Understanding and explaining terrorism: Expertise in practice

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Because terrorism and counter-terrorism are highly significant issues in international relations and domestic politics, terrorism expertise is a valued asset in public policy, the criminal justice system in media institutions and other domains. Using an innovative, mixed method approach, the proposed study will seek to develop a deeper understanding of the individuals and institutions that have been most influential in shaping our understanding of terrorism. The project also aims to undertake significant knowledge exchange and policy related work that aims to work with evidence-based research on terrorism and to embed it in policy and other domains. This will be undertaken by a variety of 'leadership' activities including sandpits, research retreats and a prominent 'wiki' website and social media presence.It will measure the prominence of different terrorism experts in different domains, including academia, the media, the internet, the criminal justice system and the policy community. It will seek to address the question of why different experts are more or less prominent in these different domains and the question of whether there is such a thing as genuine expertise in terrorism and how we might identify it. In particular the research will analyse the historical and institutional development of the use of terrorism experts as consultants by courts, governments and the media and will explore their ideological and institutional origins and affiliations. In addition the research will investigate the various think-tanks and private research institutes which provide support and funding to these experts and explore their origins and funding regime, as well as their in relations to other think-tanks and research institutes, governments, law enforcement, intelligence services, and private sector actors.The findings will have significant benefits for policy makers, media and criminal justice professionals and businesses and civil society groups seeking high quality expertise on terrorism. The findings will also have a relevance for the general public - in particular those communities disproportionately affected by counter-terrorism policies, most obviously in terms of evidence based assessments of expertise and in terms of holding public institutions to account.