he practices of theorists: Habermas and Foucault as public intellectuals
Thomas Biebricher
Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Thomas.Biebricher@normativeorders.net
Abstract
The scholarly works of Jürgen Habermas and Michel Foucault have been subject to ongoing scrutiny for a number of decades. However, less attention has been given to their activities as public intellectuals and the relation between these and their philosophical and theoretical projects. Drawing on their own conceptualization of the role of the intellectual, the article aims to illuminate these issues by examining Habermas’ advocacy of a ‘Core Europe’ and his defense of NATO bombardments in Kosovo in 1999 as well as Foucault’s involvement with the Groupe d’Information des Prisons (GIP) and a wide variety of his interviews, op-ed articles, etc. In showing that the intellectuals’ views differ in important ways from those of the scholars but nevertheless inhabit a crucial position in the overall edifice of their oeuvres, the article concludes that the practices of theorists deserve more attention for a comprehensive and more nuanced account of their thought.
from here
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Biopower, Governmentality, and Capitalism Through the Lenses of Freedom: A Conceptual Enquiry.
A draft of the above titled paper is now available for a download
from here
from here
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
Michel Foucault: Key Concepts
Dianna Taylor (ed.)
Michel Foucault: Key Concepts
Dianna Taylor (ed.), Michel Foucault: Key Concepts, Acumen, 2011, 200pp., $27.95 (pbk), ISBN 9781844652358.
Reviewed by Cynthia D. Coe, Central Washington University
Michel Foucault: Key Concepts
Dianna Taylor (ed.), Michel Foucault: Key Concepts, Acumen, 2011, 200pp., $27.95 (pbk), ISBN 9781844652358.
Reviewed by Cynthia D. Coe, Central Washington University
Michel Foucault: Key Concepts is an anthology by contemporary Foucault scholars explaining and applying, as the title suggests, Foucault's most important ideas. The volume is divided into three parts -- power, freedom, and subjectivity -- with four essays addressing each topic. Taken as a whole, the essays provide succinct and insightful explanations of Foucault's contributions to our understanding of those concepts as well as demonstrations of how they can be put to use, both within Foucault's own work and in original applications. Particular attention is paid to the concepts associated with works from Foucault's "middle" and "late" periods: discipline, assujettisement, biopower, power/knowledge, parrhēsia, and the care of the self. Although the introduction begins by highlighting the unsystematic nature of Foucault's work, the essays together reveal the strong connections between the forms of analysis Foucault pursued and the concepts he developed to address those questions.the full review here
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
philosophy . . .
". . . what I am doing - I don't say what I am cut out to do, because I know nothing about that - is not history, sociology, or economics. However, in one way or another, and for simple factual reasons, what I am doing is something that concerns philosophy, that is to say, the politics of truth, for I do not see many other definitions of the word "philosophy" apart from this. So, insofar as what is involved in this analysis of mechanisms of power is the politics of truth, and not sociology, history, or economics, I see its role as that of showing the knowledge effects produced by the struggles, confrontations, and battles that take place within our society, and by the tactics of power that are the elements of this struggle."
Security, Territory, Population, pp. 2-3.
"I think this serious and fundamental relation between struggle and truth, the dimension in which philosophy has developed for centuries and centuries, only dramatizes itself, becomes emaciated, and loses its meaning and effectiveness in polemics within theoretical discourse. So in all of this I will therefore propose only one imperative, but it will be categorical and unconditional: Never engage in polemics."
ibid. pp. 3-4.
Security, Territory, Population, pp. 2-3.
"I think this serious and fundamental relation between struggle and truth, the dimension in which philosophy has developed for centuries and centuries, only dramatizes itself, becomes emaciated, and loses its meaning and effectiveness in polemics within theoretical discourse. So in all of this I will therefore propose only one imperative, but it will be categorical and unconditional: Never engage in polemics."
ibid. pp. 3-4.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Biopower, governmentality, and capitalism through the lenses of freedom: A conceptual enquiry
Biopower, governmentality, and capitalism through the lenses of freedom: A conceptual enquiry
Abstract: There is a theme running throughout Foucault’s analyses of governmentality, biopower, discussion on the changing nature of state and its relation to society, and neo-liberalism. The theme is particularly clear in the contrast he makes between governmentality and the art of government in previous centuries (police state etc), biopower versus disciplinary power, and the modern state versus the early modern state. The theme is that of freedom, the nature of freedom, and its relation to other notions such as power, rationality etc. Foucault wants to reject a certain notion of freedom. Let’s call it a negative notion of freedom. The notion of freedom sees freedom in terms of absence of something else, something it’s not, a way out. Specifically freedom is seen as absence of repression and domination, which are in turn associated with power. Hence, freedom becomes absence of power, and the way to freedom is a way out of power relations. This also leads to a negative notion of power. Power is domination. Hence where there is power there is no freedom and where there is freedom there is no power. Let’s call this “exclusory” hypothesis. But this, Foucault argues, is to misunderstand the nature of modern freedom and power and the way they operate in modern societies. Such notions of freedom and power might have some relevance in early modern and medieval societies, but they are quite inadequate in understanding our contemporary societies. One of the insights of the analysis is that freedom is a great managing power (and not just a liberating force) and power is not necessarily something bad (it can lead to either domination or freedom). The aim of the paper is twofold: First to make explicit Foucault’s insights about freedom and power through paying close attention to what he says in his discussion of governmentality, biopower and related issues. The second aim is to show that an understanding of freedom and power can shed light on understanding certain fundamental features of contemporary capitalism. Now Foucault’s research into the nature of biopower and governmental rationality, although evidently connected to the phenomenon of capitalism, were conducted in relative isolation and without explicit attention to the concept of capitalism. For at least two reasons. First, Foucault, from a methodological viewpoint, wanted to avoid universals. His method explicitly concentrated on understanding different practices and the rationality or irrationality involved in them. Second, for strategic reasons: Foucault once said that “experience has taught me that the history of various forms of rationality is sometimes more effective in unsettling our certitudes and dogmatism than is abstract criticism. For centuries, religion couldn’t bear having its history told. Today, our schools of rationality balk at having their history written, which is no doubt significant.” (Foucault, p. 323). Similarly, it seems to me Foucault wanted to disrupt certain assumptions about capitalism through historical investigation into different forms of powers and their genealogy in the West. In this paper I will step aside of the issues of interpretation and try to investigate the conceptual advances made by Foucault’s analyses, how some of his conceptual tools can be used in understanding capitalist rationality, and how it can help deconstruct certain traditional myths about capitalism.
