murphy, K M (1993) A simple model of advertising Quaterly Journal of Economics, 108(4),

941-964

ti Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Public Choice (2007) 131 177-195 195

Berman, E (2003) "Hamas, Taliban and the Jewish underground An economist's view of radical religious militias", NBER WP 10004

Berman, E , & Laitin, D D (2005) Hard targets Theory and evidence on suicide attacks NBER WP 11740 Besley, T, & Gathak, M (2001) Government versus private ownership of public goods The Quarterly Journal

of Economics, 116(4), 1343-1372 Bueno de Mesquita, E (2005) The quality of terror American Journal of Political Science, 49(3), 515-530 Bueno de Mesquita, E , & Dickinson, E S (2005) The propaganda of the deed Terrorism, counterterronsm

and mobilization, working paper, Department of Political Science, Washington University Fana, J R & Ace, M D G (2005) Terror support and recruitment American Economic Association Annual

Meeting Papers, available at http //www aeaweb org/annual_mtg_papers/2005papers html Fawwaz, M (2004) Action et id ologie dans les services ONG Islamiques dans la Banlieue Sud de Beyrouth

In S BenNe ssa, N Abd al-Fattah, S Hanafi & M Carlos (Eds), ONG et Gomernance dans le Monde Arabe, Cedej (Le Caire) et Karthala (Pans)

Ferrero, M (2004) Revolution or reform7 Socialism's dilemma as a rational choice problem Homo Oeco nomicus 27(2), 251-282

Ghandour, A R (2002) Jihad Humanitaire Enqu te sur les ONG Islamiques Flammarion (Pans) Glazer, A , & Konrad, K A (1996) A signaling explanation for charity American Economic Review 86(4)

1019-1028 Guevara, E C (2001) Textes Militaires La d couverte (Pans) Hopkins, R , & Scott CD (1999) The economics of non-governmental organizations The Development

Economics Discussion Paper Series The Suntory Center, London School of Economics Jack, W (2001) Public policy towards non governmental organizations in developing countries, woiking

paper, Department of Economics, Georgetown University Krueger, A B , & Maleckova, J (2003) Education, poverty, political violence, and terrorism Is there a causal

connection7 Journal of Economic Pet spec ta es 17(4), 119-144 Levitt, M A (2003) Hamas blood money Mixing good works and terror is no formula for peace, Available

at http //www ict org ii

Levitt, M A (2002) The Network of Terrorist Financing, available at http //www ict org ii Rose-Ackerman, S (1998) Altruism, nonprofits, and economic theory Journal of Economic Literatme 34,

701-728

Springer

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:40:33 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations

Author(s): Scott Helfstein

Source: Public Administration Review , Jul. – Aug., 2009, Vol. 69, No. 4 (Jul. – Aug., 2009), pp. 727-739

Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Society for Public Administration

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27697917

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms

Wiley and American Society for Public Administration are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Public Administration Review

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Scott Helfste?n Combating Terrorism Center

United States Military Academy

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the

Evolution of Terrorist Organizations

Fundamentally Rethinking the

War on Terror

Scott Helfstein ?s an assistant professor

in the Department of Social Sciences and

an associate at the Combating Terrorism

Center at the United States Military Acad

emy at West Point. He has provided terror

ism policy advice to the U.S. Department

of Defense and has been invited to brief

Special Operations Command on various

aspects of terrorism. His research addresses

grand strategy, terrorism, intelligence, and

research methodology.

E-mail: [email protected]

A preoccupation with network approaches in terrorism studies has inadvertently marginalized the

fact that terrorist groups are subject to many of the

same bureaucratic forces that impact all purposeful

organizations. Because typical organizations are subsumed in the concept of networks, it is curious that

scholars have been so quick to bypass more traditional

models of organizations and bureaucracy that may help us

understand network topology. This article relies on the new

institutional approach to organizational behavior. Using the Coase theorem to explain the costs and benefits associated with different organizational structures, it follows that

counterterrorism efforts may drive some groups toward greater autonomy while

compelling others to adopt common bureaucratic

processes, often referred to as isomorphism. By exploring

the different costs that terror groups face and examining

the characteristics of terrorists associated with different

groups, organizational theory can help explain a divergent trend in terrorism research: leaderless jihad and increased bureaucratization.

In The Management of Barbarism (2004), Abu Bakr Naji recommends that jihadis attend West ern business schools to improve their manage

ment and logistical skills. Naji identifies a major fault with previous jihadi movements: Groups have mismanaged resources, recruits, and violence. This explicit condemnation of prior campaigns high lights the fact that terrorists subject themselves to critical review, are interested in learning about better organization for better operation, confront internal and external constraints, and need to iden

tify the best way to achieve success. These problems and processes confront just about any purposeful organization, and it is important to examine how institutional and organizational forces impact ter rorist groups.

Naji's critique suggests that, in many ways, terrorist organizations may be subject to the same institutional and bureaucratic forces that influence any other

purposeful organization. Some may believe that this is self-evident, while others reject the idea that terrorist

organizations are subject to basic institutional forces, but there is a tremendous amount of explanatory

Viewing terrorist activity through a governance or

institutional lens provides a parsimonious explanation for

the evolution of terror since the

September 11 attacks and the subsequent war on terror.

leverage to be exploited by this simple concept. Viewing terror ist activity through a governance or institutional lens provides a parsimonious explanation for the evolution of terror since the

September 11 attacks and the subsequent war on terror. This is particularly relevant at a time

when terrorism scholars are ad

dressing divergent trends among terror groups and trying to understand the changing nature of the terrorist threat.

Scholars and experts have approached the study of terrorism from a variety of perspectives over the past

eight years. This work has relied on historical study of groups and movements, studies of individuals and their characteristics, game theoretic and statisti

cal treatments, and studies focusing on networks as a structural form. Comprehensive classification and summary of terrorism studies would require a whole article at a minimum (McCormick 2003), and is

not practical here. Instead, this paper fills a gap that lies between two rigorous approaches to the study of terrorism that are popular in the political science and public policy communities: rational choice models and network theory.

Rational choice, specifically game theory, has been used to model different features of terrorism by

focusing on the micro-level decisions of terrorists, governments, and populations. Some of the work has examined the use of terror attacks as a resource

signal (Overgaard 1994), optimal hostage negotia tion strategies (Sandier, Tschirhart, and Cauley 1983),

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 727

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

the risks associated with proactive counterterrorism policies (Rosendorff and Sandier 2004), the pos sibilities that terrorist factions negotiate with the government (Bueno de Mesquita 2005b), the way in which government and counterterrorism policies impact recruitment (Bueno de Mesquita 2005a), and the efficient allocation of defensive resources given a rational terrorist opponent (Powell 2007a, 2007b).

The underlying assumption in all of these works is that terrorists, like the governments they compete

with and the citizens they interact with, are economi cally rational in the most basic sense of the term. The

terrorists are actors with certain goals, and they adopt strategies that they perceive as optimal to achieve

those ends. By this logic, the timing or targeting of terror attacks, recruitment activities, and internal

feuds are rational decisions that are representative of motivated individuals and groups.

