America's obsession with secret societies is a mainstay of our democracy — and it resurfaces whenever there's a renewed push for civil rights, the author of a new book says

• Colin Dickey's new book "Under the Eye of Power" examines America's obsession with secret societies.
• Far from a fringe theory, he told Insider, belief in such conspiracies is a mainstay of our democracy.
• Multiple presidents, from George Washington to Donald Trump, have endorsed conspiracy theories.

In the last decade, American conspiracy theories about secret cabals working behind-the-scenes to control the world have grown ever more central to political conversations, with supporters in the highest offices in the land. From the Freemasons to the Illuminati, theories about power — and who wields it — are influencing our elected officials, shaping society, and prompting extreme believers to take violent action.

But belief in world-dominating secret societies is nothing new — and it is woven into the very fabric of our democracy. As far back as the founding of the country, Americans have been obsessed with the idea of secret groups conspiring to pervert the will of the people and the rule of law.

Author Colin Dickey in his new book charts the history of America through its paranoias around secret societies, examining the powerful hold these theories have on the country.

This Q&A is based on a conversation with Dickey, author of the book "Under the Eye of Power: How Fear of Secret Societies Shapes American Democracy," which will be released July 11. It has been edited for length and clarity. 

It feels like discussion of secret societies and conspiracies has been increasing recently; did you find that true in your research, or is it just a sense as more prevalent figures mention conspiracy theories?

I think for a lot of people, Trump seems singular as a President of the United States who sort of openly espoused conspiracy theories — that's what I thought when I first dived in — but the more that I did the research, you find this is actually a mainstay in American culture and American politics. George Washington and Abraham Lincoln both openly espoused conspiracy theories of various kinds. Even Hillary Clinton argued, at least publicly, that the government was hiding secrets about aliens. So this is actually a thing that is, I found, constant. 

Can you describe the lifecycle of these conspiracy theories or this kind of belief in the secret society — when do these beliefs peak for us, socially?

These things are sort of omnipresent, but they tend to kind of flare at certain key moments. You find, again and again, almost on a generational level, these moral panics usually revolve around this idea of a secret group who is pulling the strings from behind the scenes. And those erupt as a response to a certain set of other social forces that develop and breed this kind of this reaction.

And can you describe some of those social forces that this conspiratorial mindset has historically or is currently responding to?

While I think all of us are prone to conspiratorial beliefs sort of across the political spectrum, this particular articulation of this idea of a secret group tends to be a thing that is pushed by the right wing in moments when social change seems to be moving at a pace that some people find uncomfortable. A good historical example of what I mean is during the Civil Rights Movement when white racist southerners began to allege that behind the civil rights movement was a sort of secret group of Jews who were pulling the strings. The idea that Black Americans in the South would not want, of their own accord, equality and justice — that they would only be doing this as a result of Bolshevik agitators from the North who were all Jewish.

Are we in one of those moments now?

I think where we're at now, we're seeing social changes that are happening both in terms of race and sexuality and gender, in ways that is discomforting for some people. One of the ways how that discomfort gets expressed is through these kinds of conspiracy theories: that maybe this stuff isn't a natural evolution of people wanting their independence, and liberty, and freedom. Maybe it's the work of some sort of group behind-the-scenes and, thus, you get the kind of absurd articulations of Pizza Gate and the secret network of pedophiles who are wrecking America.

People who staunchly believe in a powerful network of pedophiles point to high-profile cases like Jeffrey Epstein and his political ties to prove their point. What are your thoughts on the ability to point to significant social events like that and seeing that, in the conspiratorial mindset, as proof of the conspiracy?

One of the sort of "great" things about the conspiratorial mindset is that it is both unclassifiable and it is all-encompassing. It was important for me early on to make a distinction between actual conspiracies and conspiracy theories. There are a number of really classic actual conspiracies: Watergate, Iran-Contra, the Catholic Church abuse scandal. And those tend to be a specific cover-up around specific things, there's an identifiable group of actors and once you start doing basic journalism, these things tend to unravel pretty quickly.

A conspiracy theory, on the other hand, is designed from the outset in such a way to be both impervious to countervailing evidence and also ever-expanding. For example, one of the weirdest things about antisemitism is that it simultaneously takes the form that all Jews are radical communist socialists who are out to undermine capitalism and simultaneously, they are themselves rapacious capitalists and bankers who are accumulating  as much wealth as possible. The reason why antisemitism is so pernicious and so, so difficult to stamp out is, in part, because it can do whatever the believer wants it to do. And that's true of many conspiracy theories.

You mentioned Pizza Gate earlier. In your observation, is that a natural escalation of having this belief that a secret society exists and needing to take action to stop it?

The Pizza Gate incident to me represents one of the most extreme versions of what's happening here, but I think, unfortunately, what has shifted right now, is that kind of violent tendency has moved to an open level of confrontation and intimidation that is currently being directed towards the trans community and drag performances and the LGBTQ+ community as well as continuing antisemitic attacks against synagogues. Right now, I think we're at a very disturbing and dangerous time when that desire to quote-unquote "help people" has just become a shield to enact these kinds of threatening, intimidating, and violent acts against marginalized groups that are perfectly peaceful and harmless but are being attacked in these sort of violent and disturbing ways.

Nobody has a crystal ball, but where do you see this kind of mindset pushing us socially at this moment? You mentioned it's a dangerous kind of a scary moment, but are you hopeful about it? Do you have predictions?

I wouldn't say that I'm super hopeful about it. When I did the research, these moral panics tend to happen historically pretty regularly, you know, every generation. I think one of two things happen, broadly speaking: either more panics will involve the courts and successfully use the courts — a very famous and obvious example of that is the Salem Witch Trials, and more recently, the Satanic Panic of the 1980s. So, you do see these examples where the court system gets used against people, and, in the case of Salem, people were executed. In the case of the Satanic Panic, people were sentenced to decades in prison. Many of them served years in prison before they were finally exonerated.

But that doesn't always happen and sometimes the courts are not receptive to these charges. And that's, unfortunately, when you tend to see the most likely probability of mob violence of various forms. And I think that's what we're seeing. For example, thinking of Trump's "lock her up" chant when there was this idea that we would use the courts to go after our political enemies. And it turned out that the American judicial system withstood that, and what it resulted with instead was the January 6th insurrection and other sorts of increasingly lawless acts of violence. So I think that's, unfortunately, where we're heading.

Is this something that we're doomed to repeat?

I try not to be a pessimistic person. I don't think we're doomed to this. But I do think that it is a constant seduction, just based on the way that democracy works and something that I think we are morally and ethically and civilly obligated to be constantly aware of — as a very expected pitfall rather than something that belongs only to the radical fringe that we don't need to worry too much.

What are the consequences of falling into that pitfall? What are the stakes?

When I did the research, I didn't know exactly what I would find. But I did find, again and again, that these panics — not entirely, but almost always — are coming from the right, and they are being used to slow down, stifle, or reverse changes in the American identity that usually involve greater diversity, and greater economic freedom, greater freedoms for women.

So I think the danger of this pitfall is a society that will ultimately be less free, will take far, far longer for individuals who deserve the same rights as anybody else in this country to realize those those rights and freedoms and be able to live the life they lead. I think we owe it to our fellow Americans to be vigilant about how conspiracy theories formulate, because, almost always, the net effect is harm to the Americans and those in our country who have the least rights and freedoms and a benefit to those who have the most.