Abstract: There is a theme running throughout Foucault’s analyses of governmentality, biopower, discussion on the changing nature of state and its relation to society, and neo-liberalism. The theme is particularly clear in the contrast he makes between governmentality and the art of government in previous centuries (police state etc), biopower versus disciplinary power, and the modern state versus the early modern state. The theme is that of freedom, the nature of freedom, and its relation to other notions such as power, rationality etc. Foucault wants to reject a certain notion of freedom. Let’s call it a negative notion of freedom. The notion of freedom sees freedom in terms of absence of something else, something it’s not, a way out. Specifically freedom is seen as absence of repression and domination, which are in turn associated with power. Hence, freedom becomes absence of power, and the way to freedom is a way out of power relations. This also leads to a negative notion of power. Power is domination. Hence where there is power there is no freedom and where there is freedom there is no power. Let’s call this “exclusory” hypothesis. But this, Foucault argues, is to misunderstand the nature of modern freedom and power and the way they operate in modern societies. Such notions of freedom and power might have some relevance in early modern and medieval societies, but they are quite inadequate in understanding our contemporary societies. One of the insights of the analysis is that freedom is a great managing power (and not just a liberating force) and power is not necessarily something bad (it can lead to either domination or freedom). The aim of the paper is twofold: First to make explicit Foucault’s insights about freedom and power through paying close attention to what he says in his discussion of governmentality, biopower and related issues. The second aim is to show that an understanding of freedom and power can shed light on understanding certain fundamental features of contemporary capitalism. Now Foucault’s research into the nature of biopower and governmental rationality, although evidently connected to the phenomenon of capitalism, were conducted in relative isolation and without explicit attention to the concept of capitalism. For at least two reasons. First, Foucault, from a methodological viewpoint, wanted to avoid universals. His method explicitly concentrated on understanding different practices and the rationality or irrationality involved in them. Second, for strategic reasons: Foucault once said that “experience has taught me that the history of various forms of rationality is sometimes more effective in unsettling our certitudes and dogmatism than is abstract criticism. For centuries, religion couldn’t bear having its history told. Today, our schools of rationality balk at having their history written, which is no doubt significant.” (Foucault, p. 323). Similarly, it seems to me Foucault wanted to disrupt certain assumptions about capitalism through historical investigation into different forms of powers and their genealogy in the West. In this paper I will step aside of the issues of interpretation and try to investigate the conceptual advances made by Foucault’s analyses, how some of his conceptual tools can be used in understanding capitalist rationality, and how it can help deconstruct certain traditional myths about capitalism.
Monday, May 02, 2011
The Gay Science : An interview with Foucault (previously unpublished)
1) The Gay Science: Michel Foucault Translated by Nicolae Morar and Daniel W. Smith
(pdf)
About the interview:
This "lost and found" piece - Foucault's interview represents [not only] "his first public pronouncements on the topic of contemporary gay politics, gay sex, and gay culture that he intended to voice in print in his own person, implicitly acknowledging his own homosexuality", but he also makes a number of important observations about sexual liberation, gay movements, male sexual institutions, and also he elaborates on the crucial distinction between pleasure and desire. (As David Halperin see article below for details).
2) Michel Foucault, Jean Le Bitoux, and the Gay Science Lost and Found: An Introduction David M. Halperin
(pdf)
3) At the Source of Thought, Silence, and Laughter
Jean Le Bitoux
Translated by Nicolae Morar and Daniel W. Smith
For the links to the published versions go here (subscription may be required to see these).
Many thanks to Nicolae Morar for the links.
(pdf)
About the interview:
This "lost and found" piece - Foucault's interview represents [not only] "his first public pronouncements on the topic of contemporary gay politics, gay sex, and gay culture that he intended to voice in print in his own person, implicitly acknowledging his own homosexuality", but he also makes a number of important observations about sexual liberation, gay movements, male sexual institutions, and also he elaborates on the crucial distinction between pleasure and desire. (As David Halperin see article below for details).
2) Michel Foucault, Jean Le Bitoux, and the Gay Science Lost and Found: An Introduction David M. Halperin
(pdf)
3) At the Source of Thought, Silence, and Laughter
Jean Le Bitoux
Translated by Nicolae Morar and Daniel W. Smith
For the links to the published versions go here (subscription may be required to see these).
Many thanks to Nicolae Morar for the links.
