Terrorism is a multi-dimensional phenomenon that encompasses elements of politics, economics, social, and ideology, driving people to commit violent acts and become involved in such activity. As of today, the existence and latent threat of Islamist terrorism still inflict global society with formidable challenges, and one way to overcome such challenges is by leveraging our knowledge on the multi-dimensional, determining factors/elements that lead people to commit terrorist attacks and other radical-related activities. In other words, as our struggle against terrorism is a global endeavour that may last a generation or more, leveraging our knowledge on such multi-dimensional, determining factors/elements will increase our understanding of the underlying causes and patterns that continue to inspire jihadist terrorism. However, it is wrong to equate the religion of Islam with terrorism. Perhaps most importantly, the Islamic tradition is all-encompassing, combining religious and secular life and law. This surely complicates attempts to understand the Islamist ideology and counter-measures to it solely through the lens of traditional Western political science. Therefore, a distinction must be made between the religion of Islam and a set of often-conflicting political ideologies known as Islamism, where many forms of them are non-radical, reformists or gradualists. That is why, Islamist extremists who advocate acts of terrorism may be properly termed Islamist terrorists, who seek to cloth their acts in the trappings of the Islamic religion. In this case, they use their own religious-based arguments to justify their violent acts. This Ph.D. thesis examines the multi-dimensional factors that lead to the existence and latent threat of Islamist terrorism in Indonesia by focusing on the individuals who committed series of deadly terrorist attacks from 2002 – 2009 and some other radical-related activities in Indonesia until 2017. Such factors encompass at least the economic grievances, social grievances, political grievances, radical ideology, social network, state repression (“stick”), and government incentive (“carrot”), all which are the key variables in determining the existence and latent threat of Islamist terrorism. Through a systematic, multi-dimensional analysis using qualitative and quantitative research methodologies (including the social network analysis), this Ph.D. thesis will specifically examine what factors drove people with the association to Jemaah Islamiya (JI) and radical-Islamist movements to commit and become involved in terrorist attacks? and why and how might such factors/elements influence these people to commit terrorist attacks in the future? The combined qualitative, quantitative, and social network analysis in this Ph.D. thesis has proven and confirmed the main hypothesis, where the existence and latent threat of Islamist terrorism in Indonesia are indeed caused by the intertwining interaction of these multi-dimensional factors instead of being otherwise. The ideological-related variables followed by the social network-related ones are proven as the two most significant factors in the pattern of Islamist terrorism in Indonesia. In other words, the set of economic, social, and political grievances will not cause Islamist terrorism in Indonesia to occur if there are no intervening variables: the social network and radical ideology being involved in the equation. Subsequently, the other two moderating variables also play its own role, namely the state repression and the government incentive. According to various examinations of multivariate statistical analysis in this Ph.D. thesis, these two variables on their own will not cause the Islamist terrorism to occur in Indonesia, but when combined with the existence of social network and radical ideology, these two variables are proven as the moderating variables to exacerbate the occurrence of Islamist terrorism in Indonesia. In conclusion, by looking at this current pattern, it could be predicted that Indonesia herself is still likely to become both the producer and battlefield of global-Islamist terrorism in near future. Therefore, the Indonesian national counterterrorism policy and strategy need to be updated and well integrated with the Indonesian national policy and grand strategy to better address the existence and latent threat of Islamist terrorism in the archipelago.

This submission includes two studies, based primarily on the use of historical archives, of the Afghan wars from 1978 and the Iraq War from 2003. Breeding Ground: Afghanistan and the Origins of Islamist Terrorism (2011) is a study of various layers of the Afghan conflict: the 1978 communist coup; the 1979 Soviet invasion and America’s proxy war against the Soviet occupying forces in the 1980s; and the rise of the Taliban in the 1990s. It shows how Islamist groups allied to the West against Soviet and Afghan communism turned into enemies of the United States, with consequences including the September 11, 2001 attacks, President George W. Bush’s retaliation against the Taliban in Afghanistan, and the invasion of Iraq. Overcoming the Bush Legacy in Iraq and Afghanistan (2010) is an analysis of the George W. Bush presidency in terms of its “war on terror.” The books thus study the Afghan and Iraqi conflicts in the context of United States foreign policy, with particular emphasis on the interests, actions and motives of actors in the conflicts and the interactions between internal and external actors. The central argument is that these factors contributed to the development of a “culture of violence,” defined as that “condition in which violence permeates all levels of society and becomes part of human thinking, behavior and way of life,” and how this provided space for “terrorist” groups to operate.

The submitted thesis seeks to answer the question "Is the relationship between Islam and terrorism uniquely determined?". It is divided into three parts. The first chapter aims to define the term terrorism, with the associated basic facts, as well as the progressive historical development. The second part is concerned with the theme of the youngest monotheistic religion - Islam. Besides the phasing its history, it includes the fundamental realities connected to it. The final chapter unifies the theory contained in the previous two sections with practice and illustrates it on the various examples of terrorist acts. The main objective is to answer the hypothesis stated in the introduction of work.

Understanding the motives behind Islamist terrorist attacks is not only relevant for the field of politics but preoccupies research within academia. One of the most debated is certainly the role of religion. This thesis addresses this gap by asking the question, what role does religion play in the radicalization processes of Islamist terrorists attacking western targets? It combines an emotional approach to religion, with religiosity as defined by religious practices in everyday life and by the self-perception of individuals themselves. It further argues that when religion is perceived as emotionally meaningful, this results in spiritual selective incentives, individuals perceive as worth engaging in terrorism. Using process tracing and structured focused comparison, it conducts an analysis of the radicalisation processes of three individuals, within a comparative case study design, using autobiographies, court documents, previous case studies and news articles. The results show that the individuals perceived their emotions in a religious context and support is found for the hypothesis that justification for violence emerges out of religious motives. The Thesis concludes that religion does have explanatory power as an independent variable, but causal relationships are complex. This leaves room for further research which focuses more on religion as an independent variable.

Excerpt: Boaz Ganor’s Global Alert: The Rationality of Modern Islamist Terrorism and the Challenge to the Liberal Democratic Order provides in its eleven brief chapters an analysis of and prescription for liberal democratic vulnerabilities to present-day Islamist-inspired terrorism.