The P-47 Thunderbolts Liberty Fellowship The Millville School District American Institute for History Education December

1. Teaching “Terrorism”:Pedagogical Perspectives and ProblemsEric Davisdavis@polisci.rutgers.eduhttp://fas-polisci.rutgers.eduBlog: The New Middle East The P-47 Thunderbolts Liberty Fellowship The Millville School District American Institute for History Education December 7, 2009

2. Terrorism needs to be well defined: what exactly do we mean when we use the term? Terrorism may be defined as: “the ideologically driven use of indiscriminate violence against civilian populations for political ends” Terrorism must be understood relationally and contextually, not as an abstract and exotic concept; it happens for a specific reasons and in all countries Terrorism needs to be understood historically Terrorism must be understood in dynamic terms; as a process undergoing constant change in ideology, goals, tactics and in the membership of groups that support it When teaching “terrorism,” what rubric should we use?

3. How do we teach about terrorism without instilling fear in our students? How can we empower, not intimidate, students when teaching about terrorism? How do we teach about terrorism without undermining respect for civil liberties and democratic values and processes? How can we avoid overwhelming students when teaching a topic which by definition is global in nature? What exactly do they need to know? What are the main questions we should raise in teaching the topic of terrorism?

4. How do avoid reinforcing negative stereotypes when teaching about terrorism, particularly about specific religions and ethnic groups, e.g., Muslims, Arabs, Iranians, Pakistanis? How do we avoid associating the phenomenon of terrorism solely with Islam? Should terrorism be seen as an Islamic problem? How do we answer the assertion that the majority of terrorist activity occurs in the Middle East? How can quantitative indicators help disprove stereotypes about terrorism? For example, what percentage of Muslims actually engage in terrorist activities? Terrorism and Stereotypes

5. Accsed 9/11 terrorists: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Mustafa al-Hawsawi, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Walid bin Attash

6. Terrorism in American History:The Salem Witch Trials • How can we draw upon comparative historical analysis to improve the teaching of terrorism? How can we draw upon American history help students better contextualize and understand the study of terrorism? • Do the Salem witch trials, for example, constitute a form of terrorism (in this case, primarily against women)?

7. Terrorism in the United States:Abraham Lincoln’s assassination Last photograph of Lincoln on Inauguration Day - March 6, 1865 John Wilkes Booth and conspirators who sought to assassinate Lincoln

8. Terrorism in American History: Anarchism • Can we draw upon the assassination of US presidents to help us teach about the concept of terrorism? (Booth and Csolgosz) What was the political atmosphere of late 19th and early 20th century America? • Attacks by anarchists on courthouses, police stations, churches, and private homes led Woodrow Wilson to warn (1915) of: “hyphenated Americans who have poured the poison of disloyalty into the very arteries of our national life. Such creatures of passion, disloyalty and anarchy must be crushed out (sic).” This led to Palmer Raids (1919) • Were assassinations of American presidents a form of terrorism?

9. Lynching of African-Americans was common occurrence in American South after Reconstruction (5000 lynchings 1860-1890 alone; 2805 documented cases of lynchings, 1882-1930, most of which were African-Americans) Was not this period an example of terrorism according to the definition provided above? Terrorism in American History

10. Terrorism in the United States: Nazi Bund Rally Madison Square Garden 1939 Effort to use American symbols (image of George Washington) to bolster a terrorist organization – German-American Bund

11. Terrorism in the United States: Pro-Nazi Bund Rally American history textbooks fail to mention the widespread support for Nazism in the US during the 1930s

12. Terrorism in the United States: Nazi Bund Camp – Yaphank, Long Island July 1935, Friends of New Germany established Camp Siegfried in “Yip Yip,” Long Island. “Camp Siegfried Special” left NY’s Penn Station every Sunday at 8a.m. Thousands of summer campers enjoyed Nazi rallies, salutes and swimming

