In the nineteenth century anarchists were accused of conspiracy by governments afraid of revolution, but in the current century various “conspiracy theories” suggest that anarchists are controlled by government itself. The Illuminati were a network of intellectuals who argued for self-government and against private property, yet the public is now often told that they were (and are) the very group that controls governments and defends private property around the world. Intervening in such misinformation, Lagalisse works with primary and secondary sources in multiple languages to set straight the history of the Left and illustrate the actual relationship between revolutionism, pantheistic occult philosophy, and the clandestine fraternity.

Erica Lagalisse is an activist, anthropologist and writer. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the International Inequalities Institute of the London School of Economics and Political Science, where she is conducting a research project on dynamics surrounding the “conspiracy theory” in social movement spaces.