Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Erich Fromm, Rollo May, Gordon Allport, and other psychological theorists have offered methods for distinguishing "good" faith from "bad" faith. Erik Erikson has noted that many central parts of religion are subject to easy corruption, and that religious ideology can readily be transformed into fanaticism. Yet none of these approaches take us very far toward understanding why some believers in the contemporary world have become dangerous extremists. This paper seeks to develop a psychological theory of religious militancy, starting with the identification of certain core beliefs that are present in most fanatics from Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and other faiths. In some ways, extremist beliefs provide psychological benefits to believers that the tenets of more moderate religion cannot. For example, as Ernest Becker and others have argued, people may go to tremendous lengths and expose themselves to all sorts of risks and dangers solely to "prove" that the "myths" they live by are true. The extremist sometimes gets to a place where he or she can only confirm the truth of the faith by exhibiting and testing a willingness to die for it.A discussion is included of which people are at the greatest risk of becoming religious militants. Also, I address which social and political conditions most encourage the development of militancy. The paper is drawn from a chapter in my new book, BAD FAITH: The Danger of Religious Extremism (Prometheus, Expected July 2007).

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: It is generally assumed that different types of violent extremists and terrorists operate within discrete ideological and cultural milieus that are relatively insular, if not entirely distinct from one another. This simplistic assumption ignores a far more complex and fluid reality, however, since elements from different extremist milieus have not infrequently interacted and lent one another assistance in the past, and there are indications that new patterns of ideological cross-fertilization and collaboration are presently emerging among terrorist groups. The purpose of this paper is to consider whether, in spite of their marked ideological differences, a shared hatred of the ?New World Order? purportedly dominated by the United States might cause transnational Islamist terrorist networks such as al-Qā`ida to collude on an operational level with certain radical right- and left-wing groups in the West. Among the issues to be addressed will be the indicators of extremist collaboration, the doctrinal and pragmatic factors that may underlie Islamist collaboration with other terrorist groups, illustrative examples of prior collaboration between elements from different extremist milieus, the current links that have been established between Islamists and both far right and far left radicals, the potential for increased collaboration between these milieus in the future, and the strategic and tactical implications of such collaboration for mass casualty and WMD terrorism.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This project evaluates the causal complexity of religious extremist groups emerging as a strong opposition against authoritarian rule in Central Asia.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: While the criminological interest in homicide as a topic of research has a long history, scholarly attention to far-right extremist homicide is virtually non-existent. Based largely on anecdotal evidence of sensationalized cases, there may appear to be a number of differences between homicides committed by far-right extremists and other non-ideological homicide occurrences. To date, however, there have been no systematic studies of the basic similarities and differences between far-right extremist homicides and traditional homicide incidents, perpetrators, and victims. Moreover, there is preliminary evidence from an ongoing project undertaken by the authors that homicides committed by far-right extremists are diverse in their nature and, in some instances, appear to be very similar to traditional criminal homicides.

This paper will compare the nature of far-right extremist homicide incidents and participants to traditional homicides that occurred in the United States between 1990 and 2007. The data on far-right homicides come from an ongoing project funded by the National Consortium for the study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism. Data on traditional homicides will be extracted from the UCR-Supplementary Homicide Reports. We focus on a number of incident and participant-level variables, such as weapon, motive, as well as perpetrator and victim demographics.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed