Colloquium Resource Pack

#CLPostTruth

@CumberlandLodge

The Politics of (Post) Truth

Published 23 September 2018

Edited byLaura Garcia (University of Kent)

Dr Chris Henry (University of Kent)Guillermo Reyes Pascual (University of Kent)

2

The Politics of (Post) Truth Colloquium

The Politics of (Post) Truth conference, held at Cumberland Lodge from 7 - 8 October 2018, broughttogether academics, politicians, media practitioners, and members of the public in two days of collaborativeexchange. It aimed to revisit the prevailing understanding of what has popularly been labelled ‘post-truth’politics. The conference brought together three, closely linked, disciplines — politics, philosophy andjournalism — to explore new and shifting perspectives on this topic, and tried to establish aninterdisciplinary understanding of ‘post-truth’.

The post-truth phenomenon raises difficult questions for politicians, philosophers and the public alike: havewe lost trust in the media and other key institutions of the state? How might we rebuild it? Can wereassert the role of academic knowledge in contemporary political debate? How might politicians constructhealthier political debate in the face of the corrosion of the ‘truthfulness’ of political, academic andjournalistic discourse?

Responding to these questions, and in the shadow of the 2016 Brexit Referendum and Donald Trump’spresidential election victory, the conference explored the following key questions:

How can we better understand ‘post-truth’? Does ‘post-truth’ represent a genuinely new-form of politics? And if so, was there ever a ‘truth’ politics and what led to its collapse?What does the future hold for post-truth politics?What role, if any, do politicians, academics-and the media have to play in ‘armouring’ politics against the perceived threat of post-truthdiscourse? Are we in danger of reifying a phenomenon that may not really exist?

In exploring these core questions, The Politics of (Post) Truth conference responded to the fact that thisphenomenon has attracted significant popular commentary, but little in-depth analysis. The Politics of (Post)Truth challenged existing assumptions and examined shifting notions of truth in an age of increasing politicalvolatility. The conference attracted students, academics and media practitioners — anyone concerned bythe direction of contemporary politics, journalism and philosophy. The Politics of (Post) Truth drew togetherdifferent sectors of society and offered a unique opportunity to examine key socio-political questions andinterrogate the emergence of the post-truth world.

speakers

Dr Julian Baggini, Philosopher and Author, A Short History of Truth: Consolations for a Post-Truth World-James Ball, Journalist and Author, Post-Truth: How Bullshit Conquered the World-Dr Jen Birks, Assistant Professor in Media, University of Nottingham-Allie Elwell, Founder, Beyond Brussels Podcast-Professor Steve Fuller, Chair in Social Epistemology, University of Warwick-Dr Michael Hannon, Deputy Director, Institute of Philosophy, University of London-Dr Darren G Lilleker, Associate Professor in Media Communications, Bournemouth University-Professor Chris Rojek, Professor of Sociology, City, University of London-Hattie Schofield, Head of Communications, Simple Politics-Professor Jane Singer, Professor of Innovation Journalism, City, University of London-Professor Mark Wheeler, Professor of Political Communication, London Metropolitan University-Professor James Williams, Honorary Professor of Philosophy, Deakin University-Peter York, President, The Media Society-

The colloquium was organised by an interdisciplinary committee from the University of Kent — LauraGarcia, Dr Chris Henry, and Guillermo Reyes Pascual.

contents

1. Journalism and (post) truth

1.1 Want to know more?

2. Theories of truth in contemporary philosophy

2.1 Theories of truth?

2.2 Correspondence theory

2.3 Coherence theory

2.4 Pragmatism

2.5 Aletheia

2.6 Want to know more?

3. Politics and (post) truth

3.1 Want to know more?

page 4

page 5

page 7

page 8

page 8

page 9

page 10

page 11

page 12

page 14

page 15

about Cumberland Lodge

Founded in 1947, Cumberland Lodge in Windsor Great Park is home to an educational charity with thevision of more peaceful, open and inclusive societies.

We equip and inspire people from every background, generation and perspective to learn from one anotherand engage in constructive dialogue and debate on the causes and effects of social divisions.

We bring together leaders and influencers, students and community practitioners, and foster learning andcritical thinking through:

Subsidised residential study retreats for students in higher education-Inter-disciplinary conferences, lectures and seminars, with leading figures from public life-Mentoring schemes and scholarships for early career researchers and international students-Educational and cultural events for the local community, including schools workshops, art-exhibitions, public lectures and literary events.

Find out more about what we do at cumberlandlodge.ac.uk/whatwedo, and about our history and heritageat cumberlandlodge.ac.uk/history.

3

journalism and (post) truth

Journalism and journalists sit at the intersection between politics, facts and truth. Reporters are taught touse facts to make an argument, to let the facts do the talking. But what happens when just the facts aren’tenough? Lucas Greaves, author of Deciding What’s True: The Rise of Political Fact-Checking in AmericanJournalism, describes how this can be less straightforward than it looks:

‘Fact-checkers very much want to reject the tradition of “he said, she said” reporting...but at the same time,facts are slippery things so we have to recognise that people aren’t always going to agree with theirconclusions.’

