PROPHETS IN EXILE: A DIAGNOSIS OF MICHEL FOUCAULT’S POLITICAL INTELLECTUAL Approved by Dissertation Committee: Copyright by Christina L. Hendricks 2000 PROPHETS IN EXILE: A DIAGNOSIS OF MICHEL FOUCAULT’S POLITICAL INTELLECTUAL by Christina L. Hendricks, 8.A., M.A. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin August 2000 PROPHETS IN EXILE: A DIAGNOSIS OF MICHEL FOUCAULT’S POLITICAL INTELLECTUAL Publication No. Christina L. Hendricks, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2000 Supervisors: Kelly Oliver and Kathleen Higgins I investigate the question of the political role of the intellectual, considering the political and ethical impact of the scholarly work of intellectuals. I concentrate on the subtle ways in which such intellectual work can contribute to (or hinder) efforts to encourage others to think for themseves and thereby manage effective resistance to oppressive practices of power. My focus in this investigation rests on the work of Michel Foucault, who in his own work plays an intellectual role that I label, after Edward Said, the role of an “exile.” Within such a role one attempts to resist particular practices of power without escaping them entirely; one distances oneself from what is being resisted, while still retaining crucial ties to it. In encouraging others to engage in resistance to power through a movement of exile, Foucault himself attempts to take up an exile position in relation to his own use of power as an intellectual, working to transform it from within. I argue that this role of the intellectual as exile is an intriguing and fruitful one for ethically and politically concerned intellectuals to consider, and that a number of criticisms brought against Foucault’s work by commentators can be resolved by considering them within the context of his role as an intellectual exile. Table of Contents Introduction 1 Chapter One A New Type of Intellectual 41 I Universal and Specific Intellectuals 41 II The Intellectual as Exile 88 Chapter Two The Poison of the Regime of Truth 101 I Truth: Between Universal Certainty and Total Skepticism 101 II The Regime of Truth: Truth and Power 141 111 Between Tyranny and Anarchy: Poison, Power, Resistance 166 Chapter Three Intellectual Antidote 209 I The Intellectual as Genealogist: A Prophet in Exile 209 II The Foucauldian Intellectual Between Prophecy and Silence 250 Chapter Four Curative Freedom 289 I Real Freedom: The Dangers of Liberation 289 II Diagnosing the Present: How the Intellectual can Promote “Real Freedom 331 111 Real Freedom? Objections and Replies 347 Chapter Five Cure: Aesthetic Subjectivity 375 I The Arts of Existence 376 II The Care of the Self as a Practice of Freedom 406 Conclusion 462 Works Cited: Foucault 477 Works Cited: Secondary Sources 482 Vita 488 Introduction Few American intellectuals live in exile. Russell Jacoby (1987) When Russell Jacoby made this statement in the Preface to his book, The Last Intellectuals, he seems to have been speaking quite literally. The guiding question of his text, “Where are our intellectuals?”, was answered by Harold Stearns in 1921 in the following way: they are “fleeing to Europe” (Jacoby 1987, ix). Jacoby notes that this response no longer fits the current situation, as young American intellectuals now “head for Europe not to flee, but for vacations, sometimes conferences” (1987, ix). Few of them actually “live in exile.” Jacoby’s text expresses concern over the decline of “public intellectuals”: “writers and thinkers who address a general and educated audience” (1987, 5). This category, he points out, “excludes intellectuals whose works are too technical or difficult to engage a public” (1987, 5). Public intellectuals on the left are disappearing, Jacoby laments, being replaced by younger intellectuals “who no longer need or want a larger public”: [T]hey are almost exclusively professors. Campuses are their homes; colleagues their audience; monographs and specialized journals their media. Unlike past intellectuals they situate themselves within fields and disciplines . . . . (1987, 6) Such academic intellectuals become insulated from public life, writing for “specialized journals” that are read only by a small audience of other, academic intellectuals (and perhaps students). This means they no longer need to write in ways accessible to a general, educated public: “As intellectuals became academics, they had no need to write in a public prose; they did not, and finally they could not” (1987, 7). Bruce Robbins responds to Jacoby’s claims by investigating “the hidden meanings of Jacoby’s plausibly antithetical terms ‘public’ and ‘academic’” (Robbins 1990, xiii). According to Robbins, “the public” for Jacoby amounts to a kind of anonymous abstraction “that cannot be represented by specific names, faces, or places” (1990, xiii). The kind of intellectual whose decline Jacoby laments, Robbins argues, seems to be the one who speaks to all by speaking to no one in particular. Accordingly, Robbins finds more meaning in Jacoby’s use of the term “exile” in the above quote than a reference to geographic location: “To be ‘public’ is to be exiled, ungrounded, hovering somewhere above the messy melee of actual collective and overlapping identities that is society” (1990, xiv). Robbins concludes by presenting his own diagnosis of Jacoby’s diagnostic analysis of the current state of American intellectuals: “In the morally weighty name of ‘the public,’ Jacoby is in fact protecting the privileged free-floating independence of an older and less morally creditable conception of intellectuals” (1990, xiv). Jacoby’s worry is an important one for intellectuals who are concerned about the possible political impact of their work on “the public.” If intellectuals are, indeed, increasingly isolating themselves in academe, forming “insular societies” with their professional journals and annual conferences, how might their work manage to contribute to the social and political change many intellectuals hope to bring about? Such political concerns are not universally manifested amongst intellectuals, of course, American or otherwise. Some seem content to remain in the “privileged free-floating independence” of abstract, theoretical work that appears to have little connection to “the messy melee” of the actual, practical, ethical and political concerns of the society in which they function. 1 But for those who aren’t so contented, it is important to ask whether the insularity Jacoby describes is indeed occurring, and if so to what degree it hampers efforts at social and political change through intellectual work. Jacoby is correct, at least to some extent, to note that intellectuals in academe do often isolate themselves from “the public” through both the style and content of their intellectual writings. “[T]hey constitute their own universe,” Jacoby points out, whose ‘stars’ are people that are famous only within this universe’s small circle - “since they do not employ the vernacular, outsiders rarely know of them” (Jacoby 1987, 7). It is not difficult to find examples of this phenomenon in academic Philosophy, especially that branch commonly known in the U.S. as “Continental” Philosophy. 2 Much contemporary Continental theory is known by “outsiders,” if it is known at all, by its reputation for being impenetrable Continental philosophers often employ terms, concepts, styles, and rhetorical devices familiar amongst themselves, yet baffling to the uninitiated. For Continental philosophers who hope to bring about social change through their intellectual work, the question of how trading theories in “insular societies” can have political effects becomes pressing. Yet Robbins is correct to point out that the solution for the politicallyconscious intellectual should not reside simply in a return to writing for “the public” at large. Robbins’ concerns about the intellectual who tries to speak to and for all by standing above the multiplicity of current social identities, issues, and problems echo in many ways Michel Foucault’s concerns about what he calls the “universal” intellectual. The “universal” intellectual is one who speaks and acts as if s/he is the guardian of universal truths, and can therefore take up the role of representative and leader for “the public” on the issues that fall within his/her expertise. Robbins argues that in order to do this, the intellectual must separate him/herself from “the messy melee” of “specific names, faces, [and] places” that make up “the public” and act as if this multiplicity can be neatly unified. Foucault would agree he emphasizes the specificity and heterogeneity of the power relations that structure social identities, issues, concerns, and struggles, and argues that the most effective political intellectual works on a more “specific,” rather than “universal,” level. Foucault questions the idea of universal truth that is supposed to be possessed by intellectuals, arguing that what counts as “true” or “false” is a function of power relations that are dynamic and changing. The status of universality that gets attached to some claims is itself a product of particular kinds of power relations that work to support these claims by silencing others, according to Foucault. By speaking in the mode of the universal, the intellectual works to uphold and perpetuate the dominant relations of power that produce such claims to truth. While Foucault’s “universal” intellectual is not exactly the same as Jacoby’s “public” one, they seem to share a degree of emphasis on generality, on speaking to and for a “general public” as opposed to a smaller, more specific one. Both are in decline; but Foucault treats this as an auspicious development, rather than as a cause for concern. Does this mean that for Foucault the intellectual need not worry about enclosing him/herself in an “insular society” of academics, writing to and for each other and keeping “outsiders” at bay with the obscurity of their language? One might argue that Foucault’s own work tends to put him in this category, that he seems to show little concern for how well his texts can be understood by “the public.” There is some merit in this claim, since though there is evidence that Foucault was very much concerned with how his texts were received by readers, the readers with which he was concerned seemed mainly to be other intellectuals. Foucault’s focus on the reception of his work is exhibited most prominently in his numerous interviews, many of which seem directed towards clarifying his written works. A quick perusal of some of his interviews quickly reveals that Foucault often worked to explain vague points, to correct misunderstandings, and to note how his views had changed over the years. In addition, he expressed disappointment when Madness and Civilization was met with indifference by many in France. But significantly, it was the indifference of other intellectuals that bothered him: systemsl was convinced that [Madness and Civilization] would have interested the Marxists, if no one else. Instead, there was just silence. (Foucault 1991 b, 77-78) One might be tempted to conclude that Foucault’s efforts to clarify and circulate his views were aimed only at other intellectuals within his own “universe.” Yet Foucault was clearly politically engaged, not simply in terms of contributing to social and political movements outside of his own work (though he did do that), 3 but also within and through his intellectual writings. He explains in an interview given in 1978 that he writes so as to transform himself and others: I aim at having an experience myself - by passing through a determinate historical content an experience of what we are today, of what is not only our past but also our present. And I invite others to share the experience. That is, an experience of our modernity that might permit us to emerge from it transformed. (Foucault 1991 b, 33-34) Through his genealogical analyses of topics such as madness, punishment, and sexuality, Foucault hopes to change the way we view “what we are today” by investigating our past. Most importantly, he expresses hope that this transformation will have political effects: [S]tarting from experience, it is necessary to clear the way for a transformation, a metamorphosis which isn’t simply individual but which has a character accessible to others: that is, this experience must be linkable, to a certain extent, to a collective practice and to a way of thinking. (1991 b 38-39) Foucault cites “such movements as anti-psychiatry, or the prisoners’ movement in France” as examples of the kind of “collective practice” to which the “experience” engendered by his texts “must be linkable” (1991 b 39). Through an in-depth investigation into Foucauldian genealogy, I argue that Foucault presents it as capable of significant political impact -- he writes about genealogy as if it can encourage its audience to resist relations of power they find oppressive, and he writes genealogy in a way that might indeed be capable of such effects. Despite the obscurity of some of his writings, Foucault can be said to employ a rhetorical style in his genealogies that addresses more than simply the “insular society” of his fellow intellectuals. I argue that he invites, and may arguably succeed to some degree in inviting, more of “the public” to have a “transformative experience” than just other intellectuals; and he thereby offers an example of one way for the politically concerned intellectual to write texts that may have political effects beyond their own “universe.” 