Disingenuous natures and post-truth politics: Five knowledge modalities of concern in environmental governance

•Disingenuous natures are artifactual and generative of post truth politics.•Five knowledge modalities of concern show how power shapes knowledge and ignorance.•These knowledges support post-truth politics and create disingenuous natures.•These knowledges pose challenges for social-environmental decision-making.•How we know and manage nature connects to how it is made knowable and manageable. In this paper I examine our current post-truth politics and use the concept ‘disingenuous natures’ to describe the intersecting knowledge constructs, management practices and material conditions that enable authoritative knowledge of human-environment interactions to take hold and persist. These conditions are disingenuous because they are both artifactual and generative of social-ecological reifications, knowledge distortions and information deficiencies, yet retain a position of authority and legitimacy in decision-making contexts. I argue that researchers seeking to confront our current post-truth wave lack a clear framework for describing the process through which post-truthism unfolds and disingenuous natures are produced. I describe five interrelated ‘knowledge modalities of concern’ that illuminate key elements of this process. I argue for continued engagement with these knowledge types by critical scholars of the environment because they pose serious challenges for progressive environmental governance.