Facts themselves exist in what Matthew D’Ancona calls ‘incommensurable realities’ where ‘prudent conductconsists in choosing sides rather than evaluating evidence’. People choose sides and therefore the factsthat are aligned with it. The most common link between this new (post) truth world order and journalismare ‘fake news’, and ‘alternative facts’.

But how did this level of misinformation creep its way into the media? Heather Bryan outlined the challengesfor newsrooms in an article for NiemanLab: media organisations have ‘to identify sophisticatedmanipulations, educate audiences without inducing apathy and deepening mistrust, and keep the growth ofthis technology from casting doubt on legitimate and truthful stories.’

The media itself has helped to establish a narrative that ‘fake news’ is the product of clever algorithmsmanipulated by computer hackers locked away in a random basement; however, scientists disagree. AnMIT study from 2018 proved that ‘false news spreads more than the truth because humans, not robots, aremore likely to spread it’. We spread what we share. And we share it mostly online.

However, according to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, the use of social media for newshas started to fall in a number of key markets after years of continuous growth. Regardless of our chosenplatform to interact with real and fake news sites, our trust relationship with the media as a concept hassuffered in the process.

The Edelman trust barometer ‘found that large portions of the audience are cutting back on or abandoningnews entirely’. As the LSE’s Charlie Beckett put it as early as 2008: ‘Trust is a relationship, not a fact’.Relationships require constant effort to be upheld and cannot be taken for granted. Where did we startlosing people’s trust? Tech giants changed how traditional media takes in revenue from advertising, and noone seems to have found a new solid way of profitably making news. According to the Press Gazette almost200 local papers closed across the UK between 2005 and 2016.

Money isn’t their only problem: diversity is also an issue. People don’t trust media organisations that theydon’t feel represent them — especially if that feeling is linked to distrust in certain segments of the politicalelite. No wonder that the perception of collusion between government and the media is particularly acuteduring elections.

Journalists the world over have decided to fight misinformation with fact-checking. As early as 2009,Politifact won the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting for their fact-checking coverage of the 2008 election.In the UK, FullFact, Channel 4 and the BBC have all launched fact-checking initiatives. The BBC has funded150 new local democracy reporters to work in other news organisations across the UK to try and fosteraccountability at a local level. Cardiff University has established a centre to train and support communityand local news.

4

Laura Garcia

In the case of the Mexican presidential elections in July of this year, VerificadoMX brought together 70+news organisations, including Al Jazeera in Spanish, set up a Whatsapp service where people could messagein a story and the team would reply whether it was true or false. They used these stories to build acomprehensive database online that anybody could consult. Comprova, in Brazil, is copying this model aheadof their own elections. Even the UN has got involved. They recently released a manual with steps and tipson how to fight what they call ‘our current information disorder’.

Nevertheless, quality journalism has a history of survival. Why? Professor Jackie Harrison from theUniversity of Sheffield argues that the public, according to most audience surveys, ‘persistently valueaccurate, sincere and objective news — news that they believe displays editorial integrity’. Here’s hopingjournalism cracks the business model so that journalism with ‘editorial integrity’ survives long enough tore-establish our trust relationship with our audience.

Laura GarciaLecturer in Television and Multimedia Journalism and PhD Candidate, University of Kent

L.Garcia@kent.ac.uk

5

want to know more?Katherine M. Grosser et al, ‘Trust in Online Journalism’, Trust and Communication in a Digitalized World, pp53-73, Springer, February 2016 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Nic Newman, Trust, misinformation, and the declining use of social media for news: Digital News Report 2018,Reuters Institute, 2018 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Damian Tambini, Fake news: public policy responses, LSE Media Policy Project Series, 2017 [Last accessed 3October 2018]

Nikos Smyrnaios et al, The Impact of Cross-Check on Journalists and the Audience, CrossCheck, November2017 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Martin Moore and Gordon Ramsay, UK media coverage of the 2016 EU referendum campaign, Centre for theStudy of Media, Communication and Power, King’s College London, May 2017 [Last accessed 3 October2018]

Federica Cherubini and Lucas Graves, ‘The Rise of Fact-Checking Sites in Europe’, Digital News Project 2016,Reuters Institute, 2016 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Claire Wardle and Hossein Derakhshan, ‘Information Disorder: Towards an interdisciplinary framework forresearch and policymaking’, Council of Europe Report, October 2017 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Janna Anderson and Lee Raine, The Future of Truth and Misinformation Online, The Pew Research Center, 19October 2017 [Last accessed 3 October]

Journalism credibility: Strategies to restore trust, LSE, February 2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

Jason Tanz, ‘Journalism Fights for Survival in the Post-Truth Era’, WIRED, 14 February 2017 [Last accessed3 October]

