Making Stigma Work: How Conspiracy Theories Function Productively in Digital Environments

Abstract

Stigma refers to the marking of certain social actors or phenomena as deviant or unacceptable by dominant institutions. While management research has traditionally treated stigma as a liability, recent work reveals that, in some instances, it can be productive, functioning as a resource. To date, however, this work has focused primarily on stigma attached to identities, behaviours or organisational practices – that is, who social actors are or what they do.

By contrast, stigma can also attach to knowledge claims: the ideas, explanations and interpretations that social actors advance. Yet the processes through which this form of stigma operates productively in digital, information-rich contexts remain unclear. As such, this thesis investigates how digital social actors make productive use of stigmatised knowledge, taking conspiracy theories as a revelatory case.

Given conspiracism’s considerable societal, political and commercial relevance, the thesis adopts an interdisciplinary, pluralistic approach, comprising three empirical chapters that harness digital data from major social media platforms.

Chapter III begins at the individual level. It reveals how a conspiracy entrepreneur successfully operates within a state of ‘polarised legitimacy’ through a strategic, multifaceted approach that simultaneously appeals to both alternative and mainstream audiences, involving a process conceptualised as 'Janus-work'. This enables them to retain core supporter loyalty while pursuing broader mainstream access. As such, the chapter demonstrates how stigmatised knowledge can be strategically deployed to achieve cross-audience influence.

Chapter IV shifts to the movement level, shedding light on how conspiracy movements mobilise. It uses a large Twitter (now ‘X’) dataset to explain how a movement opposing urban sustainability policies transforms localised, pragmatic concerns into evidence of increasingly extreme conspiratorial plots through a networked process conceptualised as 'frame escalation'. With this, the movement galvanises diverse participants around different interpretations of a shared threat, leading to real-world protest. As such, the chapter demonstrates how stigmatised knowledge can be anchored to achieve broad-based mobilisation.

Chapter V turns inward to already established, tight-knit conspiracy communities, exploring how stigmatised worldviews are reinforced over time. It examines over 500 memes from two interconnected subreddits, revealing how specific memetic elements serve as entrenched ‘cultural resources’, enabling the succinct and consistent communication of ‘cultural themes’ emblematic of conspiracism. This cultivates lasting conviction despite external condemnation. As such, the chapter demonstrates how stigmatised knowledge can be entrenched to achieve cultural stabilisation.

Together, these chapters help explain why stigmatised knowledge is resilient to institutional challenge, pervasive across digital spaces and capable of mobilising collective action beyond them.

The thesis contributes to discussions of productive stigma and conspiracism by revealing three key mechanisms through which conspiracy theories, as a form of stigmatised knowledge, function productively in digital environments. It also illustrates the value of interdisciplinary, pluralistic approaches, demonstrating how management and organisation studies frameworks can complement other disciplinary perspectives in conspiracy scholarship.

Date of Award	25 Mar 2026
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bath
Supervisor	Adam Joinson (Supervisor), Timothy Hill (Supervisor) & Brittany Davidson (Supervisor)