ROUNDTABLE
Monday, May 23th 2011, 5-8 pm
ROUNDTABLE
Michel Foucault, Leçons sur la volonté de savoir. Cours au Collège de France (1970-1971)
introduced by Daniel Defert (Université Paris 8) and moderated by Arnold I. Davidson (University of Chicago)
with J.-F. Braunstein (Université Paris 1), M. Potte-Bonneville (CIPh), J. Revel (Université Paris 1)
Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne: 17, rue de la Sorbonne, 75005 Paris - Salle Cavaillès (1er étage, esc. C)
poster here
ROUNDTABLE
Michel Foucault, Leçons sur la volonté de savoir. Cours au Collège de France (1970-1971)
introduced by Daniel Defert (Université Paris 8) and moderated by Arnold I. Davidson (University of Chicago)
with J.-F. Braunstein (Université Paris 1), M. Potte-Bonneville (CIPh), J. Revel (Université Paris 1)
Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne: 17, rue de la Sorbonne, 75005 Paris - Salle Cavaillès (1er étage, esc. C)
poster here
Sunday, March 27, 2011
SPECIAL WORKSHOP ON BIOPOLITICS: Call for Abstracts and Papers
Greetings. The IVR XXV WORLD CONGRESS OF PHILOSOPHY OF LAW AND SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY will take place at Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt, Germany, from August 15th to 20th 2011. We would like to invite you to propose a paper for presentation in the special workshop on Biopolitcs to be held in the Congress on August 18th., Thursday. The Organizing Comitte has accepted our workshop proposal, which is hence confirmed. We enclose bellow the call for abstracts and papers. All the papers effectively presented in this special workshop will be translated to portuguese, with the permission of the author, and published as a book in Brazil, possibily a bilingual edition.
SPECIAL WORKSHOP ON BIOPOLITICS
CALL FOR ABSTRACTS AND PAPERS
Michel Foucault summarizes his understanding of the term Biopolitics in the abstract of his 1978-1979 Course at College de France: it is understood as the way it was tried, since the XVIII century, to rationalize the problems faced by governmental practices by means of phenomena concerning a group of living beings taken as a population: health, hygiene, birth rates, races... In his 1975-1976 course he defines it as the movement by which power takes charge of life concerns. Gilles Deleuze spoke of the idea of managing a multiplicity of beings (a given population) over a vast and open space, where probabilistics become increasingly relevant. Giorgio Agamben states that the totalitarianism of our century is founded on the dynamical identity of life and politics.
This special workshop is intended to gather members and scholars who consider the idea of Biopolitics as understood by the authors above mentioned – as well as by other contemporary philosophers – useful for a better comprehension of XX and XXI century national and international politics. There is a special interest in discussions towards the ways Biopolitics can be related to the role of Social Philosophy and Philosophy of Law in the present world.
Papers relating the concept of Biopolitcs or the works of the above authors to other philosophical traditions are also welcome.
Abstracts up to 500 words should be sent by email until April 31st 2011 to one of the coordinators indicated bellow.
Full papers, until June 30th 2011, designed for a 20 minutes presentation, including 5 minutes for discussion. More time will be allowed if possible.
Abstracts and papers should be written and presented in English.
All selected participants should register for the Congress.
Further information can be obtained at the Congress website http://www.jura.uni-frankfurt.de/ifkur1/neumann/ivr2011/ENG/index.html
For a list of other groups and workshops to be held in the Congress, please refer to the same website.
Kind regards,
Special Workshop Coordinators
Prof. Lucas de Alvarenga Gontijo
Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais - Brazil
alvarengagontijo@gmail.com
Prof. Luís Antônio Cunha Ribeiro
Universidade Federal Fluminense - Brazil
advogados@superig.com.br
SPECIAL WORKSHOP ON BIOPOLITICS
CALL FOR ABSTRACTS AND PAPERS
Michel Foucault summarizes his understanding of the term Biopolitics in the abstract of his 1978-1979 Course at College de France: it is understood as the way it was tried, since the XVIII century, to rationalize the problems faced by governmental practices by means of phenomena concerning a group of living beings taken as a population: health, hygiene, birth rates, races... In his 1975-1976 course he defines it as the movement by which power takes charge of life concerns. Gilles Deleuze spoke of the idea of managing a multiplicity of beings (a given population) over a vast and open space, where probabilistics become increasingly relevant. Giorgio Agamben states that the totalitarianism of our century is founded on the dynamical identity of life and politics.
This special workshop is intended to gather members and scholars who consider the idea of Biopolitics as understood by the authors above mentioned – as well as by other contemporary philosophers – useful for a better comprehension of XX and XXI century national and international politics. There is a special interest in discussions towards the ways Biopolitics can be related to the role of Social Philosophy and Philosophy of Law in the present world.
Papers relating the concept of Biopolitcs or the works of the above authors to other philosophical traditions are also welcome.
Abstracts up to 500 words should be sent by email until April 31st 2011 to one of the coordinators indicated bellow.
Full papers, until June 30th 2011, designed for a 20 minutes presentation, including 5 minutes for discussion. More time will be allowed if possible.
Abstracts and papers should be written and presented in English.
All selected participants should register for the Congress.
Further information can be obtained at the Congress website http://www.jura.uni-frankfurt.de/ifkur1/neumann/ivr2011/ENG/index.html
For a list of other groups and workshops to be held in the Congress, please refer to the same website.
