In this chapter we continue to consider approaches for preventing terrorism, shifting focus from preventing individual acts of terror in the short term to removing terrorism's sources as a long-term strategy. A central purpose is to examine possibilities for moving the train of civilization from the track of clash and conflict to that of dialogue, mutual understanding, and cooperation among nations and cultures. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the prospect of building an international community that can be more effective in preventing terrorism by removing its deeper causes.

Introduction

Prudent planning calls for preparing for both short- and long-term contingencies. Just as we may be able to prevent crime in both the short term and the long term, it may be no less possible to remove opportunities for terrorists to carry out attacks in the short term while altering the conditions that induce people to want to commit acts of terror in the first place.

How do we establish what works over the long term in preventing terrorism? It is difficult enough to know about long-term preventive strategies even in the area of crime, due to difficulties in sorting out relationships of bewildering complexity, in measuring factors of central importance accurately, in anticipating new developments and adaptations, and so on. It is considerably more difficult in the area of terrorism, because the reporting and measurement of terrorist incidents are even less reliable than in the area of crime, the explanatory factors more elusive, the frequency of incidents lower, and the consequences more severe and less readily measurable.