Issue ? 53. November 2015

Ideological and Communicational Aspects of the Contemporary Left Wing Extremism and Terrorism

Ph.D., Researcher, Institute for Political Studies, Belgrade, Serbia.
E-mail: mara.djoric@yahoo.com

This paper examines the ideological and communicational aspects of the contemporary left wing extremism and terrorism. The left wing extremism and terrorism are political and social phenomena which can be expressed in different forms, depending on the place and time they emerge. There is a wide range of names used for extremism and terrorism, which only points out the amorphousness and elasticity of these phenomena. The author has firstly made a distinction between extremism and terrorism by pointing out that every terrorist act implies extremism, but not the other way around.

The author points out that the goals of the contemporary left wing have changed, so that they are not fighting only for the rights of workers and disadvantaged minority groups anymore, but have focused on the protection of animals, homosexuals, prisoners etc. Just because of that, today extremism in the name of protection of animal rights represents one of the most important security problems. Just as the “old” far left, the new manifestations of the left wing extremism and terrorism use different ideological and communicational means in order to fulfill their political goals.

Keywords

Extremism, terrorism, far left, violence, ideology, communication.