Understanding suicide terrorism: Insights from psychology, lessons from history

History and psychology give us some powerful tools for understanding suicide terrorism. History quickly teaches that this tactic is not the reserve of any one religion and there are many examples from the past of individuals with very different motivations who are willing to sacrifice their life in an effort to kill others. Thus it is a mistake to see modern suicide terrorism as inherently an ‘Islamic problem’. Similarly, history also teaches us that perspective is important. The more you sympathise with the perpetrators’ cause, then the more you tend to explain the perpetrators’ decisions and motivations in very different (and usually much more positive) ways. If we disagree with the aims, then explanations begin to cluster around issues such as brainwashing, indoctrination, grooming, and radicalisation of vulnerable personalities. The truth almost certainly lies somewhere in between. The lesson from psychology is that there is no obvious suicide terrorist personality. Individuals reach the point of carrying out a suicide attack through a process which generally has more to do with social psychology then with the tenets of clinical or abnormal psychology. Used effectively, these insights can be tremendously helpful in stripping away many of the myths and assumptions which surround debates on suicide terrorism and leave us with a more realistic assessment of the perpetrators, who they are, how they see themselves and what forces motivate and drive them. A realistic understanding here is a vital first step in developing more effective approaches for both countering and preventing suicide terrorism.