Class 10: Politically Violent Activity

Local support and public reaction

Dr. Michael C. Zeller

Opening notes

Open Stickerfrom Open Stickers

Presentation groups

Presentations line-up
Date Presenters Method
4 Dec: Shahadaan, Kristine, Daichi ethnography
11 Dec: Bérénice, Zorka, Victoria, Katharina content analysis
18 Dec: Shoam, Aidan, Tara, Sebastian QCA

Support in an armed conflict setting

  • Meier (2022)
    • Tamils in Sri Lanka
    • territory
    • three patterns
Intractable Conflict Hugh Grant GIFfrom Intractable Conflict GIFs

Meier (2022) - context and research design

  • anti-Tamil riots in July 1983, thousands of Tamils killed
    • drove armed conflict, with 8,000-10,000 strong Tamil Tigers
  • Justification of approach: “Focusing on actions alone would deprive us of a crucial facet of support relations: the meaning people attach to actors and events. For instance, we can only understand why respondents continued to support the LTTE despite their increasing brutality and hostility if we consider the beliefs and affects that composed support relations and upheld them regardless of the LTTE’s ruthlessness.”
    • actions, beliefs/meanings - epistemologic focal points
  • Data: 30 life history interviews with former Tigers
    • “sample is too small to derive generalizable conclusions … enabling us to explore how people evaluate, make sense of and rationalize behaviors by conflict actors and to uncover some of the fluctuation, contradictions and ambivalences in peoples’ beliefs and actions towards armed groups”

Sri Lanka map

Meier (2022) - 3 patterns

  1. political representation and social distance; (2) fear and the relevance of affective ties; (3) security and (forceful) recruitment.

Meier (2022) - 3 patterns

  • respondents in LTTE territory, interacting with LTTE’s political and administrative institutions, more likely to support LTTE, having experienced them as service providers rather than as armed attackers.
  • LTTE support not “solely coerced or entirely free of force”
  • (p. 171) “it is more fruitful to explore how civilians cope with and react to this ambivalence. As the empirical evidence has demonstrated, depending on the type of force and the group targeted, violence was perceived as more or less justified.”

Poll: local support and public reaction

A QR code for the survey.

Take the survey at https://forms.gle/VZJuzHbzXXtNW2KN9

  • local support necessary violent group to have success?
  • violent escalation tends to alienate the public, reducing support?
  • most common reason people support politically violent groups?
  • citizens react differently to political violence depending on the the ideological motivations underlying the violence.
  • when states respond repressively, it usually strengthens politically violent groups’ legitimacy?
  • After an attack, demand for punishment rises. Should policymakers shift toward harsher policies?

A recent controversy

In October 2023, the Irish Women’s Football team qualified for the Women’s World Cup. In the days after, the Irish public was ablaze with debate, politicians took turns condemning and defending the players, and UEFA launched an investigation that ended in a 20,000 EUR fine. Why? For singing a certain song…

A recent controversy

see also 8-minute roundtable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkGfRbh2_Vw

local support necessary violent group to have success?

Why do you think so? What might ‘success’ mean and does that affect the ‘necessity’ of local support?

Poll results: escalation and support

violent escalation tends to alienate the public, reducing support?

most common reason people support politically violent groups?

Poll results: reaction and repression

different reaction depending on ideological motivation of violence?

After an attack, following demand, should policymakers shift toward harsher policies?

state repression usually strengthens violent groups’ legitimacy?