While the rational choice

literature often looks at strategic

decision making contingent on preferences and competitive constraints, network analysis has focused on the organizational aspects of terrorism. Instead of

deducing the terrorists' strate gies based on their preferences, network scholars examine the connections that link terrorists

and focus on ways of destabiliz

ing those networks (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001). Some of this work has traced the

network of the 9/11 hijackers (Krebs 2002), addressed the breaking points of terror cells (Farley 2003), compared collaborative networks to dark networks (Raab and Milward 2003), argued that interdiction is not sufficient to destabilize terror networks (Ken

ney 2003), examined steps needed to destabilize covert networks (Carley et al. 2003), assessed the vulnerabilities of large networks (Carley 2004), and addressed the resilience of terror financing networks

(Basile 2004). One unifying theme is that the network paradigm better characterizes terror groups than traditional organizational behavior paradigms, and counterterrorism will be most effective by focusing on

network-centric policies.

There is no doubt that networks offer a compelling and valuable way to think about terrorist groups, but

it is important to recognize that networks refer to a broad class of social structures, and there is little re

search that explains the variation in network topology.

Given that typical organizations are subsumed in the concept of networks, it is curious that many scholars

have been so fast to bypass more traditional models of institutions, organizations, and bureaucracy. Prior applications of organizational theory to terrorism have suggested that terror groups often act in ways that

are more consistent with organizational than rational behavior (Crenshaw 1987) and identify some of the organizational trade-offs that are unique to terrorists (Shapiro 2006). The network paradigm may seem particularly attractive, but the almost myopic focus on terrorist organizations as covert networks has margin alized the forces that influence organizational structur ing or network topology in the first place. The rational choice literature has assumed that actors are economi

cally rational, and the network literature has presup posed that actors adopt network structures, but there is an important body of literature that examines the

organizational and structural decisions of rational or bounded rational actors (DiMaggio and Powell 1991). There is, therefore, a disjunction or fissure between the rational choice models of strategic behavior and the network study of terror organizations. It would be a mistake to abandon institutional and bureaucratic

theory altogether based on the assumption that they

… this article suggests that

governance approaches to organizational structure offer a solution to one of the most

pressing problems facing terrorism experts today:

understanding the actual nature of the terrorist threat.

offer no analytical purchase.

Contradicting that belief, this article suggests that governance

approaches to organizational structure offer a solution to one

of the most pressing problems facing terrorism experts today:

understanding the actual nature of the terrorist threat. The war on terror initiated after

the September 11 attacks has put great pressure on terrorist

organizations (Hoffman 2003). This has led some ex perts to argue that most senior members of al-Qaeda have been captured or killed, and that the organiza tion no longer exists. These scholars point to a new and dangerous trend, often referred to as "leaderless jihad" (Sageman 2008). This describes individuals and small groups that are unaffiliated with the major terrorist outlets and the utilization of information

technology such the Internet to learn about jihad and connect with others. These groups receive no training or support from established groups, but are intent on carrying out terrorist acts.

A second group of scholars voice concern about the leaderless jihad, but argue that the remnants of al-Qaeda have reorganized, replenished themselves, and are still very much a threat (Riedel 2007). In

fact, they suggest that these organized groups are the primary terrorist threat facing the United States and its allies. They point to the increasing violence and Taliban resurgence in the Federally Adminis tered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan (Tellis 2008).

Evidence suggests that some Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders have found sanctuary in the FATA and

that they are using this opportunity to reorganize. The presence of al-Qaeda in Iraq may pose serious risks to the United States in light of current troop

728 Public Administration Review July| August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

withdrawals. These groups display a high level of or ganization and bureaucratization, evidenced by seized documents with detailed registries of foreign fighters (Personnel Database for 394 Individuals), resources

(ISI Border Sector Income, Expense, Equipment and Personnel Report), and operating requirements (Template for Weekly Border Activity Report).

At first glance, there is little to explain this seemingly divergent evolutionary pattern. Terrorists are increas ingly unaffiliated Web surfers, at the same time that groups in the Middle East and Asia are morphing into highly effective bureaucracies. While these pat terns seem unrelated, a governance analysis that treats

terrorism like any other rational enterprise provides a surprisingly coherent explanation for this latest evolution.

The point of departure is the Coase theorem, which explains why actors choose to eschew the efficiency of markets in favor

of organizational or nonmar ket structuring (Moe 1984). After showing how market and nonmarket paradigms may apply to terrorism, we examine the costs associated with each

structure and the impact that counterterrorism efforts have on those costs. Counterterrorism

policy may act to increase the transaction costs facing terror

groups, thereby making non market or organizational forms more appealing. Alternatively, organizations often have a more visible footprint because there are more

targets and more connections linking them. Terrorists seek to avoid paying counterterrorism costs and to select structures cognizant of their own strengths and

weaknesses. These features, particularly the similarity among the terrorists themselves, help dictate potential optimal organizing principles.

The coevolution of leaderless jihad and increased bureaucratization matches well with two concepts in organizational literature: autonomy and isomor phism. Autonomy refers to institutions that shed their prior links with supporters in order to develop their own goals and procedures (Carpenter 2001). This is the essence of the leaderless jihad movement, in which small groups of autonomous actors are

self-radicalizing with the help of information tech nology. The nonmarket groups are going through isomorphism, which is the tendency to adopt similar (and perhaps best) practices from similar organiza tions (DiMaggio and Powell 1991). These groups are struggling to develop the right mix of organizational control with bureaucratic operating procedures

aimed at minimizing their exposure to counterter rorism.

Network approaches to terrorist structure have and will continue to offer benefits, and this article is not

suggesting that these efforts be abandoned. It is argu ing, however, that rational approaches to bureaucracy and organizational behavior also have some important things to add to the terrorism discussion and should not be dismissed as outdated and inapplicable. The next section provides the cornerstone for the institu tional arguments by examining the Coase theorem and its application to terror networks. Then the paper offers an examination of the terrorist groups?specifi cally, the level of homogeneity among the actors. The final section shows how the different groups are likely

to respond to the pressures of

The point of departure is the Coase theorem, which explains why actors choose to eschew

the efficiency of markets in

favor of organizational or nonmarket structuring….

After showing how market and nonmarket paradigms may

apply to terrorism, we examine the costs associated with each

structure and the impact that counterterrorism efforts have on

those costs.

counterterrorism, and in so

doing, explains the complex patterns that have led to much debate among terrorism experts.

A Coase Theorem for Terrorism Ronald Coase observed the world around him and asked an

astonishingly practical question: If markets are supposed to be the most efficient means of eco

nomic transaction, why do peo ple constantly choose to adopt nonmarket or organizational structures that are supposed to be economically suboptimal? In short, he wanted to know why

organizations are so prevalent given their inefficien cies relative to supposedly efficient market outcomes (Coase 1960; Moe 1984). Coase's question is the a priori issue of rational organizational behavior. Before studying networks or any other particular structures, it is important to ask why actors would choose the inefficiencies of organizing in the first place.

The point of departure for Coase was the economic efficiency of free markets. Conventional microeco nomic analysis shows that actors benefit from trading at equilibrium levels, and any market distortions,

such as regulation, create deadweight losses that are inherently inefficient. When individuals choose to organize, there is a formal or informal contract that

involves fixed compensation for agreed-upon output. Organizing and contracting establishes set patterns of behavior and requirements outside of the efficient market, which essentially has the effect of distort

ing markets and manipulating equilibria, much like regulation. By bypassing the free market, the organiza tion is theoretically functioning at a suboptimal level relative to the outcomes it would expect if purchasing goods and services directly through the market.

