Military Power and Ideological Appeals of Religious Extremists

Original

Military Power and Ideological Appeals of Religious Extremists

Luwei Ying

Abstract

The proliferation of terrorist propaganda threatens societies worldwide. Yet, we know little about violent extremists’ strategy in disseminating their ideologies. This article studies the ideological appeals of jihadi groups, among the most prominent contemporary conflict movements, and shows how these groups navigate between religious and secular narratives in response to the fluctuations in their military power. Weaker groups must prioritize their core believers and foreground a more radical religious ideal, while stronger groups seek broader support from more moderate individuals and thus pitch themselves more secularly. I illustrate this dynamic with an original database of 87 magazines published regularly by 35 jihadi groups from 1984 to 2019. Furthermore, I leverage approximately six million tweets from 21,000 ISIS-related accounts in 2015 to examine the jihadists’ mobilization efforts regarding different audiences. Overall, I demonstrate that violent groups put more emphasis on their ideological brand when they are militarily weaker.