Abstract
In this chapter, we presents the results from a multi-method study in the Netherlands into the role of socio-economic and psychological factors underlying terrorism involvement. Building on theories and findings of previous researchers in the field, we present a descriptive model of terrorism that categorizes distal and proximal ‘threat triggers’. In the quantitative part of the study, we analysed a combined data set on suspects of terrorist offenses, a control sample of the general population and a sample of general offenders. Terrorism suspects were more often lower educated, unemployed, and previously involved in crime compared to persons from the general population with the same gender and age. Relatively often, they had lost their job or became imprisoned for another crime a year before they were charged with a terrorist offense. In the qualitative part of the study, we conducted interviews with four detainees from terrorist units, eight detainees charged with traditional crimes (as reference group), and 18 professional informants that had personal experience with current and former detainees on terrorism and other offenses. The results of these interviews suggest that among terrorist offenders, early family experiences, attachment problems, and mental health issues increase feelings of perceived threat, which further justify violent narratives of belonging and significance.
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Notes
- 1.
Both quantitative and qualitative studies have been approved by the ethical board of the Faculty of Law from the VU university in Amsterdam.
- 2.
- 3.
In the aftermath of the Theo van Gogh murder, two prominent jihadi networks, known as the Hofstad group and the Context group, have been dismantled by the security services.
- 4.
- 5.
- 6.
- 7.
- 8.
See Van Ham et al. (2018), https://www.wodc.nl/binaries/2867_Summary_tcm28-323558.pdf
- 9.
- 10.
The database contains the personal data of people who (used to) live in Netherlands. Municipalities record the personal data of all residents in the BRP. For information, see: https://www.government.nl/topics/personal-data/personal-records-database-brp
- 11.
Research on Dutch jihadi networks demonstrates the involvement of vulnerable immigrants in the Netherlands (De Bie et al. 2014). For additional information on who is excluded from the BRP, see the CBS-website: https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/achtergrond/2017/38/basisregistratie-personen (this information is only available in Dutch).
- 12.
For age, we made age categories and matched the age groups of the terrorism suspects with the control groups.
- 13.
For the dynamic variables of the control groups (which were based on 2016 information), we used data from the year 2015.
- 14.
As explained before, the education data was excluded from the logistic regression analyses due to the structural missings.
- 15.
For some terrorism suspects, we had missing data on a range of variables. Therefore, we excluded them from the analyses.
- 16.
Inclusion of the variable unemployment in Model I resulted in a significant Hosmer en Lemeshow test, which is an indication that the model is not a good fit. Therefore, we ran Model I without this variable.
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Ljujic, V. et al. (2020). Testing a Threat Model of Terrorism: A Multi-method Study About Socio-Economic and Psychological Influences on Terrorism Involvement in the Netherlands. In: Weisburd, D., Savona, E.U., Hasisi, B., Calderoni, F. (eds) Understanding Recruitment to Organized Crime and Terrorism. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36639-1_7
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