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Journal of International Criminal Justice Advance Access originally published online on December 4, 2006
Journal of International Criminal Justice 2006 4(5):894-911; doi:10.1093/jicj/mql060
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© Oxford University Press, 2006, All rights reserved. For permissions please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

I. Responding to Terrorism: The Quest for a Legal Definition

The Indefinable Concept of Terrorism

George P. Fletcher*

* Cardozo Professor of Jurisprudence, Columbia University School of Law; member of the Board of Editors. [ GeoPFletcher{at}aol.com]


  Abstract

As the concept of terrorism fulfils multiple functions, the better way to think of terrorism is not as a crime but as a different dimension of crime, a higher, more dangerous version of crime, a kind of super-crime incorporating some of the characteristics of warfare. There are at least eight primary factors that bear on terrorism: the factor of violence; the required intention; the nature of the victims; the connection of the offender to the state; the justice and motive of their cause; the level of organization; the element of theatre; and the absence of guilt. However, one cannot draw from these variables a simple (or indeed even a complex) definition of terrorism. The reason is that not all the factors apply all the time. Any proposed definition produces counterexamples. The way to think about terrorism is, therefore, to become aware of all the relevant factors but not to expect that they will all be fulfilled in any particular case. The specific cases of terrorism are related the way the members of a family are related. Most, but not all, might have the same eye shape. Others might have hair colour or the shape of their nose in common; still others might be tall or short. One should try to picture a series of overlapping sets in which no set intersects with all the others. That is the way our intuitions of terrorism operate.


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This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Security DialogueHome page
G. Mythen and S. Walklate
Terrorism, Risk and International Security: The Perils of Asking 'What If?'
Security Dialogue, April 1, 2008; 39(2-3): 221 - 242.
[Abstract] [PDF]


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