Confronting Anti-Science Narratives and Rebuilding Public Trust

Introductory slides for the workshop "Confronting Anti-Science Narratives and Rebuilding Public Trust" held at the Rethinking Economics Summer School Switzerland (2025). The workshop is complemented by a website with further materials: https://integrity-38c159.pages.uzh.ch/ Abstract The manufacturing of doubt by commercial and political interests in response to robust scientific evidence has a long and well-documented history, from the tobacco industry’s obfuscation of smoking risks to contemporary forms of climate and vaccine skepticism. At the same time, scientists themselves have called attention to challenges with the reproducibility of research findings, leading to a growing open science movement that aims to increase transparency, rigor, and public trust. However, these efforts are undermined when powerful interests weaponize the "reproducibility crisis" to erode trust in science, contributing to the rise of conspiratorial thinking, science denial, and reactionary politics. Therefore, developing effective, evidence-based counter-narratives is essential to safeguarding trust and information integrity.