New World Order (conspiracy theory) Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==Postulated implementations== Just as there are several overlapping or conflicting theories among conspiracists about the nature of the New World Order, so are there several beliefs about how its architects and planners will implement it: ===Gradualism=== Conspiracy theorists generally speculate that the New World Order is being implemented [[Gradualism#Politics and society|gradually]], citing the formation of the [[U.S. Federal Reserve System]] in 1913; the [[League of Nations]] in 1919; the [[International Monetary Fund]] in 1944; the United Nations in 1945; the [[World Bank]] in 1945; the [[World Health Organization]] in 1948; the [[European Union]] and the [[Euro]] in 1993; the [[World Trade Organization]] in 1998; the [[African Union]] in 2002, and the [[Union of South American Nations]] in 2008 as major milestones.<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> An increasingly popular conspiracy theory among American [[right-wing populism|right-wing populists]] is that the hypothetical [[North American Union]] and the [[amero currency]], proposed by the [[Council on Foreign Relations]] and its counterparts in [[Mexico]] and [[Canada]], will be the next milestone in the implementation of the New World Order. The theory holds that a group of shadowy and mostly nameless international elites is planning to replace the [[federal government of the United States]] with a [[transnationality|transnational]] government. Therefore, conspiracy theorists believe the borders between Mexico, Canada, and the United States are in the process of being erased, covertly, by a group of globalists whose ultimate goal is to replace national governments in Washington, D.C., Ottawa, and Mexico City with a European-style political union and a bloated E.U.-style bureaucracy.{{cn|date=March 2024}} Skeptics argue that the North American Union exists only as a proposal contained in one of a thousand academic and policy papers published each year that advocate all manner of idealistic but ultimately unrealistic approaches to social, economic, and political problems. Most of these are passed around in their circles and eventually filed away and forgotten by junior staffers in congressional offices. However, some of these papers become touchstones for the conspiracy-minded and form the basis of all kinds of unfounded xenophobic fears, especially during times of economic anxiety.{{cn|date=March 2024}} For example, in March 2009, as a result of the [[late-2000s financial crisis]], the People's Republic of China and the Russian Federation pressed for urgent consideration of a new international [[reserve currency]] and the [[United Nations Conference on Trade and Development]] proposed greatly expanding the I.M.F.'s [[special drawing rights]]. Conspiracy theorists fear these proposals are a call for the U.S. to adopt a [[world currency#Single world currency|single global currency]] for a New World Order.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.startribune.com/politics/state/41919847.html?page=1&c=y|title=Bachmann: No foreign currency|date=26 March 2009|newspaper=Star Tribune|access-date=3 May 2009}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://thinkprogress.org/2009/03/25/from-drudge-to-fox/|title=The Right-Wing Echo Chamber In Action: How A Conspiracy Travels From Drudge To Obama, Via Fox News|website=[[ThinkProgress]]|access-date=18 August 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110515052509/http://thinkprogress.org/2009/03/25/from-drudge-to-fox|archive-date=15 May 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> Judging that both national governments and global institutions have proven ineffective in addressing global problems that go beyond the capacity of individual nation-states to solve, some political scientists critical of New World Order conspiracism, such as Mark C. Partridge, argue that [[regionalism (international relations)|regionalism]] will be the major force in the coming decades, pockets of power around regional centers: Western Europe around Brussels, the Western Hemisphere around Washington, D.C., East Asia around Beijing, and Eastern Europe around Moscow. As such, the E.U., the [[Shanghai Cooperation Organisation]], and the [[G-20 major economies|G-20]] will likely become more influential as time progresses. The question then is not whether [[global governance]] is gradually emerging, but rather how will these [[regional powers]] interact with one another.