The similarities between Lombroso’s theories on political crime and contemporary terrorism issues

Abstract

Terrorism is considered to be a very contemporary issue and it came under the limelight only after 9/11. Yet when looking at the history of studies on terrorism and political violence, it is possible to trace back documentations from the nineteenth century. This paper looks at how Lombroso researched and studied political violence and terror in the nineteenth century. Although Lombroso is mainly known for his claims concerning the origins of criminal behaviour, he was among the first to use social science to understand anarchist political violence. In his work on anarchists, he proposed that the reasons behind anarchist violence would be found in social conditions, psychological states and religious grievances. He developed techniques to study these links, such as combining information from maps and statistical data over time to examine the likelihood of revolts occurring in particular regions of the country and to develop specific countermeasures. This study compared Lombroso's work with perspectives of academics on studies of terrorism, as well as those of policy-makers and security professionals in the implementation of security policies and potentially counterterrorism measures. This paper also compares the perspective of a current extremist actor to underlying political violence factors identified in Lombroso's work. ARTICLE HISTORY