The randomization of terrorist attacks

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore the economic theoretical foundations of the idea that rational terrorist organisations deliberately randomise their attacks (by type, timing, location and targets) to generate uncertainty and intimidation. A choice theoretic framework is applied to the analysis of the terrorist organisation’s behaviour to determine whether welfare (utility) gains from the randomisation of terrorist attacks are plausible and feasible. The randomisation of attacks can appear to promise higher amounts of political influence for each resource input but it turns out that randomisation cannot manufacture a situation where higher amounts of political influence are obtained for each resource input. The results imply that, rather than randomisation and instability, the rational terrorist organisation is likely to prefer stability. The findings and implications provide a theoretical explanation for the non-randomness of terrorist attacks. This may be one small step towards explaining the patterns—non-randomness—in the time-series of terrorist incidents.