<ref name="Partridge 2008">{{cite journal |last=Partridge |first=Mark C |title=One World Government: Conspiracy Theory or Inevitable Future? |journal=[[The Diplomatic Courier]] |date=14 December 2008 |url=http://www.diplomaticourier.org/kmitan/articleback.php?newsid=259 |access-date=4 May 2014 |archive-date=17 August 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090817053548/http://www.diplomaticourier.org/kmitan/articleback.php?newsid=259 }}</ref> ===Coup d'état=== [[File:CBP_UH-60_Blackhawk.jpg|thumb|upright|The [[American militia movement]] claim that a [[coup d'état]] will be launched by a "[[The Secret Team#Secret Team|Secret Team]]" in [[black helicopter]]s.]] American [[right-wing populism|right-wing populist]] conspiracy theorists, especially those who joined the [[American militia movement|militia movement]] in the United States, speculate that the New World Order will be implemented through a dramatic [[coup d'état]] by a "[[The Secret Team#Secret Team|secret team]]", using [[black helicopter]]s, in the U.S. and other nation-states to bring about a [[totalitarian]] world government controlled by the [[United Nations]] and enforced by troops of foreign [[Department of Peacekeeping Operations|U.N. peacekeepers]]. Following the [[Rex 84]] and [[Operation Garden Plot]] plans, this military coup would involve the suspension of the [[United States Constitution|Constitution]], the imposition of [[martial law]], and the appointment of [[military dictatorship|military commanders to head state and local governments]] and to detain [[dissident]]s.<ref name="Levitas 2004">{{cite book|author=Levitas, Daniel|title=The Terrorist Next Door: The Militia Movement and the Radical Right|publisher=St. Martin's Griffin|year= 2004|isbn=0-312-32041-8|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/terroristnextdoo00dani}}</ref> These conspiracy theorists, who are all strong believers in a [[right to keep and bear arms]], are extremely fearful that the passing of any [[gun control]] legislation will be later followed by the abolition of personal gun ownership and a campaign of gun confiscation, and that the [[refugee camp]]s of emergency management agencies such as [[Federal Emergency Management Agency|FEMA]] will be used for the [[internment]] of suspected [[subversives]], making little effort to distinguish true threats to the New World Order from pacifist dissidents.<ref name="Anti-Defamation League"/> Before 2000, some [[survivalist]]s wrongly believed this process would be set in motion by the predicted [[Y2K problem]] causing [[societal collapse]].<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/special_report/1998/09/98/conspiracy_-_radio_5_live/185161.stm|title=Death to the New World Order|access-date=24 June 2006|author=BBC News Special Report |date=5 October 1998}}</ref> Since many left-wing and right-wing conspiracy theorists believe that the [[9/11 conspiracy theories|11 September attacks were a false flag operation]] carried out by the [[United States intelligence community]], as part of a [[strategy of tension]] to justify [[political repression]] at home and [[preemptive war]] abroad, they have become convinced that a more catastrophic [[terrorist incident]] will be responsible for triggering [[Executive Directive 51]] in order to complete the transition to a [[police state]].<ref>{{cite journal|url=http://www.slate.com/id/2176185/pagenum/all/#p2|title=Who Will Rule Us After the Next 9/11?|access-date=4 April 2009|author=Ron Rosenbaum|journal=Slate |date=19 October 2007}}</ref> Skeptics argue that unfounded fears about an imminent or eventual gun ban, military coup, internment, or U.N. invasion and occupation are rooted in the [[siege mentality]] of the American militia movement but also an [[apocalypticism|apocalyptic]] [[millenarianism]] which provides a basic narrative within the political right in the U.S., claiming that the idealized society (i.e., constitutional republic, [[Jeffersonian democracy]], "[[Christian nation]]", "[[white nationalism|white nation]]") is thwarted by subversive conspiracies of [[liberalism in the United States|liberal]] [[secular humanism|secular humanists]] who want "[[Big Government]]" and globalists who plot on behalf of the New World Order.<ref name="Berlet 1999"/> ===Mass surveillance=== Conspiracy theorists concerned with [[surveillance abuse]] believe that the New World Order is being implemented by the [[cult of intelligence]] at the core of the [[surveillance-industrial complex]] through [[mass surveillance]] and the use of [[Social Security number]]s, the [[barcode|bar-coding]] of retail goods with [[Universal Product Code]] markings, and, most recently, [[Radio-frequency identification|RFID tagging]] by [[microchip implant (human)|microchip implants]].<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> Claiming that corporations and government are planning to track every move of consumers and citizens with RFID as the latest step toward a ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four|1984]]''-like [[surveillance state]], [[consumer privacy]] advocates, such as [[Katherine Albrecht]] and [[Liz McIntyre (writer)|Liz McIntyre]],<ref name="Albrecht & McIntyre 2006">{{cite book|author=Albrecht, Katherine |author-link=Katherine Albrecht|author2=McIntyre, Liz|author2-link=Liz McIntyre (writer)|title=The Spychips Threat: Why Christians Should Resist RFID and Electronic Surveillance|publisher=Nelson Current|date=2006|isbn=1-59555-021-6}}</ref> have become Christian conspiracy theorists who believe [[spychip]]s must be resisted because they argue that modern [[database]] and [[information and communication technologies|communications technologies]], coupled with [[point of sale]] [[automatic identification and data capture|data-capture]] equipment and sophisticated ID and [[authentication]] systems, now make it possible to require a [[biometrics|biometrically]] associated number or mark to make purchases. They fear that the ability to implement such a system closely resembles the [[Number of the beast|Number of the Beast]] prophesied in the [[Book of Revelation]].