Course title: Terrorism and Society

The task of the course consists in exploring sociological roots of a large variety of phenomena commonly described as terrorist activities. Some parallels between the personalities of a criminal and a terrorist are drawn. The ‘bottom up ’ approach (e.g. sources of terrorism in everyday life and social action) is compared with the ‘top down’ approach (e.g. focus on power relationships and globalization in its current form). Terrorists are not the only actors involved into activities under study: they interact with intellectuals, media, governmental bodies and security industry. Terrorism can be better understood as a product of their interaction, as an often ‘unexpected result of intentional human actions’. The teaching heavily relies on case studies (special attention will be paid, in particular, to the cases of Chechnya and the ‘homegrown ’ terrorism in the US) and game simulation