Autore
Chiocchetti, Filippo

Titolo
La storia in ostaggio. Sulle origini del conflitto tra storiografia e conspiracy theories
Periodico
Contemporanea
Anno: 2020 - Volume: 90 - Fascicolo: 3 - Pagina iniziale: 337 - Pagina finale: 362

Conspiracy theories represent an insidious threat for the historical profession, as their narrativesoften provide a falsified account of historical facts. The episode concerning Americanhistorian Carroll Quigley (1910-1977) is emblematic. Quigley was the author of a documentedpiece of research about a network of intellectuals, politicians and businessmen who played anactive role, in the first half of the Twentieth century, in strengthening ties between Great Britainand the United States. Some members of the American radical right – especially within theJohn Birch Society, a propaganda organization very active in the 1960s – appropriated his workby distorting its meaning, and made use of it as a source of their conspiracy theories. After thisintellectual fraud, Quigley was recruited, in spite of his protests, as an authoritative academicvoice in support of an anti-globalist and anti-elitist crusade that is as vibrant today as it washalf a century ago. Such an episode testifies to the usefulness of studying the historical roots ofconspiracy theories as a premise for their necessary demystification.



SICI: 1127-3070(2020)90:3<337:LSIOSO>2.0.ZU;2-U
Testo completo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/download/article/10.1409/97617
Testo completo alternativo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/doi/10.1409/97617

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