Research on violent mobilization broadly emphasizes who joins rebellions and why, but neglects to explain the timing or nature of participation. Support and logistical apparatuses play critical roles in sustaining armed conflict, but scholars have not explained role differentiation within militant organizations or accounted for the structures, processes, and practices that produce discrete categories of fighters, soldiers, and staff. Extant theories consequently conflate mobilization and participation in rebel organizations with frontline combat. This article argues that, to understand wartime mobilization and organizational resilience, scholars must situate militants in their organizational and social context. By tracing the emergence and evolution of female-dominated clandestine supply, financial, and information networks in 1980s Lebanon, it demonstrates that mobilization pathways and organizational subdivisions emerge from the systematic overlap between formal militant hierarchies and quotidian social networks. In doing so, this article elucidates the nuanced relationship between social structure, militant organizations, and sustained rebellion.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0003055413000208

Organizing Rebellion: Rethinking High-Risk Mobilization and Social Networks in War

Terrorist groups are commonly understood to be groups that carry out acts of terrorism, and their actions viewed as terrorist campaigns. Yet, recent events are a reminder that the activities of even the most violent terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda or the Islamic State extend beyond the use of terrorist tactics. These actors usually employ classic guerrilla tactics as well, and their overall strategy combines both violent and political means.  Furthermore, these acts of political violence do not merely constitute isolated campaigns of terrorism, but are usually part of a broader conflict such as an insurgency or civil war.  The purpose of the present article is twofold. The first is to offer some empirical evidence in support of our claim that most major contemporary terrorist groups also employ other, non-terrorist, modes of warfare, notably guerrilla tactics. In the second part, we offer our reflections of these findings for theory and policy. Our main recommendation is for governments to adopt an approach that separates the official labeling of these groups from the analysis of their origins, conduct, and threat potential. While official policy statements might continue to label actors involved in terrorism as terrorist groups, we argue that the policy analysis informing these governments' pronouncements and decisions should adopt greater nuance by regarding most of these actors as insurgent groups. Such an approach can help policy analysts adopt and employ a broader array of intellectual tools to understand the complex nature of the threat posed by these groups, and arrive at more adequate, comprehensive, and longer-term solutions to the problems they pose.

Say Terrorist, Think Insurgent: Labeling and Analyzing Contemporary Terrorist Actors

Well-known tools of state coercion, such as administrative punishment, imprisonment, and violence, affect far fewer than 1% of Chinese journalists and lawyers. What, then, keeps the other 99% in li...

Marcus Breen

Papers

Heroes and Martyrs of Palestine: The Politics of National Commemoration