Brad Scriber, ‘Who decides what’s true in politics? A history of the rise of political fact-checking’, Poynter,8 September 2016 [Last accessed 3 October]

Heather Bryant, ‘The universe of people trying to deceive journalists keeps expanding, and newsroomsaren’t ready’, Nieman Lab, 19 July 2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

Jackie Harrison, ‘Fake news has always existed, but quality journalism has a history of survival’, TheConversation, 3 May 2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

James Ball, ‘Distrust of social media is dragging traditional journalism down’, The Guardian, 22 January2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

Cherilyn Ireton, Julie Posetti et al, Journalism, ‘Fake News’ & Disinformation: Handbook for JournalismEducation and Training, UNESCO 2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

Paul Chadwick, ‘How fares trust in journalism amid a sea of fake news?’, The Guardian, 9 July 2017[Last accessed 3 October]

Richard Fletcher et al, Measuring the reach of "fake news" and online disinformation in Europe, ReutersInstitute, February 2018, [Last accessed 3 October]

Lucas Graves, Understanding the Promise and Limits of Automated Fact-Checking, Reuters Institute, February2018 [Last accessed 3 October]

Lisa Heyamoto and Todd Milbourn, The 32 Percent Project: How Citizens Define Trust and How Journalists CanEarn It, School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon, June 2018[Last accessed 3 October]

Video: Here’s How Fake News Works (and How the Internet Can Stop It), WIREDhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frjITitjisY[Last accessed 3 October]

Video: Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2018, Reuters Institutehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb8w3XT-KJc[Last accessed 3 October]

6

7

theories of truth in contemporary philosophy

As Misak argues in Truth, Politics, Morality, ‘the notion of truth has fallen from grace’ (Misak 2002: 1). Invarious forms of mid-20th century critical thought, truthful political philosophy became the target of apolitical philosophy of truth. This critique was an attempt to unmask and dismiss theories of truth asupholding and reinforcing the forms of logic that themselves upheld social institutions, with the assumptionthat these logics benefitted the institutions over the citizens they were created to serve. Certainly, andwhether one accepts the position that critical theory adopted or not, the current period of post-truthpolitics is (in part) constituted by a wholesale rejection of the very idea that individuals and institutionsmight present ideas that are grounded upon a form of truth. So why might one wish to hold onto theconcept of truth? Misak puts it well and it is worth quoting her at length:

‘We think that it is appropriate, or even required, that we give reasons and arguments for our beliefs, that“rational” persuasion, not brow-beating or force, is the appropriate means of getting someone to agree withus. Indeed, we want people to agree with, or at least respect, our judgements, as opposed to merely mouthingthem, or falling in line with them. And we criticise the beliefs, actions, and even the final ends and desires ofothers, as false, vicious, immoral, or irrational. The fact that our moral judgements come under such internaldiscipline is a mark of their objectivity. The above phenomena are indications that moral inquiry aims attruth’ (2002: 3).

Generally speaking then, truth claims form the weight of political argumentation, and theories of truth areoften used to ground claims in a certain sense of ‘reality’; when thinking either politics or the political,truth claims tread a thin line between a reductively dogmatic world-view and qualified political claims thatground their authority in a theory of their truthful relationship to the world. However, this ‘consequentialist’justification for truth as a legitimisation for (often coercive) political claims — ‘because it is true thatimmigration leads to social unrest, and it is true that social unrest is undesirable, we must develop a policyto reduce immigration’ — is challenged by both critical and liberal theorists alike. For liberal universalists,who deny the ability to make consequentialist truth claims, institutions of the state must take a neutralstance, allowing the individual to develop their own relative conceptualisation of truth. Of course, thisattempt at preventing the coercion of a partial system of truths itself institutes a false neutrality: forexample, the French ban of the traditional Muslim headscarf (foulard) is not a ‘neutral’ decision, but isgrounded upon a republican conceptualisation of the public sphere from which obvious distinction isintolerable.

So, whilst suspicious critical theorists and those who Misak calls ‘hands-off ’ liberals may wish to push tothe side conceptualisations of truth (at the very least), the truth claims implicit in such wariness neverthelessconstitute some of the imperative to engage with it. The rest of this introduction will outline — verygenerally — three dominant theories of truth, as well as the lesser known aletheiatic theory of truth, whichmight prove helpful as an introduction to the conference.1

1 The fourth dominant theory of truth–deflationism–will not be explicated here. Deflationism differs from the otherthree theories by arguing that truth is not a property of ontology, epistemology, or the truth-teller. Instead, fordeflationists, truthful propositions affirm the power of language itself (Armour-Garb and Beall 2005: 2). This theory isnot developed herein as it does not have a significant part to play in contemporary political philosophy.

