nonstate actor

English

Alternative forms

• non-state actor, non state actor

Noun

nonstate actor (plural nonstate actors)

1. An organization or other group whose behavior significantly affects political, economic, or strategic interactions between countries or major events within a country, but that is not itself a recognized country or a representative of a recognized country.
   • 2001 October 31, Tony Karon, “Halloween Word for the Pundits: Quagmire”, in Time, retrieved 24 May 2018:

     Nobody's particularly optimistic that the Afghan civil war that began almost a decade ago is going to end any time soon. […] [T]his is a new type of war against a non-state actor, in which the definitions, strategies and yardsticks of all previous conflicts no longer apply.

   • 2004 April 5, Douglas Jehl, David E. Sanger, “New to the Job, Rice Focused On More Traditional Threats”, in New York Times, retrieved 24 May 2018:

     “It wasn't until after Sept. 11 that most of us realized that for the first time in human history,” Mr. Blacker said, “a nonstate actor, a group of religious extremists at the very bottom of the international system, had the capability to inflict devastating damage on the very pinnacle of the international system.”

   • 2013 Winter, Robert J. Bunker, "Defeating Violent Nonstate Actors," Strategic Studies Institute—U.S. Army War College (retrieved 24 May 2018):

     The threats represented by violent nonstate actors are as old as the earliest states. Bandits, raiders, and pirates have plagued civilized peoples around the globe for millennia.

   • 2017 March 13, Charlotte England, “News media do under-report some terror attacks”, in Independent, UK, retrieved 24 May 2018:

     [T]he Global Terrorism Database (GTD) […] defines terrorism as “the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence by a non-state actor to attain a political, economic, religious, or social goal through fear, coercion, or intimidation.”