Terrorism
In November 2004, a Secretary-General of the United Nations report described terrorism as any act "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act". The international community has been slow to formulate a universally agreed, legally binding definition of this crime. These difficulties arise from the fact that the term "terrorism" is politically and emotionally charged. In this regard, Angus Martyn, briefing the Australian parliament, stated,
The international community has never succeeded in developing an accepted comprehensive definition of terrorism. During the 1970s and 1980s, the United Nations attempts to define the term floundered mainly due to differences of opinion between various members about the use of violence in the context of conflicts over national liberation and self-determination.
Sociology of terrorism
Conflict theorists view terrorism as a reaction to injustice, which is probably created in the minds of terrorists due to misguidance, illiteracy, or unrealistic goals, and that violent behaviors expressed by terrorist organizations are the result of individual frustration, aggression or showing a readiness to fight. Political conflict makes people look for ways to explain and solve the problems they are facing. If the conflict is deeply rooted, and the current ideology proves unable to deal with the problems, people begin to turn to other ideologies that can often carry a religious theme to them. This is not to say that all forms of terrorist acts are committed by people that are religious. In 83% of the suicide attackers worldwide, between 1980 and 2003, only 43% were identifiably religious.