How the “Internal Brakes” on Violent Escalation Work and Fail: Toward a Conceptual Framework for Understanding Intra-Group Processes of Restraint in Militant Groups

Abstract

This article advances the emergent literature on restraint within militant groups in three ways. First, it offers a framework for situating the "internal brakes on violent escalation"-understood as the practices through which group members shape the outer limits of their action repertoires-in relation to the interplay between conflict dynamics, intra-group processes and individual-level decision making. Second, it develops a basic analytical strategy for examining how such brakes operate at different levels of proximity to potential or actual instances of escalation. Third, it sets out four types of mechanisms through which internal brakes appear to generate or enable restraint.

Understanding (non)involvement in terrorist violence: What sets extremists who use terrorist violence apart from those who do not?

“…Especially relevant for understanding noninvolvement in terrorist violence is a new line of research that considers how group norms on the appropriateness and effectiveness of political violence can create barriers for its use. Busher et al (2019Busher et al ( , 2021 point to numerous group-level mechanisms of restraint, including moral qualms about (certain types of) violence and questions about the (continued) efficacy of violence as a strategy (see also : Dowling, 2023). In a similar vein, others have highlighted characteristics of terrorist groups that may influence their lethality, including their age, size, presence of members with (para)military experience, ties to extremist movements that explicitly call for attacks, and internal competition over means or ends (Asal & Rethemeyer, 2008;Asal et al, 2015;Chermak et al, 2013).…”