Ontological and epistemological challenges of measuring the effectiveness of urban counterterrorism measures

Abstract

Cities and their citizens are increasingly seen as vulnerable targets for terrorist attacks, and nowadays city planners have become important actors in making decisions about urban security. Multiple urban counterterrorism measures that have affected the urban landscape have been implemented in recent years. Simultaneously, new legislation requires security measures to be effective. This article outlines and discusses the epistemological and ontological challenges of acquiring knowledge about the effectiveness of urban counterterrorism measures from a local city planner's perspective. This piece of work is a discussion paper based on a literature review. We conclude that, despite the knowledge limitations regarding the threat of urban terrorism and associated countermeasures, local planners should refrain from just uncritically implementing urban countermeasures without considering the effectiveness of such measures. Without knowledge on what constitutes the effectiveness of urban security measures, the city might end up infringing the same values that it aims to protect, without achieving security.

Securing Cities in the Global War on Terrorism: The Case of Oslo

“…Firstly, situational prevention measures cannot independently solve the problem of security in the city, since the measures are designed to prevent specific actions against specific targets, and do not affect terrorists' general motivations. These measures will not necessarily cause perpetrators to refrain from other types of acts of terrorism against other targets [33,43]. The displacement effect of target selection is one of the core criticisms against this type of prevention, although the extent of the displacement effect is disputed [40].…”

“…Second, situational prevention measures always require troublesome trade-offs [11,33]. They affect the physical landscape, including streets, squares, libraries, shopping malls and buildings, and they entail values discrepancies regarding aesthetics, legal and ethical issues, environmental considerations, safety, convenience, cost and social inclusion.…”

“…They affect the physical landscape, including streets, squares, libraries, shopping malls and buildings, and they entail values discrepancies regarding aesthetics, legal and ethical issues, environmental considerations, safety, convenience, cost and social inclusion. To what extent these passive security measures benefit the aims of either openness or security is rarely evident because it is hard to prove the effectiveness of such measures [33]. If preventive counterterrorism measures in a city are effective, nothing happens, the city is safe and not the scene of a terrorist attack which makes it impossible to tell whether this is because of the security measures or whether there never exited a threat in the first place.…”

Vurdering av konsekvenser ved etablering av ytre perimeter rundt nytt regjeringskvartal

“…Murer i byene impliserer at trusselen er innenfor. Det finnes lite forskning som sier noe om hva som fungerer, og hva som er balansert sikring som ikke går utover de verdiene man prøver å beskytte (Jore, 2019;Van Um og Pisoiu, 2015). Den forskningen som finnes tar ofte utgangspunkt i land som har et annet trusselbilde enn Norge og er derfor nødvendigvis ikke overførbar.…”

“…Åpenhet og demokrati blir ofte trukket frem i forbindelse med ønsket samfunnsutvikling og hvordan det norske samfunnet skal håndtere 22. juli angrepet og forhindre nye terroranslag, blant annet i Stoltenbergs tale etter 22. juli angrepet. Urbane sikringstiltak har blitt kritisert for å fremme motsatte samfunnsverdier og vaere et utrykk for et samfunn styrt av frykt (Coaffee, O'Hare og Hawkesworth 2009;Jore, 2019). Pullerter, bommer og andre sikringstiltak har en mental påvirkning og symboliserer hvordan vi som samfunn lever med terrorisme.…”