Summer University
11 - 13 September 2003


Working Group 9 : Terrorism and Internal Security


Terrorist violence did not begin on September 11, 2001, but the sheer scale of the attacks of that fateful day heralded a new era, in which organised groups of politically motivated individuals might be both willing and able to visit acts of mass destruction on mankind.

In fact, for several decades, the scope and sophistication of terrorist activity in Western democracies has been growing. Several factors have been at work escalating the potential threat:

• new actors have entered the terrorist arena: the growth of the drugs trade, of organised mafias and of fanatical religious sects has been compounded by the rise of rogues states (for which terrorism may be an element of foreign policy) and of failed states (taken over by corruption, organized crime and private armies, in which state resources might be appropriated);
  
  
• 0terrorism has become a transnational activity, with an increasing capacity to strike across national boundaries, based on greater cooperation between groups sometimes pursuing different final goals (whether nationalistic, political, religious or 'merely' criminal) and a calculated exploitation of improved communication and globalisation in a 'borderless world';
  
  
• a new willingness has developed on the part of terrorists to deliberately kill themselves in the act of murdering others, making traditional protections less effective in a era of suicide bombing;
  
  
• new weapons and techniques have become available, including notably weapons of mass murder (nuclear, biological, chemical and radiological) and possibilities of cyber-terrorism;
  
  
• all of these of these factors have been underpinned by a growing alertness by terrorists to the media potential of their acts: over one billion people are believed to have witnessed live on television the second plane hitting the WTC two years ago, creating one of the defining images of our time.
  

WG9, at its first meeting at El Escorial, might choose to focus its discussion on the issues raised by the terrorist threat, by asking questions such as:

• How far should we view terrorism as a long-term threat that will transform our societies and how far as a short-term challenge requiring specific responses?
  
  
• How far has tackling terrorism moved from being essentially a police issue, regulated by the traditional judicial process, to a security and defence challenge, involving different rights on the part of citizens and obligations on the part of the state? What balance is to be struck between the need for security and the protection of civil liberties?
  
  
• What can European countries contribute, and how, to the fight against national and international terrorism - whether through military coalition, intelligence and police cooperation, diplomatic alliance, nation building and/or foreign aid? How can they become more effective in their common effort to improve internal security - whether through harmonising legal procedures, pooling police and intelligence resources, and/or tightening immigration and border controls?
  
  
• What lessons can we learn from comparing the policies and experience of individual EU member states, as well as of the US since September 11, in the fight against terrorism at home and abroad?