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This article examines the current state of the global jihad movement and offers reflections on its likely trajectory in the foreseeable future. It concludes that while the global jihad temporarily has been set back by the relative decline of the Islamic State, the movement overall benefits from al-Qaeda's regeneration; its ongoing ideological appeal; and its structural decentralization. In the next years, the movement likely will continue to evolve from its current bipolar structure toward an increasingly multipolar entity. Furthermore, it argues that the future jihadi movement will contain a large number of jihadi actors whose relationships will span cooperative, competitive, or mixed engagements, with implications for the movement as a whole. The article highlights several challenges for counterterrorism, including dealing with a complex movement structure; radicalization; socio-political disenfranchisement; the counter-response of societies targeted by jihadist violence; and technological changes. The article concludes with an assessment that in the next two to five years, the global jihad will remain a potent, although not an existential, threat. This article is part of a special project conducted by the Foreign Policy Research Institute, titled: “After the Caliphate: Reassessing the Jihadi Threat and Stabilizing the Fertile Crescent,” which includes a book, a thematic issue of Orbis: FPRI's Journal of World Affairs (Summer 2018), and a series of podcasts. Each element of the project can be found here: https://www.fpri.org/research/after-the-caliphate-project/ .

To date, much of the literature on the financing of terrorism and insurgency has focused at the macro-level on groups involved in financing their organizations through involvement in the drug trade. This paper discusses some of those implications, but argues that to better understand the threat faced by the new generation of jihadists in the West, security forces and intelligence services must also look at the micro-level of how lower level trafficking, drug dealing and petty criminal activity, combined with prison radicalization and ties to the black market and illicit underworld, combine to present a new spin on a longstanding threat. To be sure, the micro-level is even more difficult to counter, given already poor community-police cooperation and relations in the marginalized communities throughout the West. Further, the threat from drug trafficking at the micro-level can be equally as nefarious, as smaller cells are given greater autonomy to finance plots, recruit new members and ultimately conduct attacks in developed democracies. The paper concludes with some policy recommendations geared toward helping host-nations build capacity in critical areas, including law enforcement and intelligence, from the local to the state to the federal level. Disclaimer The analysis and opinions contained in this article are those of the author solely and do not represent the analysis and opinions of The RAND Corporation or any of the other institutions or organizations he is affiliated with. This article is available in Journal of Strategic Security: http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/jss/vol9/iss3/2

These video conference proceedings present panel discussions from a daylong conference on the evolving terrorist threat, which took place on June 27, 2017, in the Washington office of the RAND Corporation. RAND researchers Seth Jones, Colin Clarke, Lynn Davis, Ben Connable, Andrew Hoehn, Jack Riley, and Linda Robinson, along with experts from the larger national security community discuss the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), al-Qa'ida, and other terrorist groups.

Document submitted August 11, 2017, as an addendum to testimony before the House Committee on Homeland Security, Task Force on Denying Terrorists Entry into the United States on July 13, 2017.