Dr Chris Henry

If, as Burgess and Burgess claim, the best-known definition of truth by a philosopher is Aristotle’s assertionthat ‘[t]o say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, andof what is not that it is not, is true’ (Aristotle 1981: 1011b25), then we are left with a nominal definition oftruth that does not help appear to be helpful (Burgess and Burgess 2011: 2). Following Aristotle,contemporary authorship on the concept of truth generally divides between those who offer a definitionof truth (correspondence theorists), and nominalists who explain what it means to call something true(coherence theorists). However, there is another group of thinkers (pragmatists) who describe a belief astrue if it is useful in practice (as opposed to it being defined more substantially), as well as deflationists whodisagree with the above three ‘substantialist’ theories, who argue that ‘there is nothing more to the meaningof the truth predicate than what enables it to serve certain logical functions in language’ (Schmitt 2004:28). Deflationists argue that truth talk is expressive and affirms the power of language itself. Thus, althoughthere are considerable differences within each, there are four general theories of truth: coherence,correspondence, pragmatic and deflationary theories.

These four theories only constitute the most dominant theories — and particularly only those of the(predominantly) analytic tradition. Derrida differentiates between two kinds of truth theories, distinguishingbetween ‘mimetic’ truth and ‘aletheia’. According to Payne, Derrida thought that ‘[t]ruth as mimesis assumesthe unproblematic stability of language as an instrument with which to render or represent the world, andas such mimesis carries a deep suspicion of literature. Mimetic truth-seekers are highly anxious about thecapacity of language to ‘mean so many different things’ (Payne 2000: 132). Criticising the assumptions ofphilosophy’s ‘linguistic turn’— i.e. that both truth and meaning are made coherent by the rules of languageitself — both Derrida and Foucault (following Heidegger) developed theories of truth as aletheia, or ‘withoutconcealment’ (2000: 130). This theory of truth will be developed more below.

8

theories of truth?

In the Discourse on Metaphysics, Leibniz assured his reader that ‘it is agreed that every true prediction hassome basis in the nature of things’ (Leibniz 2005: Section 8), providing correspondence theory with a clearunderstanding of where truth is to be found. Understanding that the identification of a certain thing astruly a certain thing may run the risk of nominalism, Leibniz looked for a way to ground the truth ofidentification in nature. Therefore, correspondence theorists, whose key proponents alongside Leibnizinclude Russell and Wittgenstein, are usually committed to a ‘metaphysical realism’ in the sense that, asAlston puts it, ‘truth has to do with the relation of a potential truth bearer [i.e. a person] to a reality beyonditself ’ (Alston 1996: 8). Truth, according to these claims, must be independent of epistemological concepts(such as verification and ratification) and instead be an ontological property to which statements (variouslyin the form of propositions, statements, beliefs or ideas) may or may not correspond or represent.

One of the most robust correspondence theories of truth was that put forward by Bertrand Russell in hisessay ‘On the Nature of Truth and Falsehood’ (Russell 1910). Russell claimed that we may ‘state thedifference between truth and falsehood as follows: every judgement is a relation of the mind to severalobjects, one of which is a relation; the judgement is true when the relation which is one of the objectsrelates the other objects otherwise it is false’ (1910: 155-56). Acknowledging later that this definitionsuffers from the ‘direction problem’ — i.e. it does not specify whether a relation goes between A to B, orvice versa — Russell added that ‘the relation must not be abstractly before the mind, but must be beforeit as proceeding from A to B rather than from B to A. […] Then the relation as it enters into the judgementmust have a ‘sense’, and in the corresponding complex it must have the same sense’ (Russell 2001 [1912]:198-99; Newman 2002: 92-93). Russell’s theory (in its mature form) does not assume that people are inrelation to certain facts (an assumption he held in his earlier work), but that ‘a person is in a relation to

correspondence theory

9

certain objects that could be components of a fact’ (Newman 2002: 91). Put simply then, for correspondenttheorists, facts are not independent of the mind, and the mind exercises on the world in order to createfacts of it.

coherence theoryThere are three criticisms that face correspondence theory. Firstly, as Burgess and Burgess argue, there isan overriding problem with correspondence theories in that ‘they add nothing but rhetoric to thedeflationist account on which it is true that things are some way iff things are that way’ (Burgess and Burgess2011: 71).2 This criticism plays on the assumption that the mind thinking truth is assumed to be related tothe world of which it thinks. A formal separation between the mind and the world (according to whichthe individual perceives a world that is entirely independent of them), for Burgess and Burgess, means thatwhat is true is simply an apparent description of the world. Secondly, there is an infinite regress into theauthority claim that the subject uses to ‘claim’ the truth of a situation. When the subject declares thattheir belief is true because they relate truthfully to the world, this declaration uses a truth claim that itselfrequires a source of authority to assert its truth. Without employing a tautology, it is unclear where thisauthority is to be found.3 Thirdly, it is not clear to what part of reality ‘hypothetical’ or existentiallyambiguous beliefs are supposed to relate to: it is clear what the sentence ‘the snow is white’ might relateto, but what about ‘the unicorn is white’? It might be objected that the fact that unicorns do not existnullifies this problem, but this negative claim to truth (i.e. the non-existence of unicorns) cannot itself beshown to be true.

