"We live in an age of conspiracy theories, yet we know very little about how conspiracy theory as a conceptual term originated or evolved. This book is a major contribution to our knowledge and understanding of conspiracy theory, effortlessly learned and utterly absorbing."-- Richard J Evans, author of The Hitler Conspiracies: The Third Reich and the Paranoid Imagination "Why are some theories called 'theories' while others are called 'conspiracy theories'? How does such labeling affect how society views those theories labeled 'conspiracy theories'? Andrew McKenzie-McHarg's long-anticipated The Hidden History of Conspiracy Theory seeks to answer these and other questions regarding the intellectual history of conspiracy theory by examining how key thinkers, particularly throughout twentieth-century history, have developed and molded the concept. While McKenzie-McHarg is focused on the terminology and conceptualization of 'conspiracy theory,' this engaging contribution is a must-read for anyone interested in the substance of conspiracy theories themselves as well as their place in our society and their potential harms. The Hidden History of Conspiracy Theory is poised to be one of the most important contributions to the burgeoning field of conspiracy theory research."-- Joseph E. Uscinski, coauthor of Conspiracy Theories: A Primer "In this brilliant new history, Andrew McKenzie-McHarg explains how the term 'conspiracy theory' entered our conceptual vocabulary. Everyone interested in the subject should read it.

"-- Kathryn S. Olmsted, author of The Newspaper Axis: Six Press Barons Who Enabled Hitler "This brilliant, witty debut traverses the long prehistory of the conspiracy theory from the Italian Renaissance, via the French Revolution and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , to the present day. But Andrew McKenzie-McHarg does not merely offer an erudite genealogy of his subject, spiced with a literary critic's ear for verbal nuance; vitally, he also asks us to think philosophically about what a conspiracy, and a conspiracy theory, and a conspiracy theorist, have been--and are."-- Anthony Ossa-Richardson, author of A History of Ambiguity.