Criminal profiling - Term Paper Example

hat the “religious” aspect brings to the equation of profiling of terrorists prompted me to investigate further on how criminal profiling practices and theories, learnt in the class are applicable to such multi-dimensional problems. These complexities include deconstructing political motives from extreme religious beliefs, interpreting historical feuds with a neutral outlook, understanding whether profiling should be conducted for a person (the terrorist), a sect (terrorist group), a religion or a process (training camps).

United Nations Conventions targeting Terrorism have been occurring since the 60s, and national anti-terrorism laws have been conceptualized since 1970s-80s. UN and other international conventions have focused their responsiveness to protection of civil aviation and embassies’ staff, protection against abuse of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destructions, rigid monitoring and control on trans-national terrorist acts, restrictions and control of money directed towards financing terrorism.

Following the terrorist attacks in numerous parts of the globe, each country (and collectively as International bodies) has developed anti-terrorism laws, policies and practices to combat terrorism. However, it is interesting to note that UN and nation-states are still struggling to gain consensus on “defining” terrorism (or justification of violence), especially religious in nature. The geopolitical nature of “religious” terrorism acts as a double-edged sword that on one hand provokes the risk that such behavior is criminalized, while on the other hand falls under the protection of fundamental rights (or freedom of expression).

This paper would look into the sociological, neurobiological, and psychological theories of crime and build parallels, hypothesis and conclusions in context to acts of religious terrorism. Understanding such parallels would highlight the similarities (relevance) and deviations between criminal profiling and terrorism