The eradications of society in front of the terrorist groups
| Author | Maria-Magdalena Bârsan - Carmen Enache |
| Position | Senior Lecturer PhD, Transilvania University, Departament of Law - Student, Transilvania University |
| Pages | 55-61 |
The eradications of society in front of the terrorist groups 55
THE ERADICATIONS OF SOCIETY IN FRONT
OF THE TERRORIST GROUPS
Senior Lecturer PhD Maria-Magdalena BÂRSAN
Transilvania University, Departament of Law, E-mail:
maria.m.barsan@unitbv.ro
Student Carmen ENACHE
Transilvania University, E-mail: beatrice.enache@student.unitbv.ro
Abstract
The paradox of the terrorism: it comes from within us and it is us who need to suffer in the end.
Why? Because terrorism is not only the evil that threatens the society, but also the evil that comes
from within us, from the obssesive fanaticism of the human being, from the obsession of power, of
punishment, of revenge, these visions which darken even the brightest minds.
Terrorism is regulated in the national legislation mainly by the Law 535/2004, regarding the
prevention and the combat of the terrorism, in addition to which there are the international
regulations, firstly stated by the Convention from 1937, regarding the prevention and the repression
of the terrorism, adopted by the Nations League. These international regulations have developped
through a multitude of conventions, resolutions and statements of the United Nations Organization.
The vulnerability of the society facing this phenomenon is beyond question, but do we currently
really know the level of this vulnerability, its risks or the climax? Are we really capable of finding viable
remedies and an efficient treatment? Trying to fiind potential answers to these questions, I fiind of
paramount importance to draw the attention, besides the national and international regulations, on the
historical aspects of this phenomenon and on th e psichology behind the concept of terrorism. I have used
the historical-teleological method in order to highlight the evolution of terrorism, the transformations
that have occured and the extension of this phenomenon. In order to determine the psychological causes
and to establish a connection between the theoretical and the practical aspects, I will be using the logical
method. I addition to that, I will be presenting the reaction of the society by adressing two open
questions to some people of different ages and with different professions: ”What do you think are the
causes of terrorism? What do you consider to be the cure for this phenomenon?” I firmly believe that the
answers to these questions will be extremely useful because the fact that society has not enough
knowledge about this topic will negatively influence the possibility of finding a real cure and the result
will be that we will become more and more vulnerable.
In the bottom lines of my essay I will be presenting the world of terrorism through the eyes of
the ones that are considered the main suspects and the ones who cause this phenomenon, the islamic
people. It is time we found aut how they see us. By comparing the two outlooks we can identify the
main vulnerabilities of the society and we could fiind the most efficient cure for terrorism.
Keywords: terrorism, vulnerability, phenomenon, society.
Law Review vol. VII, special issue, December 2017, p. 55-61
56 MARIA-MAGDALENA BÂRSAN, CARMEN ENACHE
Terrorism- national and international regulations
In order to achieve several common goals, the prevention, the discouragement
and the combat of the terrorism acts, a multitude of international regulations have
been adopted. Romania has adhered to this line of legisative measures adopted by
the international community regarding the combat of terrorism, by adopting
several legislative and administrative measures for the security of life, of corporal
integrity, of liberty and dignity of the citizens, of the foreign countries
representatives and of all the individuals who could be found on the national
teritory.1
In the intern legislation, terrorism is regulated by the Law 535/2004 regarding
the prevention and the combat of terrorism, adopted by the national Parliament. It
defines terrorism as the totality of actions and/or threatens that represent a public
danger and affect the national security and having several characteristics. The
spread of this phenomenon has imposed more complex regulations to be adopted.
Therefore, a multitude of laws, ordinances and Govern resolutions, which include
a variety of statements, trying to contribute to the combat of terrorism (Govern
resolution 1272/2005 for the approval of the list of the individuals and of the legal
entities, suspects of having committed or having financed terrorism acts. Law
122/2006 regarding the asylum in Romania with further modifications and
additions; Emergency Govern Resolution 202/2008 regarding the executing of the
international penalties.