Kind regards,
Special Workshop Coordinators
Prof. Lucas de Alvarenga Gontijo
Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais - Brazil
alvarengagontijo@gmail.com
Prof. Luís Antônio Cunha Ribeiro
Universidade Federal Fluminense - Brazil
advogados@superig.com.br
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Foucault and Philosophy
Foucault and Philosophy
Timothy O'Leary and Christopher Falzon (eds.), Foucault and Philosophy, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010, 259pp., $104.95 (hbk), ISBN 9781405189606.
Reviewed by Ladelle McWhorter, University of Richmond
"Philosopher" was a label that Michel Foucault sometimes resisted, especially in the earlier decades of his career, but Timothy O'Leary and Christopher Falzon have assembled an excellent anthology of articles demonstrating Foucault's engagement with and contributions to contemporary philosophical practice throughout his life's work. The book examines and situates Foucault's work in relation to several major strands of philosophical tradition. It consists of an introduction and one paper each by the editors and an additional nine papers by well-known Foucault scholars including Gary Gutting, Jana Sawicki, Amy Allen, and Paul Patton, among others. There is no lack of interpretive disagreement in the group, which is especially notable in Gary Gutting's explicit critique of Béatrice Han-Pile's work and Barry Allen's implicit challenge to C.G. Prado. However, the disagreements and alternative perspectives are informative and thought-provoking.
Obviously it is impossible in one review to do justice to all eleven articles, and O'Leary and Falzon do an excellent job of summarizing them in their introduction. Here I will simply discuss four themes, each of which runs through several different papers. The first is Foucault's relation to his predecessors, including Hegel (Gutting), Nietzsche (Hans Sluga), and Heidegger (Timothy Rayner). The second is Foucault's relationship to and, in some cases, value for contemporary philosophical debates, including critical theory (Falzon and Amy Allen) and queer theory (Sawicki), as well as other discussions less easily categorized (Prado and O'Leary). Aligned with the second theme, the third theme that emerges very strongly in this collection is the question of truth and Foucault's epistemological positions. This comes out to some extent in Rayner's article on Heidegger, but it is foregrounded in Barry Allen's essay entitled "Foucault's Theory of Knowledge." Finally, I will conclude this review with a look at the theme of political theory and practice, with a focus on Paul Patton's essay, "Foucault and Normative Political Philosophy: Liberal and Neo-Liberal Governmentality and Public Reason."
full here
Timothy O'Leary and Christopher Falzon (eds.), Foucault and Philosophy, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010, 259pp., $104.95 (hbk), ISBN 9781405189606.
Reviewed by Ladelle McWhorter, University of Richmond
"Philosopher" was a label that Michel Foucault sometimes resisted, especially in the earlier decades of his career, but Timothy O'Leary and Christopher Falzon have assembled an excellent anthology of articles demonstrating Foucault's engagement with and contributions to contemporary philosophical practice throughout his life's work. The book examines and situates Foucault's work in relation to several major strands of philosophical tradition. It consists of an introduction and one paper each by the editors and an additional nine papers by well-known Foucault scholars including Gary Gutting, Jana Sawicki, Amy Allen, and Paul Patton, among others. There is no lack of interpretive disagreement in the group, which is especially notable in Gary Gutting's explicit critique of Béatrice Han-Pile's work and Barry Allen's implicit challenge to C.G. Prado. However, the disagreements and alternative perspectives are informative and thought-provoking.
Obviously it is impossible in one review to do justice to all eleven articles, and O'Leary and Falzon do an excellent job of summarizing them in their introduction. Here I will simply discuss four themes, each of which runs through several different papers. The first is Foucault's relation to his predecessors, including Hegel (Gutting), Nietzsche (Hans Sluga), and Heidegger (Timothy Rayner). The second is Foucault's relationship to and, in some cases, value for contemporary philosophical debates, including critical theory (Falzon and Amy Allen) and queer theory (Sawicki), as well as other discussions less easily categorized (Prado and O'Leary). Aligned with the second theme, the third theme that emerges very strongly in this collection is the question of truth and Foucault's epistemological positions. This comes out to some extent in Rayner's article on Heidegger, but it is foregrounded in Barry Allen's essay entitled "Foucault's Theory of Knowledge." Finally, I will conclude this review with a look at the theme of political theory and practice, with a focus on Paul Patton's essay, "Foucault and Normative Political Philosophy: Liberal and Neo-Liberal Governmentality and Public Reason."
full here
Monday, February 07, 2011
Call for papers “Races and Racisms: Foucaultian Approaches”
mf / materiali foucaultiani : volume 1, n. 2 (2011)
Call for papers
“Races and Racisms: Foucaultian Approaches”
Is it possible to analyze the contemporary forms of racism through a Foucaultian perspective? How could the Foucaultian boite à outils be useful in order to understand and reformulate the array of problems that, at present, are raising up around the different forms of racism?
The choice to dedicate a special issue of the online journal mf/materiali foucaultiani (www.materialifoucaultiani.org/en) to the articulation between race and racism which comes out from Michel Foucault’s thought, results both from the evidence that the phenomena bounded to racism are changing more and more, as well as from the necessity to contribute with a reflection on the epistemo-logical tools and the political stakes that take shape face to these questions. The scene of contemporary racisms shows a very complex and diversified landscape which requires to distinguish among overlap-ping heterogeneous times and spaces, thus raising the problem to verify whether or not the field of “problematisation” framed by Foucault could work also beyond the European borders within which he (almost completely) focused his analysis. Does Foucault’s grid of intelligibility turn out as versatile enough, in order to place itself in this horizon of analysis?
