MEASURING AND UNDERSTANDING THE IMPACT OF TERRORISM

The largest category of lone wolf attacks in the
West was political attacks. There were 37
political lone wolf attacks which caused 110
deaths and 135 injuries. The biggest political
lone wolf attack took place in Norway in 2011
when far-right terrorist Anders Breivik
conducted two attacks in one day. These killed
77 people including children attending a youth
camp run by a political party. The United States
had the most incidents of lone wolf political
terrorism with 21 different attacks, 13 of which
resulted in deaths. Extremist political views
were also prevalent in attacks in the United
States, with lone wolf attackers motivated by a
desire to bring about a political revolution,
anarchism and anti-government sentiments,
opposition to opponents of gay marriage and
opposition to proponents of abortion.
The United States also had the most incidents
of Islamic fundamentalist lone wolf attacks
with 12 attacks that killed 19 and injured 308
people. The majority of deaths in the United
States were from an attack by Major Nidal
Malik Hasan who killed 13 and injured 32 of
his fellow soldiers on a military base in Texas.
This attack has been coded as jihadism due to
statements made by Hasan about his
motivation in the trial. The majority of injuries
Lone wolf terrorism is defined as terrorist acts committed by
individuals who act alone and without the support of a terrorist
organisation.
To code the Lone Wolf Database, IEP categorised attacks in the
Global Terrorism Database from 2006 to 2014. Incidents were
classified as lone wolf terrorism if:
BOX 2 CODING THE LONE WOLF DATABASE
The attack occurred in one of the 38 countries designated as
the West. This includes Europe, Canada, the United States and
Australia.
An attack had no group claiming responsibility.
There were three or fewer perpetrators.
It was coded in the GTD as activity by an individual or unknown
actor (i.e. the act did not involve a known terrorist group).
There was no evidence of external support from a group.
If the motivation of the attacker was unknown or it could not be
established in the circumstances or through searching news
accounts of the attack, then the attack was excluded from coding.
This criteria means that the Madrid bombings in 2004 and the
London bombings of 2005 could not be coded as lone wolf terrorism
as both bombings were conducted by groups. 15
FIGURE 27 INCIDENTS AND DEATHS FROM LONE WOLF ATTACKS IN WESTERN COUNTRIES, 2006–2014
Lone wolf terrorist attacks in the West were largely confined to seven countries: Norway, United States,
France, Netherlands, Belgium, Canada and Australia. Out of the 38 countries in the West, 11 countries had
deaths from lone wolf terrorism and 19 had at least one lone wolf terrorist incident.
NUMBER OF ATTACKS AND DEATHS
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
Attacks
Deaths
0
Source: IEP Lone Wolf Database, START GTD
GLOBAL TERRORISM INDEX 2015 | Terrorism in Western Countries
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