Terrorism has rapidly spread, so that international regulations have become
indispensable to create a common battle field against terrorism acts. The first
international regulation was the Convention in 1937 regarding the prevention and
the repression of terrorism, adopted by the Nations League. The development of
the regulations regarding international cooperation concerning the combat of
terrorism has constanly evolved after the Second World War, mainly as a result of
the increasing number of air piracy.2
Therefore, the development of society, in all of its areas, has led to a
continuous development of terrorism as well, and to the fact that the regulations
regarding this topic have extended and have increased significantly. The proof of
the fact that society has desperately tried to repress terrorism acts, nationally and
internationally, is the vast majority of legal documents, which I will be attaching to
this essay.
The vulnerabilities of the society facing terrorism
Yes, we are all vulnerable! Threatening and danger are always bringing
vulnerability, fear, insecurity and chaos. How could we exceed these
vulnerabilities? First of all, we need to know them, and in order to know them we
1 https://www.sri.ro/fisiere/studii/cadrullegislativ.pdf, consultat la data 19.05.2017, ora 14:00.
2 Idem.
The eradications of society in front of the terrorist groups 57
need to discover the danger and the threatenings behind and, furthermore, we
need to fiind the causes of this phenomena which bring the danger upon us. All of
us, all of the countries must participate at this investigation, whether affected by
terrorism or not. Or, the biggest vulnerability is caused by the inability to
investigate and to accurately evaluate a dynamic and complex system, with lots of
dangerous and unforeseeable twists.3
The vulnerabilities of the democratic political systems
Why does democracy represent a vulnerable aspect of society in front of
terrorism? Even though, for society, democracy represents one of the benefits,
which was obtained hard and by blood spilling, he have come to the point where
democracy itself represents a weakness in front of terrorism acts. The transparency
of a democratic system facilitates not only the possibility for terrorists to infiltrate,
but also the process of finding relevant information for preparing a terrorist act.
The right to express an opinion is a democratic element which makes us
vulnerable, due to the fact that this liberty facilitates the spread of terrorist
ideology, which lures more and more followers and fanatics of this phenomenon.
Furthermore, the uncountable opinions stating religious intolerance and religious
discrimination have led to the increasing number of people who enlist in the
”death game”, generating an increased level of vulnerability for our society.
Multipartidism represents a vulnerability to the infiltration of certain groups
and political terrorist organizations in the system and even to the creation of a
paralel system or of some networks of political terrorism.4
The vulnerabilities generated by development and modernity
The impetuous development of society, the up-to-date techology, the biology
and chemistry progress, the numerous lab experiments have created certain
vulnerabilities, which could lead to a different type of terrorism, much more
dangerous than all the others combined, the genetic terrorism.5
At the moment, we are vulnerable and exposed to cybernetic terrorism, the
increased level of the informatic system represents an additional vulnerability of
our society in front of this terrifying phenomenon. The terrorists manage to obtain
all the necessary information to prepare the terrorist acts by breaking into certain
informatic systems and by getting secret pieces of information. They are also able
to communicate remotely, to plan terrorist acts and to lure more and more
followers without being discovered, because of the up-to-date systems developed
3 Gheorghe Vduva, Contemporary terrorism - a risk factor for national security and defense, in
the conditions of Romania's status as a NATO member, Ed Universitatea Nationala de Aparare Carol
I Publishing House, Bucharest. 2005, page 7.
4 Gheorghe Vduva, op.cit.,page 8.
5 Ibidem page 10.
58 MARIA-MAGDALENA BÂRSAN, CARMEN ENACHE
in the IT field. May it sound paradoxal, the development is what makes us
vulnerable and prone to be the victims of this phenomenon.
