Michael Butter is professor of American Studies at the University of Tübingen, Germany. He is the author of Plots, Designs, and Schemes: American Conspiracy Theories from the Puritans to the Present (2014) and The Nature of Conspiracy Theories (2020).

Peter Knight is professor of American Studies at the University of Manchester, UK. He is the author of Conspiracy Culture (2000), The Kennedy Assassination (2007) and Reading the Market (2016) and editor of Conspiracy Nation (2002) and Conspiracy Theories in American History: An Encyclopedia (2004).

Together they directed the COST Action COMPACT [Comparative Analysis of Conspiracy Theories].