As Newman puts it, ‘[a]lthough nominalists must admit that we speak truthfully about property possession,about particulars having something in common, and about particulars being the same in a certain respect,they regard them merely as related ways of speaking that are not to be taken literally. They deny the literalexistence of the things affirmed to exist by realists’ (Newman 2002: 15-16). Such theorists disavow theontological certainty that truth claims definitely relate to the world (this is what is known as anti-realism,or at least contra-realism) and instead focus on what it is to tell truth. Coherence theory emerged in the19th Century, drawing inspiration from Spinoza and Hegel, and was at its most developed in the work of HH Joachim, F H Bradley, and Brand Blanshard in the early 20th Century (Schmitt 2004: 11).According to Schmitt, the case to be made for the coherence theory is as follows:

‘Judgement that, and knowledge of whether, a given judgement is true must evidently result from a comparisonof the target judgement with other judgements. The object of such a comparison must be a relation amongjudgements. Yet the object of the comparison is truth. So truth is a relation among judgements. […]So […] truth is membership in a coherent system of judgements’ (Schmitt 2004: 12).

For coherence theorists then, truth is not an ontological property but an epistemological relation; itfunctions as a judgement that governs the veracity of other beliefs to the extent that they function properlywith other beliefs that the subject holds. Therefore, it may well be legitimate to talk of the truth of unicornsif one has good reason to believe in their existence; as long as the idea ‘unicorn’ functions properly withinthe speaker’s epistemological structure, it holds a claim for truth. It is this form of reasoning that posits theexistence of dark matter, and supported the kindling of quantum theory.

2 ‘iff ’ is used here as a shorthand for ‘if and only if ’.3 Gödel’s work following that of Russell on the formal systems ‘appeared to demonstrate the impossibility of anyformalisation of mathematical reasoning that combines both completeness (in its ability to capture all of the truths ofmathematics) and logical consistency’ (Livingston 2011: 25). Put simply, this is another way of saying that the authority ofa given system is either non-existent, or illegitimate. When applied to linguistics, this conclusion negates the assumedauthority of the subject as truth-teller. See also (Schmitt 2004: 11).

Blanshard’s criticism of Hume’s concept of causality acts as a clear advocate of the coherence theory:according to Blanshard, when ‘we see a hammer about to descend on a nail, and say it will cause the nail tosink in, we seem to be thinking not merely of hammer and nail, but of something distinct from either, apeculiar connection between them’ (Blanshard 1939: 267). Whereas, for Blanshard, Hume’s inability to‘know’ the relation between the hammer and nail forced him to explain it away merely as a product of‘habit produced by experience’ (1939: 267), in fact the existence of this relation constituted an epistemicobject that needed to be accounted for. Once saved from Hume’s desire to explain it away, for Blanshard,causality as a relation ‘must now be detached from the first pair of terms and transferred to another case’in order to establish its clear and explicit status as a truth (1939: 268).

However, it is not certain that coherence theorists can be as assured of their criticism of correspondencetheory as they may like to think. Indeed, when Blanshard says of correspondence theory that the ‘scepticismentailed by the theory is so profound as to be incompatible with any confidence in its own truth’ (Blanshard1939: 271), he hints at a similar weakness that plagues coherence theory: by disavowing the ontologicalfoundations of truth claims, what is to stop those with entirely non-sensical beliefs — those suffering fromdelusional mental health disorders, for example — from claiming that these beliefs are nevertheless true?In other words, although one might argue that the statement ‘unicorns are white’ is true — becauseunicorns and white-ness are both properties that function in the subject’s system of beliefs — this doesnot legitimise any claim about the ontological without further description of each property. Yet, each furtherclaim to populate the idea of ‘unicorn’ with properties falls to the same hurdle, i.e. the truth speaker cannever specify their idea sufficiently enough to ‘match’ an ontological object and so the same criticism thatnominalists raise against the false authority of realists can be levied — albeit inverted — back at them.4

pragmatismAlthough Toumlin urges the reader to distinguish Dewey from other pragmatists on account of his filiationwith Wittgenstein and Heidegger (Dewey 1981 introduction), Dewey joins the ranks of Charles SandersPierce, William James and Richard Rorty as one of the most influential thinkers of pragmatism. Oftencharacterised as the founder of pragmatic truth theory, Pierce laments the profusion of unclear ideas thathinder the individual’s ability to act in the world: ‘It is terrible to see how a single unclear idea, a singleformula without meaning, lurking in a young man’s head, will sometimes act like an obstruction of inertmatter in an artery, hindering the nutrition of the brain, and condemning its victim to pine away in thefullness of his intellectual vigour and in the midst of intellectual plenty’ (Pierce 2004: 44). Less concernedwith the ontological and epistemological foundations of truth than either correspondence or coherencetheorists (with the exception of Rorty, who engages with poststructuralist metaphysics), pragmatists areassociated with the claim that ‘a true belief is one which would be agreed upon at the hypothetical or idealend of inquiry’ (Misak 2002: 1). Thus, as Misak continues, pragmatism ‘abandons the kind of metaphysicswhich is currently in so much disrepute — it abandons concepts which pretend to transcend experience.Truth and objectivity are matters of what is best for the community of inquirers to believe, “best” hereamounting to that which best fits with the evidence and argument’ (2002: 1). This is why Pierce is interestedin establishing clear ideas, for it is only through clear ideas that individuals can best live their lives within acommunity of individuals who are likewise interested in furthering themselves. As James’ dedication ofPragmatism (1975 [1907]) to John Stuart Mill shows, pragmatism has its roots in Mill’s concept of genius -the becoming of which is a precursor to making good decisions about one’s life.

