Michael Barkun

Michael Barkun
Barkun in 2009
Nationality	American
Education	Ph.D., political science
Alma mater	Northwestern University
Occupation	Political scientist
Employer	Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University
Known for	Specializes in the study of political extremism, religion and violence, millenarian and utopian movements.
Website
Faculty webpage

Michael Barkun is professor emeritus of political science at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University, specializing in political extremism and the relationship between religion and violence. He is the author of a number of books on the subject, including Religion and The Racist Right: The Origins of the Christian Identity Movement (1996), A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America (2003), and Chasing Phantoms: Reality, Imagination, and Homeland Security Since 9/11 (2011).^[1]

Barkun has acted as a consultant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation; as a member of the Special Advisory Commission to the FBI's Critical Incident Response Group in 1995–1996, he provided training and background presentations on the radical right.^[2] He serves on the editorial boards of Terrorism and Political Violence and Nova Religio, and was the editor of Communal Societies from 1987 to 1994. He edits the Religion and Politics book series for the Syracuse University Press. He won the 2003 Distinguished Scholar award from the Communal Studies Association, and the Myers Center Award for the Study of Human Rights for his book Religion and the Racist Right. He earned his Ph.D. from Northwestern University in 1965.^[1]

Barkun focuses particularly on millenarian and utopian movements, terrorism and "doomsday weapons," and the contemporary influence of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, decades after it was exposed as a hoax.^[1] Paul S. Boyer writes that Barkun knows his way around the world of conspiracy theorists better than any other scholar in America.^[3]

Works

• Chasing Phantoms: Reality, Imagination, and Homeland Security Since 9/11, The University of North Carolina Press, 2011.
• Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America, University of California Press, 2003.
• (ed.) Millennialism and Violence. Routledge, 1996.
• Religion and the Racist Right: The Origins of the Christian Identity movement, The University of North Carolina Press, 1994.
• Crucible of the Millennium: Burned-Over District of New York in the 1840s, Syracuse University Press, 1986.
• Disaster and the Millennium, Yale University Press, 1974.
• (ed.) Law and the Social System, Lieber-Atherton, 1973.
• with Wesley L. Gould (eds.). Social Science Literature: A Bibliography for International Law, with Wesley L. Gould, 1972.
• International Law and the Social Sciences, with Wesley L. Gould, 1970.
• with Robert W. Gregg (eds.). United Nations System and Its Functions, 1968.
• Law Without Sanctions: Order in Primitive Societies and the World Community, Yale University Press, 1968.

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b c} Michael Barkun, Maxwell School of Syracuse University, accessed November 15, 2009.
2. ^ Barkun, Michael. "Project Megiddo, the FBI, and the Academic Community," in Kaplan, Jeffrey (ed.). Millenial Violence. Routledge 2002, p. 100.
3. ^ Boyer, Paul S. "The Strange World of Conspiracy Theories", The Christian Century, July 27, 2004, pp. 32–35.

External links

Interviews

• C-Span Video Library: A Culture of Conspiracy. Mar 12, 2004
• New Internationalist: Interview: Michael Barkun by Chip Berlet, September 2004

Reviews

• McLemee, Scott. "Aryan and Proud", The New York Times. (6 November 1994). Retrieved on 2011-07-12
• Pipes, Daniel. [Michael Barkun on] Old Conspiracies, New Beliefs. The New York Sun (13 January 2004). Retrieved on 2011-07-12
• Boyer, Paul S.. The Strange World of Conspiracy Theories. The Christian Century (27 July 2004). Retrieved on 2011-07-12
• Pratt, Ray. Review. The Montana Professor (Spring 2005). Retrieved on 2011-07-12
• Daschkea, Dereck. A Review of. Terrorism and Political Violence. Volume 18, Issue 4 (2006). Retrieved on 2011-07-12

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Name	Barkun, Michael
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