In the News: Michael Barkun

Professor Emeritus Michael Barkun was quoted in the Daily Beast article, "The Very Alive Woman Conspiracy Nuts Say Died of Monkeypox."

Professor Michael Barkun was interviewed for the Daily Beast article, "Monkeypox Is Here and COVID Truthers Are Losing It."

Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, was quoted in the Christian Science Monitor article, "‘Replacement theory’: The view from an immigration-wary Georgia district."

Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, was quoted in the Daily Beast article "COVID Truthers Have Found a New ‘Pandemic’ to Freak Out About." 

"I didn’t take it seriously for a long time, but in the last six weeks, it’s become very concerning," says Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science. "This idea that the other side winning the election will produce a precipitous decline and the disintegration of institutions is completely at variance with American history."

According to Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, three core principles characterize most conspiracy theories. First, the belief that nothing happens by accident or coincidence. Secondly, that nothing is as it seems: The "appearance of innocence" is to be suspected. Finally, the belief that everything is connected through a hidden pattern.

Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, says the unseen, mysterious nature of coronavirus makes it especially scary—and especially ripe for all kinds of imagined explanations and antidotes.

According to Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, disillusionment can be a subtle risk of conspiracy theory media. "People may draw the conclusion that conventional politics is meaningless. If they genuinely believe that what happens in the world is a result of the hidden hand of some mysterious elite, then presumably ordinary political activity is meaningless as are the decisions of lawmakers and officeholders," he says. 

Barkun discusses how conspiracy theorists are bringing apocalyptic beliefs into the political mainstream and examines the willingness of people to stay loyal to their beliefs even in the face of a world that contradicts them.

Professor Emeritus of Political Science Michael Barkun weighs in on the mystery of "Q" and the history of conspiracy theories in America in the Washington Post. "These ideas never completely die,” says Barkun, who studies conspiracy theories and political extremism. “They get recycled every generation, and in America, some of the most powerful conspiracy ideas deal with an enemy inside the government who is really pulling the strings but cannot be identified.”

“We all want stories that make sense of the world,” Barkun says. “When we can’t find them, we look around in strange places."

Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, notes that Russell Walker’s website contains "statements that are pure [Christian] Identity." "Generally speaking, people in Christian Identity have contempt for existing political institutions," he says.

Michael Barkun, professor emeritus of political science, comments that William Potter Gale, who proposed the idea of a constitutional sheriff, believed, "We know what the law really means. It’s all those lawyers who have erected a kind of apparatus of deception."