4 There are certainly other ways of engaging in intellectual work that can have political effects beyond one’s own “insular society” than the one I glean from Foucault. I mean here to present Foucault’s view as one possibility, in part for the purpose of stimulating thought about others. I focus on Foucault because I find in his work a particular rhetorical style that provides an intriguing new way to think about the potential political impact of intellectual work, and one that is easily missed due (perhaps) to Foucault’s own tendency to overstate his rejection of the “universal” intellectual role. In addition, I argue that by paying close attention to the political role Foucault describes for intellectuals, and how he plays it in his own work, we can work to resolve some of the most pressing questions and difficulties brought up by his critics. Viewing Foucault’s genealogical texts in the context of his role as an intellectual, we may be able to better understand why he wrote as he did, and to recognize that some of the seemingly problematic aspects of his work may be the result of a strategy designed to affect his audience in particular way. I argue that Foucault does not actually leave the “universal” intellectual role behind entirely, that he continues to operate within it for a strategic purpose - he plays the role of a “universal” intellectual in a way that seems meant to undermine this role, to encourage his readers to question it. 5 I locate within Foucault’s genealogical texts a rhetorical style that shows him employing tactics of the “universal” intellectual while also distancing himself from them. Put another way, Foucault exiles himself from the role of the “universal” intellectual, and from the claims to universal truth and value that such an intellectual would put forth. I use the term “exile” in a different sense than what I have attributed to either Jacoby or Robbins in employing this term. The role of an intellectual exile , as I shall describe it, is not taken up only by those who have experienced a type of geographic exile, nor is this role described well by Robbins’ notion of a “freefloating, independent” intellectual. The intellectual exile in my sense is someone who can be exiled from particular discourses, practices, claims to truth, knowledges, concepts, etc., instead of or in addition to nations and homelands. Further, the intellectual who is thus exiled does not experience a clean break, a complete separation from these discourses, practices, etc., but rather distances him/herself from them while remaining tied to them. S/he takes a step back while remaining within that from which s/he is exiled; s/he operates from a position inbetween being fully within and supporting a discourse or practice, and being fully outside and against it. Foucault does not, at least in his genealogical work, attempt to stand completely outside of his present with its discourses, practices, knowledges, truths and values. Indeed, he criticizes the historian who thinks this is possible, who attempts to take on a “suprahistorical perspective” (Foucault 1977 b, 152). Foucault works instead from a position within the present with its particular relations of power and its truth claims. He does work to question and undermine a number of the claims to truth and value that are currently dominant, but he doesn’t do so by rejecting them entirely, by moving outside of his own historical position. 6 He manages instead to question them from within. I argue that this is a strategic move on Foucault’s part, designed to encourage others to question their usual ways of thinking. In his genealogies, Foucault writes as if he were a “universal” intellectual who advocates the dominant, universal truths and values of the present in order to bring up these truths and values in his readers. He then works to undermine the very concepts he has elicited through his genealogical analyses of them, showing them to be the products of a contingent, accidental history rather than the universal and timeless notions his audience might previously have thought. He also attempts to distance himself from the “universal” intellectual role he plays as a strategy, since he questions the very universal truths he also appeared to utilize. I argue that as an intellectual Foucault inhabits, while also distancing himself from, the system of truth and power that he calls a “regime of truth.” I investigate this notion of a regime of truth in detail in Chapter Two; but a brief definition here will help to offer a preliminary idea of what it means for Foucault. Truth is bound up with power, Foucault asserts: “Truth ... is produced only by virtue of multiple forms of constraint. And it induces regular effects of power” (Foucault 1980 g, 131). This interconnection between truth and power grounds Foucault’s assertion that every society has a “general politics of truth,” or a “regime of truth”: Each society has its regime of truth, its ‘general politics’ of truth: that is, the types of discourses which it accepts and makes function as true; the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements, the means by which each is sanctioned; the techniques and procedures accorded value in the acquisition of truth; the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true” (Foucault 1980 g, 131). What we see here is a kind of system whereby “truth” is something produced by certain “mechanisms” and “techniques,” emanating from certain individuals “who are charged with saying what counts as true.” In other words, “truth,” as it is characterized here, is something created rather than discovered. It is, for Foucault, “a thing of this world”: “the truth” does exist as an eternal, absolute, in some nether realm waiting to be found, it is instead something produced here, through the interactions of individuals and the networks of power in which they are involved. The regime of truth encompasses a number of elements including institutions, individuals, and power relationships - that work together to produce what counts as “true” through the operations of power. Further, there are multiple regimes of truth, as Foucault notes (“each society has its regime of truth”), since there are different ways in which power relations can come together to “distinguish true and false statements” and to sanction those that are to count as “true.” In modern Western societies, it is “scientific” truth that has been dominant (Foucault 1980 h, 85) the current regime of truth works to produce and sanction claims that can be established as “scientific.” This means in part that “the truth” will involve claims that are accorded the status of universality. The Foucauldian intellectual exile has a very complex relationship to the regime of truth: s/he is a part of its network of power relations and the truths and knowledges these produce, operating within it, while at the same time s/he works to question, undermine, and change this regime. This poses a number of difficulties for the intellectual exile. S/he seems in a good position to criticize the regime of truth since s/he is a part of it, but this also means that s/he is easily either co-opted by it, and/or can continue to be seen by others as a part of it even when s/he works to stand back and criticize it. The intellectual remains within the regime of truth while also criticizing it, attempting to take a step back from it without leaving it altogether. The intellectual seems always in tension between being inside and outside this regime, between supporting it and criticizing it. S/he operates within an “inside” that is not entirely inside, that pushes towards an impossible “outside.” If the intellectual attempts to move “outside,” s/he will end up in a position of opposition that will only ensure that she remains “inside.” Thus s/he must somehow address and criticize the regime of truth from an “inside” which is not fully inside, in a way that will lead to some meaningful change. This leaves the intellectual in a strange and difficult position of “in-betweenness.” I call this position “in-between” one of “exile,” and in doing so I follow to some degree Edward Said’s description of the political role of the modern intellectual. Half-involvements and half-detachments In his series for the BBC Reith Lectures in 1993, Said characterizes the intellectual as marginal, as an exile. For Said, it is the intellectual as “outsider” who plays an especially significant role at the present time: It is a spirit in opposition, rather than in accommodation, that grips me because the romance, the interest, the challenge of intellectual life is to be found in dissent against the status quo at a time when the struggle on behalf of underrepresented and disadvantaged groups seems so unfairly weighted against them. (Said 1994, xvii) Said lists figures such as James Baldwin and Malcolm X as intellectuals who exhibit the kind of “outsider” consciousness that “grips” him. He also occasionally refers to Foucault, though the latter does not form a main focus of his discussions of the intellectual. 7 Still, I believe that Said’s description of the intellectual as “exile” fits a number of aspects of Foucault himself and the Foucauldian intellectual. One of the most significant characteristics of the intellectual as exile is that s/he is in an important sense “in-between,” as Said explains: There is a popular but wholly mistaken assumption that being exiled is to be totally cut off, isolated, hopelessly separated from your place of origin. Would that surgically clean separation were true, because then at least you could have the consolation of knowing that what you have left behind is, in a sense, unthinkable and completely irrecoverable. . . . (Said 1994, 48) Said is speaking partly of “exiles” in the sense of those who have left their nations or homelands behind; but he is also speaking of the condition of certain intellectuals. He points to the intellectual who is either an exile in the sense of a political dislocation or in a “metaphorical” sense, where the latter includes those who may be “lifelong members of a society,” but who do not “belong fully to the society as it is,” who “dissent”: they are “the nay-sayers, the individuals at odds with their society and therefore outsiders and exiles so far as privileges, power, and honors are concerned” (1994, 52-53). It is the second type of intellectual that I would like to focus on here, the intellectual who is in a kind of metaphorical exile. This “exile” is someone who has not left a particular society, exited its borders, but who does exist in a state of exile insofar as s/he disagrees, dissents, and distances him/herself from many aspects of this society. This intellectual, Said claims, exists in a state similar to that of a political exile who has undergone a geographic displacement: “the state of never being fully adjusted, always feeling outside the chatty, familiar world inhabited by natives, so to speak, tending to avoid and even dislike the trappings of accommodation . . .” (Said 1994, 53). The intellectual exile may feel in some senses like a “foreigner,” an “outsider” who avoids the typical means of accommodation in the society e.g., s/he may eschew the trappings of working as a cog in the capitalist machine, preferring instead to stand back from it and criticize it, even at the expense of its financial benefits to him/her. Said argues that this kind of exile can be a freely chosen position, and it is the intellectual who “will not make the adjustment, preferring instead to remain outside the mainstream” that I consider here (1994, 52). This is an intellectual in self-exile, one who chooses his or her position of marginality and resistance (though of course this may also be accompanied by rejection by others, a pressure towards exile from other members of society as well). The intellectual as exile is still part of the society in which s/he takes up a position as “outsider”; and this means that s/he is neither completely “inside”n or “outside”of it, but exists in a state in-between. Said makes a similar diagnosis of the exile: The exile ... exists in a median state, neither completely at one with the new setting nor fully disencumbered of the old, beset with halfinvolvements and half-detachments, nostalgic and sentimental on one level, an adept mimic or secret outcast on another. (Said 1994, 49) This intellectual retains ties to that from which s/he is distanced, working with “half-involvements and half-detachments,” both leaving the old behind in one sense and yet remaining within it in another sometimes acting as its supporter and sometimes not. But I would also argue that the intellectual as exile remains tied, to some degree, to the very things against which s/he dissents. Insofar as the intellectual is “at odds,” is a “nay-sayer,” s/he is functioning through a process of rejection that is, and must be, still connected to that which is rejected. The intellectual remains tied in the sense that, taking up an opposing “side,” s/he operates within the same logic of negation and contradiction, of “two sides” that structures that which s/he opposes. Even if s/he attempts to escape this structure, s/he remains entrenched within it. Said doesn’t discuss this aspect of the intellectual exile’s ties to the place s/he left, but I believe it fits the exile metaphor well in that it shows how attempts to exit a discourse or a practice do not manage to take one fully beyond it. I do not think that “nay-saying” and “opposition,” however, is the most fruitful way for the intellectual to engage in self-exile, since such negations tend simply to repeat what is being opposed in a mirror image. I believe instead that it is possible for the intellectual to take up an exile position wherein s/he distances him/herself from what s/he hopes to resist while also remaining within it, without attempting to negate or oppose it from a position “outside” of it. Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual, I will argue, manage this kind of exile; they exhibit “halfinvolvements and half-detachments,” due to a struggle to resist that to which they remain connected. The Foucauldian intellectual occupies a position “in-between” operating fully within and fully outside of particular discourses, practices, etc. S/he remains within them while also maintaining a critical distance from them, working through them towards their eventual unsettling. Foucault himself takes up this position of exile as an “in-between” in many senses, I will argue: he operates inbetween universal certainty and total skepticism in regard to truth, in-between tyranny and anarchy in regard to resisting power, and in-between prophecy and silence in regard to his or her relationship to “the public.” Said’s exile also shares other characteristics with Foucault’s intellectual. For example, Said argues that due to the “restless” condition of the intellectual exile “[e]xile for the intellectual... is restlessness, movement, constantly being unsettled, and unsettling others” (Said 1994, 53) s/he may tend towards a “fragmentary” writing style. Said lists Theodor Adorno among the several examples he gives to illustrate this point. He argues that Adorno’s writing style “is fragmentary first of all, discontinuous; there is no plot or predetermined order to follow,” and that this “represents the intellectual’s consciousness as unable to be at rest anywhere” (1994, 57). Foucault, too, claims that his work is “fragmentary.” In a discussion of some of his “genealogical” analyses, for example, he describes such researches as disconnected, as going nowhere: [T]hey have failed to develop into a continuous whole. They are fragmentary researches, none of which in the last analysis can be said to have proved definitive, nor even to have led anywhere. None of it does any more than mark time. Repetitive and disconnected, it advances nowhere. ... It is tangled up into an indecipherable, disorganised muddle. In a nutshell, it is inconclusive. (Foucault 1980 h, 78) I make no claims here to the similarities or dissimilarities between the work of Adorno and Foucault; I merely point out that the “fragmentary” writing that Said attributes to the intellectual as exile seems to be a useful diagnosis of Foucault’s texts. Foucault’s is a different kind of fragmentation, surely, than that found in Adorno’s Minima Moralia or Nietzsche’s aphorisms, but it is disconnected and inconclusive nonetheless. This is partly due to Foucault’s skepticism with regard to notions of “universality,” “unity,” and “totality.” It may also be due to a willing flexibility on Foucault’s part, a willingness to admit that he is not sure where he’s going because things may change along the way. He is quite ready to be transformed by his own work, viewing this process of transformation of himself and others as a crucial aspect of his intellectual function (Foucault 1996 f, 379). His work may be fragmentary, therefore, because he isn’t sure where it is going, if anywhere: I wouldn’t want what I may have said or written to be seen as laying any claims to totality. I don’t try to universalize what I say .... My work takes place between unfinished abutments and lines of dots. I like to open up a space of research, try it out, and then if it doesn’t work, try again somewhere else. On many points ... lam still working and don’t yet know whether I am going to get anywhere. What I say ought to be taken as “propositions,” “game openings” where those who may be interested are invited to join in ... . (Foucault 1996 i, 275) This passage also suggests another reason why Foucault’s work is not unified, namely that he wants to make only “propositions” that others can take or leave if they like. This would mean that he leaves others free to decide what, if anything, to do with his work. Accordingly, Foucault is willing to have his claims questioned and overturned: “[these “propositions’] are not meant as dogmatic assertions that have to be taken or left en bloc” (1996 i 275). 8 Said’s diagnosis of the intellectual as a “restless” exile can explain the fragmentation exhibited in Foucault’s texts. Perhaps Foucault’s work is disconnected because he is “unable to be at rest anywhere.” Specifically, Foucault (and the Foucauldian intellectual) may be “unsettled” because of his position “inbetween.” Being an intellectual exile who is inside the structures he also distances himself from, Foucault ends up in an unsettled position where escape is something continually yearned for yet impossible. This can lead to a kind of continual movement between distance and proximity, allegiance and defection. Uniting one’s work into a “totality” under these conditions would be difficult even if it were desired. 9 Said also argues that the intellectual as exile has a kind of “double perspective,” since s/he “sees things both in terms of what has been left behind and what is actual here and now” (Said 1994, 60). The intellectual in self-exile has the advantage of stepping back from the dominant view, which s/he has left behind, allowing him or her to see things from the perspective of both that view as well as the “distanced” one. This double perspective allows the intellectual a “wider picture” than those who are stuck in the particularity of a single set of circumstances, conditions, beliefs and values. 10 But the double perspective also allows the intellectual a further advantage: “you tend to see things not simply as they are, but as they have come to be that way” (1994, 60). 11 What Said calls the double perspective of the exile describes the double purpose of Foucault’s genealogies: description and diagnosis. Foucault’s description of the genealogical project closely resembles Said’s discussion of the intellectual exile’s approach to the present: Look at situations as contingent, not as inevitable, look at them as the result of a series of historical choices made by men and women, as facts of society made by human beings, and not as natural or god-given, therefore unchangeable, permanent, irreversible. (Said 1994, 60-61) It is not surprising that the intellectual would take this approach, since as one moves away from the dominant views, values, and institutions of a society one can much more easily view them as malleable rather than absolute and permanent. This view of the present as the result of contingent historical processes sounds much like the description Foucault gives of genealogy in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” (Foucault 1977 b), where notions of permanency or naturality are dispersed and historical processes of human activity are emphasized. 12 Further, Foucault questions notions of continuous, teleological historical development or “progress” indicating that the present is “contingent” not just in the sense of being historically developed, but also in the sense that it is not even the result of a linear, continuous, progressive development. Citing Nietzsche, Foucault explains that for the genealogist, history takes countless random turns and works haphazardly through misstep and error: The forces operating in history are not controlled by destiny or regulative mechanisms, but respond to haphazard conflicts. They do not manifest the successive forms of a primordial intention . . . they always appear through the singular randomness of events. (Foucault 1977 b, 154-155) Foucault, and the Foucauldian intellectual as genealogist, question the present and look to the past to do so, showing that what may seem permanent or even the result of an evolutionary “progress” from a “primordial intention” is instead handed down to us from random accident and error. Like Said’s exile, the Foucauldian genealogist sees things “not simply as they are, but as they have come to be that way”; and in so doing stands back from the dominant view in a state of self-exile. Finally, Said notes that while the exile position of the intellectual can be difficult since it means that “you are always going to be marginal,” it can still hold a certain number of benefits (Said 1994, 62). Specifically, it offers the intellectual a considerable degree of freedom: If you can experience that fate [of exile] not as a deprivation and as something to be bewailed, but as a sort of freedom, a process of discovery in which you do things according to your own pattern, as various interests seize your attention, and as the particular goal you set yourself dictates: that is a unique pleasure. (1994, 62) The exile, remaining on the margins, is able to experience an important freedom as a result of this condition. Said explains that the intellectual as exile can be liberated from typical career paths and their usual goals, and can therefore work with more freedom to choose projects and aims, and change them at will. In addition, the intellectual as exile can distance him-/herself from dominant values and practices, and can therefore “see things that are usually lost on minds that have never traveled beyond the conventional and the comfortable” (1994, 63). This intellectual, Said concludes, is therefore often more focused on the “provisional and risky,” on “innovation and experiment” than on the “habitual,” the “authoritatively given status quo” (1994, 64). Foucault admits his work is constantly changing, indicating a freedom on his part to pursue whatever projects he feels important, a freedom to transform himself through his work, to experiment with some things and move on to others if necessary. Indeed, Foucault insists that he wants to alter his own thinking through his work: “When I write, Ido it above all to change myself and not to think the same thing as before” (Foucault 1991 b, 27). Like Said’s intellectual as exile, then, Foucault’s work has “the audacity of daring,” it looks to “change, to moving on, not standing still” (Said 1994, 64). But Foucault takes this emphasis on freedom one step further, arguing that part of the intellectual’s political role is to promote a freedom for others to enjoy as well. The Foucauldian intellectual knows the pleasures of the freedom that can be gained on the margins, but s/he doesn’t keep these to him/herself. The genealogical work of the Foucauldian intellectual is aimed, in part, at inducing a transformation in its audience that can promote a certain kind of freedom, a new way of thinking as a result having taken a different view of the “comfortable and the conventional,” as Said puts it. The exile, as described by Said, is a figure in a “median” position, one who has left one place for another without completely severing ties. In the case of the intellectual, one’s exile can be from some of the dominant discourses and practices of the society in which one lives so that the “homeland” one has “left” in a sense is the one in which one still resides, and the “new” territory is that of one’s dissent against certain aspects of this homeland. Not all intellectuals, of course, take up such a position of exile. Said suggests that it is a model that ought to be seriously considered by those intellectuals who may lean towards accommodation: 13 Exile is a model for the intellectual who is tempted, and even beset and overwhelmed, by the rewards of accommodation, yea-saying, settling in. Even if one is not an actual immigrant or expatriate, it is still possible to think as one, to imagine and investigate in spite of barriers, and always to move away from the centralizing authorities towards the margins, where you see things that are usually lost on minds that have never traveled beyond the conventional and the comfortable. (Said 1994, 63) While Foucault may not have been “tempted ... by the rewards of accommodation,” he can indeed be said to have taken up a position of an intellectual exile that is similar in many ways to the one Said describes. Exile from truth, power, and subjectivity I argue that Foucault exiles himself from several aspects of the regime of truth in his political role as an intellectual, especially in regard to truth, power, and subjectivity. Further, considering his work in these areas in the context of his political role as an intellectual exile helps to resolve a number of important criticisms of Foucault brought by commentators. First, Foucault engages in self-exile from the view of truth that is currently dominant, namely the emphasis on universal, absolute truth. He does not reject such truths entirely, but works to question them from within. One way he does this is to question some claims to universal truth on the basis of others, recognizing all the while that those he keeps constant can themselves be subject to question. In addition, Foucault works to unsettle universal truths by subjecting them to genealogical analysis; and through the particular rhetorical strategy he utilizes in his genealogies he manages to bring about this unsettling through appeal to these truths themselves. In that sense, we can say that Foucault exiles himself from the dominant, universal truths of the present without moving outside of them entirely. Viewing Foucault’s relationship to truth as that of exile undermines the charges of relativism and nihilism that have been levied in regard to his view of truth. For example, Charles Taylor argues that Foucault espouses a “monolithic relativism” due to an attempt to take on the “outsider’s perspective” on truth claims as they change throughout history (Taylor 1986, 98). In other words, according to Taylor Foucault tries to view all claims to truth from the outside, viewing each as equal in legitimacy to the others, and accepting none himself. In so doing, Taylor argues, Foucault expresses a nihilist position by trying to avoid claims to truth altogether. It is certainly the case that Foucault works to question and undermine some of our most cherished “universal” truths; but Taylor and others who put forth similar criticisms seem to miss the ways in which Foucault is still tied to the current regime of truth and works through dominant truth claims in order to encourage their transformation. By focusing on Foucault’s political role as an intellectual exile, we can recognize that he distances himself from dominant truth claims while yet utilizing them strategically. Foucault also operates as an intellectual exile in regard to power. He encourages a resistance to power relations that works to transform them from within, rather than negating or opposing them from without. He argues that relations of power are everywhere, but that this doesn’t mean we are always oppressed. He points out that the limits placed on us by power can be both enabling and constraining, that they give shape and meaning to our discourses and practices, but that they can become too constraining and oppressive at times. The point of resistance, then, is not to escape from power altogether, to reach a state of pure freedom from all power relations. Foucault advocates for freedom as a practice, a practice of resistance against the limits we experience in relations of power. This practice involves resisting particular, specific power relations from within, taking up possibilities for action that these relations open out but that can work to enact change. The practice of freedom allows for an escape from particular relations of power without exiting them completely. 