For these reasons, we would then be pleased to receive contributions that deal with and develop the following themes, underlining the advantages as well as the limits deriving from the use of the Fou-caultian perspective:
•
The historical and theoretical sources of the Foucaultian analysis on race and racism
•
The intertwining between racism and sexuality
•
Relationships between racism and violence in the governmental technologies
•
Relationships between race and the claims for the right of citizenship
•
The articulation of race and class
•
Relationships between racism and power of normalisation
•
Relationships between racism and psychiatry
•
Forms of resistance to the governmental technologies grounded on racism
Abstracts (500 words, in Italian, English or French) should be submitted by the 1st March, 2011 to: redazione@materialifoucaultiani.org.
Acceptance notices will be sent by the 21st March, 2011. Selected articles will have to be presented by the 1st June, 2011.
Call for papers
“Races and Racisms: Foucaultian Approaches”
Is it possible to analyze the contemporary forms of racism through a Foucaultian perspective? How could the Foucaultian boite à outils be useful in order to understand and reformulate the array of problems that, at present, are raising up around the different forms of racism?
The choice to dedicate a special issue of the online journal mf/materiali foucaultiani (www.materialifoucaultiani.org/en) to the articulation between race and racism which comes out from Michel Foucault’s thought, results both from the evidence that the phenomena bounded to racism are changing more and more, as well as from the necessity to contribute with a reflection on the epistemo-logical tools and the political stakes that take shape face to these questions. The scene of contemporary racisms shows a very complex and diversified landscape which requires to distinguish among overlap-ping heterogeneous times and spaces, thus raising the problem to verify whether or not the field of “problematisation” framed by Foucault could work also beyond the European borders within which he (almost completely) focused his analysis. Does Foucault’s grid of intelligibility turn out as versatile enough, in order to place itself in this horizon of analysis?
For these reasons, we would then be pleased to receive contributions that deal with and develop the following themes, underlining the advantages as well as the limits deriving from the use of the Fou-caultian perspective:
•
The historical and theoretical sources of the Foucaultian analysis on race and racism
•
The intertwining between racism and sexuality
•
Relationships between racism and violence in the governmental technologies
•
Relationships between race and the claims for the right of citizenship
•
The articulation of race and class
•
Relationships between racism and power of normalisation
•
Relationships between racism and psychiatry
•
Forms of resistance to the governmental technologies grounded on racism
Abstracts (500 words, in Italian, English or French) should be submitted by the 1st March, 2011 to: redazione@materialifoucaultiani.org.
Acceptance notices will be sent by the 21st March, 2011. Selected articles will have to be presented by the 1st June, 2011.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Professor Babak Rahimi's review of Janet Afary, Kevin B. Anderson. Foucault and the Iranian Revolution: Gender and the Seductions of Islamism
Michel Foucault (1926-84), historian, philosopher,
and activist, was one of the most in
uential intellec-
tual gures whose works have had an enormous im-
pact on various elds in the humanities and the so-
cial sciences. His writings on authorship, power and
knowledge, medicine, the prison system, and psychi-
atry not only de ed general interpretive categories,
but also escaped a unifying schema through which
one could attain a reducible sense of his overall argu-
ments. Each of Foucault's writings is an act of trans-
gression, testimony to an anti-transcendental imag-
ination that contravenes established conventional
norms (especially academic ones), challenges the har-
monization of theory and the homogenization of con-
ceptions and practices, and pushes the limits of ra-
tionality by imposing new boundaries.
Read full review here
related previous posts
and activist, was one of the most in
uential intellec-
tual gures whose works have had an enormous im-
pact on various elds in the humanities and the so-
cial sciences. His writings on authorship, power and
knowledge, medicine, the prison system, and psychi-
atry not only de ed general interpretive categories,
but also escaped a unifying schema through which
one could attain a reducible sense of his overall argu-
ments. Each of Foucault's writings is an act of trans-
gression, testimony to an anti-transcendental imag-
ination that contravenes established conventional
norms (especially academic ones), challenges the har-
monization of theory and the homogenization of con-
ceptions and practices, and pushes the limits of ra-
tionality by imposing new boundaries.
Read full review here
related previous posts
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Foucault on Francis Bacon
" . . . Francis Bacon, whom no one studies any more and who is certainly one of the most interesting figures at the start of the seventeenth century. I am not much in the habit of giving you advice concerning university work, but if you want to study Bacon, I don't think that you would be wasting your time." (Security, Territory, Population, p. 267).
Friday, November 05, 2010
CFP: Geographies of power: space and heterotopias, beginning from Foucault
The online journal mf/materiali foucaultiani dedicates a special issue to the theme of space and its possible declinations in the fields of philosophy, politics and geography-urbanism, starting from the reflections brought forward by Michel Foucault.
In a number of brief texts from the seventies, Foucault confronted repeatedly and directly the question of space. A commitment associated in particular to his participation to research groups on the urbanistic policies of the time and the extended dialogue with the geographers that formed the backbone of the journal Hérodote. At the same time, his analytics of power never ceased to expose the constitutive interrelation between technologies of power and spatial organization.
We think that Foucault’s analytical paradigm can still be used today as an important matrix through which at once read and highlight the centrality of space in contemporary governmental practices. This course of research has been so far developed in fields only tangential to philosophical reflection: geographers, sociologists and urbanists have found in Foucault an innovative tool not only in order to think anew the implicit logics and the underlying power relationships of spatial distributions, but also in order to individuate possible points of resistance to them. Beyond these important and provocative appropriations, the theme of space still remains, within the area of Foucaultian studies, a vast field to explore and wander.