Public opinion on political violence

  • Setter and Nepstad (2022)
    • background
    • research design
    • mechanisms
    • findings
  • Völker (2023)
    • concepts
    • visibility, resonance, legitimacy
    • influential actors
Public Opinion Meme GIFfrom Public Opinion GIFs

background on the George Floyd protests - Setter and Nepstad (2022)

  • what are the most important points to know from this context and catalysing event?
  • what factors might escalate activism to political violence? what factors might restrain?

refresher: logics of restraint/escalation

restraint

  1. A strategic logic (violence is counterproductive in the present circumstances)
  2. A moral logic (certain forms of violence are illegitimate)
  3. A logic of ego maintenance (we are not a violent organization)
  4. A logic of outgroup definition (softening views on putative outgroups)
  5. An organisational logic (the organisation evolves in ways that undermine the logics of violent escalation)

escalation

  1. framing logic (intensity of context/threat, revolutionary goals, glorification of violence, violence as viable/necessary, increasing vilification of ‘enemies’)
  2. strategic logic (cope with changing dynamics with opponents and/or state, deal with diminishing opportunity, loss of state control)
  3. organisational logic (declining moderate influence, logistical/practical preparation for violence)
  4. constituency/social logic (endorsement/legitimation from elites and/or public, politics/media focuses on radical flank)

Setter and Nepstad (2022) - design

  • RQ: When such events happen, how does this shape citizens’ views on politically-oriented violence?
  • Context:
    • ‘U.S. citizens expect protesters to conduct themselves nonviolently…’ (p. 430)
    • YET - “people find violence more acceptable when traditional political methods are incapable of adequately addressing social injustices”
  • Data:
    • from the American National Election Study’s (ANES) 2016 and 2020 samples

how SMs influence public opinion - Setter and Nepstad (2022)

support for political violence (%) - (2022)

Demographic 2016 2020
Sample Overall 15.28 14.34
Extremely Liberal 14.55 30.79
Liberal 10.02 17.36
Slightly Liberal 16.83 16.23
Moderate 15.93 16.30
Slightly Conservative 14.84 8.59
Conservative 9.24 5.45
Extremely Conservative 12.71 8.22
White 11.79 10.89
Black 24.37 24.41
Men 16.45 14.13
Women 14.17 14.63
Age 18-29 28.40 30.42
Age 30-39 16.42 21.13
Age 40-49 14.54 16.85
Age 50-59 13.12 10.76
Age 60-69 9.86 7.15
Age 70-79 9.35 7.57
Age 80+ 15.03 6.02
Attends Church 16.10 12.82
Does Not Attend Church 14.00 15.81

any numbers that you think are noteworthy?

support for political violence (%) - (2022)

Demographic 2016 2020
Sample Overall 15.28 14.34
Extremely Liberal 14.55 30.79
Liberal 10.02 17.36
Slightly Liberal 16.83 16.23
Moderate 15.93 16.30
Slightly Conservative 14.84 8.59
Conservative 9.24 5.45
Extremely Conservative 12.71 8.22
White 11.79 10.89
Black 24.37 24.41
Men 16.45 14.13
Women 14.17 14.63
Age 18-29 28.40 30.42
Age 30-39 16.42 21.13
Age 40-49 14.54 16.85
Age 50-59 13.12 10.76
Age 60-69 9.86 7.15
Age 70-79 9.35 7.57
Age 80+ 15.03 6.02
Attends Church 16.10 12.82
Does Not Attend Church 14.00 15.81
  • “liberals became much more likely to find political violence acceptable … conservatives became much less likely to find themselves in support of violence…”
  • “Younger respondents were more likely to support political violence in 2020 … while their older counterparts were more opposed than before”

support for political violence (%) - (2022)

Demographic 2016 2020
Sample Overall 15.28 14.34
Extremely Liberal 14.55 30.79
Liberal 10.02 17.36
Slightly Liberal 16.83 16.23
Moderate 15.93 16.30
Slightly Conservative 14.84 8.59
Conservative 9.24 5.45
Extremely Conservative 12.71 8.22
White 11.79 10.89
Black 24.37 24.41
Men 16.45 14.13
Women 14.17 14.63
Age 18-29 28.40 30.42
Age 30-39 16.42 21.13
Age 40-49 14.54 16.85
Age 50-59 13.12 10.76
Age 60-69 9.86 7.15
Age 70-79 9.35 7.57
Age 80+ 15.03 6.02
Attends Church 16.10 12.82
Does Not Attend Church 14.00 15.81

One strange outlier is the 2016 survey’s proportion of 80+ year-olds who find political violence acceptable. We have checked the coding on this variable multiple times to ensure that there is nothing wrong with it, and it has remained accurate every time. Either the 2016 ANES just happened to capture a particularly rowdy set of senior citizens, or there was some cohort effect among that sample’s oldest respondents that was not shared among the 2020 cohort—such as lingering memories of WWII or the 1960s movements.

