Contemporary Politics
Alexander123
Lecture2-Causesandconsequences2022.pptx
The rise and rise of conspiracy theories (and the collapse of common sense)
During the course of
this presentation.
Why are conspiracy theories on the rise?
What are the psychological reasons?
What are the economic reasons?
What are the political reasons?
My essay question
Using relevant theories critically explain the rise of conspiracy theories in recent years and their impact on politics and society.
Example conspiracy theory
The idea that the Democrats ‘stole’ the 2020 Presidential election through massive electoral fraud.
So far, no credible evidence has been advanced to support the idea that this is a vast conspiracy.
However, the idea has been widely spread in the media and elsewhere.
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Potential consequences
A continuing rise in political polarisation
A rise in distrust in politicians, the media, and the system in general
Creates an excuse to de-legitimise the Biden Presidency leading to further gridlock
Undermines the rule of law
Worse case scenario – leads to violence (as we saw on January the 6th)
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Recap – What is a conspiracy theory
‘An effort to explain some event or practice by reference to the machinations of powerful people, who attempt to conceal their role (at least until their aims are accomplished’.
Logic and evidence is cheating;
The bad guys are pure evil;
Everything is connected;
Oversimplifies massively complicated events;
Experts are idiots;
Impossible to disprove;
Covid-19
The Masked Singer was created a year ago (before the pandemic) to make masks look cool and to convince the public it was a good idea to wear one
Distinction
However, a distinction needs to be made between:
Conspiracy theories that turn out to be true (Watergate, MK Ultra etc).
Those that are yet to be proven (most of them)
Hence unproven or unjust conspiracy theories
Academic Study
As discussed last week, conspiracy theories have become a legitimate area of academic study. This has mostly focused on their causes and consequences.
This includes a focus on:
Sociology
Politics
Psychology
Economics
No one field can completely explain their appeal and rise.
Can be divided into mechanical/theoretical reasons.
No one reason or theory explains everything.
Also, different reasons and theories arguably apply in different countries.
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Why the rise in conspiracy theories?
Firstly, has their been a rise, or are people simply more aware of them?
Or are people simply more willing to articulate them out loud in public?
As we discussed last week, conspiracy theories existed in the 19th century and before.
However, the late 20th century has seen a boom in them. Being applied not just to politics but all areas of life.
They have become increasingly wild (but I would say that, I’m a member of the liberal elite and part of the conspiracy)
The early 20th century (pre-Kennedy assassination)
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The decline of religion?
“It’s drowning all your old rationalism and scepticism, it’s coming in like a sea; and the name of it is superstition.” The first effect of not believing in God is to believe in anything: “And a dog is an omen and a cat is a mystery.” – GK Chesterton
Often misquoted as ‘When a man stops believing in God he doesn’t then believe in nothing, he believes anything’.
There may be an argument here that the decline of a single religious authority and the rise of atheism removed gatekeepers who would otherwise have blocked conspiracy theories.
However, ignores the central role the church has played in promoting conspiracy theories over the years e.g. Brother Charles, the Vatican etc
This is a very vague woolly argument and best avoided in a 2000 word essay.
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The rise of hidden actors?
World War Two, and then the subsequent Cold War saw the creation of security agencies like MI5, MI6, CIA, NSA etc.
Previously civil servants had been relatively anonymous, but not hidden, figures i.e. you could find out their names and roles if needed.
These agencies created a whole new layer of hidden bureaucracy deliberately concealed from public view.
This ‘shadow’ bureaucracy raised important questions about accountability, transparency etc.
They were also easy to blame.
Due to the media citizens new that these organisations existed but not what they did.
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Image of the CIA logo
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McCarthyism
The ‘Reds under the beds’ paranoia of 1950s America included Senator McCarthy and others (Donald Trump’s political mentor Roy Cohn) launching a years long campaign that communists had infiltrated every part of society.
There was a collective hysteria in the media and elsewhere that there was a conspiracy against the US people
While not the first conspiracy endorsed by a major political figures, it was perhaps the most significant up till that point
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An increase in leisure time
The 1950s saw the introduction of welfare states in many Western nations.
