Against every human law : the terrorist threat to diplomacy

Abstract

Over the past fifteen years, terrorism has become a subject for academic debate in much the same way that guerrilla warfare was popular with scholars in the 1950s and 1960s. A great many books and articles have been written on terrorism since the problem assumed renewed importance around 1968. Some of these studies have approached the subject from an historical perspective. Others have concentrated on the challenges posed to liberal states or have looked at the possible state sponsorship of terrorist groups. While most of these works mention the specific problem of terrorist attacks on diplomats and diplomatic facilities as part of their overall treatment of the subject, few examine it in any detail. Even those recent studies which concentrate on international terrorism tend to treat the terrorist threat to diplomats only in passing.