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Methods and Findings in the Study of Suicide Terrorism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2008

ROBERT A. PAPE*
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
*
Robert A. Pape is Professor of Political Science, University of Chicago, 5028 S. University Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637 (rpape@uchicago.edu).

Abstract

Scott Ashworth, Joshua Clinton, Adam Meirowitz, and Kristopher Ramsay (2008) allege that I have committed the sin of sampling on the dependent variable by considering only the universe of suicide terrorist attacks rather than the universe of all imaginable instances when potential or actual terrorists might have committed suicide attacks, and so cannot measure the effects of any independent variables. They go on to describe a method that they say I should have used, which is not of interest because the accusation that is supposed to motivate this discussion is inaccurate.

The main claim—that my work on suicide terrorism samples on the dependent variable—is simply wrong. Indeed, the authors paid no attention to the large portions of my recent book that explain what we know about factors that make resort to suicide terrorist campaigns more or less likely, and how we know it. Hence, this letter is mainly devoted to updating Ashworth, Clinton, Meirowitz, and Ramsay on my work. I also make a few comments about the general question of whether concerns about “sample bias” should carry significant weight when dealing with the complete universe of a phenomenon, as is the case in my work on suicide terrorism.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 2008

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References

REFERENCES

Ashworth, Scott, Clinton, Joshua D., Meirowitz, Adam, and Ramsay, Kristopher W.. 2008. “Design, Inference, and The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.” American Political Science Review 102 (2): 269273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pape, Robert A. 2003. “The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism.” American Political Science Review 97 (August): 343–61.Google Scholar
Pape, Robert A. 2005. Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism. New York: Random House, 2005.Google Scholar