14 We can use this interpretation of Foucault’s view of power and resistance to counter complaints that Foucault occupies one or both extremes of recommending a resistance aimed at anarchy or one that is ineffectual because it can never manage a clean break from power. Michael Walzer, for example, argues that Foucault expresses an anarchism by advocating that we “abolish power systems” and the “moral and scientific categories” that are produced by them: “away with them all!” (Walzer 1986, 61). I argue that Foucault not only insists that such a total eradication of power systems is impossible, he also indicates that it would not be beneficial even if it were possible. For Foucault, power relations are productive and enabling as well as repressive and constraining - they provide limits and boundaries that are necessary for the categorizations and conceptualizations we need to give shape and meaning to our experience. Thus to do away with relations of power entirely would be to advocate a kind of conceptual (as well as, perhaps, social and political) anarchy. Walzer is right to point out that Foucault criticizes many aspects of the current “power system,” which he characterizes as “disciplinary” and “normalizing”; but this is not to say he attempts to do away with it altogether. I argue that Foucault works from within the current system of power in order to encourage efforts at resistance that do not aim for its complete overthrow from the outside, nor a total rejection of power altogether. Instead, effective resistance undertakes to produce change from a position of exile, where particular aspects of the current system of power are questioned and transformed without moving beyond or outside of them. Those who resist specific relations of power take up a position “in-between” operating fully within and in support of those relations, and fully without and in a negative opposition. This means also that resistance is not, at the other extreme, ineffectual since it does not function outside of power. I argue that it is not necessary for resistance to operate completely beyond power in order to be effective in transforming it. Indeed, I contend that attempting resistance from a position fully outside of and in opposition to the relations of power being resisted is likely to work mainly to uphold and perpetuate those relations. I show that it is possible to practice a freedom through the exiled resistance Foucault describes that offers an important potential for changing relations of power in concrete and valuable ways. Foucault also attempts to distance himself from his own use of power as an intellectual. I argue that Foucault seemed very concerned about the power relations that exist between intellectuals and their non-intellectual audiences, a concern that manifested itself (among other ways) in his insistence that the intellectual not tell others what they ought to do. Foucault criticizes the intellectual who takes a “prophetic stance . . ~ the one of saying to people: here is what you must do and also: this is good and this is not” (Foucault 1996 b , 262). He argues that he himself works to simply point out problems and possible paths for strategic action, but does not “force or compel anyone to attack” (1996 b 262). He thereby leaves others free to decide whether or not they would like to do something about the problems he raises. I argue, however, that Foucault does not completely avoid the use of intellectual power in this way, despite his comments to the contrary. He does at times offer alternative ways of thinking and possible solutions to problems; and if he thereby still manages not to compel anyone to do anything, this may be because he is distancing himself from these suggestions. In other words, he may offer them while still managing to bring his audience to question them, to think about them critically and about his own role as an intellectual with the power to “prophesy.” 15 This interpretation of Foucault’s relationship to his own intellectual power and authority helps to resolve the difficulties raised when critics realize that while Foucault claims he refuses to act as a prophet, he still ends up doing so at times. Foucault notes this response himself: “My books don’t tell people what to do. And they often reproach me for not doing so ... and at the same time they reproach me for behaving like a prophet” (Foucault 1996 f, 380). Judith Butler (1990, 93-106) and Peter Dews (1987, 161-170), among others, argue that in the first volume of The History of Sexuality Foucault offers a “solution” to how we ought think about sex and sexuality by suggesting we focus on “the claims of bodies, pleasures, and knowledges, in their multiplicity and their possibility of resistance” (Foucault 1990 a, 157). In this text Foucault questions the view of sex and sexuality that makes of these natural, irreducible aspects of the self untouched by social or discursive effects of power, and that emphasizes the idea of a singular, “normal” sexuality to which all ought to conform. He then seems to offer, near the end of this discussion, an alternative way to think about sexuality that would emphasize its social production and thereby reveal how the possibility of producing multiple sexualities, multiple pleasures to which we may appeal in resisting the notion of a natural sexual norm. 16 Butler and Dews criticize Foucault for not problematizing or questioning the seemingly “universal” solution he thus offers, one that makes appeal to something like a “natural” body as an absolute, prediscursive category. I agree that Foucault’s proposed solution does have this character, but I argue that he puts it forth while also distancing himself from it by performing a genealogy of the very category of the “natural” body to which it appeals. I explain that as part of his role as an intellectual, Foucault may have made this suggestion for a pragmatic, strategic purpose, namely that it offers a ground for resistance to the relations of power that impose the notion of a sexual norm. The appeal to “bodies and pleasures” in their “multiplicity” may be a comprehensible and attractive alternative to those readers who are looking for some way to rethink our usual view of sexuality -- perhaps we could focus on the multiplicity of the body and its pleasures rather than arguing for the unity of the “true self’ and the “proper” pleasures. But Foucault does not offer this suggestion without also encouraging his readers to question it, as the careful reader will recognize that even the “multiple” body appeals to categories of “natural” sexual desires and pleasures that Foucault has questioned through his genealogical analysis. Foucault both offers an alternative in this case and also distances himself from it, potentially encouraging others to use the alternative for whatever benefits it may provide while also noting that it, too, can and should be questioned and perhaps replaced later. In so doing, Foucault acts as a “prophet in exile,” saying what must be done while also exiling himself from this prescription and encouraging others to do the same. 17 Finally, Foucault exhibits movements of exile in regard to his views of subjectivity, or the individual’s relation to and conception of itself. He contends that subjectivity is a product of relations of power, and can be created differently as these relations change. According to Foucault, the current regime of truth with its “disciplinary” and “normalizing” relations of power produces a subjectivity focused on discovering and conforming to a “truth” within, a “true self’ as a singular, natural and unavoidable conception of what one “really is.” This kind of subject believes there is a single answer as to who and what s/he is, one that may be hidden from plain view and that s/he must work to find (perhaps with the help of others, such as doctors, psychologists, teachers, religious leaders, etc.). The modern system of power individualizes us in our “truth” and ties us to this “truth” such that “what we are” seems natural and unavoidable. Foucault encourages the resistance of this “government of individualization,” suggesting that we “refuse what we are” and rather “imagine and build up what we could be” (Foucault 1983 b, 216). In his later writings, Foucault seems to offer what he calls the “arts of existence” as one way to do this. Focusing on how the ancient Greeks created their lives and selves aesthetically in regulating their sexual behavior according to moral standards, Foucault shows that it is possible to think of the self as something that can be created as a work of art. Yet this aesthetic self-creation is not a process of complete and utter freedom from limits, where we can “imagine and build up what we could be” in any way whatsoever. Foucault makes it clear that amongst the Greeks the “arts of existence” involved engaging in practices and using models that “are nevertheless not. . . invented by the individual himself’; rather, the individual takes on “models that he finds in his culture and that are proposed, suggested, imposed upon him by his culture” (Foucault 1996 e, 441). In other words, creating oneself as a work of art takes place from within the limits placed on one in the system of power within which one lives. I argue that a modern version of the “arts of existence” might develop through a process of exiling oneself from such limits. I argue for the possibility of an “aesthetic subject” who operates within the current system of power and the limits it imposes, but who recognizes that these limits are contingent and can be changed. In other words, rather than allowing him/herself to be defined “in truth” by relations of power, s/he realizes that the “truths” of the self are contingently produced and therefore malleable. The aesthetic subject creates him/herself as a work of art by taking on the models provided by the current regime of truth as contingent rather than absolute, as identities that can be assumed and then later transformed. This subject exiles him/herself from the identities and truths produced by the current system of “disciplinary” power, utilizing them with a critical distance by realizing they are not necessary and absolute. This view of aesthetic subjectivity, as well as Foucault’s political role as an intellectual exile, helps to resolve the question of agency that is sometimes brought in to criticize Foucault’s work on subjectivity. If subjectivity is a product of power if there is no “essential self’ to which power addresses itself and which can form the basis for resistance to power, then in what sense can we be said to have the capacity for agency required for the resistance Foucault suggests? Linda Alcoff criticizes Foucault and other post-structuralists for ruling out the agency of the subject: “In their defense of a total construction of the subject, post-structuralists deny the subject’s ability to reflect on the social discourse and challenge its determinations” (Alcoff 1988, 417). My response to the problem of agency in Foucault’s work has two prongs. First, I argue that the view of the aesthetic subject as an exile allows us to say s/he can still manage to “reflect on the social discourse and challenge its determinations” -- s/he can still manage to engage in resistance to particular relations of power and to the ways in which his/her identity is produced by them. This is because though the aesthetic subject is produced by relations of power, those relations are multiple and heterogeneous, resulting in what Jana Sawicki calls a “fragmented and dynamic” identity (Sawicki 1991, 41). The “fragmented” aesthetic subject might therefore be able to resist some aspects of him/herself on the basis of others that have also been produced by power, but that are nevertheless heterogeneous and therefore form a basis for resistance. This can be described as a movement of exile, as the aesthetic subject is thereby distancing him/herself from the self without attempting to exit his/her power-produced identity altogether. This may not, however, involve the kind of utterly “free choice” that may be meant when “agency” is called for, as the aesthetic subject’s choice of which aspects of the self to resist (and why s/he chooses to do so) may be strongly influenced by the way s/he has been created by power. But here the second prong of my response comes into play: I argue that if we take seriously Foucault’s political role as an intellectual exile, we can see that perhaps all he meant to do was to bring his audience to question their traditional view of agency while still utilizing it. We may be able to consider ourselves “free, autonomous” agents for the purpose of inspiring the creation of the self as a work of art; but Foucault also points out to us through his genealogy (in Discipline and Punish) of the “individual” as produced by “disciplinary power” that there is reason to question this view of agency and to try to think it in new ways. If Foucault does not resolve the question of agency, this may have much more to do with the role he plays as an intellectual than with mistakes or omissions in his work. I explain why and how this might be the case in Chapter Five. We can also say that Foucault tried to manage an exile from his own selfidentity. He often warned against trying to find a general coherence to what he wrote and a unitary identity that could be attributed to him on the basis of it. I have already noted that Foucault explicitly proclaims his work to be “fragmentary,” “diffused,” “inconclusive,” “an indecipherable, disorganized muddle” (Foucault 1980 h, 78). He claims that he “doesn’t try to universalize” what he says, that he is constantly experimenting with different fields and methods of research and moving on to new ones without coming to any clear conclusions: “My work takes place between unfinished abutments and lines of dots” (Foucault 1996 i, 275). This is in part the result of his own continual processes of self-transformation. Foucault insists that he writes so as to transform himself “and not to think the same thing as before” (Foucault 1991 b, 27). He claims to have learned from Nietzsche, Blanchot, and Bataille the possibility of having a “limit experience” that has “the task of ‘tearing’ the subject from itself,” and he conceives of his books as “direct experiences to ‘tear’ me from myself, prevent me from always being the same” (Foucault 1991 b, 31, 32). Foucault likens this process of self-transformation, of “tearing” oneself from the self, to “aestheticism”: This transformation of one’s self by one’s own knowledge is, I think, something rather close to the aesthetic experience. Why should a painter work if he is not transformed by his own painting? (Foucault 1996 f, 379) Foucault claims to be continually changing himself, creating himself as a work of art through the process of his research and writing. And yet, in so doing he does not completely reject the idea of his own self-identity, does not try to be nothing and no-one at all. Instead, he exiles himself from his self-identity, taking on identities but distancing himself from