Terrorism is a word that is thrown around very loosely by all sorts of people, often by the biggest terrorists of all. But what is its history as a concept and how can we make sense of all the competing meanings? Who stands to gain when the word is used? Barker challenges common misconceptions about terrorism and illustrates the ways in which both terrorism and counter-terrorism undermine popular politics and democratic space.
I really enjoyed and appreciated this book. It is an excellently-researched, balanced, objective, and easy-to-read primer to this incredibly emotional subject. Barker makes it his mission to describe all aspects of the phenomenon that we call 'terrorism', and he shines a light into every possible side. Only a beginning to the study of this incredibly complex subject, but an excellent beginning.
One of the new Internationalist guides. An interesting look at some of the issues surrounding both group and state terrorism - could have been written in a bit a livelier style. it was a bit dry, and obviously couldn't cover the whole subject in proper depth. A brave attempt, but the writer bit off a bit more than he could chew. Still, to be fair, he's not claiming to be Chomsky.
This is a wonderful book, full of scripts to use when speaking to people. It is well-worth reading, and it would be even better in a small paperback edition. The current Goodreads title is incorrect: the actual title is listed on the picture of the cover.
Another excellent title in the New Internationalist's No Nonsense series. A timely read post-Charlie Hebdo, even though it was first published in 2003.I've recently re-read this title after first reading it shortly after it was published.