Whilst this introduction will not develop pragmatism any further, it is necessary to highlight that, whilstcorrespondence theorists replace the priority of epistemology in favour of ontological with their theories,and vice versa for coherence theorists, pragmatists can be ambiguous with regards to both. Whilst Pierce,

10

4 See (Newman 2002: 16-17) for a development of this criticism.

11

setting himself at odds with Blanshard, takes up Hume’s mantle when he states that ‘the whole function ofthought is to produce habits of action’ (Pierce 2004: 47), for Rorty, all the mind is is the production ofpractical ways for living life and, hence, truth is simply ‘what passes for good belief ’ (Misak 2002: 13). Giventhat, for Rorty, any foundational claim based upon either ontology or epistemology is illegitimate, the onlything one can advocate is for what he calls ‘ironic liberalism’ as a way of asserting oneself whilst avoidingethnocentric biases. Only by declaring one’s identity as amongst other ‘twentieth-century Western socialdemocrats’ (Rorty 1991: 214) — and living in a constant self-critical relation to this declaration — doesRorty argue one can avoid fixing thought too rigidly in Western, liberal democratic values. Yet, if this is thecase, Christopher Norris warns that ‘we have reached a point where theory has effectively turned againstitself, generating a form of extreme epistemological scepticism which reduces everything – philosophy,politics, criticism and “theory” alike — to a dead level of suasive or rhetorical effect where consensus-values are the last (indeed the only) court of appeal’ (Norris 1990: 4). How then can pragmatists, whilstholding onto an anti-foundational set of assertions, nevertheless make definite claims about the world, oreven assert the correctness of their own theories? Pragmatism seems to rely on conviction as underpinningtheir arguments, and it is hard to see how such a concept used so nakedly might form part of a convincingposition.

aletheiaAletheiatic theories of truth, as Foucault has argued, are not mentioned explicitly in ancient philosophies,but can be found to be implicit within the plays of Euripides and Sophocles (Foucault 1983, 2014). Tracinga genealogy from ancient Greece, through to St. Paul and the early Christian monastic traditions, towardsa revised form within the Catholic system of penance, Foucault developed a practice of aletheiatic truthtelling in his own work known as ‘parrhesia’ (Foucault 1983). For Foucault, parrhesia ‘was not a questionof analysing the internal or external criteria that would enable the Greeks and Romans, or anyone else, torecognise whether a statement or proposition is true or not. At issue […] was rather the attempt toconsider truth-telling as a specific activity, or as a role’ (Foucault 1983: concluding remarks). Parrhesiaticthought is, for Foucault, not quite the affirmation of what has been said, but the ability of the individual toaffirm themselves as some who can tell their own truth. An inquiry into the self and, concomitantly, theindividual’s ability to tell the truth of the world as it appears to them is therefore also in line with thepragmatic tradition of inquiry. Telling the truth of oneself, for Foucault, has a transformative effect uponthe subject and reveals new, previously unthinkable, ways of living. For this reason, Foucault’s work fitswithin the aletheiatic tradition: ethical ways of living are revealed to the individual by their own work onthemselves.

A second influential theorist who’s work on aletheiatic truth draws on St. Paul is Alain Badiou, a prominentcontemporary post-Maoist, whose importance lies in his articulation of mathematics as the language of‘being qua being’ (Badiou 2004: 49). Arguing that ‘[o]ne of the core demands of contemporary thought isto have done with “political philosophy”’ (Badiou 2005: 10), Badiou argues that certain political eventsrupture with the current (political) order and how we know the world. This reveals the possibility for‘militants’ (in his terms), who hold fidelity to the event, to bring about the event’s consequences in what is,for Badiou, a political ‘truth procedure’.5 The ability for militants to articulate new political truths andnegate standard political philosophy (a category that includes all forms of philosophy other than Badiou’s,as well as all moral and ethical theory) is based upon mathematical set theory, in the version drawn up byZermelo and Fraenkel in the 1920s. According to Badiou’s interpretation of set theory, attempts on thepart of an individual or an institution to make everything fit into a set of categories — by a state government,for example, in a census — is illegitimate, as it pre-figures the many different ways that individuals can exist.This is demonstrated when, in Badiou’s example, a long-lost cousin knocks at the door and declaresthemselves part of the family, invalidating the census. Categorisation can, and for Badiou must, be resistedwhen a particular event reveals the possibility to do so, in a practice in which the individual acts out the

12

want to know more?

