Essay on Terrorism: Terrorism and French Terror ‘nothing
Submitted By ghostmall
Words: 2263
Pages: 10
Lecture 1 Terror and Insurgency - A Brief History
Subhead 1 Definitional Ambiguities
According to the Shorter Oxford Dictionary the term ‘terror’ represents a state of extreme fear, whilst ‘terrorism’ refers to a system of government by intimidation. Significantly, the political character of terrorism and its proponents or ‘terrorists’ dates from the French Revolution and the period of revolutionary terror applied by the Jacobin between March 1793- July 1794. In other words, its political usage coincides with the emergence of modern revolutionary or ideological politics that justifies violence in order to liberate a people from perceived oppression. The term, moreover, was pejorative, coined by the exiled conservative opponents to the French revolution and has something of a Burkean provenance.
As Christopher Hitchens observes (see Reader) the term was notably revived in the course of the Cold War by US governmental agencies and widely deployed by academics seeking to carve out a field of inquiry (as well as government grant aid and high profile careers). Hutchens is notably sceptical of the term and its definition as ‘the use of violence for political ends’ he considers tautological (actually he is wrong, the definition may be problematic, but it is not a tautological). Hutchens makes a perhaps marginally more intelligent point, when he suggests that terrorism has become an all-purpose convenience word to categorize those usually non Western states and or groups that one ideologically discountenances. This has the Orwellian tendency of obfuscating or foreclosing further inquiry, especially when the terrorist is subsequently characterised in the popular press (eg Rupert Murdoch’s Sun as ‘fiends’, ‘maniacs’ , ‘monsters’,‘men of blood’ and ‘crazed ragheads driven by a west hating blood lust’) .
Moving from journalism to an underrated academic, Ted Hondreich in an interesting series of essays On Violence contends that political violence (rather than the more emotive term terror) might have some political utility in certain but not all circumstances. Indeed, modern western political thought since at least the mid sixteenth century has defended the use of force against an illegitimate or tyrannical political arrangement ( the Spanish Jesuit Juan de Mariana defended the assassination of heretic monarchs (monarchomachia) in De Monarchica ( 1567), whilst the Huguenot political classic of the late sixteenth century the Vindicia Contra Tyrranos significantly defended tyrannicide). Such defences, in the course of the seventeenth, made possible the foundations of liberal resistance theory culminating in Locke’s Two Treatises of Civil Government (1680). By the early nineteenth century an ideological style of thought (in a variety of liberatory modes) explored and explained the uses of violence for justifiable ends-democratic, nationalist, marxist and ultimately fascist. As Saint Just observed at the height of the French Terror ‘nothing resembles virtue like a great crime’.
As Hondreich subsequently argues somewhat controversially even democratic values of freedom and equality can be served by limited violence in certain circumstances.
Subhead 2
Terror and Violence.
It would seem , however, in the literature on terrorism there is understood to be a condition of psychological fear generated amongst civilians (see Vincent in Reader) that goes beyond the odd violent act in a generally stable liberal democratic framework. As Vincent points out although most terror has a sub communal or internal effects, its impact on the international global order has grown in significance both during and since the Cold War. When undertaken by non-state groups, it undermines the rule of international society according to which states enjoy the monopoly of the legitimate use of force. It is also exacerbated by the growing links between terror groups (eg IRA , PLO and Gaddaffi in Libya in 1970s or
Related Documents: Essay on Terrorism: Terrorism and French Terror ‘nothing
Introduction to Terrorism: PAD 4374 Florida State University Abstract This paper discusses the modern definition of terrorism for the purpose of analyzing the present day activity of Islamic terrorist organizations with a primary focus on the Armed Islamic Group, or G.I.A., and the role it plays in the history and evolution of Islamic terrorism. Through the utilization of several anti-terrorist databases including the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism operated…
What are the causes of terrorism and how can it be stopped? “Terrorism and guerrilla warfare, whether justified as resistance to oppression or condemned as disrupting the rule of law, are as old as civilization itself. The power of the terrorist, however, has been magnified by modern weapons, including television, which he has learned to exploit.” (Guerrillas and Terrorists) There are many definitions and forms of terrorism: biological and chemical, nuclear, international, cyber, criminal, environmental…
conflict is in prison or had to leave the Basque Country and secondly, the solution would be to adapt the forces that took part in the armed confrontation to new situation of Basque country freely and with no threats. The Spanish history related to terrorism reveals that once a terrorist movement has taken roots, the way a democratic state can defeat it, is through a resolute and prolonged effort in which any departure from democratic principles in…
a British citizen and therefore a revolutionary who attacked a government using terrorist methods. Another example would be those poor French men and women, revolutionaries, who revolted against Louis XVI because the King was starving the country while enjoying sumptuous feasts. Such a noble cause, yet they promptly started the Reign of Terror that used terrorism to validate and protect their new government. Though people would love to say a terrorist and a revolutionary are as different as can be…
|Carleton University |Department of Law and Legal Studies | Course Outline |Course: | |LAWS & HIST 3305 C & V – Crime and State in History | | | | | |Term:…
European Medi@Culture-Online Author: Sontag, Susan. Title: Regarding the torture of others. http://www.european-mediaculture.org Source: New York Times Magazine. 23.05.2004. New York 2004. Published with kind permission of the author. Susan Sontag Regarding the torture of others For a long time --- at least six decades --- photographs have laid down the tracks of how important conflicts are judged and remembered. The memory museum is now mostly a visual one. Photographs have an insuperable…
century of French colonisation after nearly a decade of war, the Algerian war of independence possesses an obscure position in the French collective memory. Often described as the ‘unnamed war’ the Algerian war of independence alongside French colonisation as a whole provides a pivotal point in French history, dividing opinion and bringing to debate not just the banalities of war and the horrific methods used within such conflicts but also the ideas of individual and collective memories, French guilt…
Participants (1): The State (8) Oct 23rd Realists are keen as nation states being central to the world arena and the state is the dominant actor in world politics. Although there’s no world government, there is a grouping that works according to tradition and rules, which is the U.N. Link between nationalism and the state- very problematic relationship. Nationalism is what makes a lot of nation states initially come together but it also gives rise to conflict, dis-function and difficulties in…
as the lovely Antarctica, America is nothing short of peculiar. From the treasured 90’s boy bands of N*SYNC to the more recent Justin Bieber and his army of tween idols, Americans have the rare, unrivaled ability of latching on to the next big thing and sucking that sensation dry like the ravishing leeches we are. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown was no exception to this cattle call of the media farm. All the ingredients were present: Controversy? Check – nothing like pouring over a little controversy…
GP NOTES 2010 (ESSAY) Content Page 1. Media a. New vs. Traditional b. New: narcissistic? c. Government Censorship d. Profit-driven Media e. Advertising f. Private life of public figures g. Celebrity as a role model h. Blame media for our problems i. Power + Responsibility of Media j. Media ethics k. New Media and Democracy 2. Science/Tech a. Science and Ethics b. Government and scientist role in science c. Rely too much on technology? d. Nuclear technology…