Setter and Nepstad (2022) - findings

Setter and Nepstad (2022) - findings

  • support for Black Lives Matter is significantly correlated with support for political violence.
  • “The impact of age intensified between 2016 and 2020. In the 2016 model, each additional year of age corresponds to a .2% lower likelihood of supporting political violence. In 2020, each additional year corresponds to a decrease of .4%, two times the impact of the previous model. In other words, in 2016, a fifty-year-old respondent would be 6% less likely to support political violence than a twenty-year-old respondent, net of all other factors. In 2020, by contrast, they would be 12% less likely to support political violence, net of all other factors.”
  • significance of higher education: having a college degree decreases support for political violence by 3.4%.

Setter and Nepstad (2022) - findings, revised model

Setter and Nepstad (2022) - findings

the George Floyd riots functioned as a new “situational variation” that shifted people’s attitudes, increasing the proportion of liberals and ardent BLM movement supporters who felt that the political violence was justifiable.”

  • “people may shift their attitudes about political violence yet again when a different movement poses a new situational variation. In one instance, people can be supportive of political violence and then, in a different instance, be morally opposed to it. The key factor shaping beliefs in any particular moment is how a person feels about the movement that is using political violence.”

  • What do we take from these findings? How does local support (or opposition) manifest cases you know of?

terrorist attacks and public debate - Völker (2023) RQs

to what extent and how do terrorist attacks influence public debates? What are the differences between public debates after extreme right and Islamist terrorist attacks?

What do you expect, hypothesise?

Völker (2023) - key concepts (1)

  • Discursive opportunity structures - pre-existing values and visions around issues in the broader political culture of a country (Koopmans and Olzak 2004)
    • issue-specific discursive opportunity structures determine which actors and issues gain access to and influence public debates (Völker 2023, 2)
  • discursive critical junctures - moments that intensify polarisation and transform existing political alignments and visions around issues
    • can you think of an example?

Völker (2023) - key concepts (2)

Author’s own discursive radicalisation model - how radical actors may shape public debates after critical events such as terrorist attacks

  1. visibility - how much do events/actors attract attention
  2. resonance - political reactions that radical actors and events provoke and how they shape discourse dynamics on contested issues
  3. legitimacy - extent to which actors and issues resonate positively and gain support

Völker (2023) - research design

  • data: mass media coverage after (for two weeks) all seven fatal politically violent attacks since 2015 (four by extreme right, three by Islamist)
    • 2016 in München, 2019 Walter Lübcke, 2019 Halle, 2020 Hanau; 2016 in Berlin, 2017 in Hamburg, 2020 in Dresden
  • methods: relational quantitative content analysis, frame analysis, network analysis

Visibility

Finding: the most publicised terrorist attacks were those where the debate centred on the ideological motives of the perpetrators and the political consequences of the act

Visibility

Finding: extremists (esp. Islamists) gain more discursive space after attacks

Resonance

  • “politicians from right-wing parties were more visible than politicians from left-wing parties in political debates after extreme right and Islamist attacks”
    • Right-wing parties were able to share their perspective as subjects in the debate in 59% of political statements after Islamist attack; 57% after extreme right attack
      • AfD politicians often the most visible actors
    • why do you suppose this is the case?
  • “the content of public debates after terrorist attacks was related to the ideological motive behind the attack”
    • after Islamist attacks there is a broad debate about immigration and asylum
      • “debate evolved around the question of how and to what extent migration and Islam may be a breeding ground for radicalisation”
    • after extreme right attacks there is a narrow debate about RW extremism
      • “focus of the debate was on the perpetrator’s motives, individual radicalisation and right-wing extremism”