Furthermore, the modern armament systems, the new explosives generation,
guiding devices, and the remote communication systems will become more and
more accessible on the black market, the modern society creating new
vulnerabilities and new targets to the terrorists.6 In this situation, the complex
customs system must be mentioned, due to its permanent transformations , caused
by the political movements and by the dominant parties. The customs instability is
one of the most dangerous vulnerabilities, due to the fact that it allows the
terrorists to infiltrate in the target-nations, which own the explosives and the other
materials necessary to organize terrorist attacks.
Social, religious and cultural vulnerabilities
I consider that all these social, religious and cultural vulnerabilities are very
difficult to manage and improve because social, religious and cultural diversity
creates a lot of polemics and controversy in nowadays, and inside of every human
being is born the ideea of superiority and selfishness.
Why the social values as the religion, the culture and the community spirit are
now associated with the terrorism, why are they considered vulnerabilities
considering the terrorism? The desire and the attempt to transform the social
values in the maximal ideals, by determining some “supreme and superior values’’
may be the answer to that question. Therefore, the collocations as: “my religion is
the fair one”, “only the believe in my religion can take you to the heaven” increase
the religious intolerance and make the society struggle.
As we can see, we are increasing the terrorism, a growth which is based on the
religion, and therefore we become vulnerable to the phenomenon. All the
mentioned factors lead to an increase of vulnerability through the spirit of identity
that creates a state of continuous tension that has as results a series of
vulnerabilities to the terrorism of identity developed by other communities or
groups of interest, but also the rigidity and the extremism of some cults
(denominations, fundamentalist organizations) generates vulnerabilities of that
community to the political terrorism, fundamentalism terrorism and the terrorism
of identity.”7
Vulnerabilities by ignorance
Ignorance makes us vulnerable, how can we keep ourselves from something
that we don’t know about and we don’t wish to know? We can’t do it and now we
conclude that we found another spot of our vulnerabilty by not knowing things.
You keep yourself from a lion because you know he is a wild animal, you know he
6Anghel Andreescu, Nicolae Radu, Terrorist organizations. Conceptualization of terror vs.
European security, Ed.Mira, Bucharest, 2008, page.38.
7 Gheorghe Vduva, op.cit.,page 9.
The eradications of society in front of the terrorist groups 59
attacks people, and you know when he is hungry he can rip you, you keep yourself
from terrorism because you know is dangerous, but you don’t know the specifics
of this phenomenon how can you know what to stay away from?
I think, the society needs to know the causes of the terrorism, the shapes it can
take, the possible precautions and how we can prevent it, because only if we join
our efforts we can become less vulnerable and fight to stop this phenomenon.
If we would know the causes of the terrorism, we would understand that the
religious intolerance that we promote sometimes does nothing more than to
increase the motivation of its followers and their number. Maybe if we will accept
and we will proof ourselves tolerant and respectful towards the religion of the
majority of the followers, we will succeed to reduce this phenomenon.
But how can we know if this is a possible solution when we don’t even know
its causes?
Terrorism in the people’s eyes
In my opinion, as long as the problems and conflicts come from us, we are the
only ones that can find the solutions. We can find the problem solving only if we
know its causes, so I decided to ask people of different ages and different societies
two open questions: “What do you think are the causes of the terrorism?”, “Which
do you think is the effective remedy against this phenomenon?”.
Of course, everybody had his own opinion, and if regarding the causes were
some answers that have something in common: “ The causes may be political or
determined by the desire of getting redemptions and even by the religious
fanaticism, when we are talking about ISIS.”, “the cause of the terrorism as concept
is an extremist ideology with nationalist, political and religious roots”, “The
invasion of some countries from Middle East by the Great Nations, the rasism, the
religion”, when it comes to remedies, the opinions are divided, some people think
that “There’s not a posibility for us to eradicate the terrorism: responding with
violence to violence can take us only to more violence”, some of them see as a
solution “strengthening the security system at the customs points and tightening
the punishments for those why dare do commit such actions” or, some see the
opposite solution “A better communication between the countries at a social, and
cultural level, so that they come to accept and recognize all the religions, neutralize
the appearance of superiority for some of them.” We notice that the opinions are in
opposition, some people find the remedy in a better barricade and isolation from
the countries where the followers come from, some of them find the solution in a
better communication between the nations. I consider that for making a solution
work, we need everybody to embrace it because this is everybody’s fight.
