Conspiracy Theories and Their Vicissitudes

Abstract

As already noted in Chapter 1, contemporary debates about conspiracy theories, particularly in the media, are often underpinned by the implicit assumption that there is something distinctly modern (or postmodern) about their presence in society. The findings that a particular conspiracy theory is believed by a high proportion of the population, or the realisation that yet another conspiracy theory book made it onto the bestsellers list, tend to be accompanied by concerns that paranoia, suspicion and mistrust are sweeping the planet and that the present, more than any other period in history, deserves the label ‘the age of conspiracism’.