Resonance

  • “politicians from right-wing parties were more visible than politicians from left-wing parties in political debates after extreme right and Islamist attacks”
    • Right-wing parties were able to share their perspective as subjects in the debate in 59% of political statements after Islamist attack; 57% after extreme right attack
      • AfD politicians often the most visible actors
    • why do you suppose this is the case?
      • right-wing actors are successful issue entrepreneurs in moments of crisis (Della Porta et al., 2020, Discursive turns and critical junctures: Debating citizenship after the Charlie Hebdo attacks)
  • “the content of public debates after terrorist attacks was related to the ideological motive behind the attack”
    • after Islamist attacks there is a broad debate about immigration and asylum
      • “debate evolved around the question of how and to what extent migration and Islam may be a breeding ground for radicalisation”
    • after extreme right attacks there is a narrow debate about RW extremism
      • “focus of the debate was on the perpetrator’s motives, individual radicalisation and right-wing extremism”

Legitimacy

comparing level of public support for issues and actors as object of statements one week before and one week after Islamist and extreme right attacks: captures change of (average) positions on issues and actors as the objects of statements (-1 stands for a negative relationship and 1 for a positive relationship) covered in the mass media

Public legitimacy shift (average position)
Islamist attacks Extreme right attacks
Statements referring to Actors
extreme right actors -0.18 -0.35
Islamist actors -0.28 -0.37
Statements referring to Issues
Islam -0.35 -0.11
migration -0.19 -0.55
nationalism -0.19 -0.16
radicalisation 0.01 -0.06

Legitimacy

Public legitimacy shift (average position)
Islamist attacks Extreme right attacks
Statements referring to Actors
extreme right actors -0.18 -0.35
Islamist actors -0.28 -0.37
Statements referring to Issues
Islam -0.35 -0.11
migration -0.19 -0.55
nationalism -0.19 -0.16
radicalisation 0.01 -0.06

Terrorist attacks reduce the public legitimacy of extremist actors and their political agenda in public debates

Legitimacy

Public legitimacy shift (average position)
Islamist attacks Extreme right attacks
Statements referring to Actors
extreme right actors -0.18 -0.35
Islamist actors -0.28 -0.37
Statements referring to Issues
Islam -0.35 -0.11
migration -0.19 -0.55
nationalism -0.19 -0.16
radicalisation 0.01 -0.06

legitimacy of Islam decreases more after Islamist attacks than the legitimacy of nationalism does after extreme right attacks (issues)

influential actors - Völker (2023)

Who were the most influential actors in pushing frames and issues onto the media agenda?

To answer this, Völker (2023) creates ‘discourse networks’

  • the discourse networks have two types of nodes: actors and issues
  • directed ties (arrows) show which issues actors focus on
    • size of the arrow represents number of statements
    • color of the arrow represents average position
      • positive
      • negative
      • neutral

influential actors (after Islamist attacks)

  • nodes: actors and issues
  • directed ties (arrows) show which issues actors focus on
    • size of the arrow represents number of statements
    • color of the arrow represents average position
      • positive, negative, neutral

influential actors (after extreme right attacks)

  • nodes: actors and issues
  • directed ties (arrows) show which issues actors focus on
    • size of the arrow represents number of statements
    • color of the arrow represents average position
      • positive, negative, neutral

Völker (2023) - findings

  • similar actor constellations emerged and dominated public debates after terrorist attacks
    • governmental actors and political parties drive post-attack debates
    • emphasis is on security policies and strengthening counter-terrorism (‘securitisation’)

Public and political reactions drive state policy and repressive responses (covered in the next two weeks)

(relates to repressive responses that we will address in Week 12)

some 2025 PV news

next meeting

  • state responses
  • in the meantime…

Io Saturnalia! and happy holidays

Any questions, concerns, feedback for this class?

