Alternative Facts, Alternative Sciences: The Development of the Concept in Medieval Islam and Its Historical Consequences

In this essay, we explore the notions of ‘post-truth’ and ‘alternative facts’ for management studies. Adopting a pragmatist perspective, we argue that there is no intrinsically accurate language in terms of which to refer to reality. Language, rather, is a tool that enables agents to grab hold of causal forces and intervene in the world. ‘Alternative facts’ can be created by multimodal communication to highlight different aspects of the world for the purpose of political mobilization and legitimacy. ‘Post-truth’ politics reveals the fragmentation of the language game in which mainstream politics has been hitherto conducted. Using the communicative acts of businessman-turned-politician President Trump and his aides, as a prompt, we explore the implications that ‘alternative facts’ and ‘post-truth’ have for today’s management scholarship. We argue that management scholars should unpack how managers navigate strategic action and communication, and how the creation of alternative realities is accomplished in conditions of informational abundance and multimodal communication.

Navigating Post-Truth and Alternative Facts: Religion and Science as Political Theology

This article describes and critiques the government of Rwanda’s use of legal and extra-legal means to control memory and history in their country. The regime, to the extent it admits its actions, justifies them as necessary to maintain stability and avoid a repeat of the country’s horrific 1994 genocide. But increasingly, critics claim that Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, along with his ruling coterie, are tailoring memory and history with the aim of legitimizing their autocratic rule. American legal scholars who focus on Rwanda tend to describe what is happening there in terms of First Amendment values, focusing their attention on the Rwandan government’s suppression of political speech. This paper takes a different approach. Borrowing from the disciplines of history, historiography, and memory studies, it argues that Rwanda’s government is surpassing mere suppression of speech and is instead engaging in a comprehensive effort to rewrite history and reprogram its citizens’ collective memory. Scrutiny of the Rwandan government’s program of “memory entrepreneurship” grows more consequential as Donald Trump settles into the office of president of the United States. Before President Trump’s ascendance, the United States and the world community generally condemned politicians’ efforts to fabricate and enforce history as a means of holding on to power. President Trump’s administration, however, has introduced the Orwellian notion of “alternative facts” to the American people and has raised the possibility that bald fabrication paired with aggressive insistence may now be acceptable conduct in the political realm.For Rwanda, the question of whether “memory entrepreneurship” and “alternative facts” are or are not acceptable political stratagems grows all the more urgent as the country approaches a presidential election in the summer of 2017, one that Paul Kagame is virtually certain to win.

At the center of this work is the analysis of the consequences of implementing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (also known as - the Iran nuclear deal) on divergent foreign policy approaches as the main indicators of the mismatch in relations between the United States and the European Union during the administration of the 45th US President Donald Trump. While the US unilaterally withdrew from this agreement, EU member states remained in it. The United States and the European Union, on the one hand, and Iran, on the other, had completely different definitions of their own national security, insisting on their unilateral security, while failing to redefine the problem in the direction of mutual security. However, in addition, the US and EU member states, although both concerned about their own security due to the possible emergence of a nuclear-armed Iran, instead of a complementary approach to the issue had a mutually competing one. Using the case study method, as well as the analytical-deductive method and the content analysis method, the author explains the difference in this approach through the concept of the strategic culture of the US and the EU and concludes that they are a consequence of the different understanding of international relations, but also due to the different identity characters of these two actors. The main thesis of the paper is that the US administration of Donald Trump, with its more realistic and Hobbesian view of international relations, and a different understanding of the US national interest in the Middle East, adopted a different approach to curbing Iran's nuclear armament ambitions compared to the approach of the European Union, which is conditioned by a more liberal and Kantian nature of its view on international relations. With unilateral foreign policy actions, Trump's administration risked causing damage and shaking its own credibility in relations with the European Union. On the other hand, the European Union remains committed to multilateralism and the preservation of the Iran nuclear deal. The subject of this research is the direction of the foreign policy actions of the United States and the European Union, in the period from the unilateral withdrawal of Trump's cabinet from the Iran nuclear agreement on May 8th, 2018, until the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, a general of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard on January 3rd, 2020 in the Republic of Iraq. The current state and perspective of contemporary transatlantic political relations in the context of unilateral withdrawal will be taken into consideration. In accordance with its new foreign policy agenda and strategy, and more inclined to a realistic view of international relations, the Trump administration risked deeper conflicts and divergence with the European Union over regional security issues. Thus, there was a threat to limit the further deepening and strengthening of the transatlantic partnership with the leading member states of the European Union, especially with the government of the Federal Republic of Germany and the government of the Republic of France. Additionally, the subject of research will be the patterns of behavior, embodied in speeches and foreign policy actions, which are consistent with the different approaches of the US and the EU to the problem of preventing the theocratic regime in Iran from developing its nuclear program. Accordingly, the focus will be on the period of the Trump administration, which, with its political will to break off with the legacy of the Obama administration, began to perceive Iran as a factor causing instability in the Middle East region. The Trump administration did not ratify the Iran nuclear agreement and continued to act under its obligations, solely because of the unfavorable benefits and a large number of shortcomings for the US. Thus, the paper will analyze whether the US administration of Donald Trump had a concrete foreign policy strategy in relations with the European Union and Iran. Also, the paper will try to answer the question of whether a unilateral or multilateral approach to regional security problems is more fruitful, taking into consideration the question of whether the unilateral approach of the only superpower in the world is more effective or, on the other hand, an international coalition of states is needed to suppress the Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

