I present a unified discussion of several recently published results
concerning the escalation, timing and severity of violent events in human
conflicts and global terrorism, and set them in the wider context of real-world
and cyber-based collective violence and illicit activity. I point out how the
borders distinguishing between such activities are becoming increasingly
blurred in practice -- from insurgency, terrorism, criminal gangs and
cyberwars, through to the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings and London riots. I review
the robust empirical patterns that have been found, and summarize a minimal
mechanistic model which can explain these patterns. I also explain why this
mechanistic approach, which is inspired by non-equilibrium statistical physics,
fits naturally within the framework of recent ideas within the social science
literature concerning analytical sociology. In passing, I flag the fundamental
flaws in each of the recent critiques which have surfaced concerning the
robustness of these results and the realism of the underlying model mechanisms.