Liquid Terrorism: Altruistic Fundamentalism in the Context of Liquid Modernity

• Published in: Sociology (Oxford) Vol. 44; no. 4; pp. 678 - 694
• Main Author: Best, Shaun
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.08.2010; Sage Publications; Sage Publications Ltd; Cambridge University Press
• Subjects: Altruism; Bauman, Zygmunt; Bauman, Zygmunt (1925-2017); Bomber aircraft; Consumerism; Durkheim, Emile; Durkheim, Emile (1858-1917); England; Explosives; Fluids; Gratification; Human dignity; Islam; Liquefaction; Liquids; London, England; Males; Martyrdom; Martyrs; Men; Modernity; Modernization; Motivation; Muslims; Narratives; Religious fundamentalism; Risk and disasters sociology; Sociology; Sociology of knowledge and sociology of culture; Sociology of leisure and mass culture; Studies; Suicide; Suicide bombers; Suicide bombings; Terrorism; Trials; Trust; United Kingdom; Victimology; United Kingdom > UK; Bauman; liquid modernity; martyr; altruism; suicide bomber; Durkheim; Terrorism; Altruism; Narrative analysis; Trust; Modernity; Fundamentalism; Zygmunt Bauman; Durkheim (E.)
• ISSN: 0038-0385; 1469-8684
• DOI: 10.1177/0038038510369355

Liquid life is the name that Zygmunt Bauman gives to the experience of life within 'liquid modernity' - a form of modernity in which social frameworks and institutions experience a process of accelerating liquefaction. On the basis of a narrative analysis of martyr videos recorded by the 7 July 2005 London bombers and eight men who stood trial in the United Kingdom for planning to bomb transatlantic airliners with home-made liquid explosives, a core set of altruistic motivations were found to emerge. Liquid modernity appears to have no space for martyrs who reject the instant survival-and-gratification consumerism for other longer term communal goals. Such a stance is incomprehensible and irrational for the liquid moderns. Fundamentalism rooted in a form of Durkheimian altruism provides confidence, trust and self-assurance to people who would otherwise be stripped of human dignity and humiliated in the face of consumer revelry.