Sociology of Terrorism

The sociology of terrorism has been understudied, even though considerable literatures on various forms of social conflict and violence have been produced over the years. The aim here is to note what has been learned about the social origins and dynamics of terrorism in order to suggest agendas for future research. Arguably the main foci of sociological studies of terrorism should be (a) the social construction of terrorism, (b) terrorism as political violence, (c) terrorism as communication, (d) organizing terrorism, (e) socializing terrorists, (f) social control of terrorism, and (g) theorizing terrorism. For each issue, I provide a brief summary of current knowledge, with bibliographic leads to more detailed information, as well as identify research issues.