A Theory of General Causes of Terrorism - High Population Growth, Income Inequality and Relative Deprivation

Abstract

This paper has two goals. The first is to analyze the possible association between demographic factors and effects of terrorist attacks in society. The second is to detect possible socioeconomic and psychosocial risk factors. These topics are basic in social sciences because terrorism is growing both in rich and in developing nations (Devezas & Santos, 2006; Root causes, 2015;Li & Schaub, 2004;Norris et al., 2013; Reardon, Abstract.A fundamental problem in psychosocial sciences is how to explain the root causes of terrorism. The vast literature has analyzed several determinants of terrorism. However, the precise role of demographic factors for the evolution of terrorism is hardly known. Statistical evidence here reveals that fatalities for incidents of terrorism are associated with growth rates of population. This finding seems to suggest that terrorism thrives -in average-in specific regions with high growth rates of population that may generate income inequality, subsistence stress and relative deprivation of people. In addition, geospatial analysis here reveals that countries with high association between fatalities from terrorist incidents and population growth are mainly in Africa and Middle East. Overall, then, the study here can clarify and generalize whenever possible, one of the causes of terrorism, which seems to be due to sociodemographic factors combined with psychosocial risk factors. Finally, the study suggests socioeconomic policies directed to reduce this critical problem in society.

The Root Causes of Terrorism in Southern Thailand

“…The Gini Index as a proxy for poverty has a positive and significant effect on Terrorism in Southern Thailand with a coefficient value of 7.310455. This means that, if income inequality increases by 7.31%, it will positively and significantly lead to an increase in terrorism; the results obtained are in line with (Piazza, 2011;Coccia, 2018a). Poor people do not feel afraid to commit cruel actions because they think death is a better solution than the conditions or life they are experiencing, or in other words, those in unsupported conditions always look for better solutions to be avoided of the conditions that are being taken at that time.…”

“…The population growth coefficient is 8.947387,this may be interpreted increasing the population by 1% may cause the increasing ofterrorism by 8.94%; this result is supported by (Coccia, 2018a(Coccia, , 2018b(Coccia, , 2018c(Coccia, , 2018d, who links population growth to terrorism. The empirical results showed that population growth accompanied by economic insufficiency would trigger violence actions.…”

“…Event elements such as date and time, functional area or location, cause pattern, and target.The analysis in this study carried out by regression and descriptive, using Poverty, according to the United Nations (UN), is a condition of lack enough of income and productive resources to lead a sustainable life. The poverty proxied in this study is the income Gini index (Piazza, 2011), unemployment rate (Ismail & Amjad, 2014;Lassoued et al, 2018), population growth (Coccia, 2018a(Coccia, , 2018b(Coccia, , 2018c(Coccia, , 2018d and inflation (Sultan Mehmood, 2013;Chuku et al, 2019). The data was obtained from the Ministry of Labor (MOL), Bank of Thailand (BOT), and the National Statistical Office of Thailand (NSO).…”

“…Hence this harms psychosocial and psychology so that trigger political violence (Terrorism). Coccia (2018a) research uses three population growth is accompanied by low economic conditions, which triggers terrorism, especially for male youth aged 22-34 years due to environmental frustration ( Korotayev et al (2019) and Blomberg et al (2004) would benot sure can reduce the number of terrorismbecause it depends on the economic growth, whether it can reduce social problems or not, including if it can reduce the number of unemployed, it vice versa. Developed countries have more terrorism movements than developing countries ( developed countries as targets for terrorist organisations.…”

Deviance due to fear of victimization: “emotional intelligence” a game-changer

“…Following the unprecedented 9/11 terrorist attack on US targets, many researchers have attempted to analyze the determinants of terrorism. Some explained the sources of terrorism with economic factors (Hertog, 2010; Shahbaz et al , 2013), others with political (Ismail and Amjad, 2014; MengYun et al , 2018), yet another with social factors (Enders and Hoover, 2012; Krueger and Malečková, 2009), while some with demographic factors (Coccia, 2018; Rehman and Vanin, 2017). Analysts, on the other hand, have also refused to accept that there might be legitimate causes or grievances behind (Newman, 2006).…”