In reading through my Essential Reading in Comparative Politics, I stumbled across this paragraph in an article by Martha Crenshaw called “The Causes of Terrorism”:
“Urbanization is part of the modern trend to war aggregation and complexity, which increases the number and accessibility of targets and methods. The popular concept of terrorism as “urban guerilla warfare” grew out of the Latin American experience of the late 1960’s. Yet, as Hobsbawn has pointed out, cities became the arena for terrorism after the urban renewal projects of the late nineteenth century, such as the boulevards constructed by Baron Haussman in Paris, made them unsuitable for a strategy based on riots and the defense of barricades. In preventing popular insurrections, governments have exposed themselves to terrorism. P.N. Grabosky has recently argued that cities are a significant cause of terrorism in that they provide an opportunity(a multitude of targets, mobility, communications, anonymity, and audiences) and a recruiting ground among politicized and volatile inhabitants.”
O'Neil, Patrick and Ronald Rogowski. Essential Readings in Comparative Politics. New YorK: W. W. Norton and Company, 2010.
I thought it hit on some great observations about urban violence from a political violence perspective. It also alluded to anonymity being an essential ingredient that made cities prime areas for terrorism. This clearly is advantageous when it comes to secrecy involved in terrorism but it also is ideal for recruitment. We discussed urbanization as a cause of isolation in the city, and when one looks at the personal reasons an individual joins a terrorist group, it is frequently because they want to belong to something. This is especially prevalent in countries without a strong national identity and poor education (Pakistan is an example that is particularly relevant to national security).Young children(unfortunately the targets of recruitment) are particularly vulnerable to the persuasions of the terrorist when they feel isolated, hopeless and are surrounded by poverty that they feel incapable of surmounting. In Goldstein’s piece, the success of this tactic on the youth in Rio de Janeiro was obvious. This much more international version of the violence occurring there is of particular interest when looking at the intricate international or global relations cities have with one another. It also illustrates how a city can represent the entire country when it is the actor in a violent attack or reciprocate of political violence as New York was with the 9/11 attacks.
- Helen(also i blieve i forgot to put my name on clothing as a second skin)
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