"The Terrorist Mind: An Update"- From NY Times, Jan. 10th 2010

Article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/weekinreview/10kershaw.html?pagewanted=1

1)Identify:
The gist of the article as well as the problem (in its broadest form) I see: Times columnist Sarah Kershaw attempts to consolidate myriad theories and studies of possible roots of radical activity into one comprehensive archival category of “terrorism.” The language the author uses to make her claims serves not only to classify the range of contextually-disparate behavior (extracted from loosely-cited research) under a single label (implying all violent action is the same regardless of motivation), but also to associate that take on “terrorism” with the notion of a “science.” Given that an understanding of terrorism is pliable under both the eye of the media and such constitutional alterations as the Patriot Act, this is a dangerous oversimplification.

(SHORTHAND - I’m no scientist, BUT - what’s at work: othering; empowerment of the expert class; discursive association of science with something currently describable only through dubious legal assertions or media-spun colloquialisms.)

2)

Dear Editor,
A January 10th article written by Sarah Kershaw, entitled “The Terrorist Mind: An Update,” suggests that a science exists which can explain the psychology of what might be called terrorism, and consequently its roots. However, although the research she cites might be based on more than just the “largely theoretical,” to place these case studies in the single category of “terrorism” is, simply based on the sheer variety of “paths” to radicalization they entertain, a gross oversimplification. Based on Merriam Webster’s definition science, as “knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method,” it is clear that Kershaw’s science is a loose one.
The extensive range of the theories that she extracts from the research – what she calls the beginnings of “a nascent science” – should be enough to disprove the effectiveness of using a single classification for all the data she includes. Yet it is all too easy to swallow the argument that there is a definitive understanding of what terrorism is - and this is where I think the politics of the article become dangerous: given that a larger understanding of the idea of terrorism is pliable through both discursive formation by the media and under such authoritative constitutional alterations as the Patriot Act, taking its meaning for granted negates the need to make a proper distinction between its extremes. According to the article’s logic, Al Qaeda, the Irish Republican Army, and the Japanese Imperial Army of World War II can be best defined as terrorists; actions of the terrorist can consist of suicide bombing, sniper attack, or bomb-throwing/detonation, regardless of motive or context. If this were adopted as a ‘true science,’ then there might legally be no difference between charges of conspiracy and charges based on failed attempts to commit acts of terrorism. And, if people who read this accept the accounts therein as scientific evidence, then the latter is already effectively the case.
I am not saying that the “types” and “trajectories” of so-called radicalization are all illegitimate, but as long as all terrorist activity does not result in the same violence and for the same reason, it seems that the many ‘paths to radicalization’ end in many uncharted places.