THE NEW TERRORISM AND ANALYSIS OF THE PKK IN THE CONTEXT OF LEARNING TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS

Abstract

According to David Rapoport’s Four Waves theory, “modern terrorism” is historically handled in four waves: “anarchist, anti-colonial, new left and religious.” However, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, new terrorism advocates stated that a fifth wave had begun. Al-Qaeda and ISIS terrorist organizations are generally at the center of these discussions as actors of new terrorism. Although the PKK terrorist organization is in the third wave in Rapoport’s classification of terrorist waves, it has sought to change its organizational style, goals, motives and motivation sources, action methods and tactics according to time and environment, with the methods it has experienced and learned from al-Qaeda and ISIS. In this study, the PKK’s search for change, which is called a learning terrorist organization, is analyzed on the basis of the arguments of new terrorism. The main question of the study is whether the PKK can be considered as an actor of new terrorism, such as al-Qaeda and ISIS terrorist organizations.