them by recognizing their contingency and his own ability to change them. Foucault sometimes indicates that he wants to have no identity whatsoever “I am no doubt not the only one who writes in order to have no face. Do not ask who I am and do not ask me to remain the same” (Foucault 1972 a, 17) 18 yet he continually speaks in interviews about what he is interested in, what he is trying to do, what themes unify his work (Foucault 1980 f, 53; 1991 b, 145; 1996 d, 215; 1996 e, 432; 1996 c, 456; 1997 f, 147-152). He is continually telling us who he is and what he is trying to say, though these statements do often reflect a shifting identity and different concerns. Rather than saying Foucault is attempting to reject any identity for himself, then, we could say that he is quite willing to take on various identities as long as none of them are said to give him a permanent and unitary “true self.” He engages in a process of selfexile as an “aesthetic subject,” one who transforms himself continually as a “work in progress,” without rejecting entirely the identity he works to transform. He changes some aspects of himself on the basis of keeping others constant, distancing himself from the self while yet remaining tied to it. Accordingly, one might ask whether the present inquiry into “Foucault’s view” of the intellectual’s political role is a legitimate one. In presenting a diagnosis of Foucault’s political intellectual, am I not attributing to him a stable, unified “view”of the intellectual’s political role that he would have rejected, due to its seeming permanence? Cognizant of this danger, and of Foucault’s own continued self-transformation, I offer this diagnosis as appealing to one of the “identities” that Foucault may have or could have taken on. In other words, I do not argue that the intellectual political role of “exile” I attribute to Foucault reflects the one, correct interpretation of his view of his own work and of the political role of intellectuals in general. Rather, I suggest that the exi/e is a model for the intellectual that can be gleaned from Foucault’s genealogical texts and his direct statements in interviews about the political role of the intellectual; it is the product of a “reading” of these texts and interviews that may not necessarily reflect “the truth” about “Foucault’s view,” but that, I argue, fits the spirit of what he seemed to be trying to say and do. I do not claim that the intellectual exile as I describe him/her is a figure that Foucault consciously took on or prescribed to others, but rather that it is possible to locate this model in his texts and interviews as one he could have assumed. It is an identity that he might have taken on, rather than one that gives him a permanent, “true” self. He might have played the role of an intellectual exile at some points of his life and not others, changing the way he viewed himself as an intellectual. I focus on the figure of the intellectual exile that I find in Foucault because I think it offers an intriguing and importantly valuable way for intellectuals within the current regime of truth to operate so as to encourage others to think differently and more independently, to change the still-prevalent view of the intellectual as one who is supposed to possess universal truths and pass these down to others. For those intellectuals who believe that Foucault’s stated goal of pointing out problems so as to open a space for others to engage in resistance and transformation of the relations of power they find oppressive, the model of the intellectual exile provides a promising way to approach this goal. I agree with Edward Said that the political role of the modem intellectual is best thought of as being a “spirit in opposition”: [S]omeone whose place it is to raise embarrassing questions, to confront orthodoxy and dogma (rather than to produce them), to be someone who cannot easily be co-opted by governments or corporations, and whose raison d’etre is to represent all those people and issues that are routinely forgotten or swept under the rug. (Said 1994, 11) Intellectuals can be in a good position to “raise embarrassing questions,” to represent what is often forgotten or hidden, for several reasons. First, because of their research, they may have access to information that leads them to question “orthodoxy and dogma,” to raise questions that are not often asked by those who spend their lives operating within the current system out of either ignorance or a basic need to survive, giving them little time or incentive to question it. Intellectuals can often have the privilege of distancing themselves from the current system of power and knowledge in order to assess it critically, a privilege many others cannot afford. In addition, their position within society may allow them to “raise embarrassing questions” and to offer scathing criticisms without consequences as dire as might befall others who engage in such critique of the present. The intellectual who is an academic may have been granted tenure, which can afford him/her the luxury of a freedom of thought and speech without the degree of reprisals that threaten many of those who can easily and quickly lose their jobs, social status, etc. Certainly, there can be and is backlash against academic intellectuals, sometimes leading to the loss of their jobs; but it must be admitted that their position is relatively more protected than that of those who have no “tenure” in their careers or social status. The relative freedom enjoyed by the academic intellectual is perhaps magnified in the intellectual who is not attached to an academic institution and does not hope to be so, and who may therefore have little to lose in speaking out. These figures seem in a good position to express opposition, to shake up the status quo, to incite resistance. Yet I also agree with Foucault that intellectuals (especially those affiliated with academic institutions) can operate in the service of the current system of truth and power, by framing their views and their criticisms as instances of universal truth. I agree that opposing “orthodoxy and dogma” as universal, timeless truths with other “universal truths” on the opposite side can be “provisionally useful to change the scenery from time to time” (Foucault 1996 d, 221-222); but it can also work to uphold the status quo in its fundamental forms while only changing its direction a bit. A more profound and lasting change may require that intellectuals try to transform the game of truth and power within which they act as “prophets” of universal truth. Changing the intellectual role of “universal prophet,” however, requires not simply rejecting it altogether - for then one simply becomes a “prophet” on the “other side,” universally negating universal truth and the role of the intellectual as its spokesperson. Instead, the intellectual who hopes to transform his/her role as a “prophet” of universal truth must play such a role as an exile, inhabiting it while also distancing him/herself from it. The model of the intellectual exile I find in the work of Foucault provides one way to accomplish this task. Still, this is a task only for now, within the current regime of truth where intellectuals, if they are to eventually escape being “prophets,” must do so through exiling themselves from this role rather than trying to move outside of it entirely. I do not suggest the role of the intellectual exile as a kind of universal prescription for all intellectuals now and future. To a certain extent, I do not even suggest it for all intellectuals under the current regime of truth. Some intellectuals may be inclined to argue that they need not be much concerned with their political role because their work does not clearly have political effects. This attitude may be especially present in philosophy, as it is a common theme in Western philosophy, at least, that the philosopher operates within the lofty and godlike realm of “the truth,” far above merely human, socio-political concerns. The philosopher’s job is often thought to be to abstract from the particulars of the practical and political and locate the more general, universal truths that lie behind them. Working near the exalted realm of Plato’s Forms, or with Aristotle’s theoretical rather than practical wisdom, the philosopher may think his/her work to have only remote, indirect impact on the lower region of the political, if any impact at all. I submit, however, that insofar as one’s intellectual work reaches “the public,” (including students) and makes claims to universal truth, Foucault’s work on truth and power shows that it might indeed have political effects. According to Foucault, even the most abstract studies of metaphysics could have political ramifications: if they purport to reveal universal truths they can work to uphold the relations and institutions of power that function to produce and perpetuate such truths. I believe all intellectuals ought at least to consider the possibility that much of their work may have political effects in this and perhaps other ways, to work to determine the nature and extent of such effects, and, if they conclude that the political effects of their work are substantial, to decide what kind of political role they want to take up as a result. For those intellectuals who decide they must take seriously their political role, and who conclude that their role is best played as a “spirit in opposition,” the intellectual exile that can be found in the work of Foucault provides a valuable model for such a political role. 19 Within it, the intellectual can encourage others to question their usual ways of thinking and take a critical look at the relations of power within which they live and the truths produced by them, resisting if necessary through their own methods and with their own goals. In addition, the intellectual exile can bring others to question his/her own role as an intellectual “prophet,” as one who possesses universal truths. S/he can begin to reduce what Foucault calls the “call to prophetism” and to encourage the development of multiple, new ways of thinking amongst “the public” (Foucault 1996 f, 380). A disputed category So far I have been using the term “intellectual” as if its meaning were clear and uncontested. It is not, and I have not yet specified the scope of this term as I shall use it in speaking of the political role of intellectuals. Sunil Khilnani asserts that “(t]here are no uncontentious criteria for what it is to be an intellectual: a term that is at once appraisive and descriptive, and a classic instance of a fundamentally disputed category” (Khilnani 1993, 11). When we state who falls within the category of “intellectuals,” we are both describing and creating a specific group of individuals. Stephen Leonard argues further that in doing so we are making a political statement. According to Leonard, different “ways of seeing intellectuals” are reflected in various definitions of the term, and such definitions “should be understood as political statements, crafted in response to a constellation of development in which the identity of the intellectual has become a matter of ongoing social concern” (Leonard 1996, 18). In other words, different meanings have been attributed to the term “intellectuals” and the social role ascribed to those who fall within its scope, according to various social and political disputes over the “persons, practices, and self-understandings presupposed in the use of . . . the concept of the intellectual” (1996, 18). To even define the term and who it is to cover, according to Leonard, is to make a political statement about the relationship between “the life of the mind and the life of action,” “the relationship of intellectual activity and political life” (1996, 19, 3). Leonard provides a genealogy of the different ways in which intellectuals have been seen and defined, beginning with the ancient Greeks, and shows how differing views on the proper relationship between intellectual and political activity affect who is considered an “intellectual” (whether or not that term was explicitly used, since it was not common until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries) and what that concept means. Foucault belongs in the later stages of this genealogy (though Leonard doesn’t mention him), offering a way of seeing intellectuals that reflects his own view of how intellectual and political activity ought to be related. For the purposes of this study, I follow Foucault’s conception of the intellectual and repeat his “political statement” thereby. Unfortunately, however, Foucault did not himself set out a clear definition or description of the individuals he calls “intellectuals.” To approach his view of who falls into this category, it is helpful to consider how the category itself developed in France so as to understand the context within which Foucault may have been using the term “intellectuals.” Several authors writing on the topic of intellectuals and politics note that the term “intellectuals” gained currency in France as a noun after the publication of the Manifeste des intellectuels in 1898 (Levy 1995, 55; Gagnon 1987, 5; Khilnani 1993, 11). This manifesto was written in support of the cause of Albert Dreyfus, a French, Jewish officer who had been accused of spying for the Germans. The “Dreyfus Affair,” as it came to be called, stirred up deep and divisive tensions in Paris at the time and, according to Bernard-Henri Levy, “created the ‘big bang’ from which the intellectual emerged” (Levy 1995, 9). By proclaiming his innocence, Dreyfus provoked those in France with anti-semitic proclivities, who interpreted his actions as “calling into question the authority of the judicial system and the French army,” and who acted as if “behind Dreyfus . . . there existed a dark conspiracy to sully the nation’s honour” (1995, 8). According to Levy, the “affair” prompted a group of artists, writers, poets and professors to react with outrage and take up the pro-Dreyfus cause. It was in this context that the “manifesto of the intellectuals” was written and published, with figures such as Bernard Lazare, Charles Peguy, Emile Zola, Lucien Herr, and Georges Clemenceau taking on the title of “intellectual” consciously and publicly. Levy states that previously, the term “intellectual” was used mainly as an adjective, and often a derogatory one: If a judgment was referred to as “intellectual”, it denoted woolliness and superficiality. When one spoke of an “intellectual tendency in a writer, it denoted a certain rigidity of mind as distinct from genuine thinking. Thus it was not until the Dreyfus Affair that a group of men and women took the adjective, transformed its meaning, and used it not merely as a noun but as a veritable title of distinction. “We are the intellectuals.” (Levy 1995, 55) “The Dreyfusards” were those who “dropped everything to move into the public arena and make themselves intermediaries between the concerns of the moment and the timeless values of truth, goodness, and right” (1995, 9). They “were a group; they formed a crowd” (1995, 55); and they did so self-consciously, purposefully joining together under the title they had annexed to themselves. Describing the use and meaning of the term “intellectuals” in France, Sunil Khilnani points out that the Dreyfus Affair gave this word “a political and intentional meaning,” so that it became used for the purpose of self-description, in order to “place those who so describe themselves in a particular relation to society” (Khilnani 1993, 12). Specifically, those who call themselves “intellectuals” are taking up a social role wherein they are, as Regis Debray puts it, “socially authorized to express individual opinions on public affairs independently of the normal civic procedures to which ordinary citizens are subject” (Khilnani 1993, 12). 