What Makes a Terrorist: Economics and the Roots of Terrorism

Military Review, May-June, 2008 by Jason Ridgeway

WHAT MAKES A TERRORIST: Economics and the Roots of Terrorism, Alan B. Krueger, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 2007, 180 pages, $24.95.

As a company commander during Operation Iraqi Freedom, I was responsible for the security of a small but well-to-do neighborhood in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk. My neighborhood had few security problems compared to less-advantaged areas of the city, and I wondered at the time whether the area's economic stability played a role in its security situation. Princeton economist Alan B. Krueger asks a similar question, although in greater scale and scope, in his recent book What Makes a Terrorist: Economics and the Roots of Terrorism.

Krueger's book is based on a series of lectures he gave at the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2006, in which he presented and interpreted his statistical analyses of the causes and effects of terrorism. These studies examine data on terrorism at both the individual and state scales in an effort to determine what variables are most highly correlated with terrorist attacks. Krueger finds that two of the most popular explanations for terrorism, poverty and a lack of education, do not positively correlate with terrorist attacks; in fact, in some cases he shows that material wealth and higher education levels may actually contribute to terrorism. Krueger does find that countries that suppress civil liberties and political rights tend to spawn more terrorists; therefore he argues that feelings of political impotency, coupled with a variety of geopolitical grievances (whether real or imagined), are the root causes of terrorism.

As a noted scholar and former chief economist for the U.S. Department of Labor, Krueger is well qualified to perform the types of sophisticated statistical analyses presented here. Despite his weighty academic credentials, however, his book is happily succinct and eminently readable. If the mere mention of negative binomial regressions sends a shiver up your spine, you may blithely ignore Krueger's carefully selected charts and graphs without detracting from his analysis. If, on the other hand, p- and t-values really get your blood pumping, there is enough statistical data here to satisfy your numerical cravings. As a result, What Makes a Terrorist is a quick and pleasurable read while remaining highly informative.

Although the book seems aimed at policy makers, it has military implications all the way down to the tactical level. In today's conflicts, leaders need to be as well versed in economic and social issues as in room-clearing techniques, and military officers must clearly understand the factors that cause the different threats of crime, insurgency, and terrorism before they can devise solutions. Krueger's book, with its focus on data and analysis, is an excellent contribution to understanding the last of these.

MAJ Jason Ridgeway, USA, West Point, New York