ABSTRACT
Dictatorships, sub-state groups, and liberal-democratic states have all committed acts of terror. This chapter surveys the literature and argues that the assumption that power is a capacity to dominate focuses attention on the way terror challenges the abstract authority of the nation-state, but detracts from an appreciation of how the authority of nation-states is constituted and maintained. According to Lukes' well-known map of power's three dimensions, the idea that power has measurable dimensions arose with Robert Dahl's path-breaking call for precision about who exercises power and how its exercise can be discerned. Social movement studies shape much of the discussion about groups that deploy terror. The first three groups of commentaries on September 11 arguably all concern themselves with the capacity of al Qaeda and similar groups to challenge the authority of nation-states. The three dimensions of power as a capacity rest on Hobbes' singular rationality of sovereignty.