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 729

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

According to Coase, the reason individuals choose to adopt nonmarket structures, essentially contracting goods and services, lies in the existence of transaction costs (Coase 1960; Moe 1984). When the costs of accessing markets or completing transactions rise too high, nonmarket structures may become economically optimal. If employers or parts purchasers had trouble locating reliable suppliers, the transactions costs may

make contracting an optimal approach to securing the desired goods. Suppliers, for their part, are happy con tracting, because it ensures them a fixed rate, thereby

eliminating the risks associated with market pricing. When transaction costs are sufficiently high, both demanders and suppliers can derive benefits from nonmarket structure.

Nonmarket structure and contracting, however, are not without their own costs. Contracted employees or suppliers have to be monitored in order to ensure that they are delivering the products or services of agreed upon quality (Radner 1981; Keck and Sikkink 1998). This gives rise to the commonly cited agency problem, in which an employee can shirk his or her responsi bility. Employers, for their part, are left to observe outcomes and question whether poor outcomes are the product of market forces or employee shirking. In

many formulations of the principal-agent problem, monitoring is further complicated by the fact that the agent has more information than the principal and can blame poor performance on externalities when his or her shirking was actually the culprit. The market versus nonmarket decision is a complicated balance of transaction costs associated with accessing the efficient

markets, and the monitoring and contracting costs associated with nonmarket structures. Most exchange happens somewhere on a spectrum between pure mar ket and complete bureaucracy. Many bureaucratized firms incorporate markets within the organization (Baker, Gibbons and Murphy 2001), just as many

markets incorporate institutional principles such as property rights or price systems (Bates 1995).

The logic of Coase's argument relies on the assump tion that actors are economically rational, which is simply to assert that actors choose among behaviors that are most likely to accomplish reasonably well defined goals. If terrorists are the rational agents that game theoretic scholars assert, then these compet ing forces should be taken into account, just as they

would among any other set of rational individuals. In other words, we cannot assume that terrorists are

rational agents and then eschew the rational theories

that provide the foundation for organizational or bu reaucratic behavior. Admittedly, applying the Coase theorem and rational choice explanations of organi zational behavior to terrorism may seem inappropri ate to some who prefer psychological or sociological rationales. Those favoring a sociological approach

would argue that terrorism is a social phenomenon

based on collective goals. This is certainly an impor tant element of terrorism; however, these approaches do not preclude an economic or rational approach to these problems. Elinor Ostrom (1990) examined how institutions overcome individual incentives to

counter collective action problems, an examination of collective goals that explicitly incorporates rational action. Mark Granovetter (1978) relied on individual

incentives as important causal mechanisms in his study of collective action, specifically addressing riot behavior and collective violence. A careful analysis shows the value of applying economic theories of rational institutions to terrorism, and that terrorist

groups may be constrained by some common market forces.

A necessary precondition for applying the Coase theorem to any situation is the existence of a market.

The absence of a market would render the subsequent logic about market and nonmarket structuring ir relevant, as there would be no market alternative. This

begs the question, what does a terrorism marketplace look like? Rational choice treatments of terrorism have

implicitly envisaged the terror market as analogous to the employment market. For example, Ethan Bueno de Mesquita (2005b) examined an interac tion whereby government policies may drive citizens toward terror groups who are interested in recruiting the best of those available. In this structure, there is

some demand for terrorist acts, represented by both the terrorist group and the discontent among the

general population that drives citizens to seek employ ment as terrorists. The terrorist group is the engine of

market demand, though it may be responding to an underlying demand in the population as a whole, and the members of the population represent the supply of people available for employment?or more accurately, deployment?as terrorists.

This represents a supply and demand construct that has the familiar look of a labor market, in which

output is the completion of terror attacks. Employ ers have some need for laborers and prefer to hire as

many people for as low a rate as possible. The number of units demanded is a decreasing function of price. The population represents the pool of people avail able for recruitment, or the supply. Suppliers want to sell as many products as possible for as high a rate as possible, and they are willing to offer greater supply as the price increases. The number of units supplied is an increasing function of the price. In an unencumbered free market, the intersection of supply and demand represents the equilibrium specifying the quantity of units traded at a specified price. Terrorists, therefore, offer some form of compensation to those who are willing to carry out terror attacks. This compensation may take the form of financial support for families,

training, or simply respect and reverence. More people should volunteer to participate in terrorism when

730 Public Administration Review July| August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

this compensation looks attractive relative to other opportunities.

The labor market model of supply and demand in the terrorist context is the most commonly applied and the easiest to envision, but there is an alternative that

is worth mentioning briefly. Traditional notions of

recruitment may be poorly suited to some transna tional terror groups (Sageman 2004). An alternative approach to a terrorism marketplace could involve competition for resources among individuals who are interested in carrying out terrorist acts, making the terrorist the demander. As the resources available for

an operation decline, fewer demanders are willing to accept the terms. The supply of resources is based on the support made available from global jihad organi zations. In this case, organizations increase the supply of resources as the number of qualified candidates capable of carrying out significant attacks increases. This concept flips the supply and demand dynamic of the labor market upside down.

Despite the plausibility of this structure, this analysis will follow others by treating the ter

rorism marketplace as analogous to the labor market, although the actual market structure does

not play a significant role in the ensuing analysis.

The Cost of Doing Business: Market versus Nonmarket Markets, irrespective of the players, have some com mon features. In theory, all that is necessary for a mar

ket system is three actors, where one actor is trying to transact and can choose between alternatives offered

by the other two actors. While pure market systems

require no organizational construct because outcomes should be self-enforcing, there are often institutional

elements such as property rights or price systems to make exchange easier. In a market, any demander can meet a supplier and complete a transaction. Terrorism markets, in their pure form, pose quite the dilemma for counterterrorism officials. There are a few tools that states and counterterrorism officials can use to combat market-based terrorism. The most basic

counterterrorism policy, though the most difficult to enact effectively, would require finding all of the

individual, unrelated market players or constricting all forms of communication between market actors.

Alternatively, states could act in ways that reduce the incentive to participate in terror markets in the first

place by increasing the value of outside options, creat ing a shortage that would impede market function. In short, counterterrorism in a market structure requires

increasing the transaction costs so that markets become inefficient mechanisms or inhospitable places for terrorists to inhabit.

Transaction costs are common in economic dialogue and usually involve costs embedded in a market or necessary to complete economic exchange. Often, these costs involve behaviors such as information

search, locating buyers or sellers, shipping or delivery, and bargaining. This is certainly not an exhaustive list of transaction costs, but it serves as a guide for

application to the terrorist market framework. Some of these issues present a greater challenge for terrorists than others. For example, information search is likely to be more costly than bargaining. The illicit nature of terrorism, coupled with the need for secrecy, makes information search, and communication more gener

ally, relatively expensive. The information needed to complete transactions is rarely readily available, mean ing that actors have to do more research requiring

higher transaction costs. Locating transaction partners may also present problems that are contingent on the operational environment. In Western or well-policed

In Western or well-policed societies, terrorists cannot really go out to the market and openly represent themselves as suppliers

or demanders. On the other

side of the spectrum, terrorists

operating in lawless areas may be less constrained.

societies, terrorists cannot really

go out to the market and openly represent themselves as suppli ers or demanders. On the other

side of the spectrum, terrorists

operating in lawless areas may be less constrained.