The article discusses the results of a technical study of a collection of medieval sword and dagger pommels owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, with particular focus given to the probable use of the lost-wax technique to create them and the conclusion that they were most likely created in Europe due to the presence of Champleve enameling. A brief overview of medieval metalwork is presented, and the pommels and their creation are described in detail. The association of the pommels with the crusades is also commented on.

Recent political developments have made the notion of 'post-truth' ubiquitous. Along with associated terms such as 'fake news' and 'alternative facts', it appears with regularity in coverage of and commentary on Donald Trump, the Brexit vote, and the role – relative to these phenomena – of a half-despised, half-feared creature known as 'the public'. It has become commonplace to assert that we now inhabit, or are entering, a post-truth world. 
 In this paper, I issue a sceptical challenge against the distinctiveness and utility of the notion of post-truth. I argue, first, that the term fails to capture anything that is both real and novel. Moreover, post-truth discourse often has a not-fully-explicit political force and function: to ‘irrationalise’ political disaffection and to signal loyalty to a ‘pre-post-truth’ political status quo. The central insight of the speech act theory of J. L. Austin and others – that saying is always also doing – is as indispensable for understanding the significance of much of what is labelled ‘post-truth’, I’ll argue, as it is for understanding the significance of that very act of labelling.
 Keywords: post-truth, speech acts, Trump, brexit, Austin

The United States and state and non-state actors in the Middle East have impacted and influenced one another mightily since the conclusion of the Cold War. In terms of economic exchange, political deliberation, and military engagement, the Middle East has left an indelible mark on American commerce, diplomacy, and security—and vice versa. America’s post–Cold War experience in the Middle East began during the first Bush administration following two events in 1991: The US-led liberation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. These heralded a unipolar world order where American values and interests promulgated via diplomacy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, deterrence of Iraq and Iran, and defense arrangements with Arab monarchies and select republics. Following the Clinton administration’s tenure in the 1990s, US hopes for orderly oversight of the Middle East crumbled on 11 September 2001. In the subsequent two years, the United States assembled coalitions of various strength and legitimacy to intervene in Afghanistan and Iraq. Despite insistence from Arab partners (aside from Kuwait) that an invasion of Iraq would destabilize the Gulf and augment Iranian influence, the Bush administration launched a war that contributed, in part, to the rise of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS). The Obama administration’s engagements in the Middle East were multifaceted, ranging from diplomacy and intervention during the Arab Spring regional uprisings and revolutions, coercion against ISIS through a global coalition, and the passage of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) Iran nuclear deal. The Trump administration premised its Middle East policy on confrontation with Iran, embodied in Maximum Pressure, and Arab-Israeli normalization through the Abraham Accords. These twin policies interlinked the United States with Yemen, the monarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Morocco, and—to some extent—Sudan. The Biden administration’s ambitions for a recalibration toward the Indo-Pacific region, showcased through its hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan, confronted the lingering realities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Hamas attack into Israel on 7 October 2023, and the Israeli response in the Gaza Strip, tested US diplomacy and deterrence. The United States navigates a strained alliance with Turkey and a Middle East becoming more multipolar as competition for energy resources and logistical routes ensues. A renewed Trump administration enters a Middle East wherein the United States is undeniably entrenched, but where numerous policy shortfalls have fundamentally eroded the power and prestige it enjoyed in the early 1990s.

