ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the productive effects of terrorism as a concept. It has four key features of terrorism: that violence is targeted against civilians, non-combatants or innocents; that violence intentionally targets civilians or intentionally terrorises; that terrorism is a communicative form of violence; and finally that terrorism is an exceptional form of violence. One unifying theme amongst the many definitions of terrorism is that terroristic violence is directed against civilians, non-combatant or the innocent. Coady, for instance, argues that terrorism is the organised use of violence to attack non-combatants or innocents or their property for political purposes. Like the war crime then, the exceptionalism associated with terrorism suggests that there is something extraordinary about terroristic violence that it belongs outside the norm of warfare or legitimate violence. Terrorism' shares the same normative space as atrocity'. According to Hannah Arendt's critique of violence, beyond very limited short-term effects, violence is unpredictable.