We’ve shared our vision about the terrorism, now is time to find out what they
think about us, those who are considered first suspects when a terrorist attack
takes place. So, Abdoul Rashid Ghazi said “We can’t speak with the West. We
don’t understand each other. All the westerns stereotypes about us, partisan of
60 MARIA-MAGDALENA BÂRSAN, CARMEN ENACHE
Islam, have reappered after 9/11, and I strongly advise them to stop making all
kinds of calculations and suppositions, as they did after London attacks (at the
subway, July 7th, 2005). If a bomb will explode in Islamabad and we will discover
that one of the terrorists booked a room in a hotel in Oxford, will we accuse The
Great Britain?”8 A very good point! I think with all this stereotypes make the
nations move away more and this way we walk away from the possibility of
finding a solution that can actually work. Surely hatred and unfounded
accusations won’t help us with the improvement of the situation that we are in, on
the contrary will lead us to bigger conflicts.
Conclusion
I think the vulnerabilities of society against the terrorism keep growing, an
increase that is almost directly proportional with social, industrial, technological
and computer evolution of the mankind, through all this evolutions we’ve made
not only our work easier but also the work of the terrorism followers. Therefore,
our attention over this phenomenon needs to grow, we need to find answers or at
least to have other questions.
The terrorism marks lives and destinies on both sides, whether we talk about
victims, about the guilty ones, whether about the suspects or the entire world. I’m
wondering, can we erase the terrorism print? Let’s find out which are our
vulnerabilities and try to heal some of its parts, isn’t it better to fix it from the
bottom?
We need to be aware of this phenomenon causes, maybe we can split the guilt,
maybe we can change something, let’s start with our thoughts and then to continue
with world’s ideologies. Politics, social discriminations, religious intolerance,
rasism are factors that encourage the terrorism, this are not the only factors, but
this are the ones that depend on us and we can work to destroy them. I am not the
promoter of an utopian idea, I’m not convinced that we can eradicate the terrorism,
but I’m sure this way we can reduce it.
I conclude by supporting our need to leave aside just for one second our vision
of the world and try to see the world through their eyes, maybe this way we can
find effective solutions that can settle this conflicts. We will not be able to build our
own antiterrorist house and just live there, we can’t choose to barricade ourselves
from a nation that is barricaded in her own world.
Even if the abyss between us got deeper, I think an effective solution can be the
dialogue, by mutual listening, leaving behind the hatred, bringing in the four
ground the tolerance, humanity and respect. We can succeed only by trying! Better
we fail trying then regret that we didn’t! The subject is still open to reflection: are
the congresses of peace, communication, school campaigns about peace and
coexistence effective solutions, are they able to blur the terrorism? It’s worth trying!
8 Anne Nivat, Islamists. How they see us, Ed. Corint, Bucharest, 2016, page 38.
The eradications of society in front of the terrorist groups 61
Bibliography
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Ed. Mira, Bucharest , 2008.
2. Anghel Andreescu, Nicolae Radu, Terrorist organizations.
Conceptualization of terror vs. European security, Ed.Mira, Bucharest , 2008.
3. Anne Nivat, Islamists. How they see us, Ed. Corint, Bucharest, 2016.
4. Stelian urlea, Bomb of Drugs, Ed.Humanitas, Bucharest, 1991.
5. Gheorghe Vduva, Contemporary terrorism - a risk factor for national
security and defense, in the conditions of Romania's status as a NATO member,
Ed Universitatea Nationala de Aparare Carol I Publishing House, Bucharest, 2005.
Webography
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