Counterterrorism, in essence, tries to increase these trans

action costs in the hopes of discouraging involvement in the terror market. Typical micro

level counterterrorism efforts are aimed at identifying those who are interested in terrorism and remov

ing them from the marketplace. Counterterrorism officials may track people's information searches or plant false information, making information gather ing either overly risky or worthless (Ressler 2006).

Finding transaction partners is also complicated by counterterrorism efforts, as officials may use spies in

the hopes of identifying those who are participating in the market. Even bargaining costs and shipping costs can be manipulated by counterterrorism policy. The former is made more costly by using signals intercepts to reduce communication, and the latter by imposing better border and transit security measures that make

the movement of people or dangerous substances more difficult.

In a marketplace in which transaction costs are already high, counterterrorism can have a large dis torting effect. The terrorists' problem is best expressed in a probabilistic or expected value context, which is appropriate if they are rational actors (Morrow 1994). Transaction costs are increasing in the probability of getting identified. Costs would also be increasing in the actual penalty exacted for exposure or capture. In the expected utility context of microeconomic trans actions, the probability of capture and the associated

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 731

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

penalty must be absorbed in the transaction. If actors know that they have to absorb this cost in order to participate in the market, then it might be in their best interest to organize outside the market in the hope of bypassing such costs.

Participation in a marketplace, irrespective of struc ture, must be measured against nonmarket alterna tives. Nonmarket alternatives are selected when

transaction costs get sufficiently high that markets become inefficient exchange mechanisms (Moe 1984). These high costs justify the nonmarket structure and organization that constrain actors' behavior. Unlike market activity, nonmarket activity requires some form of centralization and commitment. It is these

two elements that allow individual agents to avoid the transaction costs that make markets a poor alterna

tive. Centralization may have functions of planning, resource allocation, training, procurement, or recruit

ment. Centralization, or organization more broadly, requires that agents commit to fulfilling their respon sibilities so that the organization maintains an accept able level of output. This requires a formal or informal

contracting mechanism.

The easiest way to conceive of a terrorism market is an environment in which individu

als respond to some demand for terror acts without active

logistical support. In the market context, individuals respond to a community grievance by acquiring the necessary skills or resources (or self-organizing, if operating as cell) needed to carry out an attack. In a

nonmarket structure, the actors carrying out the terror

attacks have the advantage of accessing resources made available by some form of organization or preexist ing resource network. Situations where individuals are vetted, drafted, trained, and supplied by groups show institutionalization, specialization, and hierarchy reflective of nonmarket structures.

Evidence shows that global and regional jihad move ments have traditionally relied on a nonmarket or organizational structure (Byman 2003). Al-Qaeda had a central planning staff that managed resources,

organized recruiting, and coordinated isolated cells. Regional groups, such as Hamas, often have com mand or logistical units outside their primary conflict zone that are charged with providing resources to the in-theater units that actually carry out attacks (Levitt

2004). Many of these groups have organizational structures that would look like almost any other en

terprise or bureaucracy staffed with financial officers, operations officers, strategy officers, and even public

relations officers. Adopting a nonmarket structure

or organizational features is not surprising, as coun terterrorism policies theoretically attempt to increase transaction costs, but nonmarket structures are not

without their own costs.

There are two costs that are particularly vexing for these illicit nonmarket groups: contracting costs and secrecy (or what we call footprint) costs. Contracting involves fixing some agreed level of output for a nego tiated price, allowing the parties to bypass the market place. There are inherent inefficiencies associated with these commitments. The major costs associated with contracting, both products of different preferences or incentives among the actors, are monitoring and enforcement problems. Monitoring involves paying costs to ensure that the contracted parties deliver as

promised, and the difficulty of accurate monitoring can vary with the specific situation (Fudenberg, Le vine, and Maskin 1994). Enforcement involves impos ing punishments on parties who shirk or deviate from their obligations (Fearon 2003; Koremenos, Lipson, and Snidal 2001). These problems are common in analyses focusing on principal-agent problems, but as noted here, this is just one set of problems associated with market/nonmarket decisions and clandestine

groups.

Contracting has some unique dynamics when applied to

terrorism, but forms recovered

from Iraq show that fighters and suicide bombers do sign

contracts for attacks, separation, and temporary leave.

Contracting has some unique dynamics when applied to terrorism, but forms recovered

from Iraq show that fighters and suicide bombers do sign contracts for attacks, separa tion, and temporary leave (ISI

Template for Suicide Op eration Pledge; AQI Template for Leaving Iraq or the AQI

Organization; Template for Overseas Medical Treat ment Authorization). Unlike firms in the economic

marketplace that can rely on writ of law to enforce contracts, there are no external enforcement mecha

nisms available to terrorist organizations. As a result,

illicit groups should have particularly high costs for monitoring and enforcement. These costs can vary sig nificantly, and therefore have a significant impact on organizational behavior. Monitoring becomes increas ingly important as the terrorist leaders and subordi nates have different priorities. Terrorists can overcome these costs by increasing reporting requirements and creating middle management that improves oversight, as al-Qaeda in Iraq has attempted to do (Template for

Weekly Border Activity Report). All of these activities create organizational or operational costs. Enforce ment is also a costly activity because punishments are rarely cost free to those being punished or those imposing punishment.

One might be tempted to ask how important moni toring really is. After all, terrorism is about creating

732 Public Administration Review July | August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

a sense of insecurity and anarchy in the hope of gaining political concessions (see definitions from the State Department, Defense Department, or Federal Bureau of Investigation). The importance of monitor ing and enforcement, however, is directly tied to the risks associated with shirking or defection. There are numerous ways in which terrorists may defect from

obligations. One option is that they choose not to carry out the attack. This defection may be relatively modest if the group has made little investment in the individual, but the defection of well-placed or highly trained individuals may be costly. Enforcement mechanisms may involve threats to family and friends.

A second form of shirking is disregarding leadership wishes and carrying out unsanctioned attacks. Groups may respond by not playing martyr videos or with holding remuneration guaranteed to family members. The monitoring costs may be modest when it comes to attacks, as these are widely observable events, but enforcement is likely to be a serious bureaucratic problem.

Another type of defection is the most dangerous and severe for terror organizations. This is the actual defec tion of terrorists to the government or counterterror

ism authorities. Actors serving as informants or spies

could impose significant costs on a terrorist organiza tion. Given the illicit nature of these organizations, a betrayal of this magnitude would have to be met with harsh punishment possibly involving torture or execu tion. Even if enforcement penalties are set particularly high, a well-placed spy may be able to avoid detec tion for some time, thereby making monitoring and counterintelligence functions central to any terrorist organization (Arquilla and Ronfeldt 2001). This type of monitoring can be particularly costly, and jihad groups have tried to circumvent these costs by relying on kinship or friendship networks when recruiting and planning (Sageman 2004).

This is closely tied to secrecy costs, or what might better be referred to as footprint costs. Nonmarket

structures, such as organizations, have larger foot prints than individuals. Individuals who engage in illicit activity, especially those whose participation is brief, can be difficult to identify or stop. Organi zations, on the other hand, have regularized com munication among certain people, as evidenced by the seized documents cited earlier. Communications

and the connections between people or groups leave a record of interaction that can be used to track

the group (Carley 2004). Regular communication, whether voice or data, can be intercepted. Meetings can be photographed and taped. Because communi cation in organizations is a regular occurrence, the existence of patterns increases the susceptibility of future correspondence and the likelihood of intercep tion. Basically, organizations leave a larger footprint than individuals, and counterterrorism officials excel

at exploiting these connections.

