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Paper short abstract:

Based on ethnographic research in the global North among different marginalized groups, the proposed paper aims to underscore the importance of a threefold approach (contextual, pragmatic and intersectional) to understand the significance of conspiracy-theory beliefs among the subalterns.

Paper long abstract:

While the significance of conspiracy theories (CT) is increasing in the contemporary Western world, and CT beliefs can be found even among those with high cultural capital and political resources, accumulating evidence reveals that they are more likely to be found among the socioeconomically disadvantaged and the racially discriminated, thus correlating CT beliefs, on the one side, and race and class, on the other. How can this correlation be explained, without reproducing deeply-rooted stigmas on the (racially-subaltern) poor – that is to say, without leaping to explanations based on their alleged ignorance, anti-social behaviour, or propensity to be manipulated by charismatic leaders?

By relying on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in different Western EU countries among different disadvantaged communities, both autochthonous and from the global South (Roma camps’ dwellers, white unemployed workers, and African farmworkers), I argue about the importance of adopting a threefold approach in CT research: 1) a contextual approach to understand the social, economic and cultural conditions of acceptability of CTs; 2) a pragmatic approach (what effects people intend to produce by voicing CTs, or which practices they intend to justify) to understand conflicts that develop around CTs; and 3) an intersectional approach to understand the significance of CT-beliefs for dispossessed groups worldwide under the current conjuncture of increasing social inequalities at the global level, without denying the relative privilege of living in the global North.

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Paper short abstract:

Conspiracy theories are an ordinary rather than startling epistemic device. They are employed by everyone in a local urban conflict, irrespective of power and status. Analysis of a rich tapestry of conspiracy narratives hints at the epistemic-social functions which conspiratorial thinking performs.

Paper long abstract:

I am interested in the minimal form of conspiracy theory, which I call “conspiracy narrative”. In a three-year long ethnographic work on a conflict over urban space in post-socialist Sofia, Bulgaria, I documented how all involved parties narrated what was going on (or not) through conspiracy theories. Although stakeholders came from across a spectrum of class and power positions – from marginalised minority groups to professionals and the city administration – they all readily employed conspiracy narratives about each other’s actions. In contrast to most theory in conspiracy theory studies I find that neither “conspiracy theorists” nor their inventions are necessarily marginal and excluded.

The conspiracy narrative perspective lets me decouple my analysis from the usual focus on fringe populations, extreme examples (aliens, the Illuminati, etc.), and recently, tropes about the power of transnational propaganda (Russian, COVID-19…). Little attention has been paid to conspiracy theory as ordinary rather than startling epistemic device. Taking advantage of the rich tapestry of narratives collected (mapped, in addition, to varied social contexts in Sofia), I am able to analyse and draw general conclusions about the epistemic-social functions which conspiratorial thinking performs. It is found to be the cheapest machinery for discursive action: the most accessible tool for critique of the social order. The conspiracy narrative concept further opens the way for developing a discursive mechanics of the interactions between conspiratorial tropes as well as of their cross-linking with non-conspiratorial discourse.

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Paper short abstract:

Many of the motives present in conspiracy theories influencing vaccine hesitancy during COVID-19 pandemic had global reach, however in Dagestan the local motives proved to be much more important. We will show the importance of local conspiracy theories rooted in the colonial relations.

Paper long abstract:

Many of the motives present in conspiracy theories influencing vaccine hesitancy during COVID-19 pandemic had global reach. During our fieldwork in 2021 in Dagestan (southern most republic of Russian Federation) we occasionally heard mentions of Bill Gates, microchips, or monkey DNA present in the vaccines. Although present, such global narrations were expressed without conviction. On the contrary motives that were important for Dagestanis were associated with mistrust towards government and anything it produces. Conspiracy theories in Russia may be seen as a kind of legacy of the Soviet meta-narratives of “the secret war between us and them” (Panchenko 2016). In Dagestan, however, this “secret war” was “not so secret” – we are therefore more inclined to interpret these narratives in relation to the everyday experience of violence and discrimination against the North Caucasus inhabitants. Emotionally loaded narratives about the extermination of Dagestani people re-surfaced during the pandemic, we heard them earlier in the turbulent period of “fight with terrorism”, in particular between 2007-2014, when Dagestanis were deeply concerned about the numbers of their (often innocent) youth becoming victims of anti-terrorist units. Our interlocutors perceived COVID-19 vaccination regulations as imposed by Moscow, despite the federal authorities decision to shift the responsibility for disease control and prevention to regional governments. Using Dagestani examples we will show the importance of local conspiracy theories rooted in the colonial relations.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the relationship between conspiracy theories, populism from below and religious mobilization in contemporary Romania. The explosion of conspiracy theories express an apocalyptic angst caused by cyber-capitalism's polycrises and the feeling that the world ceased to make sense .

