The Paranoia of Postmodernism

The paranoid style in the sociology of financial reporting principles

“…Paranoid style analysis has been conducted on scholarly discourse in domains as diverse as legal scholarship (see, for example, Mootz, 1994; Schneiderman, 2016; Short, 2012), history of science (see, for example, Reisch, 2012; Williams, 2019), literary-critical theory (see, for example, Beckman, 2020; Bywater, 1990) and political science (see, for example, Moss and Oey, 2010). The circumstances in which academic discourse is constructed are generally very different to those associated with the paranoid style in the political arena.…”

“…The menace threatened in the former is, nonetheless, potentially significant, namely, understating the dangers of tyrannical exploitation of a strong state; that in the latter, undermining the benefits to society of the investment arbitration bar, is less significant, though serious for those affected. The literary-critical studies cited above both target non-postmodern criticism, its actions allegedly resulting in, respectively, support for the authority of the text contrary to a postmodern understanding (Bywater, 1990) and inappropriate literary-critical engagement with capitalism (Beckman, 2020). The scope and menace of the actions are significant for the discipline though perhaps not from a wider perspective.…”

“…Mootz (1994, pp. 875 and 876), citing Bywater (1990), who takes a similar view, focuses on the affinity between the discourse he analyses and actual paranoia, to conclude that “the project is desperately misguided” and no “intelligent and well-adjusted critic seriously can propose to adopt in real life the critical pose” required.…”

“…Members of accounting standard-setting bodies are selected for their expertise and experience in financial reporting [2], and it might be supposed that they would be committed to maintaining the effective functioning of their discipline, including its principles, with, if anything, a bias towards enhancing the future success of accounting practice. But to those constructing a narrative in the paranoid style, as we will see, “[t]he obvious is regarded as misleading and as something to be seen through”; rather, “[a]ttention is directed not to overt content but to the searching out of clues which will reveal the hidden […] meaning of the objects of attention” (Bywater, 1990, p. 80).…”

The Politics of Paranoia: paranoid positioning and conspiratorial narratives in the surveillance society

“…(Quirke, 1993) Although the answer to the question about mental illness is reported to be negative, the very process of questioning it serves to mark out Seal's views, cutting her out in the sense of rendering her views illegitimate and not explicable according to normal social rulessimilar patterns are evident in texts where writers denounce particular projects as paranoid (e.g. Bywater, 1990). Thus the conference organizer becomes positioned as paranoid both by adopting a particular stance (of suspiciousness) and by her being positioned by wider discourses (e.g.…”