Under the eye of power : how fear of secret societies shapes American democracy / Colin Dickey.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dickey, Colin, author.

Contributor:

Tom Monahan Memorial Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

United States--History.

United States.

Secret societies--United States--History.

Secret societies.

Conspiracy theories--United States--History.

Conspiracy theories.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

353 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

[New York] : Viking, [2023]

Summary:

"From beloved cultural historian and acclaimed author of Ghostland, a history of America's obsession with secret societies and the conspiracies of hidden power The United States was born in paranoia. From the American Revolution (thought by some to be a conspiracy organized by the French) to the Salem witch trials to the Satanic Panic, Illuminati and QAnon, one of the most enduring narratives that defines the United States is simply this: secret groups are conspiring to pervert the will of the people andthe rule of law. We'd like to assume these panics exist only at the fringes of society, or are unique features of an internet age. But history tells us, in fact, that they are woven into the fabric of American democracy. Cultural historian Colin Dickey has built a career studying how our most irrational beliefs reach the mainstream, why, and what they tell us about ourselves. In UNDER THE EYE OF POWER, Dickey charts the history of America through its paranoias and fears of secret societies, while seekingto explain why so many people-including some of the most powerful people in the country-continue to subscribe to these conspiracy theories. Paradoxically, he finds, belief in the fantastical and conspiratorial can be more soothing than what we fear the most: the chaos and randomness of history, the rising and falling of fortunes in America, and the messiness of democracy. Only in seeing the cycle of this history, Dickey says, can we break it"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: The paranoid republic

Part one: As above, so below. The arch and the cenotaph

The craft

The dreadful fire

"There is something earnest in all this, but the object is concealed"

Part two: Deep-laid schemes. Mysteries of iniquity

"Do not open your lips"

In the convent's crypt

Fresh from the loins of the people

A piece of machinery, so to speak

The mystic red

Part three: National indigestion. Abraham Lincoln's secret confidant

The man who threw the bomb

A matter of trusts

The world's enigma

The (in)visible empire

Part four: Wonders of the invisible world. Subliminals

Truth drugs

Purity of essence

Beware the Siberian beetle

Part five: Behind the hieroglyphic streets. Networks

The suburban uncanny

Attack of the lizard people!

The banality of evil

Nothing is true, everything is permitted

Epilogue: Citizens' commissions.

Notes:

Place of publication from publisher's website.

Includes bibliographical references (pages [331]-353).

Local Notes:

Athenaeum copy: Hagen fund bookplate.

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Tom Monahan Memorial Fund.

Other Format:

Online version: Dickey, Colin. Under the eye of power.

ISBN:

9780593299456

0593299450

OCLC:

1385352528

Publisher Number:

99994262539