Who Sympathizes with Osama bin Laden? Revisiting the Hearts and Minds of Pakistani and Indonesian Muslim People

Abstract

This article is designed to explore the elements of calculus behind Muslims' support of bin Laden in light of al Qaeda's objectives in Indonesia and Pakistan. It-guided by ideas in scapegoat theory, religious theory, and rationalist theory-taps into survey data to fully investigate the demand side of determinants contributing to the popular approval of bin Laden. Local population in Pakistan and Indonesia is more prone to be supportive of bin Laden's appeals based on their political calculus. Neither sociotropic dissatisfaction nor personal economic frustration robustly explains the variance of support for bin Laden. This analysis also suggests that neither religiosity nor the attachment to political Islam is an effective predictor of one's positive faith in bin Laden.