NCJ Number
210825
Journal
Studies in Conflict and Terrorism Volume: 28 Issue: 4 Dated: July-August 2005 Pages: 275-293
Date Published
July 2005
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This article presents a new typology of Islamic terrorist organizations in an attempt to identify the types of structure and modes of operation of different Islamic terrorist organizations in global and more localized environments, with al-Qaeda conceptualized as a Dune organization.
Abstract
Much of the research on al-Qaeda, its affiliates, and on Arab Islamic terrorist groups has relied on two organizations approaches: hierarchical order and networks. However, neither approach accounts for the structure or mode of operation of al-Qaeda as a global terrorist organization. This paper introduces a new typology of terrorist organizations, the concept of the Dune organization. The Dune organization provides an effective tool for the conceptualization and analysis of al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda conceptualized as a Dune organization has a structure and activities that rely on a strategy of territorial disappearance and lack of imminent institutional presence. This conceptualization leads to a new typology of Islamic terrorist organizations which concentrates on organizational behavior patterns and provides a framework for a comparative analysis of terrorist movements which is applied to a study of al-Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist groups. References