"Though capable of staging spectacular attacks like 9/11, jihadist organizations were not a significant force on the ground when they first became notorious in the shape of al-Qa'ida at the turn of century. The West's initial successes in the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan weakene…
This study marks the first attempt in Western scholarship to analyze the evolution of Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist groups’ and the Islamic State’s online branding in the Russian Federation, trying to explain how radicals’ sporadic activities have been transformed into recogniza…
Current efforts at mapping how women engage in violent extremism and terrorist activities highlight a lack of contemporary understanding regarding women’s motivation to support and participate in extremist activity. Traditionally, terrorism studies have focused on men, in large …
This dissertation examines three periods in Euro-American history that appear disparate but reflect the West’s changing relationship with the Islamic World and with Muslims, in particular with Muslim women, in Muslim-majority countries, the United States, and the United Kingdom.…
Political psychologists have identified patterns in the use of cognitive categorization for the structuring of the political worldview of foreign policy decision makers. This dissertation uses a case study approach to investigate the political worldview of the Islamic State of I…
In just over two years, the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq (ISIS) established itself as a global threat unlike any Islamic extremist group that preceded it. ISIS has adopted unprecedented tactics in order to establish, maintain, and develop its ideologies and to create an Islam…
This dissertation explores the possibilities of Islamic statehood in post-colonial Pakistan through the works of three figures involved in framing the idea of the Islamic state: W.C. Smith, Muhammad Asad, and Muhammad Munir. Each of these three thinkers owes their position and p…