Emotions, Ideologies, and Unconventional Political Violence

With Andrea Ruggeri

The advent of radical Islamist groups, the birth of Isis and many violent events in the last fifteen years – including the recent attacks in Paris – have shown that ideologies and emotions play central roles in issues related to political violence. On the one hand, it seems clear that massive violence, especially when used against civilians, creates strong emotions that can have dramatic effects on individual and political decisions. On the other hand, emotional shocks due to state policies that are considered illegitimate can lead individuals to radicalization. Likewise, many insurgent and terrorist groups develop their own ideologies and their strategy can sometimes be understood only taking into account the objectives proposed by those ideologies.