If only for this reason, we think that developing the theme here proposed may effectively extend the Foucaultian trajectory over and beyond the lines of research so far undertook. We would then be happy to receive contributions concerned with the following themes:
•
Space, power and resistances in Michel Foucault.
•
Contemporary declinations of disciplinary spatiality.
•
Genealogical perspectives and the analysis of space.
•
Governmental techniques deployed in space and practices of resistance existent and possible, a) in the postcolonial present; b) in the management of migrations.
•
Mapping of territory and new urbanistic practices: political stakes.
•
Society of control, disciplinary society: two readings of space between Deleuze and Foucault.
Abstracts (about 500 words, in Italian, English or French) should be submitted by 15 Dicember, 2010 to:
redazione@materialifoucaultiani.org
Selected articles will have to be presented by 15 March, 2011.
In a number of brief texts from the seventies, Foucault confronted repeatedly and directly the question of space. A commitment associated in particular to his participation to research groups on the urbanistic policies of the time and the extended dialogue with the geographers that formed the backbone of the journal Hérodote. At the same time, his analytics of power never ceased to expose the constitutive interrelation between technologies of power and spatial organization.
We think that Foucault’s analytical paradigm can still be used today as an important matrix through which at once read and highlight the centrality of space in contemporary governmental practices. This course of research has been so far developed in fields only tangential to philosophical reflection: geographers, sociologists and urbanists have found in Foucault an innovative tool not only in order to think anew the implicit logics and the underlying power relationships of spatial distributions, but also in order to individuate possible points of resistance to them. Beyond these important and provocative appropriations, the theme of space still remains, within the area of Foucaultian studies, a vast field to explore and wander.
If only for this reason, we think that developing the theme here proposed may effectively extend the Foucaultian trajectory over and beyond the lines of research so far undertook. We would then be happy to receive contributions concerned with the following themes:
•
Space, power and resistances in Michel Foucault.
•
Contemporary declinations of disciplinary spatiality.
•
Genealogical perspectives and the analysis of space.
•
Governmental techniques deployed in space and practices of resistance existent and possible, a) in the postcolonial present; b) in the management of migrations.
•
Mapping of territory and new urbanistic practices: political stakes.
•
Society of control, disciplinary society: two readings of space between Deleuze and Foucault.
Abstracts (about 500 words, in Italian, English or French) should be submitted by 15 Dicember, 2010 to:
redazione@materialifoucaultiani.org
Selected articles will have to be presented by 15 March, 2011.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
A new Foucault wbesite: materiali foucaultiani
Here is a brief intro from the site:
"The objects of our project are to publish a new journal and to set up a web site dedicated to Michel Foucault. The primary aim is to fill a gap in the Italian academic milieu regarding one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century. During the 1990s, several unpublished Foucaultian texts were edited and, by the end of the decade, the great task of publishing his Collège de France lectures has started. In front of such a flourishing editorial activity, in Italy there have been monographs, collective works and a significant number of international conferences and special issues that several journals devoted to the French thinker. However, there still does not seem to exist a recognised research platform on which scholars in Italy and elsewhere may interact on a continuous and organized way. The creation of such a platform represents the core of our project."
Go to materiali foucaultiani
"The objects of our project are to publish a new journal and to set up a web site dedicated to Michel Foucault. The primary aim is to fill a gap in the Italian academic milieu regarding one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century. During the 1990s, several unpublished Foucaultian texts were edited and, by the end of the decade, the great task of publishing his Collège de France lectures has started. In front of such a flourishing editorial activity, in Italy there have been monographs, collective works and a significant number of international conferences and special issues that several journals devoted to the French thinker. However, there still does not seem to exist a recognised research platform on which scholars in Italy and elsewhere may interact on a continuous and organized way. The creation of such a platform represents the core of our project."
Go to materiali foucaultiani
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Theory Culture & Society Special Issue – Michel Foucault
Theory Culture & Society
Special Issue – Michel Foucault
Volume 26, Issue 6
Click here to access this issue for free! (access ends January 31st)
Edited by Couze Venn and Tiziana Terranova
Special Issue – Michel Foucault
Volume 26, Issue 6
Click here to access this issue for free! (access ends January 31st)
Edited by Couze Venn and Tiziana Terranova
Foucault’s Untimely Struggle
Paul Rabinow
Abstract
In his series of essays on Kant written during the 1980s, Michel Foucault attempted to discern the difference today made with respect to yesterday. As his essays as well as his lectures (especially at the Collège de France and Berkeley) during the early 1980s demonstrate, he was drawn – and devoted the bulk of his scholarly efforts to a renewed form of genealogical work on themes, venues, practices and modes of governing the subject and others –to experiments in new forms of friendship, sociability and transformations of the self and others that he saw taking shape, or imagined were taking
shape around him. This work, which has come to be known unfortunately as the ‘late Foucault’, arose out of deep dissatisfaction with his own life conditions, the broader political climate of the time, and a profound and unexpected rethinking not only of the specific projects he had intended to carry out but of what it meant to think. This article explores some of the elements at play during these deeply (re)formative several years, which as they unfolded were in no way intended to constitute a ‘late Foucault’, quite
the opposite, even if fate would have it otherwise. The article begins with a ‘prelude’ that introduces the problem of what mode is appropriate for giving form to thinking. It proceeds to argue that Foucault engaged in a struggle to redefine the object of thinking; that in order to do so he was led to pursue a venue in which such thinking could be practised; and finally to an increasingly articulate and acute quest for a form that would constitute a difference between what Foucault diagnosed as an impoverished modern problem space and a future in which things might be different and better.
