Cost–Benefit Decision-Making and Lone-Actor Terrorism

The primary conceptual underpinning of understanding offender decision making is that they are rational actors. This chapter applies rational-choice approaches that are used to understand everyday criminals to the problem of lone-actor terrorism. The first section poses the question: who are the lone actor terrorists? It is established that they are a broad set of individuals; no profile exists, and they are varied in terms traits and pathways into terrorism. The second section discusses the rationality of lone actor terrorists in terms of the decision-making processes surrounding choosing a target and hostile reconnaissance. Decisions about when, where, and how to carry out a particular attack derive from simple cost-benefit analyses, including anticipated and unexpected costs. The next section discusses how cost-benefit analyses can be used to disrupt lone-actor terrorism through detection and deterrence. The final section consists of several illustrative examples. This is followed by suggestions of basic prevention mechanisms to counter lone-actor terrorism based on the situational qualities of their behaviour.