<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> In January 2002, the [[Information Awareness Office]] (IAO) was established by the [[Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency]] (DARPA) to bring together several DARPA projects focused on applying information technology to counter [[asymmetric warfare|asymmetric threats]] to [[national security]]. Following public criticism that the development and deployment of these technologies could potentially lead to a mass surveillance system, the IAO was defunded by the United States Congress in 2003.<ref name="eff-tia-funding">{{cite web|url=http://w2.eff.org/Privacy/TIA/20031003_comments.php|title=Total/Terrorism Information Awareness (TIA): Is It Truly Dead?|date=2003|work=Electronic Frontier Foundation (official website)|access-date=15 March 2009|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090325113304/http://w2.eff.org/Privacy/TIA/20031003_comments.php|archive-date=25 March 2009}}</ref> The second source of controversy involved IAO's original logo, which depicted the "all-seeing" [[Eye of Providence]] atop of a pyramid looking down over the globe, accompanied by the Latin phrase ''[[scientia potentia est|scientia est potentia]]'' (knowledge is power). Although DARPA eventually removed the logo from its website, it left a lasting impression on privacy advocates.<ref name="Seifert 2004">{{cite web|author=Seifert, Jeffrey W.|title=Data Mining: An Overview|date=16 December 2004|url=https://fas.org/irp/crs/RL31798.pdf|access-date=11 October 2009}}</ref> It also inflamed conspiracy theorists,<ref>{{cite web|author=Terry Melanson|date=22 July 2002|url=http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NWO/Paranoid.htm|title=Information Awareness Office (IAO): How's This for Paranoid?|publisher=Illuminati Conspiracy Archive|access-date=11 October 2009}}</ref> who misinterpret the "eye and pyramid" as the [[Freemasonry|Masonic]] symbol of the [[Illuminati]],<ref name="AMFAQ 2.3"/><ref name="Morris 2009">{{cite web|author=Morris, S. Brent|date=1 January 2009|url=http://web.mit.edu/dryfoo/masonry/Essays/eyepyr.html|title=The Eye in the Pyramid|work=Short Talk Bulletin|publisher=Masonic Service Association|access-date=27 October 2009|archive-date=15 December 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091215172036/http://web.mit.edu/dryfoo/masonry/Essays/eyepyr.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> an 18th-century secret society they speculate continues to exist and is plotting on behalf of a New World Order.<ref name="Stauffer 1918"/><ref name="McKeown"/> American historian [[Richard Landes]], who specialized in the history of [[apocalypticism]] and was co-founder and director of the [[Center for Millennial Studies]] at Boston University, argues that new and emerging technologies often trigger [[alarmism]] among [[millenarianism|millenarians]]. Even the introduction of [[printing press|Gutenberg's printing press]] in 1436 caused waves of apocalyptic thinking. The [[Year 2000 problem]], bar codes, and Social Security numbers all triggered [[Eschatology|end-time]] warnings which either proved to be false or were no longer taken seriously once the public became accustomed to these technological changes.<ref>{{cite news|author=Baard, Mark|title=RFID: Sign of the (End) Times?|work=wired.com|url=https://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,70308-0.html|access-date=18 December 2006|date=6 June 2006}}</ref> Civil libertarians argue that the privatization of surveillance and the rise of the surveillance-industrial complex in the United States does raise legitimate concerns about the erosion of [[privacy]].<ref name="ACLU 2004">{{cite journal|author=Stanley, Jay|title=The Surveillance-Industrial Complex: How the American Government Is Conscripting Businesses and Individuals in the Construction of a Surveillance Society|date=August 2004|journal= American Civil Liberties Union| url=https://www.aclu.org/FilesPDFs/surveillance_report.pdf|access-date=14 July 2014}}</ref> However, skeptics of mass surveillance conspiracism caution that such concerns should be disentangled from secular paranoia about [[Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)|Big Brother]] or religious hysteria about the [[Antichrist]].<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> ===Occultism=== Conspiracy theorists of the [[Christian right]], starting with British revisionist historian [[Nesta Helen Webster]], believe there is an ancient [[occult]] conspiracy—started by the first [[mystagogue]]s of [[Gnosticism]] and perpetuated by their alleged [[esotericism|esoteric]] successors, such as the [[Kabbalah|Kabbalists]], [[Cathars]], [[Knights Templar]], [[Hermeticism|Hermeticists]], [[Rosicrucianism|Rosicrucians]], [[Freemasonry|Freemasons]], and, ultimately, the [[Illuminati]]—which seeks to subvert the [[Judeo-Christian]] foundations of the [[Western world]] and implement the New World Order through a one-world religion that prepares the masses to embrace the [[imperial cult]] of the [[Antichrist]].