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Lance DeHaven-Smith
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Conspiracy Theory in America (Discovering America) Hardcover – 15 April 2013

English edition by Lance Dehaven-Smith (Autor)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 120 ratings
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Ever since the Warren Commission concluded that a lone gunman assassinated President John F. Kennedy, people who doubt that finding have been widely dismissed as conspiracy theorists, despite credible evidence that right-wing elements in the CIA, FBI, and Secret Service—and possibly even senior government officials—were also involved. Why has suspicion of criminal wrongdoing at the highest levels of government been rejected out-of-hand as paranoid thinking akin to superstition? Conspiracy Theory in America investigates how the Founders’ hard-nosed realism about the likelihood of elite political misconduct—articulated in the Declaration of Independence—has been replaced by today’s blanket condemnation of conspiracy beliefs as ludicrous by definition. Lance deHaven-Smith reveals that the term “conspiracy theory” entered the American lexicon of political speech to deflect criticism of the Warren Commission and traces it back to a CIA propaganda campaign to discredit doubters of the commission’s report. He asks tough questions and connects the dots among five decades’ worth of suspicious events, including the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, the attempted assassinations of George Wallace and Ronald Reagan, the crimes of Watergate, the Iran-Contra arms-for-hostages deal, the disputed presidential elections of 2000 and 2004, the major defense failure of 9/11, and the subsequent anthrax letter attacks. Sure to spark intense debate about the truthfulness and trustworthiness of our government, Conspiracy Theory in America offers a powerful reminder that a suspicious, even radically suspicious, attitude toward government is crucial to maintaining our democracy.
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  1. Print length
    272 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    University of Texas Press
  4. Publication date
    15 April 2013
  5. Dimensions
    13.97 x 1.78 x 22.86 cm
  6. ISBN-10
    0292743793
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0292743793
  8. See all details
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"An intriguing take on the origins and implications of conspiracy theories and the paranoid mindset itself... Confronted with these compelling arguments, even the most incredulous readers will find themselves questioning their own preconceived notions of paranoia, governmental transparency, and conspiracy theorists." Publishers Weekly

About the Author

LANCE DEHAVEN-SMITH Tallahassee, Florida DeHaven-Smith is Professor in the Reubin O'D. Askew School of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University. A former President of the Florida Political Science Association, deHaven-Smith is the author of more than a dozen books, including The Battle for Florida, which analyzes the disputed 2000 presidential election. DeHaven-Smith has appeared on Good Morning America, the Today Show, NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, CBS Nightly News with Dan Rather, the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, and other national TV and radio shows.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ University of Texas Press (15 April 2013)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0292743793
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0292743793
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 13.97 x 1.78 x 22.86 cm
  • Customer reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 120 ratings

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Lance DeHaven-Smith

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Top reviews from Germany

  • Rene Adler
    5.0 out of 5 stars Great, inspiring,
    Reviewed in Germany on 27 April 2016
    Verified Purchase
    I learned a lot, this is a milestone to understand the term "conspiracy" and its misuse throughout the last decades.
    One person found this helpful
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  • spiritus
    5.0 out of 5 stars The True History of the 'Conspiracy Theory' meme.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 23 February 2019
    Verified Purchase
    In 1976, in the wake of the Church Committee hearings (which had coincided with the first public broadcast of the Zapruder film on March 6th 1975), The New York Times made a Freedom Of Information Request to the Central Intelligence Agency which resulted in the agency's release of CIA document 1035-960 entitled 'Concerning Criticism of the Warren Report'. This memorandum had been sent to hundreds of print and broadcast outlets throughout the United States and suggested various arguments and strategies for dealing with the increasing number of people (Mark Lane, Sylvia Meagher and Jim Garrison being among the early pioneers of JFK assassination research) raising issues concerning the reliability of the Warren Commission report's conclusions and the methods that were employed to reach those conclusions. As well as revealing that the CIA had thousands of assets working in both state and corporate media throughout the country the document is notable for introducing the expression 'Conspiracy theories' which had not had widespread currency prior to this time. It was in the wake of this memorandum that the term came to be used as a method of marginalizing and delegitimizing factual information which contradicted official narratives. However, the use of this term - as well as the corresponding term 'conspiracy theorist' - really took off in a big way in the wake of the 9/11 event. Today, barely a day goes by without some mainstream source decrying 'conspiracy theories'.

    Professor Lance deHaven Smith has conducted an important piece of historical research for those who wish to understand where the term conspiracy theory came from and why it is used to label certain kinds of information.
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  • Mikael Book
    5.0 out of 5 stars Conspiracy Theory in America (book review)
    Reviewed in the United States on 6 January 2014
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    This book by a professor of political science from Florida, USA, summarizes how the Americans have viewed the political conspiracies of their rulers from the 18th to the 21st century. The starting-point for author deHaven-Smith is that the founding fathers of the USA where conspiracy theoreticians. He shows that the constitution of the USA with its division of state powers and its famous checks and balances is based on a conspiracy theory and thus that "conspiracy" is a keyword in America's political history.

