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Political Impetus for the Response to Terrorism

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Part of the book series: Rethinking Political Violence ((RPV))

Abstract

This chapter looks at political impetuses for response and highlights how countering terrorism is but one consideration of states in a complex web of inter-related responsibilities. It also points to the propaganda value of particular kinds of response to terrorism and how and why the states we have addressed in our case studies have put ‘message sending’ ahead of effective counter-terrorism in some instances.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    B. Walter, Reputation and Civil War: Why Separatist Conflicts Are So Violent (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), pp. 200–1.

  2. 2.

    Ibid.

  3. 3.

    For more information on the violent and non-violent strands of independence movements in the United Kingdom, see N. Brooke, The Dogs That Didn’t Bark: Political Violence and Nationalism in Scotland, Wales and England, (Unpublished PhD thesis, University of St Andrews, 2016)

  4. 4.

    D. Byman, ‘Do Targeted Killings Work?’, Foreign Affairs, 85 (2006), p. 99.

  5. 5.

    Ibid, p. 100.

  6. 6.

    Ibid, pp. 102–5.

  7. 7.

    K. Hearty, ‘The Political and Military Value of the “Set Piece” Killing Tactic in East Tyrone 1983–1992, State Crime Journal, 3/1, (20145), pp. 50–72.

  8. 8.

    Ibid, p. 59.

  9. 9.

    J. Stevenson, ‘Britain and the IRA: Legacies of Restraint’, in G. Kassimeris, (ed), Playing Politics With Terrorism, (London: Hurst, 2007), p. 140.

  10. 10.

    L. Mees, Nationalism, Violence and Democracy, (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2003), p. 102.

  11. 11.

    P. Woodworth, p. 182.

  12. 12.

    Ibid.

  13. 13.

    See, for example, N. Serra, The Military Transition, G. Alonso and D. Muro, The Politics and Memory of Democratic Transition.

  14. 14.

    A. Horne, A Savage War of Peace, pp. 434–435.

  15. 15.

    Ibid.

  16. 16.

    See B. O’Duffy, ‘British and Irish Conflict Regulation from Sunningdale to Belfast Part 1: Tracing the Status of Contesting Sovereigns, 1968–1974’, Nations and Nationalism, 5/4 (1999), p. 532.

  17. 17.

    G. Walker, A History of the Ulster Unionist Party, p. 235.

  18. 18.

    Ibid.

  19. 19.

    P. A. J. Waddington, ‘Towards Paramilitarism? Dilemmas in Policing Civil Disorder’, British Journal of Criminology, 27/1 (1987), p. 45

  20. 20.

    P. Bew, P. Gibbon and H. Patterson, Northern Ireland 1921/2001, p. 229.

  21. 21.

    See, for example, M. Cunningham, British Government Policy in Northern Ireland, p. 99.

  22. 22.

    See, for example, R. English, Armed Struggle, pp. 289–296.

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McConaghy, K. (2017). Political Impetus for the Response to Terrorism. In: Terrorism and the State. Rethinking Political Violence. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57267-7_8

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