[1][2] As such, it differs from other forms of targeted killing, in particular, the close type of individual murder, the ancient practice of political assassination.
[2] Many authors do not draw distinction between types of political assassinations and furthermore, and there is no full consensus on the issue.
While revolutionary individual terror and traditional political assassination share the common goal, a major political change, they differ in various aspects: tactics, methods, role, view on the society, and significance of an individual act.
While traditional political assassination may well be clandestine, the efficiency of revolutionary individual terror in a greater extent depends on the publicity of the act.
[4] David C. Rapoport (1971) drew the difference as follows: "...the assassin destroys men who are corrupting the system, while the terrorist destroys a system which has already corrupted everyone it touches..."[5] The roots of individual terror as revolutionary tactics lie in the second half of the 19th century in Europe.