free access to the article (here)
Abstract
In his series of essays on Kant written during the 1980s, Michel Foucault attempted to discern the difference today made with respect to yesterday. As his essays as well as his lectures (especially at the Collège de France and Berkeley) during the early 1980s demonstrate, he was drawn – and devoted the bulk of his scholarly efforts to a renewed form of genealogical work on themes, venues, practices and modes of governing the subject and others –to experiments in new forms of friendship, sociability and transformations of the self and others that he saw taking shape, or imagined were taking
shape around him. This work, which has come to be known unfortunately as the ‘late Foucault’, arose out of deep dissatisfaction with his own life conditions, the broader political climate of the time, and a profound and unexpected rethinking not only of the specific projects he had intended to carry out but of what it meant to think. This article explores some of the elements at play during these deeply (re)formative several years, which as they unfolded were in no way intended to constitute a ‘late Foucault’, quite
the opposite, even if fate would have it otherwise. The article begins with a ‘prelude’ that introduces the problem of what mode is appropriate for giving form to thinking. It proceeds to argue that Foucault engaged in a struggle to redefine the object of thinking; that in order to do so he was led to pursue a venue in which such thinking could be practised; and finally to an increasingly articulate and acute quest for a form that would constitute a difference between what Foucault diagnosed as an impoverished modern problem space and a future in which things might be different and better.
free access to the article (here)
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Dialectical logic versus Strategic logic
Dialectical logic puts to work contradictory terms within the homogeneous. I suggest replacing this dialectical logic with what I would call strategic logic. A logic of strategy does not stress contradictory terms within a homogeneity that promises their resolution in a unity. The function of strategic logic is to establish the possible connections between disparate terms which remain disparate. The logic of strategy is the logic of connections between the heterogeneous and not the logic of the homogenization of the contradictory. (TBoBP, p. 42).
Foucauldian Categorical Imperative
Foucauldian Categorical Imperative
“. . . I will . . . propose only one imperative, but it will be categorical and unconditional: Never to engage in polemics.” (STP: 4).
"I like discussions, and when I am asked questions, I try to answer them. It’s true that I don’t like to get involved in polemics. If I open a book and see that the author is accusing an adversary of “infantile leftism” I shut it again right away. That’s not my way of doing things; I don’t belong to the world of people who do things that way. I insist on this difference as something essential: a whole morality is at stake, the one that concerns the search for truth and the relation to the other.
In the serious play of questions and answers, in the work of reciprocal elucidation, the rights of each person are in some sense immanent in the discussion. They depend only on the dialogue situation. The person asking the questions is merely exercising the right that has been given him: to remain unconvinced, to perceive a contradiction, to require more information, to emphasize different postulates, to point out faulty reasoning, and so on. As for the person answering the questions, he too exercises a right that does not go beyond the discussion itself; by the logic of his own discourse, he is tied to what he has said earlier, and by the acceptance of dialogue he is tied to the questioning of other. Questions and answers depend on a game—a game that is at once pleasant and difficult—in which each of the two partners takes pains to use only the rights given him by the other and by the accepted form of dialogue.
The polemicist , on the other hand, proceeds encased in privileges that he possesses in advance and will never agree to question. On principle, he possesses rights authorizing him to wage war and making that struggle a just undertaking; the person he confronts is not a partner in search for the truth but an adversary, an enemy who is wrong, who is armful, and whose very existence constitutes a threat. For him, then the game consists not of recognizing this person as a subject having the right to speak but of abolishing him as interlocutor, from any possible dialogue; and his final objective will be not to come as close as possible to a difficult truth but to bring about the triumph of the just cause he has been manifestly upholding from the beginning. The polemicist relies on a legitimacy that his adversary is by definition denied.
Perhaps, someday, a long history will have to be written of polemics, polemics as a parasitic figure on discussion and an obstacle to the search for the truth. Very schematically, it seems to me that today we can recognize the presence in polemics of three models: the religious model, the judiciary model, and the political model. As in heresiology, polemics sets itself the task of determining the intangible point of dogma, the fundamental and necessary principle that the adversary has neglected, ignored or transgressed; and it denounces this negligence as a moral failing; at the root of the error, it finds passion, desire, interest, a whole series of weaknesses and inadmissible attachments that establish it as culpable. As in judiciary practice, polemics allows for no possibility of an equal discussion: it examines a case; it isn’t dealing with an interlocutor, it is processing a suspect; it collects the proofs of his guilt, designates the infraction he has committed, and pronounces the verdict and sentences him. In any case, what we have here is not on the order of a shared investigation; the polemicist tells the truth in the form of his judgment and by virtue of the authority he has conferred on himself. But it is the political model that is the most powerful today. Polemics defines alliances, recruits partisans, unites interests or opinions, represents a party; it establishes the other as an enemy, an upholder of opposed interests against which one must fight until the moment this enemy is defeated and either surrenders or disappears.
Of course, the reactivation, in polemics, of these political, judiciary, or religious practices is nothing more than theater. One gesticulates: anathemas, excommunications, condemnations, battles, victories, and defeats are no more than ways of speaking, after all. And yet, in the order of discourse, they are also ways of acting which are not without consequence. There are the sterilizing effects. Has anyone ever seen a new idea come out of a polemic? And how could it be otherwise, given that here the interlocutors are incited not to advance, not to take more and more risks in what they say, but to fall back continually on the rights that they claim, on their legitimacy, which they must defend, and on the affirmation of their innocence? There is something even more serious here: in this comedy, one mimics war, battles, annihilations, or unconditional surrenders, putting forward as much of one’s killer instinct as possible. But it is really dangerous to make anyone believe that he can gain access to the truth by such paths and thus to validate, even if in a merely symbolic form, the real political practices that could be warranted by it. Let us imagine, for a moment, that a magic wand is waved and one of the two adversaries in a polemic is given the ability to exercise all the power he likes over the other. One doesn’t even have to imagine it: one has only to look at what happened during the debate in the USSR over linguistics or genetics not long ago. Were these merely aberrant deviations from what was supposed to be the correct discussion? Not at all—they were the real consequences of a polemic attitude whose effects ordinarily remain suspended." (Polemics, Politics and Problematizations)
“. . . I will . . . propose only one imperative, but it will be categorical and unconditional: Never to engage in polemics.” (STP: 4).
"I like discussions, and when I am asked questions, I try to answer them. It’s true that I don’t like to get involved in polemics. If I open a book and see that the author is accusing an adversary of “infantile leftism” I shut it again right away. That’s not my way of doing things; I don’t belong to the world of people who do things that way. I insist on this difference as something essential: a whole morality is at stake, the one that concerns the search for truth and the relation to the other.
In the serious play of questions and answers, in the work of reciprocal elucidation, the rights of each person are in some sense immanent in the discussion. They depend only on the dialogue situation. The person asking the questions is merely exercising the right that has been given him: to remain unconvinced, to perceive a contradiction, to require more information, to emphasize different postulates, to point out faulty reasoning, and so on. As for the person answering the questions, he too exercises a right that does not go beyond the discussion itself; by the logic of his own discourse, he is tied to what he has said earlier, and by the acceptance of dialogue he is tied to the questioning of other. Questions and answers depend on a game—a game that is at once pleasant and difficult—in which each of the two partners takes pains to use only the rights given him by the other and by the accepted form of dialogue.
The polemicist , on the other hand, proceeds encased in privileges that he possesses in advance and will never agree to question. On principle, he possesses rights authorizing him to wage war and making that struggle a just undertaking; the person he confronts is not a partner in search for the truth but an adversary, an enemy who is wrong, who is armful, and whose very existence constitutes a threat. For him, then the game consists not of recognizing this person as a subject having the right to speak but of abolishing him as interlocutor, from any possible dialogue; and his final objective will be not to come as close as possible to a difficult truth but to bring about the triumph of the just cause he has been manifestly upholding from the beginning. The polemicist relies on a legitimacy that his adversary is by definition denied.
Perhaps, someday, a long history will have to be written of polemics, polemics as a parasitic figure on discussion and an obstacle to the search for the truth. Very schematically, it seems to me that today we can recognize the presence in polemics of three models: the religious model, the judiciary model, and the political model. As in heresiology, polemics sets itself the task of determining the intangible point of dogma, the fundamental and necessary principle that the adversary has neglected, ignored or transgressed; and it denounces this negligence as a moral failing; at the root of the error, it finds passion, desire, interest, a whole series of weaknesses and inadmissible attachments that establish it as culpable. As in judiciary practice, polemics allows for no possibility of an equal discussion: it examines a case; it isn’t dealing with an interlocutor, it is processing a suspect; it collects the proofs of his guilt, designates the infraction he has committed, and pronounces the verdict and sentences him. In any case, what we have here is not on the order of a shared investigation; the polemicist tells the truth in the form of his judgment and by virtue of the authority he has conferred on himself. But it is the political model that is the most powerful today. Polemics defines alliances, recruits partisans, unites interests or opinions, represents a party; it establishes the other as an enemy, an upholder of opposed interests against which one must fight until the moment this enemy is defeated and either surrenders or disappears.
Of course, the reactivation, in polemics, of these political, judiciary, or religious practices is nothing more than theater. One gesticulates: anathemas, excommunications, condemnations, battles, victories, and defeats are no more than ways of speaking, after all. And yet, in the order of discourse, they are also ways of acting which are not without consequence. There are the sterilizing effects. Has anyone ever seen a new idea come out of a polemic? And how could it be otherwise, given that here the interlocutors are incited not to advance, not to take more and more risks in what they say, but to fall back continually on the rights that they claim, on their legitimacy, which they must defend, and on the affirmation of their innocence? There is something even more serious here: in this comedy, one mimics war, battles, annihilations, or unconditional surrenders, putting forward as much of one’s killer instinct as possible. But it is really dangerous to make anyone believe that he can gain access to the truth by such paths and thus to validate, even if in a merely symbolic form, the real political practices that could be warranted by it. Let us imagine, for a moment, that a magic wand is waved and one of the two adversaries in a polemic is given the ability to exercise all the power he likes over the other. One doesn’t even have to imagine it: one has only to look at what happened during the debate in the USSR over linguistics or genetics not long ago. Were these merely aberrant deviations from what was supposed to be the correct discussion? Not at all—they were the real consequences of a polemic attitude whose effects ordinarily remain suspended." (Polemics, Politics and Problematizations)
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
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