Understanding China's War on Terrorism: Top-down Vs. Bottom-up Approaches ; a Case Study of Counterinsurgency in Xinjiang

The approaches to counterterrorism (CT) and counterinsurgency (COIN) can be viewed as a spectrum of tactics, with Top-down and Bottom-up poles. The ideal-type Top-down approach focuses only on killing or capturing the individual terrorist leaders, and perhaps the terrorist cadres as well. Alternately, the ideal-type Bottom-up approach addresses socio-political root causes, running the gamut from addressing and countering specific radical ideologies to altering social-structural pathways to joining the jihad (global or more localized). Both types of tactics have important and unique effects upon an insurgency, ranging from stop-gap measures to durable political solutions. Real-world CT and COIN campaigns are often a mix of both Top-down and Bottom-up tactics. This dissertation investigates China's CT and COIN efforts, highlighting the efficacy of a society-centric approach.