    The American constitution was designed to regulate and limit the possibility of high crimes that might destroy or actually would destroy the republic and end in tyranny. It used to be politically correct (to use a slightly anachronistic term) to suspect politicians and statesmen of conspiracy. Charles Beard (1874-1948) was according to deHaven-Smith the last Amercan political scientist who shared the original American perspective on conspiracies. After the second world war, American political science has been heavily influenced by, on the one hand, the liberal Austrian philosopher K.R.Popper (1902-1994), who delivered an original and devastating critique of "the conspiracy theory of history" (thus not particularly of the role of conspiracy theory in America's history); and, on the other hand, the works of Leo Strauss (1899-1973), another, but conservative, European philosopher with a very different approach to politics; like Plato and Machiavelli, Strauss would allow political leaders to commit high crimes and tell the people "noble lies" whenever necessary for what they held to be a good cause. The different and contradictory intellectual premises and views of Beard, Popper and Strauss are brilliantly elucidated (and aptly summarized in a figure and table) in the third chapter in of the book ("Conspiracy Denial in the Social Sciences").

    "Significantly, although we speak of conspiracy theory as if it were an objective reality understood similarly by everyone who uses the term", deHaven-Smith writes

    "its meaning varies from one theoretical context to another. Consequently, people are often talking past each other when they differ on the issue. When speaking of conspiracy theories, Beard, for example, means hypotheses about specific actions by identifiable persons or groups that result in identifiable advantages for these groups in law or political institutions. In contrast, Popper usually means a superstition-like belief that large societal calamities, such as wars, financial crises, famines, and the like, were caused by such amorphous categories of people as economic classes, races, ethnic groups, and so on. Strauss does not use the term "conspiracy" at all, but speaks instead of "noble lies," so for him a conspiracy theory would be an ill-considered speculation, probably be a non-elite and perhaps partially or fully true, casting doubt on a noble lie. Thus for Strauss we might say a conspiracy theory is a "dastardly truth." "

    The disagreements between these three accounts of conspiracy theories are "subtle and complex", deHaven-Smith adds, because "such is the nature of differences between divergent philosophical perspectives."

    Of course, "Conspiracy theory in America" is not only a book about the history of some political ideas. It is also a political work in a the best sense of that word. deHaven-Smith describes how, after the murder of President Kennedy 1963, and as a result of a veritable campaign by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the notion of "conspiracy theory" took on its present derogatoriness. Among other things, he clarifies the role of the CIA's dispatch number 1035-960 from 1967. This document was later (in 1976) obtained by a Freedom of Information request and published by the New York Times. "Essentially", writes deHaven-Smith, the

    "Dispatch 1035-960 instructed CIA agents to contact journalists and opinion leaders in their locales about critics of the Warren Commission [the official commission on the murder of JFK]; ask for their assistance in countering the influence of "conspiracy theorists" who were publishing "conspiracy theories" that blamed top leaders in the U.S. for Kennedy's death; and urge their media contacts to criticize such theories and those who embrace them for aiding communists in the Cold War, trying to get attention, seeking to profit financially from the Kennedy tragedy, and refusing to consider all the facts."

    The combined effect of the post-war turn in academic political science and the subsequent political indoctrination campaign was that anyone -- and not only any American, because the propagandistic use of the term `conspiracy theory' has also spread to Europe and other parts of the world -- who thinks that the leaders of our goverments are still capable of high crimes in this modern, democratic and technological era, risks to be labelled as a conspiracy nut and politically marginalised.

    In the later parts of the book deHaven-Smith goes on to develop and explain the concept of "state crime against democracy" (SCAD) as a tool to be used in the analysis of present-day high political conspiracies. deHaven-Smith's SCAD construct is not completely new for the book in question here; it has previously been used by, for instance, the authors of a special issue of American Behavioral Scientist in their effort to make sense of e.g. the 11 September 2001 attacks in New York and Washington. (See ABS Volume 53 Number 6, February 2010.)

    The political science of prof deHaven-Smith can actually help its students, both academics and laymen, to understand what is going on in America and even in world politics in this period where the American superpower is declining.

