CONSPIRACY THEORY IN POLITICAL THOUGHT by Atheer A. Shawai A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of George Mason University in Partial Fulfillment of The Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Political Science Committee: _______________________________________ Matthew Scherer. Faculty, Chair _______________________________________ Char R. Miller. Faculty _______________________________________ Jesse Kirkpatrick. Faculty _______________________________________ Ming Wan, Program Director _______________________________________ Mark J. Rozell, Dean Date: __________________________________ Fall Semester 2017 George Mason University Fairfax, VA Conspiracy Theory in Political Thought A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Art in Political Science at George Mason University By Atheer A. Shawai Bachelor of Arts George Mason University, 2015 Director: Matthew Scherer, Professor The Schar School of Policy and Government Fall Semester 2017 George Mason University Fairfax, VA Copyright 2017 Atheer A. Shawai All Rights Reserved ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank Professor Matthew Scherer, Professor Char R. Miller, Professor Jesse Kirkpatrick for participating in my thesis committee and their invaluable comments during the research process. Without their support, I would not have been able to write my study in this extend. I reserve special thanks for Professor Andrew Hughes Hallett for his insightful feedback and suggestions which sharpened my arguments and enhanced the logical flow of my thoughts. Finally, I would like also to thank the administrative staff at the Schar School of Policy and Government, especially Nicholas Stroup, Associate Director of Student Services for excellent help with practical issues during my thesis. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract…………………………………………………………………………….…………..v 1. Introduction .............................................................................................................…1 2. The Epistemological Approach of Conspiracy Theory....................................................8 The Theoretical Connection between Political Theory and Conspiracy Theory……11 The Epistemological Explanations of Conspiracy theory ..……………………..…..27 The Theoretical Bases and the Argumentative Strategies of Conspiracy Theory .…42 3. The politically-Oriented Approach of Conspiracy Theory ……………………..…..63 Conspiracy Theory in the Right-wing Discourse ......................................................64 Conspiracy Theory in the Marxist Discourse…………......................................……97 Conspiracy Theory in the Islamist Discourse ...........................................................111 4. The Cultural and Critical Approaches of Conspiracy Theory....................................131 The Cultural Approach ..............................................................................................133 The Critical Approach ...............................................................................................140 5. Conclusion . ............ ..................................................................................................161 List of References……………………..........................................................................165 Biography....................................................... ...............................................................176 iv ABSTRACT CONSPIRACY THEORY IN POLITICAL THOUGHT Atheer A. Shawai, MA. George Mason University, 2017 Thesis Director: Professor Matthew Scherer This thesis analyzes the theoretical bases, argumentations, logical developments of conspiracy theory from epistemological, politically-oriented, cultural and critical approaches. The majority of scholarly literature considers conspiracy theory as an irrational conception that is irrelevant or even contrary to the Enlightenment rationality, but this research finds the opposite. After discussing conspiracy theory from different aspects, whether in the theoretical or practical levels, this thesis concludes that the theoretical flaws of conspiracy theory are attributed to inaccurate premises and assumptions lie at the heart of the Enlightenment project itself. What pushes conspiracy theory into the margin of Enlightenment is not its lack of rationality but, rather, its contradictory orientation towards reasonability understood as the ability to compromise with other rational parties to reach an overlapping consensus. INTRODUCTION This study investigates the conceptual content of conspiracy theory by examining its cognitive validity, argumentative procedure, logical consistency and theoretical foundations. Through employing different approaches, this thesis sheds light on various aspects and trajectories of conspiracy theory in terms of the interlacing of their philosophical and ideological components, general conceptions, justifications and notional applications. The major object is to provide adequate accounts of the main theoretical foundations and developments of conspiracy theory for better understanding of its inner structure. Conspiracy Theory in Political Thought is an abstract study which predominantly focuses on thoughts, ideologies and philosophies that form the fundamentals of conspiracy theory. Thus, this thesis does not address the thematic patterns, styles, types and narratives of conspiracy theory, and has no intent to make use specifically of the methods of sociology, anthropology, psychology and other related disciplines to study conspiracy theory. Conspiracy Theory in Political Thought offers answers to important questions concerning different levels of conspiracy theory. At the internal level, sundry opinions, debates and arguments on the definition of ‘conspiracy theory’ are presented and evaluated, not only to fully understand this term, but also to realize how scholars gradually have developed their perceptions of it. This study, at a broader level, provides multiple answers 1 to questions about the origin of conspiracy theory as it relates the latter to its theoretical contexts and philosophical backgrounds. At the most comprehensive level, various discussions and insights are presented throughout this research to explain the emergence and the persistence of conspiracy theory in the modern era and how such theory has located itself within the discourses of different ideologies, cultures and movements. Similar to other modern sociological phenomena, conspiracy theory is open to different interpretations in different contexts and perspectives. In this thesis, conspiracy theory is neither considered as merely an unproven proposition about a claimed and/or unwarranted conspiracy nor a paranoid, pathological explanation of an event or situation. Rather than limiting conspiracy theory to its external credibility or a singular characteristic of its essence, such as paranoia, this research uses more expansive perspectives of conspiracy theory in order to be inclusive in the sense of embracing different orientations and approaches. Epistemological, politically-oriented, cultural and critical approaches reveal different aspects of conspiracy theory, each according to its own nature. In a general sense, and regardless of these differences, conspiracy theory in this study is projected as a rational way of thinking that is driven from Enlightenment and characterized by its definitive features, especially skepticism, rationality and idealism. Conspiracy theory evidently is not an exotic phenomenon in the modern world. In contrast, although unauthorized and marginalized, conspiracy theory is a legitimate product of the Enlightenment rationality from which it inherits its inaccurate philosophical premises and inadequate evidence. As its intellectual incubator, namely, Enlightenment, conspiracy 2 theory is a rational endeavor to comprehend the manners, logic and rationale that rule the world by relying on objectivity and critical stances. Conspiracy theorists are often considered as self-deceivers because of their maintaining adherence to conspiratorial thinking, and being unable to recognize the contradiction and the flaws in their thinking. Likewise, it might be useful to acknowledge the possibility that the rest of the humanitarian theorists since the emergence of Enlightenment are self-deceived by their own well-established convictions of the Enlightenment rationality, and being unable to recognize the contradiction and the flaws in their thinking. The only major difference between the general trends of Enlightenment and conspiracy theory is reasonability. Unlike the latter, the former has the flexibility to compromise with other rational approaches in order to establish common understandings about reality rather than demonstrating intransigence to impose their own understanding of certain events and issues. The greater the support base, the closer conspiracy theory becomes to reasonable approaches. Eventually, this theory turns to be not only rational to its theorists, but reasonable to the public wherever it flourishes and dominates. From this viewpoint, a question arises: can Enlightenment itself be considered as a ubiquitous conspiracy theory since it has been adopted by most cultures? For centuries, the dominating rational trends of Western and Eastern cultures established reasonability based on which scientific explanations of natural phenomena were excluded. Reasonability is not sufficient in itself to be the standard that determines the value and the appropriateness of Enlightenment and conspiracy