When did the modern New World Order conspiracy theory originate?
Executive summary
The “modern” New World Order (NWO) conspiracy theory is a layered phenomenon with roots in 18th‑century fears about secret societies such as the Illuminati and Freemasons, crystallized by reactionary writers like John Robison, and then reshaped in the 20th century by antisemitic forgeries and interwar propaganda into the form recognizable today [1] [2] [3]. Its contemporary, mass‑media profile—where the phrase “New World Order” entered popular discourse and the conspiracy attached to it surged—was further amplified in late‑20th century politics and culture, including the post‑1990s milieu and internet age [4] [5].
1. From 18th‑century panic to a combustible meme: the Robison and Illuminati moment
The earliest genesis of what scholars call the modern NWO conspiracy lies in late‑18th‑century anxieties about Enlightenment secret societies: Scottish author John Robison and others accused the Illuminati and Freemasons of plotting to subvert religion and governments, and those claims migrated across the Atlantic to fuel nineteenth‑century anti‑Masonic moral panics [1]. Those foundational accusations provided the template—an organized, hidden elite manipulating politics—for later narratives that would broaden the alleged cast of conspirators beyond lodges to bankers, politicians and international institutions [3].
2. The 20th century: Protocols, fascist propagandists, and the hardening of antisemitic frames
In the interwar and World War II eras the conspiracy morphed as the forged Protocols of the Elders of Zion and fascist propagandists like Nesta Webster wove Jewish‑targeted tropes into older Illuminati myths, linking finance, Bolshevism and global control in explicitly antisemitic form; that synthesis is a central piece of the modern NWO’s ideological DNA, according to multiple historical accounts [2] [3]. American fundamentalist and anti‑communist movements then became conduits that popularized these claims in U.S. political and religious subcultures, embedding the idea that international institutions and elite networks were fronts for a one‑world scheme [3] [2].
3. Naming and mainstreaming: the phrase “New World Order” and late‑20th century spread
While the language of secret global governance predates the term, the phrase “New World Order” entered broad public awareness through political rhetoric—most notably President George H.W. Bush’s 1990 usage—which meme culture and later internet communities seized and remixed, turning a diplomatic phrase into a shorthand for the conspiracy [4] [5]. The 1990s and early 2000s saw televangelists, books and emerging online forums accelerate the theory’s diffusion, merging older antisemitic and anti‑globalist themes with new targets like the United Nations, international banks and later, tech elites [5] [6].
4. Internet, culture and the “superconspiracy”: why the modern form spread rapidly
Scholars and analysts describe the modern NWO as a “superconspiracy” that aggregates disparate fears—secret societies, global governance, transnational finance, and later technology and transhumanism—into a single all‑encompassing plot; the internet, popular media and subcultures (from heavy metal to TV) provided transmission vectors and visual tropes that made the theory ubiquitous and mutable in the late 20th and early 21st centuries [7] [6] [8]. Contemporary reporting and research also stress the theory’s real‑world harms, noting that its anti‑Semitic and violent potentials are not just historical but active in online radicalization today [2] [8].
5. How to answer “when did it originate?” and what sources don’t say
If “originate” demands a single date, the evidence shows no single moment: the thematic origins are 18th century and John Robison’s writings, the ideological hardening—particularly antisemitic components—arrived in the interwar period via the Protocols and fascist propagandists, and the phrase and mass popularization took off in the late 20th century and internet era [1] [2] [4]. Sources supplied here document these stages, but they do not offer a single founding document or sole inventor of the modern NWO; historians and analysts trace multiple, overlapping roots rather than a single point of origin [3] [2].