Transnational Terrorist Recruitment: Evidence from Daesh Personnel Records

Anne Brockmeyer, Quy-Toan Do, Clément Joubert (), Mohamed Abdel Jelil and Kartika Bhatia

No 8381, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: Global terrorist organizations attract radicalized individuals across borders and constitute a threat for both sending and receiving countries. The paper provides plausibly-identified evidence on the drivers of transnational terrorist recruitment. Using unique personnel records from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, a.k.a. Daesh), it shows how economic opportunities and migration costs interact to explain the spatial pattern of foreign participation in the terrorist group. Poor labor market opportunities generally push more individuals to join Daesh, but they hamper recruitment in countries far away from the organization?s headquarters, as migration costs are large and liquidity constraints may bind.

Keywords: Employment and Unemployment; Educational Sciences; International Terrorism&Counterterrorism; Armed Conflict; Labor Markets; Rural Labor Markets; Social Cohesion (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018-03-27
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:8381

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