LA DIALECTIQUE GÉNÉRÉE PAR LE DISCOURS CONSPIRATIONNISTE : LE SENS DE L’IMPOSSIBLE CONVERSION DES CONTRAIRES EN CONTEXTE AFRICAIN
THE DIALECTIC GENERATED BY CONSPIRATORIAL DISCOURSE : THE MEANING OF THE IMPOSSIBLE CONVERSION OF OPPOSITES IN THE AFRICAN CONTEXT

Summary/Abstract: The driving force behind any conspiracy theory is the sum total of thecontradictions it provokes and feeds on. The dialectic generated by conspiracism is essentiallythat two or more ‘explanations’ for the same object of information or communication contradictor irreconcilably exclude each other, thus creating doubt and confusion in the minds of thereceivers of these discourses. The reason for this state of affairs can be found in the verydefinition of conspiracism as ‘the belief in the existence of an illegal plan deliberately organisedby ill-intentioned individuals, and the use of this belief to explain certain facts or the course ofhistory’ (J. Jamin, 2009: 44). Conspiracism thus operates on the basis of suspicion or mistrustbetween one pole of ‘conspirators, known or otherwise’ and another assumed by conspiracists,or, if we can put it another way, on the basis of ‘a dualism of the “us versus them” type and adynamic of the “good and bad” type which, together, make it possible to eliminate all nuance andcomplexity. In the African context, the dialectic created and maintained by conspiracy theoristsgenerally has more to do with rumour, accusations of intent, defamation, etc. than with logical, reasoned and dispassionate contradiction, with the ‘they say that...’ or one of its expressivevariants as its proven genetic source. Here again, ‘conspiratorial thinking is alien to the principleof non-contradiction’ (M. Angenot, 2010 : 35) and that is why, faced with the impossible synthesisof opposites, which is nonetheless the expected outcome of any dialectical process, we are led towonder what point there is in a conspiratorial explanation taking the radical opposite view toofficial information or communication that is supposed to be objective, credible or truthful and,as such, enlightened and enlightening.

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