This combined with better regulation of working hours gave many people the freedom and financial resources needed for hobbies.
In some cases it gave people the free time needed to study and spread conspiracy theories.
For instance, during lockdown the amount of time people could spend online increased significantly
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Some conspiracy theories turned out to be true
The last few decades have seen some former conspiracy theories unmasked as being true:
Watergate;
MK Ultra;
The plot of kill Castro;
Echelon 4;
Many many others…
Government promotion
Some authoritarian governments have used conspiracy theories to cement their own grip on power and influence public mood
Blame minority groups (The Protocols of the Elders of Zion were originally created by the Russian secret police in the 19th century)
Today we see it all over the world in authoritarian regimes and some supposedly democratic ones.
A good example would be Orban’s government in Hungary blaming George Soros for everything.
You could argue that populism and authoritarianism often go hand in hand with conspiracy theories.
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The weaponization of conspiracy theories
Fighting real wars is expensive, often unpopular, and runs the risk of losing (and nuclear conflict).
Information warfare and hacking is much more cost-effective
Destabilise your enemies from a distance with no risk to yourself
The rise of troll farms in most countries
Creating, spreading, and promoting conspiracy theories to destabilise their enemies
Russia and it’s applies have become extremely efficient at this
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‘“Doubt is our product” since it is the best means of competing with the ‘body of fact’ that exists in the minds of the public’ – 1969 tobacco industry executive
Using phrases like:
Alternative facts
Fake news
Many sides
Different perspectives
Uncertainties
Multiple ways of knowing
Media deregulation
The late 70s/early 80s saw a rise in neo-liberal governments all over the world.
They pushed through laws de-regulating the media.
This had two consequences.
Companies were given more freedom to publish whatever they wanted in pursuit of readers/ratings.
Also, a concentration in media ownership (Rupert Murdoch and the rise of Fox News).
Decline of the mainstream media as gatekeepers
The mainstream media (certainly newspapers) has been in decline for some time now
Their traditional role as gatekeepers has been eroded. Conspiracy theories that would never have been allowed into the press can now enter the body politic
Although it could be argued that the media barons now have less influence to inject their own pet conspiracy theories directly into the publics minds.
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The monetarisation of conspiracy theories
While conspiracy theories had existed before this, the murder of Presidency Kennedy arguably created a conspiracy industry.
There was a sudden huge interest in who had killed Kennedy and why?
Adorno in the 1930s argued that culture would eventually become standardised. Also, people didn’t want new things, they wanted things like what they already owned.
Conspiracy books became a massive industry.
Tens of thousand had been published on the JFK assassination despite the fact they all broadly contain the same information.
News also became subject to the culture industry.
The rise of infotainment
The collapse in people paying for the media/advertising has created a ferocious competition for audience.
Traditional news values that would explain why a story is news (Galtung and Ruge, 1965), have been replaced by newer ones e.g. entertainment, negativity, shareability (Harcup and O’Neill, 2001, 2016).
Conspiracy theories meet many of the important news criteria.
The rise of infotainment
Increased focus on clickbait news headlines.
For instance…
Focussed on entertainment.
Speculation about past, current, present events.
Have a low factual content (facts are often dull).
Quickly and cheaply produced (no fact checking).
Contain recycled information (which if often wrong).
Willing to engage with ideas and theories traditionally ignored (anything to get those viewers/clicks).
Modern news
Even supposedly respectable news outlets have given worrying amounts of time and space to conspiracy theories (even if merely to debunk/mock them)
There has to be a distinction here between news agencies.
Those that generate conspiracy theories – Alex Jones and Infowars
Those that promote conspiracy theories – The Daily Express and downmarket tabloids.
Those that give air time to conspiracy theories (split into):
Those that openly advocate conspiracy theories
Those that give air time to conspiracy theories while trying to debunk them
The media’s obsession with balance meant that often marginal or discredited viewpoints are given equal time.
The media can then claim they’re giving both sides of the story.
However, there aren’t always two equal and opposite sides to every story.
There are not two equal and opposite arguments with regards to climate change.
Conspiracy theories are sometimes given airtime/coverage for this reason.
Social Media
Social media has given everyone a platform and a voice.
We’ve effectively made everyone a publisher.
Access is cheap and virtually unlimited.
Gives people the power to publish anonymously freeing them from the consequences of their actions.
Also allows individuals to become celebrities and monetarise their conspiracies.
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Echo chambers
The rise of the internet and social media produced several unintended consequences.
One was the creation of ‘bubbles’.
Conspiracy theorists could now connect directly with each other all over the planet.
In the real world these people might have had to engage with dissenting voices, or rational arguments that could talk them out of the conspiracy theory.
Instead they latched onto comforting online communities that agreed with them and reinforced their own views ten-fold.
The Culture Industry
1968 saw the debut of the Prisoner. A science-fiction/fantasy thriller where a former spy is kidnapped and held prisoner.
During his confinement in the village he is brainwashed repeatedly and his perception of truth and reality broken down
Crucially he never discovers if it any enemy power doing this to him or his own government (it is implied at the end that there are no separate governments and society is controlled by vast conspiracy)
Crucially, one of the first pieces of conspiracy focused entertainment where are no good guys
This was followed by a raft of paranoid conspiracy thrillers in the 1970s like the Parallax View, Three days of the Condor, All the Presidents Men
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TV Nation
The 80s continued this trend with even actions series aimed at children like the A-team, Knightrider, Airwolf etc implying that the government could not be trusted.
The apex of this was arguably the X-Files on Fox (1993) which every week followed the investigation of a conspiracy theory and the government (at it height it was watched by 20 million viewers a week
It’s particularly important because the rational scientist sceptic character (Scully) was usually shown to be wrong.
This saw a boom in conspiracy shows and films (24, Edge of darkness, Utopia,) to the extent that the conspiracy genre has become one of the most dominant forms of entertainment
Even children's entertainment is not immune (Zootopia, Gravity Falls)
Official endorsement
Some politicians and public figures have given their official endorsements to conspiracy theories e.g. Trump, his children, General Flynn etc
Also endorsement by others…
Celebrity endorsement
Celebrities have become one of the chief promoters of conspiracy theories.
Various reasons why this might be:
Celebrities often live in a world where no one will say no to them and point out they’re wrong.
Celebrities sometimes take drugs that have not entirely benign effects on their mental health.
C and D list celebrities can use conspiracy theories as a way of getting more social media attention (or even a second career).
Kanye West won’t take his meds…
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Mental illness
Worldwide a rise in anxiety, stress, and depression.
This is due to worsening work environments, pollution, the stress of urban living, the breakdown of traditional family support networks, poor diets, disrupted sleep patterns, social media etc.
Living with nonstop anxiety, stress, and depression creates a fertile breeding ground for paranoia and conspiracy theories.
Academics
Some academics directly (protected by academic freedom and tenure)
Academics as bad faith actors (seduced by money from think tanks and big business)
Well meaning academic suffering from Nobel fallacy (there are a lot of these about)
Post-modernists (don’t get me started on them)
The rise of post-modernism
Post-modernism, pioneered in France in the 1960s rejected traditional narratives and frameworks like modernism, structuralism, Marxism etc.
They argued that there was no one-truth and everything was relative.
History and other social truths are constructed
They even argued that science was socially constructed
This is a very very dangerous path - see the Sokal Affair
The rise of the ‘me’ generation
In his 1979 classic Christopher Lasch argued that Americans were increasingly defined by:
Self-gratification
Attention craving
Looking out for Number 1
Impulse driven
Short attention spans
Contrast with the ‘greatest generation’ myth that went before
Conclusion
Conspiracy theories are complicated.
Their rise and rise cannot be simply explained by one theory or set of ideas.
These reasons vary depending on the conspiracy theory.
Also from person to person and country to country.
There is a big financial motivation underpinning it though as well as issues with late 20th/early 21st century life
This will be explored in more detail in the seminars