13. “Home grown” US terrorists Alfred P. Murrah Federal Bldg., Oklahoma City, OK April 19, 1995 Abortion clinic bomber, Eric Rudolph TheodoreKaczynski Timothy McVeigh

14. LTTE – Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam – founded 1976,began terrorist operations in 1983; first suicide attack in 1987 Used suicide bomber to kill Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 A Marxist organization (namely secular), LTTE has carried out more suicide bombings than any other terrorist group in the world LTTE recruited Sri Lankan Hindus who seek a Tamil state LTTE destroyed by Sri Lankan army in May 2009 and leader killed The Role of the Tamil Tigers in Promoting Terrorism in Sri Lanka Velupillai Prabhakaran former LTTE leader

15. How much do such bombings tell us about Iraqi society? Or do they promote stereotypes about Iraq? Large majority of Iraqis pro-democracy and anti-sectarian Long tradition of cross-ethnic cooperation in Iraqi nationalist movement prior to the rule of Saddam Husayn and the Bacth Party No suicide bombings in Iraq before US invasion of 2003 Suicide Car Bombings in Iraq

16. Is terrorism a male only phenomenon? Female suicide bombers in Chechnya Note Western, “Islamic” and traditional dress of three women

17. Poverty (social class) is a poor predictor as Fareed Zakaria’s The Future of Freedom, and Robert Pape’s Dying to Win: The Logic of Suicide Terrorism indicate Terrorists often well educated and secular (Zakaria) Pape argues that terrorists’ main goals to make foreign forces leave their soil, e.g., West Bank, Iraq, Chechnya, Sri Lanka, but this ignores many factors Rural-urban migration,lack of jobs and pooreducationsystem central in promoting terrorism Collapse of agrarian sector and expansion of education systems that prevent critical thinking (particularly by authoritarian regimes such as Saudi Arabia) critical in promoting terrorism Why do people become terrorists?

18. Education, empowerment and terrorism • Education is not necessarily correlated with support for democratic values if it prevents critical thinking, esp. in authoritarian societies (often supported by US/West) • Education can promote feelings of anger and powerlessness if there no perceived hope for the future • The well-to-do (Bin Laden is the exception that proves the rule) and the very poor are not the primary recruits to terrorist organizations • Terrorists often view their activities as a vehicle for empowerment, suggesting important psychological processes are drivers of terrorist actions

19. Terrorists have many goals, including creating fear and disrupting the normality of life However, terrorists seek above all to erode strength of democratic political systems One of the best ways to defeat terrorism is to not allow terrorists to force democracies to eliminate their personal freedoms Ability of a democracy to continue functioning despite terrorist attacks shows its strength Terrorism and constitutional freedoms

20. The imprisonment of alleged terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was a defeat for democratic values that undercut US legitimacy By creating a new, “non-judicial” category, enemy combatant, US lost the moral high ground with regard to authoritarian regimes Decision to close Guantanamo and try terrorist suspects in US civil courts demonstrates that terrorists cannot destroy our democratic values Terrorists and the rule of law

21. Terrorist organizations share an important weakness: Ideological rigidity, e.g., rejection of Islamic State of Iraq/ al-Qacida in Iraq by Sunni Arabs in al-Anbar and Diyala provinces People reject strict rules that are largely cultural, e.g., regulating dress, banning tobacco, alcohol and music, confining women to the public sphere, the arbitrariness of “laws” formulated by terrorist organizations Tendency towards internecine war among terrorist groups Olivier Roy distinguishes Islamo-nationalism from trans-national Islam; spectacle without defined political ends Conclusion: terrorist groups will continue actions, but not be able to seize power in Middle East or elsewhere The future of terrorist organizations

22. Sherrilyn A. Ifill, On the Courthouse Lawn: Confronting the Legacy of Lynching in the Twenty-first Century. Boston: Beacon Press, 2007. Robert Pape, Dying to Win : The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism. New York: Random House, 2005 Bibliography