9/11 as a Trigger for Long-Term Shifts in World Public Opinion

Abstract

Over the last few years, there have been all sorts of public opinion polls concerning the `war on terrorism': in the US and the EU, but also throughout the Islamic and rest of the world. Some of the reported results are disheartening. They suggest that many of the reactions of western leaders to 9/11 and subsequent attacks have in fact been counterproductive. Insofar as they tended to reduce the varied and complex identity of another culture to only one aspect of threat and fear, and thus further contributed to polarization. They reinforced stereotyping and discrimination, albeit mostly unintentionally, and led significant parts of well-meaning mainstream Muslim populations to sympathize with some of the terrorists and their actions. Only recently has there been a change in approach. But the question is whether it is not `too little, too late'.