Channels, Fall 2017

Page 97 Channels • 2017 • Volume 2 • Number 1 1970s. Beginning in the mid-1970s, Greece has experienced enduring, systemic terrorist activity against their civic institutions. 43 Most of this activity is perpetrated by revolutionary guerrilla terrorist groups seeking to achieve various, though uniformly leftist, political ends. 44 The activity of Greece’s homegrown terrorist groups masks the effects of immigration and makes it difficult to discern how much of its 2007-2011 spike in terrorism was caused by pre-existing Greek extremism and how much by immigration from terror-prone nations. That being said, the peaks in terror-prone immigration and terrorist activity—though separated by time—are similar enough to lend support to the idea that immigration played a role in the increased terrorist activity. Additionally, the notion of a delay between the influx of migrants and increased terrorist activity is not unsupported. Research suggests that radicalization of migrants is related to the discontentment fostered by a lack of assimilation into the host nation. 45 Thus, it is reasonable to assume that migrant radicalization would not occur right away. The percolation of sufficient levels of economic and social distress would take some amount of time. This concept lends weight to the position that increased terrorism in Greece could be related to a delayed instead of immediate response to immigration from terror-prone nations. Meanwhile, Canada’s negative correlation between immigration and terrorism further reinforces our overall conclusion that it is immigration from terror-prone nations that leads to the spread of terrorism to new regions and not simply immigration in general that accomplishes this end. Existing research suggests that immigration itself is naturally negatively related to terrorism unless the migrants originate from a terror-prone nation or region. 46 Therefore, Canada’s negative correlation between immigration and terrorism is exactly what one would expect if our hypothesis was correct given its relatively low levels of migrants from terror-prone nations. Conclusion Conflict, poverty, and adverse political environments over the last several decades have prompted a significant rise in international immigration. Recent reports estimate that the number of international migrants reaches well over 232 million. 47 During roughly this same period of increased migration, terrorism has become an increasingly prominent and deadly phenomena. Whether these two factors are related is a matter of intense debate wherever individuals meet to discuss issues of national and international concern. Our research shows that, as predicted in our hypothesis, increased terrorism is linked to increased migration from terror-prone nations and regions. The data from Germany and Turkey display a strong positive correlation between asylum-seeker migration and 43 George Kassimeris, “Greece: The Persistence of Political Terrorism,” International Affairs 89, no. 1 (2013): 132. 44 Ibid, 138. 45 Nicholson, “Swedish Open Immigration Policies - Correlation with Terrorism,” 199. 46 Bove and Bohmelt, “Does Immigration Induce Terrorism?” 584. 47 Ibid, 572.