Mysteries and Conspiracies

Detective Stories, Spy Novels and the Making of Modern Societies

Nonfiction, Social & Cultural Studies, Social Science, Sociology
Cover of the book Mysteries and Conspiracies by Luc Boltanski, Wiley
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Luc Boltanski ISBN: 9780745683447
Publisher: Wiley Publication: October 10, 2014
Imprint: Polity Language: English
Author: Luc Boltanski
ISBN: 9780745683447
Publisher: Wiley
Publication: October 10, 2014
Imprint: Polity
Language: English

The detective story, focused on inquiries, and in its wake the spy novel, built around conspiracies, developed as genres in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During the same period, psychiatry was inventing paranoia, sociology was devising new forms of causality to explain the social lives of individuals and groups and political science was shifting the problematics of paranoia from the psychic to the social realm and seeking to explain historical events in terms of conspiracy theories. In each instance, social reality was cast into doubt. We owe the project of organizing and unifying this reality for a particular population and territory to the nation-state as it took shape at the end of the nineteenth century.

Thus the figure of conspiracy became the focal point for suspicions concerning the exercise of power. Where does power really lie, and who actually holds it? The national authorities that are presumed to be responsible for it, or other agencies acting in the shadows - bankers, anarchists, secret societies, the ruling class? Questions of this kind provided the scaffolding for political ontologies that banked on a doubly distributed reality: an official but superficial reality and its opposite, a deeper, hidden, threatening reality that was unofficial but much more real. Crime fiction and spy fiction, paranoia and sociology - more or less concomitant inventions - had in common a new way of problematizing reality and of working through the contradictions inherit in it.

The adventures of the conflict between these two realities - superficial versus real - provide the framework for this highly original book. Through an exploration of the work of the great masters of detective stories and spy novels - G.K. Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Le Carré and Graham Greene among others - Boltanski shows that these works of fiction and imagination tell us something fundamental about the nature of modern societies and the modern state.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

The detective story, focused on inquiries, and in its wake the spy novel, built around conspiracies, developed as genres in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During the same period, psychiatry was inventing paranoia, sociology was devising new forms of causality to explain the social lives of individuals and groups and political science was shifting the problematics of paranoia from the psychic to the social realm and seeking to explain historical events in terms of conspiracy theories. In each instance, social reality was cast into doubt. We owe the project of organizing and unifying this reality for a particular population and territory to the nation-state as it took shape at the end of the nineteenth century.

Thus the figure of conspiracy became the focal point for suspicions concerning the exercise of power. Where does power really lie, and who actually holds it? The national authorities that are presumed to be responsible for it, or other agencies acting in the shadows - bankers, anarchists, secret societies, the ruling class? Questions of this kind provided the scaffolding for political ontologies that banked on a doubly distributed reality: an official but superficial reality and its opposite, a deeper, hidden, threatening reality that was unofficial but much more real. Crime fiction and spy fiction, paranoia and sociology - more or less concomitant inventions - had in common a new way of problematizing reality and of working through the contradictions inherit in it.

The adventures of the conflict between these two realities - superficial versus real - provide the framework for this highly original book. Through an exploration of the work of the great masters of detective stories and spy novels - G.K. Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Le Carré and Graham Greene among others - Boltanski shows that these works of fiction and imagination tell us something fundamental about the nature of modern societies and the modern state.

More books from Wiley

Cover of the book Genetically Modified and non-Genetically Modified Food Supply Chains by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Optical Payloads for Space Missions by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Food Webs and Biodiversity by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Fundamentals of Polymer Science for Engineers by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Mimicry, Crypsis, Masquerade and other Adaptive Resemblances by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Mechanical Characterization of Materials and Wave Dispersion by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Reservoir Engineering in Modern Oilfields by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book The Benevolent Dictator by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book eBu$iness by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book The Student's Companion to Social Policy by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Die Wahrheit über begeisterte Mitarbeiter by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Overcoming Dyslexia For Dummies by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Running a Great Meeting In a Day For Dummies by Luc Boltanski
Cover of the book Measurements for Terrestrial Vegetation by Luc Boltanski
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy