01:790:102 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Realpolitik, No Quarter, Democratic Peace Theory

• School: Rutgers University
• Department: Political Science
• Course: 01:790:102
• Professor: Professor Rossi

Document Summary

Policy intended to create and spread fear: often perpetrated in an ideological goal, deliberate targeting of non-combatants, use of unlawful violence and unconventional warfare. Impact of violence meant for visual and psychological means rather than strategic. Terrorist organizations with a global reach and a global impact. Strength to engage states on an equal basis. Almost always an extreme socio-political position: establishment/destruction of a state, imposition of a fundamentalist way of thinking, messianism, millenarianism. Weapons of the weak: fear and uncertainty are the greatest weapons, deliberately targets liberalist ideology. Combination of economic revenue, failed states, western imperialism, and the rage of the bazaar . Inability of altering or challenging the political system: yet socio-political mobility empowers lower levels of groups to attack the status quo. Non-state actors taking the role of states. Facilitating a war of ideas outside formal sovereign boundaries: masses, not soldiers. Al qaida and the war on terror (1998-present)