5 There are four types of truth procedure for Badiou: those of politics, art, science and love. The political truthprocedure has been outlined here only for the sake of brevity.6 An excellent summation of the relationship between Badiou, Foucault and Derrida in this respect can be found in(Balibar 2002).

Alston, William P. 1996. A Realist Conception of Truth (Cornell University Press: Ithaca).

Aristotle. 1981. Metaphysics (Clarendon: Oxford).Armour-Garb, Bradley P, and JC Beall. 2005. Deflationary Truth (Open Court Publishing: Chicago and La Salle).

Badiou, Alain. 2004. Theoretical Writings (Continuum: London and New York).———. 2005. Metapolitics (Verso: London and New York).

Balibar, Etienne. 2002. ''The History of Truth': Alain Badiou in French Philosophy', Radical Philosophy: 16-28.

Blanshard, Brand. 1939. The Nature of Thought (G. Allen & Unwin ltd: London).

Burgess, Alexis G., and John P. Burgess. 2011. Truth (Princeton University Press: Princeton and Woodstock).

Dewey, J. 1981. The Later Works, 1925-53 (Southern Illinois University Press: Carbondale).

truth of this event for them.

It is clear that the aletheiatic tradition has a radically different understanding of the relationship betweenontology and epistemology than the traditional theories of truth.6 The most significant difference betweenthese and the traditional theories of truth is the reliance that aletheiatic thinkers place upon the aleatory,or ruptural, nature of events. Indeed, aletheiatic philosophy distinguishes itself upon the indescribability ofemergent events, in the sense that significant events in our lives (job interviews, deaths, engagements,revolutions, etc.), often wash over us and leave us to pick up the pieces in their wake. New meaning iscreated either as addition to (Foucault and Derrida), or as subtraction from (Heidegger and Badiou) events.This distinction is in sharp contrast with the correspondence and coherence theories, which both professto speak the truth of an already-existent world. The aletheiatic relationship with both pragmatic theorieshowever is less distinct and there is clearly productive work to be done in this field of study. For example,what is the nature of truth-claims about a world that has not yet come into being? This might be aparticularly important consideration when constructing a world post-(Post) Truth. How can one talk of aworld-to-come using language from within a world that must — necessarily — be negated?

Whilst this introduction cannot approximate the detail and importance of the concept that is advocatedby those working on the field, it is hoped that at least it is interesting, and provides a useful backdrop fordiscussion at the conference.

Dr Chris HenryAssociate Lecturer in Politics, University of Kent

C.M.Henry@kent.ac.uk

13

Foucault, Michel. 1983. "Discourse and Truth: the Problematisation of Parrhesia." In, edited by J. Pearson.University of California at Berkeley: Northwestern University.———. 2014. On The Government of the Living: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1979-1980 (PalgraveMacmillan: London and New York).

James, William. 1975 [1907]. Pragmatism: a New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking (Harvard UniversityPress: Cambridge and London).

Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm. 2005. Discourse on Metaphysics and the Monadology (Dover Publications: Mineola,New York).

Livingston, Paul M. 2011. The Politics of Logic: Badiou, Wittgenstein, and the Consequences of Formalism (Routledge:London and New York).

Misak, Cheryl. 2002. Truth, Politics, Morality: Pragmatism and Deliberation (Routledge: London and New York).

Newman, Andrew. 2002. The Correspondence Theory of Truth: An Essay on the Metaphysics of Predication(Cambridge University Press: Cambridge).

Norris, Christopher. 1990. What’s Wrong with Postmodernism: Critical Theory and the Ends of Philosophy(Harvester Wheatsheaf: New York).

Payne, Michael. 2000. 'The Survival of Truth After Derrida', Journal for Cultural Research, 4: 127-34.

Pierce, Charles Sanders. 2004. 'How to Make Our Ideas Clear.' in Frederick F. Schmitt (ed.), Theories of Truth(Blackwell: Malden, Oxford and Carlton).

Rorty, Richard. 1991. 'Feminism and Pragmatism', Michigan Quarterly Review: 231-58.

Russell, Bertrand. 1910. 'On the Nature of Truth and Falsehood.' in Bertrand Russell (ed.), PhilosophicalEssays (Longmans, Green: London).———. 2001 [1912]. The Problems of Philosophy (Oxford University Press: Oxford).

Schmitt, Frederick F. 2004. Theories of Truth (Blackwell: Malden, Oxford and Carlton).