Terror organizations, therefore, are confronted with a

complicated mixture of incentives and costs. Non market structure helps to avoid the transaction costs associated with entering the market, but also involves contracting and footprint costs. By contrast, terror ists can rely on the marketplace, but the illicit nature of the activity makes for an opaque market with high transaction costs. The features of market and nonmar

ket structures, and the associated counterterrorism

policies, are summarized in Table 1. Ultimately, ter rorist groups may settle on models between these two extremes in order to optimize their utility across the

different risks, but these hybrid structures are meant to balance these basic forces.

The incentives of market and nonmarket structures

are further distorted by counterterrorism efforts. Counterterrorism, in its purest form, tries to increase the transaction costs associated with accessing the terror market. Officials can pose as demand

ers or suppliers, restrict money transfers, disrupt connections, intercept communications, and use incentives to discourage participation. The costs of being caught are severe. As discussed earlier, how ever, nonmarket structures are not immune from

counterterrorism pressures. While these groups face lower transaction costs, counterterrorism increases

the contracting and footprint costs. Terrorist groups have to spend more time monitoring members. The footprint costs are particularly problematic. They are fundamental to the functioning of any group, but they also provide counterterrorism officials with their best source of information. In order to limit these

footprint costs, some jihad movements have tried to bureaucratize their secrecy procedures or focus on horizontal rather than hierarchical structuring (Jenkins 2002).

Table 1 Summary of Market and Nonmarket Attributes

Market Nonmarket

Construct Exchange Contract Primary Cost Transaction Monitoring

Relationship Bargained (horizontal) Specified (hierarchical) Counterterrorism Goal Disrupt market functioning Disrupt organization/command and control

Primary Tool Increase transaction costs Increase operating (monitoring) costs Impact Drive terrorists toward nonmarket Drive terrorists toward looser connections/market

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalise! and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 733

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Stepped-up counterterrorism since the September 11 attacks has made these choices particularly difficult for terrorists. On the one hand, transaction costs have

increased, decreasing the appeal of loose or market oriented structures. Alternatively, counterterrorism has also increased contracting and footprint costs, decreasing the appeal of the nonmarket structure (al-Hakaymah 2006). While terrorists are caught in a dilemma, terror experts have debated how their foes have reacted to these dual pressures. Without

explicitly considering the rational pressures of markets and organizations, there can be little hope of produc ing an internally consistent explanation of seem ingly divergent trends: leaderless jihad or increased bureaucratization. These questions are perhaps best addressed by thinking about the market and non market issues in combination with an analysis of the terrorists themselves.

Terrorist Characteristics: All Alike? Terrorists try to escape the costs of counterterror

ism, but their means of doing so is contingent on the characteristics of the terrorists themselves. The

incentive structure and capabilities of actors play a crucial role in rational institutionalism (DiMaggio and Powell 1991; Koremenos, Lipson, and Snidal 2003), and it would be a mistake to assume that

these factors do not play a role in terrorism and its

organizing principles. The institutional and organi zational behavior literature address these issues from

a number of angles, such as individual incentives, function-based structure, and organizational culture (Moe 1984; Vaughan 1996; Weiss 1982). Each of these issues, in different ways, addresses the degree of

homogeneity between actors involved in an organiza tion. Homogeneity, a generic term used to represent a degree of similarity between entities, can refer to interests, skills, or other pertinent variables. This interests bureaucratic scholars because of the organi zational problems discussed earlier, and particularly the principal-agent problem.

Despite some rigorous studies of terrorism before September 11 (Hoffman 1998; Lesser 1999; Reich 1998), common conceptions of terrorists, particularly suicide terrorists, portrayed them as psychologically deficient individuals hell-bent on reeking havoc indis criminately (Atran 2004; Sageman 2004). While this characterization is a gross oversimplification, this type

of portrayal still appears in popular media accounts and political speeches. Recent research into terrorist organizations and terrorists themselves reveals a much more complicated picture (Kimhi and Even 2004; Sageman 2004). Islamic extremists who opt to use terrorism may or may not be poor, may or may not be well educated, and may or may not have been edu

cated in madrassas. Despite this mix of characteristics, there are empirical patterns among terrorists and the types of terrorist groups they are associated with.

Marc Sageman's (2004) first canonical study of 170 transnational terrorists, as opposed to those associ ated with regional groups, provided some startling revelations. With few systemic exceptions, these individuals were not poor, and most were actually from

middle-class or wealthy families. Those who were poor tended to hail from poor neighborhoods in Morocco or Western Europe, a group that Sageman calls the

Maghreb Arabs. It also turns out that the vast majority of individuals in the sample were highly educated and were often doctors, engineers, or scientists. By contrast,

the Maghreb Arabs were relatively uneducated. Most in the sample were not educated in madrassas and did not come from religious families. Most were radical ized outside their home countries, often after exposure

to Western society. This profile of transnational terror

groups such as al-Qaeda paints a picture of highly educated, highly motivated, rational, and relatively homogenous individuals coming together to influence political decisions by deliberate targeting of civilians.

Sageman (2008) has recently deviated from his initial opinion that jihadis are likely to be the best and the brightest. Over the past few of years, he has identified a new trend among terrorists. They are unremarkable,

average people. Initially, he reasoned that the proc ess of recruitment, a requirement in any nonmarket

structure, allowed the leadership of groups such as al-Qaeda to screen candidates and only maintain association with the best. As the leaders of al-Qaeda and similar groups have been driven underground, those interested in jihad have to rely on Web sites and local connections to people with similar interests. The lack of formal recruitment, training, or leadership has

changed the profile of terrorists. Groups no longer train, recruit, and screen, meaning that terrorists

are more likely to be average or unremarkable. The emergence of leaderless jihad, Sageman argues, has essentially eliminated any terrorist profile.

Both of these stories about terrorists and their

personal characteristics stand in stark contrast to the image of poor, unemployed, uneducated youths that resonates through the media. It would be wrong, however, to assume that all terrorists are well-off and educated. While terrorist leaders maintain that suicide

bombings are a costly signal because martyrs are often the best and brightest from the population (Atran 2004), regional groups such as Hamas clearly distin guish between leadership and martyr brigades (Kimhi and Even 2004; Levitt 2004). This differentiation is

particularly evident when examining al-Qaeda in Iraq. There, al-Qaeda recruited largely poor and uneducated Sunnis from Saudi Arabia and brought them into Iraq to carry out suicide attacks (Parker 2007). The leader

ship tries to keep count of those recruited to carry out attacks and the resources that they bring with them (ISI Foreign Fighter Registry December 2006-January 2007). This is the type of heterogeneity that gives rise

734 Public Administration Review July| August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

to principal-agent problems in institutional theories of organization.

This means there are two different narratives about

terrorists and their characteristics. On one hand,

terrorists may be educated or average people who connect over a common desire to resort to violence.