The world hasn’t yet really decided what the presidency of Donald Trump will leave as its legacy but whatever it is you can be certain it won’t be the normal presidential legacy. Few observers, whatever their leaning, would argue that Trump’s policies are without controversy and there is little in the American President’s politics that we can find reflected in the views of the editorial staff here at 360 . A quite astounding phenomenon has been the development of the term ‘alternate facts’. A jaw-dropping approach which is at best misdirection and at worst flagrant lies. This phenomenon has set me thinking about probity and specifically research ethics. To coin a new phrase, ‘alternate facts papers’ are not as rare as one might think. The best estimates of the number of retracted papers would suggest …

Recovering a sense of reality

The way of U.S. diplomacy under President Trump administration declared a different approach from the Obama era. As President Trump extols unpredictability as a virtue, where Trump is more active through social media in conveying his views. That behavior considered a boomerang for U.S. diplomacy. Under President Trump’s administration, many of the state statement is contradicted with the White House. The uncertainty of U.S. diplomacy is seen when the United States involved in efforts to resolve the Qatar crisis. Qatar crisis is a diplomatic crisis that occurred between Qatar and the Gulf Arab countries which reached its peak in 2017. The United States has never interfered disputes between Qatar and the Gulf Arab countries that have occurred since 2002. However, the United States increased the tension of the Qatar crisis after several tweets from President Trump criticize Qatar funds terrorism in the Middle East. Simultaneously, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson corrected President Trump's statement by expressing the U.S. is supporting Qatar and trying to help by resolving the conflict as quickly as possible. Qatar is well known as the closest ally of the United States on combating terrorism in the Middle East. The disputes between Qatar and the Gulf Arab countries considered had an impact to be interrupting the movement of the United States on combating terrorism in the Middle East which directly affects several U.S. interests in the region. Differences between President Trump and the State Department do not send a clear nor unified message that is a problem for U.S. strategy towards the Qatar Crisis. It considered as proof of the uncertainty of U.S. diplomacy under President Trump administration. Through this analysis the article seeing the uncertainty of the U.S. diplomacy strategy in resolving the Qatar crisis

The role of negative affects such as fear and hate, their manifestation in atmospheres, manipulability, and mobilization as a response to threat perception play a pivotal role in the current political conjuncture. This essay traces the dissemination of fake news and the role of affective labor in its digital spread through the example of the recent Pizzagate phenomenon. This particular viral story and its real world fallout speak to the turn to a ‘post-truth’ politics, which has been embraced by President Trump and his surrogates, through the appropriation of the term ‘fake news’ and rhetoric of ‘alternative facts’, to describe all forms of dissent and justification for executive actions, respectively. By examining the circulation and coalescence of negative affects such as fear and hate, and their utility in a moment of political uncertainty defined by divisive populist rhetoric, it becomes clear that a reorientation to affective engagements with digital media and facticity is necessary and pressingly urgent.

Science, antiscience, and environmental decision making: A call to action.

Review: <i>Environmental Politics of the Middle East</i>, edited by Harry Verhoeven