<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> More broadly, they speculate that globalists who plot on behalf of a New World Order are directed by occult agencies of some sort: [[Rite of Strict Observance|unknown superiors]], [[Spiritual Hierarchy|spiritual hierarchies]], [[demon]]s, [[fallen angel]]s or [[Lucifer#Occult beliefs|Lucifer]]. They believe that these conspirators use the power of occult sciences ([[numerology]]), symbols ([[Eye of Providence]]), rituals ([[Master Mason|Masonic degrees]]), monuments ([[National Mall#Landmarks, museums and other features|National Mall landmarks]]), buildings ([[Manitoba Legislative Building]]<ref name="Albo 2007">{{cite book|last=Albo|first=Frank|title=The Hermetic Code|publisher=Winnipeg Free Press|date=2007|isbn=978-0-9682575-3-1}}</ref>) and facilities ([[Denver International Airport]]) to advance their plot to rule the world.<ref name="Barkun 2003"/><ref name="Marrs 2013">{{cite book|author=Marrs, Jim|title=Our Occulted History|publisher=William Morrow|date=2013|isbn=978-0-06-213032-7}}</ref> For example, in June 1979, an unknown benefactor under the pseudonym "[[Christian Rosenkreuz|R. C. Christian]]" had a huge granite [[megalith]] built in the U.S. state of [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]], which acts like a compass, calendar, and clock. A message comprising ten guides is inscribed on the occult structure in many languages to serve as instructions for survivors of a [[doomsday event]] to establish a more enlightened and sustainable civilization than the destroyed one. The "[[Georgia Guidestones]]" has subsequently become a spiritual and political [[Rorschach test]] onto which any number of ideas can be imposed. Some New Agers and [[neo-pagan]]s revere it as a [[ley line|ley-line]] power nexus while a few conspiracy theorists are convinced that they are engraved with the New World Order's anti-Christian "[[Ten Commandments]]." Should the Guidestones survive for centuries as their creators intended, many more meanings could arise, equally unrelated to the designer's original intention.{{cn|date=March 2024}} Skeptics argue that the [[demonization]] of [[Western esotericism]] by conspiracy theorists is rooted in [[religious intolerance]] but also in the same [[moral panic]]s that have fueled [[witch trials in the Early Modern period]], and [[satanic ritual abuse]] allegations in the United States.<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> ===Population control=== Conspiracy theorists believe that the New World Order will also be implemented through [[human population control]] to more easily monitor and control the movement of individuals.<ref name="Barkun 2003"/> The means range from stopping the growth of human societies through [[reproductive health]] and [[family planning]] programs, which promote [[abstinence]], [[contraception]] and [[abortion]], or intentionally reducing the bulk of the [[world population]] through [[genocides]] by mongering unnecessary wars, through [[plague (disease)|plagues]] by engineering [[emergent virus]]es and [[Vaccine hesitancy|tainting]] [[vaccine]]s, and through [[environmental disasters]] by [[weather control|controlling the weather]] ([[High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program|HAARP]], [[chemtrail conspiracy theory|chemtrails]]), etc. Conspiracy theorists argue that globalists plotting on behalf of a New World Order are [[Neo-Malthusianism|neo-Malthusians]] who engage in [[Human overpopulation|overpopulation]] and [[climate change]] alarmism to create public support for coercive population control and ultimately world government. [[United Nations]] [[Agenda 21]] is condemned as "reconcentrating" people into urban areas and depopulating rural ones, even generating a dystopian novel by [[Glenn Beck]] where single-family homes are a distant memory. Skeptics argue that fears of population control can be traced back to the traumatic legacy of the [[eugenics]] movement's "war against the weak" in the United States during the first decades of the 20th century but also the [[Second Red Scare]] in the U.S. during the late 1940s and 1950s, and to a lesser extent in the 1960s, when activists on the [[far right]] of American politics routinely opposed [[public health]] programs, notably [[water fluoridation]], mass [[vaccination]] and [[mental health]] services, by asserting they were all part of a far-reaching plot to impose a socialist or communist regime.