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores the relationship between conspiracy theories, populism from below and religious mobilization in Romania. I look at how conspiracy narratives align with non-elite populist rhetoric and how this discourse informs far right political practices and imaginaries. What glues this edifice together are subordinate factions of the Romanian Orthodox church emboldened by the popularity they gained after leading the opposition to pandemic restrictions. This loose coalition might resemble the interwar fascist movement. However, the resonance within its ranks of conspiracy theories offers the imprint of a movement specific to contemporary cyber-capitalism and its legitimacy crises. The text situates conspiracy theories within a broader interpretive spectrum, alongside topics such as rumors, gossips, urban legends, occult practices, and alternative metaphysics. Therefore, it rejects cognitivist approaches that reduce conspiracy theories solely to psychology and resists the 'folkloric' approaches that merely index them. Instead, my investigation looks at how people produce realities from below in their everyday lives, particularly in a context characterized by the climate crisis, the fear of atomic annihilation, financial and economic crises, wars and the decline of the previous international order. The explosion of conspiracy theories in this context is inseparable from an acute apocalyptic angst that feeds into radical religious hope amid loss of sense and meaning. Methodologically, I treat conspiracy theories as ethnographic objects and I investigate the everyday contexts in which they are formulated, debated and amplified thus shedding light on the mechanisms through which conspiracy theories influence public opinion, political (dis)engagement, and (dis)trust in institutions.

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Paper short abstract:

By focussing on certain narratives among “treasure-hunters” in Turkey, this paper explores how a particular way of imagining the past and anticipating the future under conditions of economic precarity gives rise to “the conspiracy theory” as a particular diagnostic of power.

Paper long abstract:

Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork among archaeological looters in Turkey, this paper explores how a particular way of imagining the past and anticipating the future under present-day conditions of economic precarity gives rise to “the conspiracy theory” as a particular diagnostic of power. Looters in Turkey, better known as “treasure-hunters,” are typically people who occupy life-worlds characterised by scarcity, precarity, and indebtedness. Largely as a response to these circumstances, they will carry out illegal expeditions into oft undocumented historical sites, where they believe they might find buried valuables from the past. These semi-clandestine practices tend to draw inspiration from imagined local histories, folklore, and various spiritual beliefs. Here, a certain sense of historicity comes together with a certain perception of material uncertainty in order to give rise to a world where deliberately deceptive apparent forms seem to withhold essential truths from the insufficiently vigilant. For most treasure-hunters, numerous “shady actors” lurk around every corner, treasure-related matters “run deep,” and “things are often not as they seem.” Arguably situated within the wider discursive terrain of conspiratorial narratives in contemporary Turkey, “treasure conspiracies” take on particular forms in relation to the wider circumstances of their purveyors. By focussing on the story of a “mysterious excavation” carried out by the state in Southern Turkey and how this event was interpreted by certain treasure-hunters, this paper attempts to think about some of the ways in which “conspiracy theories” figure into the lives of those who must themselves necessarily “conspire” in order to realize their aspirations.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper critically reflects on the relationship between hegemonic and counter-hegemonic narratives in ‘conspiratorial practices’. Bringing ethnographic insights from research with conspiracist far-right voters in Brazil, it problematises the precariousness of the conspiratorial agent(s).

Paper long abstract:

Conspiracy theories usually emerge only tangentially in ethnographies, rarely becoming their main focus. When they do gain centre stage, anthropologists tend to associate them with affective and meaning-making mechanisms, discarding a pathologizing approach. Part of this literature has explored conspiracy theories as a kind of ‘subaltern talk’: a strategy mobilised by people in the margins of national and global powers with which they could manifest anxieties and imaginaries that would have otherwise remained unexpressed. This has indeed been a tendency observed in ethnographies from the Global South (e.g. Didier Fassin in South Africa, Nayanika Mathur in India), which have diligently tried to answer why and under which circumstances people may embrace conspiracism by showing, for example, how state powers may discredit and ultimately silence marginal(ised) narratives by labelling them as ‘conspiracy theories’.

This paper contributes to the panel’s discussion by critically reflecting on the relationship between hegemonic and counter-hegemonic narratives in ‘conspiratorial practices’. Bringing ethnographic insights from long-term fieldwork with far-right voters who mobilise conspiracy theories in Brazil, the paper wishes to problematise the precariousness of the conspiratorial agent(s). In conversation with recent ethnographies of conspiratorial agents who rather than being in tension or in an antagonistic relationship with state powers, align their discourse to official narratives, this paper examines the dynamic relationship between centre and margins, majority and minorities, empowered and precarious agents, below and above, in order to better account for the on the ground tensions shaping political subjectivities among far-right constituents in Brazil.

