Overview

Taking a global and interdisciplinary approach, the Routledge Handbook of Conspiracy Theories provides a comprehensive overview of conspiracy theories as an important social, cultural and political phenomenon in contemporary life. This handbook provides the most complete analysis of the phenomenon to date. It analyses conspiracy theories from a variety of perspectives, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. It maps out the key debates, and includes chapters on the historical origins of conspiracy theories, as well as their political significance in a broad range of countries and regions. Other chapters consider the psychology and the sociology of conspiracy beliefs, in addition to their changing cultural forms, functions and modes of transmission. This handbook examines where conspiracy theories come from, who believes in them and what their consequences are. This book presents an important resource for students and scholars from a range of disciplines interested in the societal and political impact of conspiracy theories, including Area Studies, Anthropology, History, Media and Cultural Studies, Political Science, Psychology and Sociology.

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9780815361749

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Reviews

This handbook is an essential resource for researchers. Its broadly accessible, insightful essays cover a range of topics from different disciplines and about different nations, and it demonstrates the importance of conspiracy theories in contemporary politics and society. -- Mark Fenster, Levin College of Law at University of Florida, USA This wide-ranging collection brings together many different strands of scholarship on conspiracy theories. Sociologists, political theorists, historians, psychologists, and philosophers provide new and compelling ways to examine who believes in these theories, why they believe them, and what we can do about them. An essential exploration of one of the defining features of our age. -- Kathryn Olmsted, University of California, USA

Author Information

Michael Butter is professor of American Studies at the University of Tübingen, Germany. He is the author of Plots, Designs, and Schemes: American Conspiracy Theories from the Puritans to the Present (2014) and The Nature of Conspiracy Theories (2020). Peter Knight is professor of American Studies at the University of Manchester, UK. He is the author of Conspiracy Culture (2000), The Kennedy Assassination (2007) and Reading the Market (2016) and editor of Conspiracy Nation (2002) and Conspiracy Theories in American History: An Encyclopedia (2004). Together they directed the COST Action COMPACT [Comparative Analysis of Conspiracy Theories].

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