On the other hand, bureaucratized groups with well-defined leadership recruit lesser individuals to further the violent mission of the organization. If both of these stories are correct, then there appear to

be two generic types of terror groups: groups with

high homogeneity and groups with high hetero geneity. Groups of seemingly regular individuals that self-organize are likely to have a high degree of homogeneity of interests, and may have a good deal in common by virtue of their interpersonal connec tions. Contrarily, organizations that recruit poor and

uneducated individuals are likely to exhibit higher levels of heterogeneity. Leaders want to further the

cause and strengthen the organization, while a host of issues that include religion, discontent, or financial remittance for family members may motivate their

martyr recruits.

At first glance, the discussion of terrorist character istics seems semantic. Does it really matter whether the participants in these groups have similar interests?

Does the profile of these people help to understand the broader trends in terrorism today? The next sec

tion will argue that it does. In fact, the complicated trends in terrorism can be explained by the forces of

rational institutionalism offered by Coase, the degree of heterogeneity within a group, and the pressures of counterterrorism.

A Tale of Two Trends: Isomorphism and Autonomy Today, and since the September 11 attacks, terrorists find themselves between a rock and hard place. Coun terterrorism efforts increase the transaction costs asso

ciated with a terror marketplace at the same time they increase the footprint and contracting costs associated

with nonmarket structures. The natural reaction to

the pressures of counterterrorism is to seek escape,

and in this case, that involves minimizing exposure to these costs. The best way for terrorists to minimize the costs associated with counterterrorism is conditioned

on their characteristics and heterogeneity.

Terrorists have found two ways they can hope to minimize counterterrorism costs: autonomy and iso morphism. Both of these concepts play a significant role in new institutional approaches to organization al behavior. All organizations seek autonomy?the ability to operate independently, with little or no control from outside or central authorities?over

their missions (Emmerich 1950). Just because they seek it, that does not necessarily mean it is achieved.

Systemic study of autonomous and nonautonomous bureaucratic units within the U.S. government revealed that organizations are most likely to achieve autonomy when mid-level operators within the bureaucracy have good relationships with leaders or outside authorities (Carpenter 2001). In these instances, authority figures believe that mid-level

management is both competent and best suited to structure organizational initiatives. When mid-level

managers have weak relationships with the relevant authorities, it is becomes less likely that organiza tions gain autonomy.

Isomorphism refers to the organizational tendency to take on the structure and operational patterns of other (perhaps successful) organizations in a similar field (DiMaggio and Powell 1991). Isomorphism may be competitive or instrumental. Competitive isomor phism reflects the tendency to adopt the best possible practices, emulating successful organizations. Institu tional isomorphism refers to organizational changes that are intended to accommodate the outside world

that may not reflect competitive pressures. There are

three types of institutional isomorphism: coercive,

mimetic, and normative. Coercive isomorphism is similarity bred by pressure from outside forces, be

it suppliers, financiers or supporters. The more an

organization is dependent on outside actors, the more likely it is to experience this form of isomorphism.

Mimetic isomorphism, the tendency to copy visible organizational models, tends to happen in fields in which there are few organizations to copy or there is

high uncertainty. In environments with high uncer tainty, adopting a familiar organizational form may allay some concerns rooted in uncertainty from opera tions. Finally, normative isomorphism is driven by social ties such professional training.

These two organizational phenomena, autonomy and isomorphism, represent two very different behavioral

patterns that are driven by different forces. Because au

tonomy refers to the severing or loosening of organiza tional ties, at its most basic level, it represents a move

from nonmarket to market structure. Alternatively, isomorphism refers to the adoption of organizational best practices, which inherently reinforces nonmarket

structuring. These two forces have had a significant impact on the evolution of terror organization.

The relative power of these forces is conditional on

the capacities and nature of group. Homogenous groups?those with similar interests?benefit from adopting greater autonomy and essentially adopt ing as close to a market structure as possible. When homogeneity is high, there is less worry that actors will attempt to cheat or exploit, and they need less direction from outside. These actors are less concerned

with the possibility that market partners will not carry out their duties or inform on them because they have

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 735

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

similar interests. Greater autonomy, fewer connec

tions, and less regular bureaucratic routine allow these groups to minimize the costs of nonmarket structure,

while minimizing the exposure to transaction costs associated with the market alternative. Homogeneity among participants acts as a natural hedge against the increased transaction costs associated with counterter

rorism policies.

The traditional logic of markets is that they offer the most efficient outcome given actors with different

interests. Here, heterogeneous groups have less incen tive to adopt a market structure because actors with different interests are less reliable partners, and there

is a premium placed on reliability. Heterogeneous groups that adopt more autonomous structures run the risk that subordinates will act in ways that are con

trary to the interests of the leadership. Some terrorist groups, such as al-Qaeda, have relied on a degree of autonomy whereby small units or cells often function for long periods of time with little direction (Byman 2003). Other groups, such Hamas and al-Qaeda in Iraq, have limited the autonomy of subordinate units (Levitt 2004). Simply put, market-oriented structures are not efficient options for groups of heterogeneous actors and probably do little to minimize exposure to counterterrorism costs.

Because principal-agent prob lems are endemic to heterogene ous groups and make market

structure inhospitable, these groups have to adopt the most efficient nonmarket or bureau cratic structures available. This

is isomorphism in the truest sense. These groups cannot necessarily trust their subordi nates, so they must contract, monitor, and enforce.

Adopting the best practices from other organizations is an optimal strategy for avoiding counterterrorism costs. It would be limiting to think that terror groups only experience competitive isomorphism, when they might also undergo institutional isomorphism as defined earlier. Organizations are more likely to experience institutional isomorphism when there is greater reliance on outside actors, greater uncertainty,

fewer organizational models, and common profes sional training. It is interesting to note that the groups experiencing increased bureaucratization are often tied to external actors (such as al-Qaeda central), and their

members often go through some sort of training.

Isomorphism reinforces the bureaucratic structure as groups adopt operational procedures that help mini mize the contracting and footprint costs. Evidence of increased bureaucracy in terror groups is evident from computers and hard drives seized by counterterrorism officials (some of this data has already been cited).

Many of these documents are bureaucratic forms much like the standard paperwork or inventories of any organization. There are also forms outlining standard operating procedures, which is particularly important because these groups need to adopt the best counterintelligence and communication policies if they are to reduce the footprint costs associated with counterterrorism efforts.

An institutional approach to organizational behavior or governance, therefore, provides a parsimonious explanation for the divergent trends of leaderless jihad and increased bureaucratization. Terrorists who are

well positioned to minimize their organizational fea tures, by moving toward market structure and greater

autonomy, have chosen this method for countering the costs of counterterrorism efforts, resulting in the

leaderless jihad movement. Terror groups that require a nonmarket structure have adopted common (and perhaps better) procedures in the hopes of minimizing the costs involved with bureaucracy and confounding counterterrorism officials. There is evidence of these

patterns across groups and functions. Both Hezbollah (Harik 2005) and Hamas (Levitt 2004) have ostensi bly benefited from organizing themselves into military,

political, and social wings that perpetuate terrorist acts, participate in government, and

Because principal-agent problems are endemic to

heterogeneous groups and make market structure inhospitable, these groups have to adopt the most efficient nonmarket or

bureaucratic structures available.

provide social services. There is also convergence in transna tional groups, substantiated by bureaucratization among al-Qaeda in Iraq to emulate al Qaeda who have been keeping records and demanding pledges since the organization's incep tion (Wright 2006). The recent alliance between al-Qaeda and the Salafist Group for Preach

ing and Combat in Algeria, resulting in the creation of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, may offer further evidence of common organizational practice.