The LA River. Photo: Andrea Gibbons.‘I'm the guy pushing a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan … Shipyards, ironworks, get them all jacked up. We're just going to throw it up against the wall and see if it sticks. It will be as exciting as the 1930s and greater than the Reagan revolution — conservatives, plus populists, in an economic nationalist movement.’(Stephen Bannon, quoted in Blake (2016))‘Trump … talks a lot about walls … It’s an enclave mentality, a circling-the-wagons mentality that is going to continue to pillage and gather all the resources possible while there are still resources to gather – because I think they are all afraid of global warming even as they deny it with their last breath – and deny the humanity of everyone outside those gates. It is a familiar mentality. We’re seeing it all play out again in the military actions against Native American struggles for water at Standing Rock – they are fighting for all of us and the land itself and yet the government has brought in tanks.’(Andrea Gibbon (this issue))‘Immersed in a rapidly flowing stream, we stubbornly fix our eyes on the few pieces of debris still visible on the shore, while the current carries us away and propels us backward into the abyss.’(Alexis de Tocqueville (2004 [1835]: 7))When the preceding CITY editorial (‘Trumped? Some Groundings’) set out in mid- December 2016 an interim summing-up of US President Donald Trump’s ‘transitional’ arrangements and some possible environmental implications, it was still possible to conclude, tentatively, that we did not necessarily face a ‘situation of extraordinary continuing turmoil.’However, we introduced, in opposition to that tentative conclusion, as our first epigraph there, a passage from Noam Chomsky’s almost immediate, deeply challenging response to the election results and to the report of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) on climate change delivered on the same day, November 8th:The election outcome placed total control of the government -- executive, Congress, the Supreme Court -- in the hands of the Republican Party, which has become the most dangerous organization in world history … The Party is dedicated to racing as rapidly as possible to destruction of organized human life.(Polychroniou 2016)In the light of only a few months’ experience of the emerging Trump regime, there is, by now, April 2017, enough qualitative mainstream, specialist and journalistic reporting and analysis to begin to evaluate Chomsky’s overlapping contentions.With regard to his first contention, Republican control of the government – though patchy, confusing, zig-zagging between various positions, recently challenged in the streets as well as in some professional chambers, channels and courts – is emerging and beginning to simultaneously falter and accelerate. The Trump-appointed leadership of Bannon (though now apparently distanced), Mathis (‘Mad Dog’) and Tillerson has begun to take form and make decisions, supported – but not always supported – by a crowd of unpredictable extras with the continuing role of Paul Ryan, Speaker of the House of Representatives but now, it seems, as an at times head waiter at the banquets and behind the scenes. And then there is the Master himself, Trump. Of a recent episode, as the news leaked out of the White House, it was reported in the Washington Post that ‘Trump was mad — steaming, raging mad’ (Rucker, Costa, and Parker 2017).The Washington Post’s tone and focus changed slightly in a later edition. Madness disappeared and was replaced by impatience:At the center of the turmoil in the White House is an impatient president frustrated by his administration’s inability to erase the impression that his campaign was engaged with Russia, to stem leaks or to implement any signature achievements.’What was happening was perhaps exaggerated in the first version of the report. But in the world of Trump’s pantomimes, Stephen Bannon’s jacked-up realities and of Kellyanne Conway’s ‘alternative facts’, it is not easy to find ‘le mot juste’.As to Chomsky’s second contention, action on climate change is marginalised when/where it is not yet up for reversal.Though apparently premature at the time and over-stated, Chomsky’s contentions seem to be holding up. The more evidently social dimension of his forecast, refining it a little in the light of subsequent events, is taking the form of the control of the government in the hands of a plutocratic, military, technicist/professional, and promotional elite operating within the Republican Party. The process is well described, in Naomi Klein’s words, as ‘a corporate takeover’. But more than that, it is a form of regime change, occasioned, on the one hand, by an uneven, but nevertheless capitalism-threatening, humanitarian long revolution and, on the other, challenged and supplanted, bit by bit, by the attempted inauguration of another stage, possibly decisive, of a long counter-revolution, much deeper than a mere coup.

Amidst ""alternative facts"" and ""post-truth"" politics, news journalism is more important and complex than ever. This book examines journalism's evolution within digital media's ecosystem where lies often spread faster than truth, and consumers expect conversations, not lectures. Tthe 2016 U.S. presidential election delivered a stunning result, but the news media's breathless coverage of it was no surprise. News networks turned debates into primetime entertainment, reporters spent more time covering poll results than public policy issues, and the cozy relationship between journalists and political insiders helped ensure intrigue and ratings, even as it eroded journalism's role as democracy's ""Fourth Estate."" Against this sobering backdrop, a broadcast news veteran and a millennial newshound consider how journalism can regain the public's trust by learning from pioneers both within and beyond the profession. Connecting the dots between faux news, ""fake news,"" and real news, coauthors Madison and DeJarnette provide an unflinching analysis of where mainstream journalism went wrong–and what the next generation of reporters can do to make it right. The significance of Donald Trump's presidency is not lost on the authors, but Reimagining Journalism in a Post-Truth World is not a post-mortem of the 2016 presidential election, nor is it a how-to guide for reporting on Trump's White House. Instead, this accessible and engaging book offers a broader perspective on contemporary journalism, pairing lively anecdotes with insightful analysis of long-term trends and challenges. Drawing on their expertise in media innovation and entrepreneurship, the authors explore how comedians like John Oliver, Trevor Noah, and Samantha Bee are breaking (and reshaping) the rules of political journalism; how legacy media outlets like The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, and The New York Times are retooling for the digital age; and how newcomers like Vice, Hearken, and De Correspondent are innovating new models for reporting and storytelling. Anyone seeking to make sense of modern journalism and its intersections with democracy will want to read this book.