Engineers of Jihad: The Curious Connection between Violent Extremism and Education (Englisch) Gebundene Ausgabe – 8. März 2016

Many Islamic radicals are better educated than their peers, and a good proportion attended college - with many becoming engineers (Mohammad Atta, Osama bin Laden). The strange part about the latter is that it is a profession we would not naturally associated with a religious movement. Not surprisingly, the authors immediately jump into providing an informal list of such individuals - over a period of decades and a wide geographic area in the Middle East.

Then, taking a more scientific and structured approach, they compile a list of 404 members of violent Islamist groups from 30 nationalities. Of that group, they found biographical information for 326 cases and educational information for 284. Of those, 26 had less than a secondary education, 62 completed secondary education (including madrasas), and 196 had higher education (at least 37 studied in Western countries). The share with higher education worked out to 69%. In 1986-87, when many of the individuals were studied, tertiary enrollment rates in the Arab world averaged 12.2%, leaving little doubt that violent Islamist radicals overall were vastly more educated than their compatriots.

The authors were also able to find the subject of study for 178 of the 196 cases engaged in higher education at some point. The second most numerous group was comprised of 34 individuals who pursued Islamic studies - not surprising. However, the group that came first was engineers - 78 out of the 178, followed by 14 in medicine, 12 in economics and business, and 7 in natural sciences. Overall, the individuals who studied for engineering, medicine, and science represented 56.7%. Among the 42 of the 78 cases for whom they could find the precise discipline, electrical, civil, and computer-related studies predominated.

The preceding pattern generalized except for Saudi Arabia (lower proportion of engineers) and Singapore/Indonesia (higher proportion). (Much less information was available regarding jihadists born/raised in the West. Again, however, engineering was overrepresented - to an even higher degree.)