A group that fights against a state in order to achieve political goals. In contrast to a guerilla movement, an insurgency group is often militarily focused and may field forces orders of magnitude larger than a traditional armed opposition. An insurgency may also use terrorism or other violent tactics.
Decades of social movement research have confirmed that armed groups often form along networks of information, trust, and reciprocal obligations based on existing nonviolent politicised networks mobilised prior to the adoption of insurgent violence (Boulanger Martel, 2022a). These are then adapted to insurgency by recruiting followers and organising them into a new organisational structure. This approach is often more effective than trying to build a grassroots insurgent organisation from scratch, especially when the original structures are already powerful.
The most militarily effective insurgents are integrated groups with a strong central command and control over local units. These resemble militarized coalitions and can often agree on strategy even in difficult conditions. The Tamil Tigers in the mid-1980s and Hamas in modern times are examples of integrated insurgent organisations. Parochial groups, on the other hand, are dominated by powerful local factions and lack a strong central command. They resemble militarized coalitions with competing objectives and are hard to reform. Examples include the Jaish al-Mahdi in Iraq during the mid-2000s and the contemporary Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.
Vanguard groups are able to change quickly, but they can be vulnerable when leadership is decapitated and their ideological discourse is out of sync with the wider context. They can become integrated by building alliances with local communities, or die out if they are not able to sustain a military struggle. This is the case of al-Shabaab in Somalia, which is largely clan-based and nationalistic in its approach but still retains senior leaders affiliated with global jihad.
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