Comparing Transnational Networks – Terrorist Networks and International Law Networks

Transnational network theory is a very hot topic these days.  Part of it is the crossover effect of a new organizing tool from another discipline – we law professors are great hunter-gatherers across many fields – and part of it is a drive to account for new and rising forms of transnational organization and coordination.  I have been working fitfully on a piece on legitimacy and transnational networks.  Transnational network theory has been invoked as a new mechanism for pushing forward global governance, as earlier vanguard movements such as transnational civil society or straight-up global constitutionalism seem to have stalled.  It has been invoked in new forms of global governance that are not precisely political liberal internationalism – the rise of global administrative law, for example, and the assertion of technocracy networks over more sweeping and direct political governance claims.  And transnational network theory is also starting to face a reality check, in the form of scholarship cautioning that transnational governance networks have limits on what they can do – limits that are likely to emerge in such areas as global financial regulation – notably this recent article by Pierre-Hugues Verdier, Transnational Regulatory Networks and Their Limits.

But our very own Chris Borgen has a new piece up on SSRN that is well worth reading, comparing transnational networks of terror groups with transnational networks of international law and counterterrorism.  Chris is apparently far too modest to post his own piece up (I myself never have more than twinges that way, and anyway easily overcome) so I thought I would do it.  I read it as part of my transnational networks research and found it wryly astute in capturing important similarities and differences in two normatively profoundly opposed networks.  This is the abstract on SSRN, A Tale of Two Networks: Terrorism, Transnational Law, and Network Theory.  Highly recommended, as Larry Solum might say.

It has become a standard conceit in counterterrorism policy to describe al Qaeda and similar such transnational organizations as networks. At the same time, among a scholars focused on topics such as cross-border regulatory regimes, transnational litigation, and the structures of public international law, there has been an increasing consideration of law and legal institutions as being a part of one or more networks. This essay, prepared for the Oklahoma City University School of Law symposium, “Military Commissions and Congress’s Role in the War on Terror,” is thus the tale of two networks: what happens when the network of terror and the network of law collide. 

After and introductory section, Part II will briefly introduce the network theory and use it to describe the mechanisms of al Qaeda’s terror network. Part III will turn to how network theory has affected counterterrorism strategy, particularly emphasizing intelligence analysis and the use of legal regimes to leverage strengths. Part IV will return to network theory more broadly and ask how the network of law can be adjusted to be more effective in disrupting the terrorists’ network. This essay concludes that, despite the hostility of the Bush Administration to international law and that Administrations’ efforts to circumvent existing domestic legal regimes, the network of domestic and international laws, including the protection of civil liberties, is a crucial component to a successful counterterrorism strategy. 

From “smart mobs” to “netwars;” from narcotrafficking to the Internet, network theory has provided insights into decentralized social organization and coordinated action. Both sides in the “War on Terror” are networked and are themselves networks. This article attempts to grapple how social organization is evolving in the 21st century and how this evolution affects counterterrorism.