<ref name="Henig">{{cite book|last=Henig|first=Robin Marantz|title=The People's Health|publisher=Joseph Henry Press| date=1997|isbn=0-309-05492-3|page=85}}</ref> Their views were influenced by opposition to a number of major social and political changes that had happened in recent years: the growth of [[internationalism (politics)|internationalism]], particularly the [[United Nations]] and its programs; the introduction of social [[welfare]] provisions, particularly the various programs established by the [[New Deal]]; and government efforts to reduce inequalities in the [[social class in the United States|social structure of the U.S.]]<ref name="Rovere">{{cite book|last=Rovere|first=Richard H.|title=Senator Joe McCarthy|publisher=University of California Press|date=1959|pages=21–22|isbn=0-520-20472-7}}</ref> Opposition towards mass vaccinations in particular got significant attention in the late 2010s, so much so the [[World Health Organization]] listed [[vaccine hesitancy]] as one of the top ten global health threats of 2019. By this time, people that refused or refused to allow their children to be vaccinated were known colloquially as "anti-vaxxers", though citing the New World Order conspiracy theory or resistance to a perceived population control plan as a reason to refuse vaccination were few and far between.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.who.int/emergencies/ten-threats-to-global-health-in-2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190116182336/https://www.who.int/emergencies/ten-threats-to-global-health-in-2019|url-status=dead|archive-date=16 January 2019|title=Ten health issues WHO will tackle this year|website=Who.int|language=en|access-date=19 January 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.newsweek.com/world-health-organization-who-un-global-health-air-pollution-anti-vaxxers-1292493 |title=The anti-vax movement has been listed by WHO as one of its top 10 health threats for 2019 |last=PM |first=Aristos Georgiou |date=15 January 2019 |access-date=16 January 2019 |language=en}}</ref> ===Mind control=== Social critics accuse governments, corporations, and the [[mass media]] of being involved in the [[propaganda model|manufacturing of a national consensus]] and, paradoxically, a [[culture of fear]] due to the potential for increased [[social control]] that a mistrustful and mutually fearing population might offer to those in power. The worst fear of some conspiracy theorists, however, is that the New World Order will be implemented through the use of [[mind control]]—a broad range of tactics able to subvert an individual's control of their own thinking, behavior, emotions, or decisions. These tactics are said to include everything from [[The Manchurian Candidate|Manchurian candidate]]-style [[brainwashing]] of [[sleeper agent]]s ([[Project MKULTRA]], "[[Project Monarch]]") to engineering [[psychological operations]] ([[water fluoridation]], [[subliminal message|subliminal advertising]], "[[microwave auditory effect|Silent Sound Spread Spectrum]]", [[MEDUSA (weapon)|MEDUSA]]) and [[parapsychology|parapsychological]] operations ([[Stargate Project]]) to influence the masses.<ref name="Harrington 1996">{{cite journal|author=Harrington, Evan|title=Conspiracy Theories and Paranoia: Notes from a Mind-Control Conference|journal=[[Skeptical Inquirer]] |date=1996|url=http://www.csicop.org/si/9609/conspiracy.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080317115600/http://csicop.org/si/9609/conspiracy.html|archive-date=17 March 2008|access-date=23 July 2009}}</ref> The concept of wearing a [[tin foil hat]] for protection from such threats has become a popular stereotype and term of derision; the phrase serves as a byword for [[paranoia]] and is associated with conspiracy theorists. Skeptics argue that the paranoia behind a conspiracy theorist's obsession with [[mind control]], [[population control]], [[occultism]], [[surveillance abuse]], [[Big Business]], [[Big Government]], and [[globalization]] arises from a combination of two factors, when he or she: 1) holds strong [[individualist]] values and 2) lacks [[power (philosophy)|power]]. The first attribute refers to people who care deeply about an individual's right to make their own choices and direct their own lives without interference or obligations to a larger system (like the government), but combine this with a sense of powerlessness in one's own life. One gets what some psychologists call "[[agency (philosophy)|agency]] panic," intense anxiety about an apparent loss of autonomy to outside forces or regulators. When fervent individualists feel that they cannot exercise their independence, they experience a crisis and assume that larger forces are to blame for usurping this freedom.<ref name="Shrira 2008">{{cite journal|first1=Ilan|last1=Shrira|title=Paranoia and the roots of conspiracy theories – September 11 and the psychological roots of conspiracy theories|journal=Psychology Today|date=11 September 2008|url=http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-narcissus-in-all-us/200809/paranoia-and-the-roots-conspiracy-theories|access-date=14 July 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|publisher=Cornell University Press|isbn=0-8014-8606-8|last=Melley|first=Timothy|title=Empire of Conspiracy: The Culture of Paranoia in Postwar America|date=December 1999}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page