Given these organizational trends, it seems pertinent to ask, what do autonomy and isomorphism mean for terrorism and counterterrorism? Both forces are

double-edged weapons for both terrorists and coun terterrorism officials. Autonomy reduces the organi zational footprint, making it more difficult to track or even identify members of autonomous groups. As recent terror arrests of autonomous groups in Toronto

and Amsterdam show, it is possible (Sageman 2008). While terrorists benefit from a reduced footprint, the

limitations of minimal structure may also be harmful.

Research on the operational capabilities of centralized versus decentralized groups shows that decentralized groups should have superior problem-solving skills when tasks are simple, but centralized structures perform better as tasks get increasingly complex (Kollman, Miller, and Page 2000). This means that

736 Public Administration Review July| August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

decentralized or autonomous groups may be more effective in carrying out smaller terror attacks, but will find it difficult to carry out complex attacks requiring

significant resources or coordination.

Isomorphism also has upsides and downsides for all involved. Best practices should improve or at least

regularize communication, secrecy, logistics, planning, and financial procedures. Best practices improve or ganizational efficiency and performance, making these terror groups more difficult to counter. The counter

terrorism benefits to isomorphism lie in the fact that

groups adopt similar procedures. This provides a set of clues or cues that counterterrorism officials can use to

identify terror groups and suspected terrorists. Behav

ioral similarities?individual and organizational?im prove the effectiveness of profiling and other means to uncover these clandestine groups. Adopting similar practices also means that counterterrorism strategies that are effective against one group may be effective against others. Once officials find the chink in the

armor, they can exploit that weakness across groups.

Despite the weaknesses of each structure, both trends are daunting for those involved in counterterrorism efforts. Recognizing that your enemy is increasingly

stealthy at the same time that others are becoming increasingly efficient seems to offer little reason for

optimism. This is further aggravated by the fact that the skills needed to tackle increasingly autonomous groups might be very different from those needed to counter increasingly efficient groups. Different wars, or at least theaters of battle, usually require different

weapons and tactics. It would appear that the key is to recognize these divergent trends, acknowledge the fact that a one-size-fits-all counterterrorism policy will not

achieve its objectives, and work toward exploiting the weaknesses inherent in both trends.

Conclusion This essay has argued that organizational theory based on the economic logic of market and nonmarket structuring can help shed light on a major debate

within terrorism studies. It is important to note that

other organizational theories, such as those focus ing on sociology or political mobilization, may offer different perspectives on this phenomenon. Just as this article has argued that organizational frameworks other than network theory can still offer valuable

insights, it is also possible noneconomic theories of organization may be applicable to the issues addressed here. Perhaps further research will focus on the com parative merits of different approaches to organiza tional behavior within terrorism. One of the purposes

of this piece is to show how one traditional approach could shed light on contemporary issues.

Over the next few years, scholars will continue to

produce rational choice models of terrorist activity,

and network research will push on and provide valu able tools in the fight against terrorists. While tradi tional approaches to organizational behavior are likely to be relegated to the shadows of terror research,

we must be careful not to ignore them altogether. Lessons learned from more traditional organizations and bureaucracies may not appear to explain terror organizations, but, as this article has shown, they can be applied and may even have a good deal of explana tory power. Here, we argued that complex divergent trends in terrorism can be explained by a careful ap plication of these theories.

What about these trends? Who is right? Are terrorist groups increasingly decentralized and autonomous, as suggested by advocates of the leaderless jihad vi sion, or are terror groups increasingly organized and bureaucratic? The answer, inconvenient as it might be, is both. These trends are rational responses to the

pressures of stepped-up counterterrorism efforts since the September 11 attacks. One need not create caveats or carve-outs to explain these seemingly unique or divergent trends. Both patterns are reflective of

rational actors responding to organizational pressures in the hopes of minimizing operating costs. While these two patterns appear distinct, they are in fact

opposite sides of the same coin and can be explained by governance theories based on new institutional literature.

Perhaps most important, these divergent trends, and the explanation offered here, reflect evolution ary change implicit in dynamic processes. The terror threat has, like any well-functioning industry or or ganization, evolved over time. Evolution, as slow as it may be, is a central component of organizational and social behavior. Just as post-September 11 counter terrorism efforts helped to trigger the changes among terrorist groups that are now becoming evident, current counterterrorism efforts will spur a new wave

of change. As difficult as it has been to discern the divergent patterns of leaderless jihad and increased bureaucratization, the next stage of evolution may be even more perplexing. Both of these groups will surely evolve.

While the best-case scenario is that the two patterns converge toward a single model, the reality is that these two patterns may fracture even further with new

structures and operating procedures. Counterterror ism experts would be wise to recognize that we will probably need every tool in the social science arsenal to predict, analyze, and understand the next evolu tionary cycle. If the past has any predictive ability, we

will find that terror groups and networks are subject to the same organizational or bureaucratic headaches as everyone else. Perhaps we can take comfort in that knowledge as we retrench for the next wave of this long war.

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalism and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 737

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Acknowledgments The author would like to thank Ann Lin, Brian

Fishman, Dominick Wright, panel participants at an Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, and the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions. All errors contained in the paper are those of the author.

The views expressed herein are those of the author and do not reflect the position of the United States

Military Academy, the Department of the Army, or the Department of Defense.

References Abu Bakr Naji. 2004. The Management of Barbarism.

http://www.ctc.usma.edu/naji.asp.

Al-Hakaymah, Muhammad. 2006. Toward a New

Strategy in Resisting the Occupier. http://www.

opensource.gov.

AQI Template for Leaving Iraq or the AQI Organiza

tion. Harmony ID: NMEC-2007-657700. http://

www.ctc.usma.edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

Arquilla, John, and David E Ronfeldt. 2001. Networks

and Netwars: The Future of Terror, Crime, and Mili

tancy. Santa Monica, CA: RAND.

Atran, Scott. 2004. Mishandling Suicide Terrorism.

Washington Quarterly 27'(3): 67-90.

Baker, George, Robert Gibbons, and Kevin J. Murphy.

2001. Bringing the Market Inside the Firm. Ameri

can Economic Review 91 (2) : 212-18.

Basile, Mark. 2004. Going to the Source: Why Al

Qaeda's Financial Network Is Likely to Withstand

the Current War on Terrorist Financing. Studies in

Conflict and Terrorism 27(3): 169-85.

Bates, Robert H. 1995. Social Dilemmas and Rational

Individuals. In The New Institutional Economics and

Third World Development, edited by John Harriss,

Janet Hunter, Colin M. Lewis, 27-48. London:

Routledge.

Bueno de Mesquita, Ethan. 2005a. The Quality of

Terror. American Journal of Political Science 49(3):

515-30.

-. 2005b. The Terrorist Endgame: A Model with Moral Hazard and Learning. Journal of Conflict

Resolution 49(2): 237-58.

Byman, Daniel L. 2003. Al-Qaeda as an Adversary: Do

We Understand Our Enemy? World Politics 56(1):

139-63.

Carley, Kathleen M. 2004. Estimating Vulnerabilities

in Large Covert Networks. Paper presented at the

2004 International Symposium on Command and

Control Research and Technology, San Diego, CA.

Carley, Kathleen M., Matthew Dombroski, Max

Tsvetovat, Jeffrey Reminga, and Natasha Kamneva.