Anonymous feedback here: https://forms.gle/NfF1pCfYMbkAT3WP6

Alternatively, please send me an email: m.zeller@lmu.de

References

Al Jazeera. 2025. “US Lists White Supremacist Terrorgram Network as ‘Terrorist Group’.” Al Jazeera, January.
Amsallem, Noé, William Audureau, and Romain Geoffroy. 2025. “Quelles sont les 46 associations visées par une dissolution sous la présidence Macron?” Le Monde, June.
Bryant, Miranda. 2025. “‘It Is about Vulnerable Guys’: Violent Far-Right Groups in Sweden Recruit Boys as Young as 10.” The Guardian, March.
Bundesministerium des Innern und für Heimat. 2025. “Bekanntmachung Eines Vereinsverbots Gegen ,,Königreich Deutschland“ Und Seine Teilorganisationen.” Bundesanzeiger, April.
Carroll, Rory. 2025. “MI5 Impeded Inquiry into Stakeknife Agent Who Murdered for IRA, Says Official Report Northern Ireland.” The Guardian, December.
Duncan, Pamela, Raphael Hernandes, Elena Morresi, Pablo Gutiérrez, Garry Blight, and Lydia McMullan. 2025. “Inside the Everyday Facebook Networks Where Far-Right Ideas Grow.” The Guardian, September.
Firoz, Fahadh. 2025. “Mapping ISKP’s Strength: Social Network Analysis of Tech-Driven Jihad.” Global Network on Extremism & Technology, April.
Guardian staff. 2025. “Five Jailed for Far-Right Plot to Overthrow German Government.” The Guardian, March.
Hernandes, Raphael, Elena Morresi, Robyn Vinter, and Pamela Duncan. 2025. “Far-Right Facebook Groups Are Engine of Radicalisation in UK, Data Investigation Suggests.” The Guardian, September.
Jürgens, Oliver. 2025. “Radikalisierung im Internet: Junge Rechte werben um Nachwuchs.” NDR, May.
Kerr, Dara. 2025. “TikTok to Replace Trust and Safety Team in Germany with AI and Outsourced Labor.” The Guardian, August.
Koopmans, Ruud, and Susan Olzak. 2004. “Discursive Opportunities and the Evolution of Right-Wing Violence in Germany.” American Journal of Sociology 110 (1): 198–230. https://doi.org/10.1086/386271.
Litschko, Konrad. 2025. “Abzielen auf eine sehr verletzliche Zielgruppe.” TAZ, May.
Makuch, Ben. 2025. “Ukraine Wing of US-founded Terrorist Group Says It Was Involved in Killing of Intelligence Officer in Kyiv.” The Guardian, July.
Meier, Larissa Daria. 2022. “Between Coercion and Representation: Exploring Variation in Support Relations Between Tamil Civilians and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).” Partecipazione e Conflitto 15 (1): 157–74.
PA Media. 2025. “Kneecap Banned from Canada for ‘Glorifying Terrorist Organisations’.” The Guardian, September.
Rankin, Jennifer. 2025. “Poland Hails Breakthrough with Ukraine over Second World War Volhynia Atrocity.” The Guardian, January.
Setter, Davyd, and Sharon Erickson Nepstad. 2022. “How Social Movements Influence Public Opinion on Political Violence: Attitude Shifts in the Wake of the George Floyd Protests.” Mobilization: An International Quarterly 27 (4): 429–44. https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671X-27-4-429.
Völker, Teresa. 2023. “How Terrorist Attacks Distort Public Debates: A Comparative Study of Right-Wing and Islamist Extremism.” Journal of European Public Policy, October, 1–28. https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2023.2269194.
Weaver, Matthew. 2025. “Terrorism Case Against Kneecap Rapper Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh Thrown Out.” The Guardian, September.
Zeit Online. 2025. “Dobrindt verbietet Reichsbürgerverein "Königreich Deutschland".” Die Zeit, May.