Conspiracy Theories, Anti-Science, and Disinformation in East Asia: Perspectives from Japan

Application summary

The project will promote scientific breakthroughs by illuminating the extent to which – and to what (possible) ends – activism and narratives fuelled by conspiracy theories (CTs), disinformation and anti-science claims have been targeting domestic policies and institutions and foreign and security policies in Japan. The project is a pioneering attempt (1) to investigate conspiracy theory-rooted stances pertaining to COVID-19/the pandemic-mitigation measures and the ongoing Ukraine and Israel–Hamas crises amongst Japanese conspiritual organisations, populist political actors and far-right organisations and (2) to show how such narratives and activism are fused with other ideologically laden claims of individual and collective rights, anti-establishment and anti-globalisation approaches, alternative health practices and disinformation spread by authoritarian regimes. Moreover, the findings will allow us to explain the extent to which the COVID-19 pandemic and the Ukraine and Israel–Hamas crises have become catalysts for CT flows in(to) Japan and how the presence and operations of the selected actors contribute to perpetuating systemic vulnerabilities by disseminating conspiratorial claims, drawing on anti-science arguments and mis/disinformation. The gathered evidence will also enable us to assess how CT flows in Japan can be exemplary (or not) of global trends and/or crises of public trust in epistemic authorities and identify the similarities, differences and interconnections between such activism in the group of so-called “WEIRD” countries. New expertise produced within the framework will lend itself to comparative inquiries of the Finnish and other European/American cases to parse out the similarities and differences between their respective narratives and the operations of the CT actors in the “WEIRD” countries, as the academic community currently lacks sufficient empirical data for such prospective comparisons.