Plotting against justice: Conspiracy theory endorsement and opposition to criminal justice reform

Abstract

Conspiracy theories about criminal justice reform are an unexplored domain with unique relationships to system justification and resistance to criminal justice reform. Across two studies, we developed and began to validate a measure of conspiracies about criminal justice reform, the CCJR. The CCJR was predicted by system justification, general conspiracy mentality, and political ideology (Study 1). The CCJR also mediated the relationship between system justification and resistance to information about criminal justice reform (Study 2). These studies suggest that conspiracy theories contribute to opposition to criminal justice reform, and that criminal justice reform-related conspiracy theories serve a system-justifying function, that is, atypical of conspiracy theories. These findings suggest new avenues for research on both conspiracy theories and criminal justice reform.