2003. Destabilizing Dynamic Covert Networks. Pa

per presented at the Eighth International Command

and Control Research and Technology Symposium,

Washington, DC.

Carpenter, Daniel P. 2001. The Forging of Bureaucratic

Autonomy: Reputations, Networks, and Policy Innova

tion in Executive Agencies, 1862-1928. Princeton,

NJ: Princeton University Press.

Coase, Ronald H. 1960. The Problem of Social Cost.

Journal of Law and Economics 3(1): 1 -44.

Crenshaw, Martha. 1987. Theories of Terrorism: Instru

mental and Organizational Approaches. Journal of

Strategic Studies 4(10): 13-31.

DiMaggio, Paul J., and Walter W. Powell. 1991. The

Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and

Collective Rationality. In The New Institutionalism in

Organizational Analysis, edited by Walter W Powell

and Paul J. DiMaggio, 1-38. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press.

Emmerich, Herbert. 1950. Essays on Federal Reorganiza

tion. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.

Farley, Jonathan David. 2003. Breaking AI Qaeda

Cells: A Mathematical Analysis of Counterterrorism

Operations. Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 26(6): 399-411.

Fearon, James D. 2003. Bargaining, Enforcement, and

International Cooperation. International Organiza

tion 52(3): 269-305.

Fudenberg, Drew, David Levine, and Eric Maskin.

1994. The Folk Theorem with Imperfect Public

Information. Econometrica 62(5): 997-1039.

Granovetter, Mark. 1978. Threshold Models of Collec

tive Behavior. American Journal of Sociology 83(6):

1420-43.

Harik, Judith Palmer. 2005. Hezbollah: The Changing

Face of Terrorism. London: I. B.Tauris.

Hoffman, Bruce. 1998. Inside Terrorism. New York:

Columbia University Press.

-. 2003. AI Qaeda, Trends in Terrorism, and Future Potentialities: An Assessment. Paper pre sented at the RAND Center for Middle East Public

Policy.

ISI Border Sector Income, Expense, Equipment and Per

sonnel Report. Harmony ID: NMEC-2007-657676.

http://www.ctc.usma.edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

ISI Foreign Fighter Registry December 2006-January

2007. Harmony ID: NMEC-2007-657683. http://

www.ctc.usma.edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

ISI Template for Suicide Operation Pledge. Harmony

ID: NMEC-2007-657925. http://www.ctc.usma.

edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

Jenkins, Brian Michael. 2002. Countering al Qaeda:

An Appreciation of the Situation and Suggestions for

Strategy. Santa Monica, CA: RAND.

Keck, Margaret E., and Kathryn Sikkink. 1998. Activists

beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International

Politics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Kenney, Michael. 2003. From Pablo to Osama:

Counter-Terrorism Lessons from the War on Drugs.

Survival 45(3): 187-206. Kimhi, Shaul, and Shemual Even. 2004. Who Are the

Palestinian Suicide Bombers? Terrorism and Political

Violence 16(4): 815-40.

738 Public Administration Review July | August 2009

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Kollman, Ken, John H. Miller, and Scott E. Page.

2000. Decentralization and the Search for Policy

Solutions. Journal of Law Economics and Organiza

tion 16(1): 102-28.

Koremenos, Barbara, Charles Lipson, and Duncan

Snidal. 2001. The Rational Design of International

institutions. International Organization 55(4): 761-99.

Krebs, Valdis. 2002. Uncloaking Terrorist Networks.

First Monday 7(4). http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgi

wrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/941 /863

[accessed April 3, 2009].

Lesser, Ian O. 1999. Countering the New Terrorism.

Santa Monica, CA: RAND.

Levitt, Matthew. 2004. Hamas from Cradle to Grave.

Middle East Quarterly 11(1): 3? 15 – McCormick, Gordon H. 2003. Terrorist Decision

Making. Annual Review of Political Science 6: 473-507.

Moe, Terry M. 1984. The New Economics of Organi

zation. American Journal of Political Science 28(4):

739-77.

Morrow, James D. 1994. Game Theory for Political

Scientists. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Ostrom, Elinor. 1990. Governing the Commons: The

Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. New

York: Cambridge University Press.

Overgaard, Per Baltzer. 1994. The Scale of Terrorist

Attacks as a Signal ofResources. Journal of Conflict

Resolution 38(3): 452-78.

Parker, Ned. 2007. The Conflict in Iraq: Saudi Arabia

Role in Insurgency. New York Times, July 15.

Personnel Database for 394 Individuals. Harmony

ID: NMEC-2007-657674. http://www.ctc.usma.

edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

Powell, Robert. 2007a. Allocating Defensive Re sources with Private Information about Vulner

ability. American Political Science Review 101(4): 799-809.

-. 2007b. Defending against Terrorist Attacks with Limited Resources. American Political Science

Review 101(3): 527-41.

Raab, J?rg, and H. Brinton Milward. 2003. Dark Net

works as Problems. Journal of Public Administration

Research and Theory 13(4): 413-39.

Radner, Roy. 1981. Monitoring Cooperative Agree

ments in a Repeated Principal-Agent Relationship.

Econometrica 49 (5): 1127-48.

Reich, Walter. 1998. Origins of Terrorism: Psychologies,

Ideologies, Theologies, States of Mind. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press.

Ressler, Steve. 2006. Social Network Analysis as an

Approach to Combat Terrorism: Past, Present, and

Future Research. Homeland Security Affairs 2(2).

http://www.hsaj.org/pages/volume2/issue2/pdfs/

2.2.8.pdf [accessed April 3, 2009].

Riedel, Bruce. 2007. AI Qaeda Strikes Back. Foreign

Affairs 86(3): 24-40. Rosendorff, B. Peter, and Todd Sandier. 2004. Too

Much of a Good Thing? The Proactive Response Di

lemma. Journal of Conflict Resolution 48(5) : 657-71.

Sageman, Marc. 2004. Understanding Terror Networks.

Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

-. 2008. The Next Generation of Terror. Foreign

Policy, March/April, 37-42.

Sandier, Todd, John T. Tschirhart, and Jon Cauley.

1983. A Theoretical Analysis of Transnational

Terrorism. American Political Science Review 77(1):

36-54.

Shapiro, Jacob. 2006. Terrorist Organizations Inef

ficiencies and Vulnerabilities. Paper presented at

the Annual Meeting of the International Studies

Association, San Diego, CA.

Tellis, Ashley J. 2008. Pakistan's Record on Terrorism:

Conflicted Goals, Compromised Performance.

Washington Quarterly 31(2): 7-32.

Template for Overseas Medical Treatment Authoriza

tion. Harmony ID: NMEC-2007-657669. http://

www.ctc.usma.edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

Template for Weekly Border Activity Report. Harmony

ID: NMEC-2007-658008. http://www.ctc.usma.

edu/harmony/Sinjar2.asp.

Vaughan, Diane. 1996. The Challenger Launch Decision:

Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Weiss, Thomas G. 1982. International Bureaucracy:

The Myth and Reality of the International Civil

Service. International Affairs 58(2): 287-306.

Wright, Lawrence. 2006. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda

and the Road to 9/11. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Governance of Terror: New Institutionalise! and the Evolution of Terrorist Organizations 739

This content downloaded from �������������128.111.180.8 on Wed, 15 Dec 2021 23:43:27 UTC�������������

All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms