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Income a motivator for terrorism, says DHS summer research team

 (Sept. 17, 2006)

    Links between the influence of profit upon terrorist group membership have been made clearer, thanks to the research of a DHS-sponsored summer student-faculty team from Spelman College.

    Hosted by the START Center of Excellence, a three-member team from Spelman spent this past summer examining economic models and profitability relative to motivating terrorism. An additional outcome is the enhanced ability to predict terrorist attacks based upon a quantifiable measurement of terrorist group behavior.

    Ashleigh Coaxum (above), is a junior at Spelman and a member of the research team. “Our research addresses the utility function and consumer behavior model which tells us how we can possibly quantify terrorist behavior and therefore input it into a model which will help us to predict their future behavior," says Ashleigh.

    To date, Ashleigh’s research has looked at terrorism in Africa and South Asia. There are 28 recognized terrorism groups in Africa and 106 throughout South Asia. "We chose South Asia and Africa because there are two very important yet underrepresented regions in the study of terrorism,” says Ashleigh. “The terrorist activities in these regions could offer helpful information that could be applied to other terrorist regions."

     Ashleigh, majoring in economics with a minor in French, is on a study abroad semester in France. Her research collaborators on this project are Morey Murray, also a junior, and Dr. Juliet Elu, a faculty member at Spelman.