20 In other words, intellectuals in France include those individuals who enjoy a particular kind of social position wherein they have “the authority to express their opinions on matters of common concern . . . publicly” and they can “expect to be listened to” (1993, 12). But it is not just any individual who can designate him/herself as part of this group, who can expect to be recognized as an intellectual and listened to. Khilnani argues that such recognition accrues not only to those with a certain degree of intelligence or who have attended the right schools (e.g., the Ecole Normale Superieure), but seems also to be tied to “experience of or participation in collective political activity,” especially on the Left (Khilnani 1993, 13). For example, those who participated in the French Resistance during the Second World War, those who supported the independence movements in Indo-China and Algeria, in the Leftist political efforts in France during 1968, etc., could, according to Khilnani, “count on being more or less automatically accorded a high status” (1993, 13). It is certainly legitimate to argue that Foucault’s use of the term “intellectuals” takes place within the context of the general conception of this category in France and its historical background. Following the Dreyfusards, we might say that “intellectuals” in France are those whose occupations lie for the most part outside the realm of politics and in what could be called the realm of “ideas” (artists, writers, philosophers, university professors), but who feel it is necessary to involve themselves in political questions nonetheless, to publicly “express their opinions on matters of common concern.” Further, they are those individuals who are recognized as having the social authority to make such proclamations, and are listened to by “the public.” “Intellectuals” seems thus a politically-charged term in France, one that denotes a group of people who do not simply operate in the airy isolation of the abstract and the theoretical, but who intervene in practical and political concerns. Foucault’s use of the term reflects this meaning: whenever he speaks of “intellectuals” in interviews, it is within the context of describing or prescribing their ethical and political impact. The Dreyfusards intervened in the political realm in the name of the “timeless values of truth, goodness and right” (Levy 1995, 9). Perhaps it is something like this historical circumstance and its influence on the role of intellectuals thereafter that lies behind Foucault’s notion of the “universal” intellectual one who “spoke and was acknowledged the right of speaking in the capacity of master of truth and justice” (Foucault 1980 g, 126). At times, Foucault speaks of intellectuals as those who fall into this category, as “agents” of the current “system of power” that supports and rewards the pursuit and dissemination of universal truths (Foucault 1977 b, 207). Along these lines, we might include in the group of “intellectuals” those individuals who publicly express opinions on political issues as the Dreyfusards did, in the name of universal truths and values, justice and right. This category might include those whose occupations involve developing and disseminating universal ideals, so that they are recognized to have a certain authority in appealing to them. According to Khilnani, this group of people would be restricted in France to those with a certain educational background, a certain recognized intelligence, and a certain kind of experience in (Leftist) collective political activity. Yet Foucault also argues that the “universal” intellectual is waning, and at times he suggests a different kind of intellectual intervention in the political realm, one that has to do with transformation of oneself and others: What can the ethics of an intellectual be --1 reclaim the term “intellectual” which, at the present moment, seems to nauseate some -- if not... to render oneself permanently capable of self-detachment (which is the opposite of the attitude of conversion?).... To be at the same time an academic and an intellectual is to try to engage in a type of knowledge and analysis that is taught and received in the university in a way so as to modify not only the thought of others but one’s own as well. (Foucault 1996 c, 461) Here Foucault deliberately uses the term “intellectual,” making tacit appeal to those individuals who intervene in the political realm; and he offers a different way of thinking about how they ought to do so than was prevalent amongst the “universal” intellectuals such as the Dreyfusards. No longer the “spokesman of the universal” (Foucault 1980 g, 126), the intellectual’s ethical and political dimension now involves, according to Foucault, the attempt to modify one’s own thought and that of others. In order for this to be possible, it is crucial that the intellectual be someone granted the social authority to publicly express his/her views and to be listened to - otherwise the hoped-for transformation in the thought of others is not likely to occur. We might say that those who fall under this category of “intellectuals” could be the same kinds of individuals who make up the category of the “universal” intellectuals, except that the latter would seem to be those who work with and express universal truths and ideals. Could this type of individual also act as the “transformative” intellectual Foucault describes/prescribes here? I argue that in a certain sense the answer is yes the intellectual who transforms his/her own thought and that of others is the intellectual exile, who plays the role of the “universal” intellectual while also distancing him/herself from it. In other words, the intellectual exile acts as if s/he is an “agent” of the current system of power, as if s/he is putting forth universal truths, and it is in this way that s/he is able to be recognized by those enmeshed in this system of power as someone with the authority to speak out and who ought to be listened to. The intellectual exile then uses this position of authority to elicit a change in the thought of others, bringing them to question their usual ways of thinking. What can we conclude regarding who falls into the category of “intellectuals” for Foucault? I have described the general outlines of this category: those whose occupations lie in something like the realm of “ideas” but who still feel it is their duty to intervene in the political realm, to express their opinions on political issues; those who are recognized as having the authority to do this by others and who are listened to by others; those who intervene in the political in the name of universal ideals or who play this role strategically, in order to bring others to transform their modes of thought; 21 in France, at least, those who are granted this authority in part by virtue of their educational and political background. For the purposes of this investigation into Foucault’s political intellectual, I include within the term “intellectuals” individuals who fit roughly within these outlines. I follow Erik Olin Wright, first of all, in restricting the term to “those whose occupations involve the elaboration and dissemination of ideas” (Wright 1978, 192); which means that “intellectuals” are those who work to develop and change ideas, not simply to transmit them. This would exclude, as Alain Gagnon points out, “most elementary and secondary school teachers, as well as many of the staff of technical colleges (including some university professors),” if they work mainly to transmit rather than to also create and transform ideas (Gagnon 1987, 6). This definition would include most university professors as well as those individuals who perform research in the realm of “ideas” without being affiliated with an academic institution. I construe the “realm of ‘ideas’” broadly, to include in the group of those who work there anyone whose main occupation involves conceptualizing and theorizing in addition to or instead of engaging in what seems closer to “practice” or action. For example, the scientist who develops theories and construes experiments to test them is an intellectual on this view; the laboratory technician who carries out the experiments is not (unless s/he is also involved in the development of the theory driving the experiments). The political scientist who develops models of demographic voting patterns that are used by candidates to shape their speeches is an intellectual; those who perform the surveys from which the models are developed are not, and neither are the candidates who use the models. There are, of course, gray areas for example, what about the politician or bureaucrat who is also involved in shaping ideas of justice, rights, etc.? In general, the intellectual as I use the term is someone who is chiefly occupied in the realm of “ideas,” whose work lies mainly in the “elaboration and dissemination of ideas.” The politician or bureaucrat in question may or may not fit this category. In addition, I focus on those individuals who take on the role of “the spokes [person] of the universal,” either seriously or strategically those who are taken to be expressing universal truths, whether they hold to these truths themselves or are simply using them in order to incite transformation in others. In the current system of truth and power, many or most of those who occupy the realm of “ideas” would also fall into this category according to Foucault. This is because the current regime of truth emphasizes and rewards the production of “ideas” with universal force. The political philosopher who speaks of “justice” and “rights” is understood to be elaborating the one, true and absolute conception of such terms. Finally, the group of “intellectuals” to whom I refer here are mainly those who already feel the need to intervene in the political realm, who do not isolate themselves in the lofty heights of their “ideas” but rather venture into the more practical, socioeconomic and political concerns of “the public.” They are those who combine their intellectual work with more traditional “political activity” (such as participating in protests, in political interest groups, helping political campaigns, etc.), and who are concerned about the political impact of their ideas, in their substance and in the way they are disseminated. This group, then, would not immediately include all who may sometimes be thought “intellectuals,” such as university professors in general. Those who have little to no concern about the political impact of their work or who do not participate in political activities would not fall into the category of “intellectuals,” according to my usage of the term from its French historical background. Still, taking Stephen Leonard’s claims seriously, I am making a political statement by defining intellectuals in this way, stating how I think (following Foucault to a substantial degree) the relationship between the life of the mind and the life of action ought to be structured. By conferring the label “intellectual” on the individuals described here, I am ascribing them a certain social status that reveals how I think others who are similarly situated ought to act in regard to the political realm. Thus my definition of “intellectuals” indicates that those who elaborate and disseminate ideas, but who remain relatively isolated there, ought to be more politically concerned and active. Engaging in intellectual exile is one way to do this. I proceed with a diagnosis of Foucault’s political intellectual as follows. In Chapter One I explain Foucault’s distinction between “universal” and “specific” intellectuals, and I introduce and motivate the notion of exile that characterizes the Foucauldian intellectual. Chapter Two is dedicated to elaborating the system of truth and power that, according to Foucault, the intellectual is to address as a political problem. I also discuss Foucault’s own movements of exile in relation to truth and power, and answer critics who argue that Foucault is a nihilist and/or an anarchist. In Chapter Three I explain in detail the exile character of the Foucauldian intellectual, and how Foucault’s rhetorical strategy in his genealogies seems directed towards transforming the thought of his audience. I conclude this chapter with a diagnosis of some of the benefits and drawbacks of this intellectual role. In Chapters Four and Five I address the potential result of the political role of the intellectual exile, the freedom that Foucault indicates the intellectual can promote. Chapter Four focuses on the notion of practicing of freedom through resistance to power, and Chapter Five focuses on the notion of creating the self as a work of art the manifestation of both of these appears to be a goal of intellectual political activity. I also consider and resolve a number of problems with Foucault’s conceptions of power, resistance, freedom, and agency in these final two chapters. I conclude with a statement of the value I find in the role of the intellectual exile, and the problems that must yet be resolved in the formulation of this model of the political intellectual. 