Transnational Terrorism Regenerated

Resumo

Now that Da’ish’s territorial construct has been dismantled, a new version of violent Islamic extremism is confidently predicted. Its form and ideological content is, as yet, undefined but the fact that it will emerge is considered inevitable as extremism follows what is assumed to be a linear progression into becoming the basic challenge facing the hegemonic secular political order, whether liberal or autocratic in nature. This comment is intended to question this conclusion by suggesting that extremism of this kind may be ideologically static or even in regression as it fragments and begins to confront mirror-images of itself that also operate outside the confines of the formal state. It is a fragmentation that has also been accelerated by the sustained anti-terrorist containment tactics of the West which have cut into its efficacy in terms of ideological regeneration and territorial control. Western tactical and strategic mistakes, however, have given it the means to postpone its ultimate defeat and, even, to recuperate from much of its past losses.