For some time, the world of politics has been shocked by the introduction of a new concept that is shiftingthe traditional sense of responsibility, honesty and rightness that should characterise political discourse.Some intellectuals identify 2015-16 as the year in which politics changed and became ruled by a new dynamicthat centred on emotionally charged discourse and appealed to the passions of the audience. The termpost-truth was coined as a reflection of this new political dynamic and has quickly become ubiquitous. Eventhe Oxford English Dictionary declared post-truth the word of the year in 2016, and defined it as: ‘relatingto or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion thanappeals to emotion and personal belief ’. Politics, as it was understood, has mutated into a new creaturethat exceeds the control of its own players. Post-truth is the new wave.

Using the definition given by the Oxford Dictionary as a starting point, it can be said that if post-truth is anadjective that relates to emotions and subjectivity, then the logical conclusion is that politics is no longerbased on rigour and objectivity. But, was politics ever devoid of any reference to emotions? Brexit andDonald Trump´s electoral campaigns are used as the two events that inaugurated a post-truth era in politics,but this does not mean that politics and political discourse lacked an emotional charge. The differencebetween these events and the previous era, in terms of the influence of post-truth, is that objectivity andtruth, if present at all, are no longer at the centre of the debate. The aim of any electoral campaign, forinstance, should be to create a series of expectations in the electorate. When voters buy in to a particularparty’s policies, this expectation can be seen as emotionally charged and related to the prospect of changefor the better. Yet, it seems unlikely that this emotional response was at the centre of the political debate;rather, at the centre of the debate sat the means by which such change could be achieved. In the new eraof post-truth politics, this is no longer the case. Speaking to the emotive response of the electorate sitsfront and centre in political debate, and the means for affecting change are merely secondary considerations.As this process becomes less important to political discourse, so the rigour of party policies and pledgesis undermined as the means to the promised end is not subject to question or challenge.

This shift in the dynamic of the political arena has a potentially significant impact on voters. The old adagethat politicians are not to be trusted may be true, but voters at least trusted the system, thus ensuring itssurvival. With the emergence of the post-truth era of politics, it is no longer simply the case that politiciansmay be untrustworthy, but that the system as a whole is undermined by public servants who can twist,hide, or manufacture the facts they require to suit the emotional needs of the voters. It is not only theplayers who are different — the game itself has changed and appears to be in direct conflict with the valuesand moral codes used to build our political structures. Such values serve as the pillars on which our politicalarena is constructed; if these are undermined, then the building itself is in danger. This is the risk inherentin the rise of post-truth politics: the complete mistrust of the electorate leading to the collapse of thoseinstitutions that are built on trust and responsibility. This new era of politics demands investigation. Howcan we adapt to this new form of political discourse? What does this mean for the future of politics?

Guillermo Reyes PascualAssistant Lecturer and PhD Candidate in Comparative Politics, University of Kent

gr242@kent.ac.uk

14

politics and (post) truthGuillermo Reyes Pascual

John Keane, ‘Post-truth politics and why the antidote isn’t simply ‘fact-checking’ and truth’,The Conversation,23 March 2018 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Alex Kingsbury, ‘‘Post-truth’, the ultimate form of cynicism’, The Boston Globe, 18 May 2018 [Last accessed3 October 2018]

Diana Popescu, ‘What we talk about when we talk about post-truth’, Aeon, 2 April 2018 [Last accessed 3October 2018]

Audio: The Roots of the ‘Post-Truth’ Era, The Brian Lehrer Show, 10 April 2018 [Last accessed 3 October2018]

‘Art of the lie’, The Economist, 10 September 2016 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

‘Yes, I’d lie to you’, The Economist, 10 September 2016 [Last accessed 3 October 2018]

Marc Jungblut, ‘Political communication in the age of post-truth’, New Europe, 8 January 2017 [Last accessed3 October 2018]

Silvio Waisbord (2018) ‘The elective affinity between post-truth communication and populist politics’,Communication Research and Practice, 4:1, 17-34.

Jonathan Rose (2017) ‘Brexit, Trump, and Post-Truth Politics’, Public Integrity, 19:6, 555-558.

Jane Suiter (2016) ‘Post-Truth’, Political Insight, 7:3, 25-27.

Brian L. Ott (2017) ‘The age of Twitter: Donald J. Trump and the politics of debasement’, Critical Studies inMedia Communication, 34:1, 59-68.

John Corner (2017) ‘Fake news, post-truth and media-political change’, Media, Culture & Society, 39:7, 1100-1107.

Linda M. G. Zerilli (2006) ‘Truth and Politics’, Theory & Event, 9:4.

Martin Montgomery (2017) ‘Post-Truth Politics?’, Journal of Language and Politics, 16:4, 619-639.

Jonathan Hopkin and Ben Rosamond (2018) ‘Post-truth Politics, Bullshit and Bad Ideas: ‘Deficit Fetishism’ inthe UK’, New Political Economy 23:6, 641-655.

15

want to know more?

Cumberland LodgeThe Great Park, Windsor, SL4 2HP

01784 432316cumberlandlodge.ac.uk

Cumberland Lodge is a company limited by guarantee.Company no. 5383055. Registered Charity no. 1108677