Suicide terrorist through the social mirror

Abstract

This article makes—from the perspective of social sciences—one comparative analysis of two works that have studied in depth one of the most important counter-figures of our times: suicide terrorist. He´s one of the great strangers of the global society—physically near, but culturally distant as Simmel would tell. They are persons that seem to act on other reality´s foreground and with other conduct´s codes. Josetxo Beriain in his work El sujeto transgresor (y transgredido) and Joseba Zulaika in Terrorism: The self-fulfilling prophecy study the suicide terrorist from two different and innovative approaches, that allow to understand better their complexity and the shades ascribing to their acts. The nihilist martyr that Beriain introduces, and the subjective version of the suicide terrorist envelops in counter-terrorism that Zulaika provides, contribute to create new analysis tools and knowledge strategies for understanding better one capital phenomenon of our society.