Seminar paper from the year 2012 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Topic: Peace and Conflict Studies, Security, grade: B, University of Canberra, language: English, abstract: The controversy surrounding the definition of terrorism has led to minimalistic approaches to the issue thus reducing a clear cut understanding of what terrorism entails. The fact that the practice is fuelled by emotional and political motivation makes it even more difficult for scholars to come to a common ground on what really constitutes terrorism if at all a definition cannot surmise. However, the studies in terrorism activities have given better insight than all politically self serving semantic propaganda that everyone uses to justify or condemn terrorism. A close analysis of a terrorist group in an existing socio political and economic context is the only valid method to help us understand what terrorism is and all the other germane issues that surround the controversial subject. For this purpose, I have selected the most well known terrorist group in the world al-Qaeda as a case study to try and understand the fundamental issues that make it the most feared group and what qualifies it as a terrorist group in the first place.