The Internet, New Media, and the Evolution of Insurgency

Abstract

Introduction Insurgency, like war, has an enduring nature and a changing character. It remains a strategy entailing violence used by the weak and desperate against a power system. (1) Often (but not always), this pits a nonstate or proto-state organization against a state. Out of weakness, the organization using a strategy of insurgency attempts to shift the focus of conflict away from domains where the state or other power structure is particularly strong, particularly the conventional military. Insurgents seek to make domains decisive where morale and other psychological characteristics matter more than tangible power, recognizing these characteristics even the odds to a certain extent. The enduring nature of insurgency includes three core functions: an insurgency must survive, it must strengthen itself, and it must weaken the power structure or state. How an insurgency accomplishes these three objectives constitutes the changing character of the phenomenon. Throughout the long history of insurgency there have been multiple types or models. Today, three exist in various parts of the world. One is the proto-state. Derived from the Maoist movements of the twentieth century, this is often considered the gold standard for any insurgency. In this model, an insurgency weakens the state through guerrilla attacks, terrorism, subversion, and psychological operations while it simultaneously serves the functions of the state in areas it controls. By demonstrating that it can provide better services than the existing state, it hopes to win support and eventually replace the existing government. This type of insurgency was particularly effective in peasant societies where active popular support mattered greatly; hence, the insurgents and the state competed for that support. In the classic Maoist method, final victory comes when the insurgency is the equal of the state politically, militarily, and economically. The organizations created by Mao and his best student--Ho Chi Minh--ultimately won conventional military victories over the Chinese and Vietnamese and were immediately prepared to assume the role of the state. The second model--and one which is more controversial among insurgency theorists--is nonpolitical. Rather than seeking to replace the state, this type of insurgent simply wants to weaken the state sufficiently to be free of its control. Normally, it is the insurgent's intent to practice some form of organized criminal activity. Like organized crime everywhere, these insurgents seek passivity more than active popular support. The methods of such insurgents, though, are quite similar to the politically focused insurgent. Mexico today is one example of this while some other insurgencies that began life as protostate insurgencies eventually devolved into nonpolitical or what might be called commercial insurgencies. (2) Examples of these include the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) in Colombia, Shining Path in Peru, and a number of African movements. The third model consists of insurgencies that hope to replace the state but, because they are unable to control significant territory, approach the goal of destroying the state and replacing it in a sequential rather than simultaneous manner. Their initial focus is destruction. Again, active support is less important than passivity. They use a dispersed, networked organization and rely on the swarming method of attacks dominated by terrorism rather than guerrilla or conventional military operations. To augment their ability to survive and increase their own strength, they develop an important transnational dimension. Since traditional, Maoist style insurgencies seek to carve out, administer, and govern areas, they are intimately connected to specific locales and populations in those locales. Because networked insurgencies do not seek or are unable to develop liberated areas which they administer and govern, they are less intimately linked to specific locales and populations. …