    Mikael Böök
    Master of Social Sciences
    Finland
    Report
  • Jean-paul Lacharme
    5.0 out of 5 stars Très bonne étude d'un label infamant
    Reviewed in France on 24 March 2015
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    Ce travail mené dans le cadre de la politique américaine porte sur l'utilisation de théories conspirationnistes dans l'élucidation des crimes d’État (SCAD : State Crimes Against Democratie). L'auteur démontre comment la crainte des complots politiques est au cœur même de la Constitution Américaine mise en place par les Pères Fondateurs, complots ourdis par l'Angleterre ou par des factions internes. Les mécanismes de protections mis en place à l'origine sont peu à peu démantelés. L'étiquette péjorative -elle ne l'était pas au départ- de « théorie conspirationniste » est élaborée en 1967 par la CIA pour discréditer toute critique du rapport Warren donnant la version officielle de l'assassinat de J.F. Kennedy (CIA Dispatch # 1035-960). L'auteur montre également le rôle idéologique majeur apporté par des intellectuels renommés comme K. Popper et L. Strauss dans ce travail de décrédibilisation, ces deux auteurs apportant cependant des arguments entièrement opposés l'un à l'autre. Les différents cas de SCAD avérés ou probables survenus depuis deux siècles sont passés au crible de ces analyses. Il reste à savoir comment ce travail pourrait être porté en France, puisque l'attribution du label infamant évitant toute analyse critique y est encore plus opérationnel qu'aux USA. Cet excellent travail apporte une base solide à cette extension.
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  • Patrick C
    5.0 out of 5 stars A new way of looking at conspiracies
    Reviewed in Canada on 5 July 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Conspiracy Theory in America is the tome we've been waiting for but just didn't know it. The great accomplishment of this book is to provide a fresh theoretical framework in which to view the most vexing issues of politics and governance since WWII: SCADs-state crimes against democracy. Being interested, and a boomer, I thought I was pretty knowledgeable about the Kennedy assassination, 9/11 and every thing in-between. But Dr.deHaven-Smith has provided a lens that brings these events and their discontents into much sharper focus.

    Having experienced ridicule and even anger for being a "conspiracy theorist" I especially appreciated deHaven-Smith's deconstruction of that meme, including the CIA's role in deploying it. The author provides a valuable historical context for conspiracies before bringing us up to speed on the most recent and far reaching ones.

    Let's be clear, this is not another book detailing theories and evidence how the towers fell or how many shooters there were. It is rather a theoretical lens for looking at and evaluating such evidence. While the entire book is excellent chapter 5, State Crimes Against Democracy is the beating heart at the centre. Here, using the example of Darwin's Theory of Evolution as a model deHaven-Smith shows how a theoretical framework can allow us to see and understand something previously obscured. His analysis here of the iconography of 9/11 (the actual referent to the event) and its possible implications is stunning!

    The only relative weakness of the book for me was the final chapter, Restoring American Democracy. Absent a genuine bloody revolution I don't think it can be done. The author suggests, for instance, that if local authorities were allowed/mandated to do their proper investigative and forensic functions the perpetrators would have less opportunity to get away with their crimes-think Kennedy assassination and 9/11. But I think the corruption of our institutions had already gone too far. For example local police forces are undergoing training by such suspect organizations as Craft International and the Israeli police.

    To sum up, this is not just another book on conspiracies; it is the book which will open the door to important new ways of looking at them. I predict it will not only be influential but a breakthrough in the same fashion as many great theories have been.
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  • Joe Surkiewicz
    5.0 out of 5 stars Forget "conspiracy theory." Think SCAD.
    Reviewed in the United States on 2 June 2019
    Verified Purchase
    Americans aren't stupid. We're just dumbed-down, submerged in a sea of consumerism, professional sports, celebrity worship, and shoddy "journalism." Luckily, there are a few academics who actually do their jobs--figure out complex stuff and offer solutions. Among them are Mark Crispin Miller, an NYU media prof who edited the Discovering America series that includes this book, and author Lance deHaven-Smith, a professor at Florida State University, who do the heavy lifting to figure out why this country is such a mess (not the term I'd like to use, but the one that will get past the censor).

    The first thing deHaven-Smith does in this readable (not overly academic) book is explain the source of the term "conspiracy theory." It's not a spoiler to say the CIA was behind turning the phrase into a pejorative sneer at anyone who questions the official company line about events like the Kennedy assassinations or 9-11. Even if you're aware that the CIA virtually coined the term to counter the growing body of skeptics about the JFK murder in the late 60s, there's a lot to learn in the book (like if you read beyond the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence you'll see that it describes a conspiracy theory about King George III). It turns out conspiracy theories are as American as, well, attacking Third World countries and stealing their resources.

    deHaven-Smith also coins his own term, state crimes against democracy (SCAD)--an innovative way to think about political crimes that occurred throughout American history and define our era. He lists an entire range of crimes that probably qualify as SCADs, from the Sedition Act of 1798, the Mexican-American War, the sinking of the Maine in 1898, and Pearl Harbor, to more contemporary horrors like the Gulf of Tonkin, the assassination of Lee Oswald, the October Surprises of 1968 and 1980, the assassination of Paul Wellstone in 2002, and the events of September 11, 2001.

    Were they all SCADs? Probably not. But the point deHaven-Smith makes is that virtually none of the events were treated as crimes. High powered people were able to intervene and destroy evidence, quash investigations and divert public attention. Think of JFK's body being illegally removed from Dallas on Air Force 1. Or the carting away of all the debris from the World Trade Centers without scientific examination for explosives. If those events had been treated like normal crime scenes, with chains of evidence and professional investigations, Americans would have a better understanding of their past. And be able to figure a future much less bleak that what we're confronted with every day.
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