Citation

Arce DG, Siqueira K. Journal of Theoretical Politics 2014; 26(4): 677-695.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014)

DOI

10.1177/0951629813511711

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

We investigate the problem of motivating terrorist operatives for suicide missions and conventional terrorist attacks when operatives have either self-interested or social preferences that are not observable by the terrorist organization. We characterize the screening mechanism for selecting operatives according to their social preferences and determine under what conditions a terrorist group will prefer to utilize suicide versus conventional tactics. For example, when operatives are intrinsically motivated and likely to be represented in the pool of potential recruits, a terrorist organization will be more likely to employ suicide attacks as its sole tactic of choice. © The Author(s) 2013.

Language: en

Keywords

Screening; terrorism; social preferences; suicide missions