Blood and Ink! The Common-Interest-GameBetween Terrorists and the Media

Abstract

It has often been pointed out in the literature that a symbiotic relationship exists betweennterrorist groups and the media. As yet, however, no formal model has been built based on thisnissue and only very little empirical research has been done in this field. The presentncontribution builds a simple game theoretic model, focussing on the social interactionsnbetween terrorists and the media. The model has features of a common-interest-game andnresults in multiple equilibria. After a discussion of the policy implications of the model, annempirical analysis is performed. Using newspaper coverage, terror incidents and terror fatalities data, it is shown that media attention and terrorism do mutually Granger cause eachnother, as predicted by the model. Moreover, it is explained why terror attacks tend to ben“bloodier” in developing countries than in Europe and the United States.