1 Whether or not they are concerned about it or even aware of it, it may be that the (even highly theoretical) work of intellectuals can have political impact, if only on a small audience. The theories and concepts formulated and expressed by intellectuals can help to shape the ways in which their students and colleagues, at least, approach ethical and political questions. This impact may eventually spread to others, perhaps eventually reaching a substantial segment of “the public.” I am therefore inclined to argue that all intellectuals ought to be concerned about the political effects of their work; but I do not undertake such an argument here, as my focus is mainly to investigate ways in which those intellectuals who already are concerned about their potential political impact can express this in their work. 2 The same can certainly be said of other areas of philosophy as well, since much of the discipline as a whole is unknown to “the public” and difficult for the layperson to understand. But the problem seems an especially pressing one in Continental Philosophy, which has a reputation within the discipline itself of being obscure to an extreme degree. Many attempt to distinguish Analytic philosophy in part by its clarity in comparison to Continental thought; and though one might dispute the clarity of the former from the point of view of the layperson, the fact that this claim is often made shows that Continental philosophers may form even more of an “insular society” than (at least some) others within the discipline. I was surprised and disappointed by this reaction; I’d thought that there were things in my work that should have interested precisely those intellectuals who were most dedicated to the analysis of social and political 3 For example, in 1971 Foucault formed the Groupe d’lnformation sur les Prisons, an organization dedicated to investigating prison conditions in France through the voices of prisoners. James Miller describes this group, and its objectives and activities, in his biography of Foucault (Miller 1993, 185-193). Throughout his text Miller scatters descriptions of numerous other political efforts on Foucault’s part as well. 4 ln Chapter Three I explain in depth how Foucauldian genealogy may be able to bring about a transformation in its audience that can encourage political resistance to oppressive relations of power. Though my focus is on Foucault and how he attempted to effect such changes in his readers, I do not mean to argue that writing genealogy is the only way the politically concerned intellectual should operate. Intellectuals may wish to emulate Foucault’s example and undertake their own genealogies; but I will not argue that they must do so. s lf this strategy works, it may allow the readers of Foucauldian genealogy to focus less on looking for universal solutions (from a “universal” intellectual) to the social and political problems they face, and to turn more to themselves for ideas on how to engage in resistance and struggle in ways more tailored to their local and specific situation. For Foucault, such a change would prove more politically promising, as “global” and “universal” solutions emanating from an intellectual who is distanced from the specificity of a particular struggle are not likely to be as efficacious as those efforts designed at the more “local” level. 6 Actually, since the current regime of truth emphasizes universal truths, in order to operate from within this regime Foucault ends up acting as if he were moving outside of his historical perspective to offer truths from a universal view. I argue that this is a strategic move that Foucault also works eventually to question, so that while he may play the role of a universal intellectual, he doesn’t remain fully within it in the sense of supporting and perpetuating it. 7 Actually, Said says a number of things in this series of lectures with which Foucault would likely not agree. For example, Said emphasizes the intellectual’s capacity for “universality,” which involves both going beyond the particularities of our own background and beliefs to recognize and address the “otherness” of others, as well as “looking for and trying to uphold a single standard for human behavior” in regard to things like government policy (Said 1994, xiv). Foucault may have little quarrel with trying to move away from our own insularity and working to approach the “other,” but it is doubtful that he would uphold an emphasis on something like a “single standard for human behavior.” This “universality” also plays a role in Said’s contention that the intellectual has a “representative” role to play: “The intellectual is an individual endowed with a faculty for representing, for embodying ... a message, a view, an attitude ... to, as well as for, a public. . . . [The] raison d’etre [of this intellectual role] is to represent all those people and issues that are routinely forgotten or swept under the rug. The intellectual does so on the basis of universal principles: that all human beings are entitled to expect decent standards of behavior concerning freedom and justice from worldly powers or nations . . .” (1994, 11). Again, Foucault would likely quarrel with Said on both the idea of “universal principles” and the “representative” function of the intellectual; though he may sympathize and agree with the goal of focusing on those people or issues who are routinely ignored. For his part, Said criticizes the kinds of claims Foucault might make, such as one quoted by Said from Lyotard: “‘grand narratives of emancipation and enlightenment’ ... are pronounced as no longer having any currency in the era of postmodernism” (1994, 18). Noting that postmodern intellectuals de-emphasize “universal values like truth and freedom,” Said insists that these values still have important roles to play in today’s society: “[f]or in fact governments still manifestly oppress people, grave miscarriages of justice still occur . . .” (1994, 18). Foucault would most certainly agree with the latter claims, but would likely reject the idea that the best way to approach such oppression and injustice is through an appeal to “universal principles.” He would insist that doing so will ultimately work to uphold the kinds of power mechanisms that one wishes to resist. Still, I argue in the following chapters that while Foucault explicitly criticizes “universal principles,” he still appeals to them in his role as an intellectual. I contend that Foucault does not leave behind entirely the role of a universal intellectual nor the universal truths and values such an intellectual pronounces; rather, he distances himself from these without making a clean break. Thus one could make a case that Foucault and Said may be closer than is immediately apparent as regards the question of the intellectual’s “representative” function and appeal to “universal principles.” This would require a more in-depth comparison of the views of Said and Foucault on the role of the intellectual than I will undertake here. Rather, I use Said’s notion of the intellectual as exile mainly to show that and how Foucault does not separate himself from the role of a universal intellectual to the degree that he himself claims to do. B There is, of course, another way to interpret the “muddled” character of Foucault’s work it may be that it “advances nowhere,” is “repetitive and disconnected” due to factors that do not reflect so positively on Foucault as a scholar or a writer (he may, for example, have needed to do more editing before publication of what may be considered drafts that are too rough). Perhaps I (following Said) am working too hard to put a sympathetic spin on what may simply be sloppy writing. Nevertheless, I think Said offers an interesting and valuable interpretation of the fragmentary writing styles of authors such as Adorno and Foucault by suggesting that they may result from a kind of intellectual exile. The “muddle” of Foucault’s work may be due to many factors, including those he himself cites in his explanations of it, his position as an intellectual exile, as well as a lack of polish. 9 Jon Simons notes that Foucault’s work exhibits a kind of oscillation between what he calls “lightness” and “heaviness.” He argues that Foucault seems to have two moods: an “oppositional” one, where he “[depicts] our present as totally constraining” and “induces despair by indicating that there is no way out of our subjection”; and an “affirmative” mood, where he emphasizes access to an “untrammeled freedom and an escape from all limitations” (Simons 1995, 3). According to Simons, Foucault moves back and forth between these two “heavy” (the present as “totally constraining”) and “light” (access to “untrammeled freedom and escape”) moods in his work, “riding the tension by adopting unstable positions between them” (1995, 3). Simons’ interpretation is intriguing, and he uses it throughout his book to help explain the oscillations Foucault seems to make between the extreme positions of saying that we are all doomed to continual subjection by power and that we can eventually reach a state of pure freedom from it. While Foucault rarely, if ever, goes as far as either of these two extremes, he does at times seem to move more in the direction of one than the other, then reversing this movement elsewhere. Simons does not, however, diagnose these oscillations as movements of an intellectual exile; and I think that doing so provides a helpful explanation of why and how Foucault ends up in the unstable position Simons describes. 10 It is probably unlikely that any individual is stuck in a single perspective throughout their life if nothing else, most will have the possibility of achieving the “double perspective” of seeing things in terms of beliefs and values they held when younger, and in terms of those they came to hold later. Thus the emphasis on the “double perspective” of the exile should be on seeing things both in terms of the dominant view and the dissenting, or “exiled” one. 11 It is not clear in Said’s text why the exile is more likely to take on this historical perspective why would it be that dissenting from dominant views would lead one to see the historical development of these views? One explanation could be that for those holding to the dominant view without dissent, this view may appear to be universally and timelessly true the “correct” way of looking at the world, not one that has been developed over time and may give way to a new “correct” view later. Also, if one does not consider the dominant view with a critical eye, one is less likely to have reason to think about the history of its development. 12 Still, Foucault would likely de-emphasize Said’s claim that the present is a result of “historical choices made by men and women,” since for Foucault what is even more important are the workings, the procedures, the mechanisms of a system of power. As I explain in Chapter Two, “power” is not a “thing” wielded by individual subjects it is not as if they are the ones in control, manipulating something called “power.” Instead, individuals and their subjectivity are themselves produced by power. Individual “choices” do play a role in historical processes, of course, but Foucault mainly emphasizes the system of power that he sometimes calls the “regime of truth.” 13 Said may be offering exile as a model only for those intellectuals who are consciously aware of their leanings towards accommodation, those who are on the border between wanting to dissent and feeling the pull of those rewards that accompany not doing so. He may be suggesting that they think and act as exiles because there are rewards there too - including the freedom already mentioned, and the chance to “see things that are usually lost on minds that have never traveled beyond the conventional and the comfortable” (in addition to representing people on the margins, “those people and issues that are routinely forgotten or swept under the rug” (Said 1994, 11)). Perhaps he is also hoping to engage those intellectuals who are not aware of their own accommodation, to bring them to recognize and rethink their own “yea-saying” and “settling in.” In any case, it is the accommodating intellectual that, for Said, ought to consider taking on the role of the intellectual as exile. 14 1 explain my usage of the terms “escape” and “exit” in detail in Chapter Two. By “exit” I mean a negation, an opposition, a moving “outside” the boundaries of what one is leaving; while an “escape” is a moving towards a space beyond, but only through that which one is leaving. I argue that attempting to exit relations of power through negation ultimately works by mirroring and thereby upholding and perpetuating those relations; and effective resistance to power must therefore proceed through a process of escape that does not involve pure negation or opposition. 15 0 f course, it may simply be that Foucault is not living up to his own prescriptions regarding intellectual prophecy. In what follows I consider the views of several commentators who point out discrepancies between what Foucault does and what he says he does; and I offer an alternative reading of Foucault’s work that shows he may be more consistent in practicing what he preaches than many commentators have allowed. I also want to make clear, however, that even if Foucault himself was not attempting to consciously play the role of a “prophet in exile” that I here describe, it is a role that those who share his concerns about the intellectual’s place in the regime of truth should consider taking up. 16 1 discuss this “solution,” and the criticisms of it by Butler and Dews, in some depth in Chapter Four. Here I mean mainly to provide an example that shows Foucault does at times offer positive, prescriptive alternatives or solutions to the problems he raises. 17 1 argue that this is the most effective way for Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual to engage in prophecy; but it is not always what Foucault did himself. For example, Foucault suggests in some of his later writings and interviews that perhaps we ought to change our view of subjectivity and focus on creating ourselves aesthetically rather than searching for the “true self’ within. This suggestion is not offered through a movement of exile in that Foucault does not unsettle it through a genealogical analysis of the aesthetic concepts and categories upon which it relies. He instead seems to “prophesy” outright in this case. 18 See also the interview entitled “The Masked Philosopher” (Foucault 1996 j), which Foucault gave anonymously and in which he argues for the virtues of anonymity. 