Here is my latest LSE book review of a tome exploring the exotic world of rumours – how they spread, what they mean, and what might be done about them:

The Global Grapevine: Why Rumours of Terrorism, Immigration and Trade Matter.

Gary Alan Fine and Bill Ellis, OUP 2010

My basic point:

The authors do a spirited job in making sense of this mass of (by definition) confusing and inconsistent material, arguing that successful rumours are both plausible and credible -’too good to be false’. They draw terse insights: “rumours are often wrong, but they are rarely insane”; “an effort to halt the circulation of a rumour based on a conspiracy theory, paradoxically, demonstrates that it is true”; “rumour allows us to discuss hidden fears and desires without claiming these attitudes as our own”.

So far so good. But the book is much less convincing where it moves on from describing/analysing rumours to trying to explain why they ‘matter’ and what if anything might be done about them…

The book peters out in a series of platitudes. “Rumours are not easily mastered”; we should “question claims which seem too good to be false”, moving past “stereotypical thinking” to “recognize our strengths as a society” and “determine cautiously and carefully which forms of globalization strengthen us” (good luck with that one)…

My conclusion? Why focus on vanilla US conspiracy theories when there are such luscious, ripe Balkan ones:

For the best conspiracy theories the authors need to get on down to former Yugoslavia.

In Sarajevo one school of thought has it that the European Union makes very clear that Muslims are unwelcome in Christian Europe.

The evidence? The EU’s yellow star-circle logo, obviously representing the halo above the Virgin Mary.