Transparency and Conspiracy

by West, Harry G.; Sanders, Todd; Kendall, Laurel (CON); Bastian, Misty L. (CON)

• ISBN13: 9780822330363
• ISBN10: 0822330369
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-05-01
• Publisher: Duke Univ Pr

Summary

Transparency has, in recent years, become a watchword for good governance. Policymakers and analysts alike evaluate political and economic institutions-courts, corporations, nation-states-according to the transparency of their operating procedures. With the dawn of the New World Order and the "mutual veil dropping" of the post-cold war era, many have asserted that power in our contemporary world is more transparent than ever. Yet from the perspective of the relatively less privileged, the operation of power often appears opaque and unpredictable. Through vivid ethnographic analyses, Transparency and Conspiracy examines the vast range of expressions of the popular suspicion of power-including forms of shamanism, sorcery, conspiracy theory, and urban legends-illuminating them as ways of making sense of the world in the midst of tumultuous and uneven processes of modernization. In this collection leading anthropologists reveal the variations and commonalities in conspiratorial thinking, or occult cosmologies, around the globe-in Korea; Tanzania; Mozambique; New York City; Indonesia; Mongolia; Nigeria; and Orange County, California. The contributors chronicle how-whether through voudou, sorcerers, shamans, or meetings to decipher the battle of God's will and the forces of evil in contemporary political debates-people express profound suspicions of the United Nations, the state, political parties, police, courts, international financial institutions, banks, traders and shop keepers, media, churches, intellectuals, and the wealthy. Rather than focusing on the veracity of these convictions, Transparency and Conspiracy investigates who believes what and why. It makes a compelling argument against the dismissal of conspiracy theories and occult cosmologies as anti-modern, irrational oversimplifications, showing how these beliefs render the world more, not less, complex by calling attention to its contradictions and proposing alternative ways of understanding it. Contributors. Misty Bastian, Karen McCarthy Brown, Jean Comaroff, John Comaroff, Susan Harding, Daniel Hellinger, Caroline Humphrey, Laurel Kendall, Todd Sanders, Albert Schrauwers, Kathleen Stewart, Harry G. West

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	vii
Power Revealed and Concealed in the New World Order	1	(37)
Todd Sanders
Harry G. West
Gods, Markets, and the IMF in the Korean Spirit World	38	(27)
Laurel Kendall
``Diabolic Realities'': Narratives of Conspiracy, Transparency, and ``Ritual Murder'' in the Nigerian Popular Print and Electronic Media	65	(27)
Misty L. Bastian
``Who Rules Us Now?'' Identity Tokens, Sorcery, and Other Metaphors in the 1994 Mozambican Elections	92	(33)
Harry G. West
Through a Glass Darkly: Charity, Conspiracy, and Power in New Order Indonesia	125	(23)
Albert Schrauwers
Invisible Hands and Visible Goods: Revealed and Concealed Economics in Millennial Tanzania	148	(27)
Todd Sanders
Stalin and the Blue Elephant: Paranoia and Complicity in Post-Communist Metahistories	175	(29)
Caroline Humphrey
Paranoia, Conspiracy, and Hegemony in American Politics	204	(29)
Daniel Hellinger
Making Wanga: Reality Constructions and the Magical Manipulation of Power	233	(25)
Karen Mccarthy Brown
Anxieties of Influence: Conspiracy Theory and Therapeutic Culture in Millennial America	258	(29)
Susan Harding
Kathleen Stewart
Transparent Fictions; or, The Conspiracies of a Liberal Imagination: An Afterword	287	(14)
Jean Comaroff
John Comaroff
Contributors	301	(4)
Index	305