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Paper short abstract:

The paper explores the consumption of conspiracy theories in relation to their personal sense of the world among a group of 65+ year-olds in Bucharest, Romania.

Paper long abstract:

The paper reports the initial results of a long-term ethnography on the relation between what is commonly known as “fake news” and social trust in Bucharest, Romania. My research opened two main directions. First, most research participants tend to aggregate different conspiracy theories into a bigger conspiracy with a huge potential to explain the contradictions and inconsistencies in the world. For many, this bigger conspiracy has the quality to possibly reveal the “truth” that is strictly restricted in terms of access and governance.

Second, my initial findings suggest that older people, especially if they are retired, relatively less active, and have limited contact with their families and peers are much more inclined to follow and engage with conspiracy theories. A particular group is represented by 65+ year-olds who live by themselves. For this age group, conventional media, such as TV and radio, are important but the main access to conspiracy theories is via social media. They engage with various content, from “shorts” distributed via TikTok or Reels to ad-hoc Facebook live broadcasts. They rarely discuss such materials with families and peers. This observation is important in the context in which my previous research on social media in southeast Italy (Nicolescu 2016) showed a subtle relation between social trust, including in most controversial matters, and the breadth and intensity of social relations.

My paper explores why and how people engage with conspiracy theories in relation to their own sense of position in the larger society and possibilities to experience the world.

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Paper short abstract:

In Argentina, alternative farmers worry about pollution caused by the soy-boom; concerns voiced in conspiracist tones. Eschewing ‘conspiracy’ as a comment on veracity, I treat it as a descriptor of Argentine political culture, and as a speech genre that foregrounds causality, agency and culpability.

Paper long abstract:

In rural and peri-urban Argentina, farmers worry about the health effects of the boom in soy agriculture that has so radically altered landscapes since the late 1990s. Working with agroecologists, alternative farmers that use the symbiotic relations in ecosystems to produce without the use of chemicals, these concerns were frequently repeated to me, often in distinctly conspiratorial terms. They would speak of corrupt dealings between agro-industrial polluters and the government; of coverups and suppressed knowledges; of diseases caused by pesticide spraying, but also by vaccine application and the construction of 5G towers. In this presentation I do not use the term conspiracy to comment on the veracity of my interlocutors’ claims, nor am I discussing the belief in any one specific conspiracy. Instead, I use conspiracism to describe Argentine political culture, and also to name a narrative genre that foregrounds direct-causality, agency and culpability. I explore how the generalized political atmosphere of conspiracism in Argentina shaped my interlocutors’ conceptualizations of responsibility. In doing so, I suggest, they developed a coherent means to critique socio-ecological harms – the diffuse, structural nature of which would otherwise impeded holding actors to account.

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Paper short abstract:

The article investigates what role conspiracy theories and doubts play in forming and practicing citizenship among Kists, a predominantly Muslim ethnic minority in Georgia. The paper interrogates whether conspiracies can turn into a tool for deciphering the inner workings of politics and society.

Paper long abstract:

As the global aftermath of the War on Terror began to unfold following the 9/11 attacks, the peripheral region of Georgia – Pankisi Gorge and its Kist inhabitants suddenly found themselves at the center of myriad conspiracy theories that represented Pankisi as a haven for terrorist organizations. Motivated by Russia's war in Chechnya at the time and Russia's dominant perceptions of Chechens, Kists were also viewed as ‘radical,’ ‘uncivilized,’ and ‘dangerous’ since they are a predominantly Muslim minority that belong to the same ethnicity as Chechens, Ingush and Bats/Batsbi. In the past two decades, these understandings have largely shaped the Georgian and international policies towards them.

While Pankisi and its inhabitants are often subjected to suspicions in the Georgian and international arena, the afterlives of these perceptions have rarely been examined. Moreover, conspiracy theories or mistrust of Kists towards political processes or systems have been left unexplored. The article investigates what role mistrust, conspiracy theories and doubts play in forming and practicing citizenship among Kists. In Pankisi, political decisions are frequently met with suspicions, alternative explanations of events are often employed, and everyday events are regularly thought to be shaped by larger political powers beyond the local influence. These insights expose how Pankisi residents view themselves within the political order. The paper complicates the dominant convictions about conspiracy theories and questions the tendency to dismiss them completely. It interrogates whether conspiracy theories can turn into a tool for deciphering the inner workings of politics and society.