Description
Why would one join someone else’s civil war? Renewed interest in ’foreign fighters’ (FFs) as a form of transnational high-risk activism takes place in compartmentalised academic disciplines like contentious politics, civil war or terrorism studies, with few cross-references. Conceptual definitions are often based on the assumed motivations of the FFs, further contributing to this disconnect. Importantly, the policies of their home countries do not feature prominently. Yet, actors taking up arms and leaving to fight in somebody else’s civil war can be affected by the state policies both directly and indirectly. Using the case-study of Russian FFs leaving to fight in Syria and Iraq (not to be confused with PMCs or mercenaries), this project aims to understand this particular mobilisation and the Russian perception of this phenomenon. Thus, Annamaria’s thesis applies a Social Movement Theory framework to understand high-risk transnational activism and the state’s perceptions. Her research combines interviews, open source biographical data, legal documents, and ethnographic fieldwork.
