Dilemmas of fundamentalist non-state actors in international relations

The introductory chapter to this volume canvases a range of dilemmas, problems, and puzzles surrounding non-state actors (NSAs). It convincingly argues that they should be considered as an integral part of IR’s ontology and as a result it presents a robust, power-based typology which seeks to locate four ideal type of NSAs. This chapter addresses what the introductory typology calls fundamentalist groups defined as broadly as possible as holding diverse prioritises, goals, and aims, but identified through discursive and operational extremism and modus. In this chapter, we unpack the dilemmas presented by such NSAs. In short, our departing assumption is that few stereotypes are more frequently associated with non-state actors, of any kind, than that of the fundamentalist - matched perhaps only with the equally problematic idea that poverty alone drives conflict (for example see, Jackson et al, 2011, p. 205; Kreuger, 2008, p. 1)