19 1 think that the political role of the intellectual exile might fruitfully be prescribed for all intellectuals under the current regime of truth, but justifying this claim well would require an indepth argument regarding the current status of intellectuals in many different fields and the potential political ramifications of their work. Rather than embarking on such an argument, I focus in this study on the nature of the Foucauldian intellectual exile and its benefits and drawbacks, for the purpose of at least suggesting a model for those intellectuals who already do think their political role involves unsettling the status quo in the way both Said and Foucault describe. To argue that this role should be taken up more widely is a topic that could well warrant its own, separate investigation. Consider as a preliminary suggestion, however, that this role seems intuitively to make sense at least for those intellectuals who are also teachers. If an important part of teaching involves encouraging students to think for themselves, to engage in original, creative thought so as to learn how to solve problems without being guided every step of the way by the teacher, then the role of the intellectual exile seems especially suited to teachers (at least within the current system of truth and power). The intellectual exile acts as a “prophet,” as if s/he is handing down universal truths to others; but s/he also distances him/herself from these truths, encouraging her audience to question them as well as his/her own role as an authoritative truth-provider. This intellectual manages only to throw doubt upon dominant truths and values, to bring others to view them critically without rejecting them altogether. S/he does not then tell them what ought to be done, how they ought to think instead leaving them with a space to think of their own solutions and an inspiration and motivation to do so. Applying this kind of role to pedagogical issues and methods would, I think, yield some interesting results. Here I focus only on intellectual work in the form of written texts and public lectures and interviews. 20See Debray (1981, 32). 21 Foucault did not himself discuss directly this notion of playing the role of the universal intellectual strategically - he insisted, on the contrary, that he did not and would not act as a universal intellectual. I argue in the following chapters (especially Chapter Three), however, that we can nevertheless note in Foucault’s own comportment as an intellectual something like a strategic playing of this role that may work also to undermine it. I argue that this kind of exile from the role of the universal intellectual is more likely to promote the kinds of transformations Foucault offers as a goal for intellectual work than would the outright rejection of the universal intellectual role that he claims for himself. Chapter One A New Type of Intellectual I Universal and Specific Intellectuals One of Foucault’s most concise and detailed discussions of the political role of the intellectual can be found in an interview with Alessandro Fontana and Pasquale Pasquino, published in Italy in 1977 and translated into English with the title “Truth and Power” (Foucault 1980 g). There, Foucault describes how the political role of the intellectual has shifted of late using his terms, the role of the “universal intellectual” is giving way to that of the “specific intellectual.” The “universal intellectual” is one who acts as the representative and spokesperson for others, in the name of universal and absolute truths. This intellectual prescribes to others how they ought to think about social and political issues, and what must be done; and this prescription is grounded in an appeal to universal truths about what is just, right, and good. The “specific intellectual” addresses issues in their more particular manifestations, tailoring his/her speech and action to the specificity of local conditions. Rather than appealing to universal truths and values and pronouncing them to all, this intellectual recognizes and respects the heterogeneity of particular, local struggles and the need to work with those directly involved in them to determine what must be done. Foucault seems to offer the “specific” intellectuals as an alternative role to counter the one taken on by some Marxist intellectuals during this century. Foucault argues that the “universal intellectual” function that is now waning is a holdover from Marxism: the bearer of this universality in its conscious, elaborated form. (Foucault 1980 g, 126) One way to be a “politically engaged” intellectual on the left is to be a Marxist; but here Foucault is arguing that Marxism may have provided the structure for an intellectual role that is potentially quite dangerous. It is against this kind of role that Foucault provides an alternative; and I believe that his claims concerning the intellectual’s political role can be better understood against the backdrop of the kinds of intellectual activities he was rejecting: those of particular Marxist intellectuals around him. “A Faded Marxism ” Foucault speaks partly from personal experience, as he was briefly a member of the communist party in France (the Parti Communiste Frangais, or PCF) in his youth. He joined in 1950, when he and other young intellectuals who had lived through the tumultuous and tragic events during World War II in France reacted with “total rejection”: “The very experience of the war had shown us the necessity and the urgency of creating a society radically different from the one in which we had lived” (Foucault 1991 b, 47). It was in this spirit and with this hope that Foucault joined the PCF, hoping to get to where “something totally different seemed to be taking shape or already existed, that is, communism” (1991 b 51). He quickly became disillusioned and uneasy, leaving the party after having been lied to by party leaders in regard to a fabricated plot to assassinate Stalin the “Doctor’s Plot” of 1952. In an interview with Duccio Trombadori, Foucault briefly explains what happened: A little while before the death of Stalin, the news was spread that a group of Jewish doctors had tried to kill him. Andre Wurmser held a meeting in our Communist student cell in order to explain, in effect, how the plot was to have unfolded. . . . Three months after Stalin’s death, however, it became known that the doctor’s plot was a total invention. . . . We wrote to Wurmser, more or less asking him to come and explain to us how come the assassination attempt that he had talked about had never taken place. We didn’t get any answer. (1991 b 52- 53). Foucault recalls forcing himself to believe what the party had said in regard to the plot, no matter how unbelievable; he took on an attitude of “being obligated to sustain the opposite of what’s believable” (1991 b 52). This attitude he later called “disastrous,” and he claims that he remained distant from the PCF after discovering that the party had lied, that the plot was “a total invention.” 1 Still, he insists that the experience had a certain benefit: “my brief experience with the Party was useful, above all, for what it enabled me to see” (1991 b 54). In his biography of Foucault, James Miller explains: If nothing else, [Foucault’s] experience during the roughly three years he spent in the party taught him something about the pliability of truth and also about the ability of the trained mind to believe, and find reasons for believing, almost anything. Learning to toe the party’s line . . . Foucault learned how to lend credence to the incredible .... (Miller 1993, 57-58) Though Miller doesn’t elaborate on this point in his text, it is possible to see how such a lesson could have influenced his future work on notions of truth and power and their relationship of mutual support. In other words, Foucault learned that “the truth” can simply be what those in power say it is, and it may not take much for this to be believed and followed easily by others. Keeping in mind Foucault’s disillusionment with his party experience and what he learned from it helps one to better understand the direction of Foucault’s critical remarks with regard to Marxism and intellectual prophecy. Of course, perhaps the most significant aspect of Foucault’s personal history as it regards his view of Marxism and Marxists is that he lived in the presence of Marxist revolutionary movements that ended up fueling oppression Stalinism and the Russian Gulags, Maoism and the Cultural Revolution, the Khmer Rouge, and others. Foucault indicates that rather than being “perversions” or “abuses” of Marxism, oppressive structures such as these may have their roots in some elements of Marxist theory itself. For example, in regard to the “Gulag question,” Foucault argues that to ask it properly means not treating it as a mistaken view of Marxism, but rather as a possible outgrowth of the theory itself: [To pose the Gulag question means] [Refusing to question the Gulag on the basis of the texts of Marx or Lenin or to ask oneself how, through what error, deviation, misunderstanding or distortion of speculation or practice, their theory could have been betrayed to such a degree. On the contrary . . . . it is a matter of asking what in those texts could have made the Gulag possible, what might even now continue to justify it... . (Foucault 1980 e, 135) These remarks indicate there may be something fundamentally problematic about Marxist theory that may underlie the Gulag and other oppressions, and that continues to harbor the possibility for such dangers in the future. Thus whatever Foucault’s own negative experiences with the PCF, it seems he ties some of Marxism’s atrocious effects not simply to “errors” or “misunderstandings” of Marxist theory, but to something deeper within the structures of the theory itself. Of course, as Alan Sheridan points out, the PCF refused to acknowledge this possibility: [T]he atrocities of the Stalin era were dismissed [by the Party] as unfortunate effects of ‘the cult of the personality of the general secretary’ or ‘violations of socialist legacy. In other words, they were the result of human error or weakness ultimately moral failings. No serious attempt was made to account for them in historical terms. (Sheridan 1980, 198) Foucault was only one of a large number of French intellectuals to become disillusioned with the PCF, Sheridan notes; but for Foucault’s part, at least, it was not simply because of the nature of the Party itself. It is true that it engaged in lies, forced conformity amongst its members, and engaged in policies that had tragic effects. For Foucault, the criticism runs deeper: the Party is of course problematic, but so is the theory of Marxism itself, for it harbors within its very structure the possibility of oppression and the gulag. Yet it is important to note that Foucault seems to be talking about a certain kind of Marxism/Marxist when he makes such claims; sometimes he admits the value of studying and using Marx in historical discourses and in political struggles. In an interview from 1975, Foucault admits that Marx forms an important and valuable influence on his own work, that he often quotes Marx without acknowledging the source, and that “it is impossible at the present time to write history without using a whole range of concepts directly or indirectly linked to Marx’s thought. ..” (Foucault 1980 f, 53). But he complains that many intellectuals who claim to be Marxists are following the dictates of communist parties rather than listening to what Marx himself had to say: [T]hose who call themselves Marxists . . . play a game whose rules aren’t Marxist but communistological, in other words defined by communist parties who decide how you must use Marx so as to be declared by them to be a Marxist. (1980 f 53) Thus it is important to note that while Foucault criticizes “Marxism” and “Marxists,” this does not seem to be a full-scale condemnation of any type of Marxism whatsoever. Indeed, he notes that he himself experienced the workings of a Marxism in Tunisia that was importantly different from the way Marxist discourses operated in France. Foucault spent over two years in Tunisia in the late 19605, and in March of 1968 he experienced events there that were in some ways similar to what occurred in Paris in May of that year. But there were important differences: In Tunisia . . . everyone was drawn into Marxism with radical violence and intensity .... For those young people, Marxism did not represent merely a way of analyzing reality; it was also a kind of moral force, an existential force that left one stupefied. And I felt disillusioned and full of bitterness to think of how much of a difference there was between the way the Tunisian students were Marxists and what I knew of the workings of Marxism in Europe (France, Poland, etc.). (Foucault 1991 b, 135-136) What he knew of the “workings of Marxism in Europe,” Foucault says, included the “cold, academic debates” in France in the early 19605, and how Marxism was “taught like the catechism” in Poland (1991 b 135). When Foucault returned to France near the end of 1968 he was disappointed with what he calls the “hyper- Marxistization” among the French intellectuals at the time, the “round of endless discussions ... of indomitable discursivity,” “that unleashing of theories, anathemas, the splitting up into factions all very disturbing . . .” (1991 b 139). For Foucault, this compares unfavorably with his experience of Marxism as an existential force in Tunisia. It is important, therefore, to try to specify just who Foucault is talking about when he criticizes “Marxism” or “Marxists.” He speaks critically not only of “Marxists,” but also of “Communists” (Foucault 1991 b, 178-179; 1996 b, 257- 262), “Stalinists” (Foucault 1980 g, 110; 1996 b, 256), “Maoists” and “Marxist- Leninists” (Foucault 1991 b, 106-107). No doubt it would be necessary to do an in-depth study to find out whether these terms are used carefully to delineate different groups of people or whether they are sometimes used interchangeably by Foucault. Rather than making a conclusive judgment either way, I will simply assert here that Foucault, even if he is talking about different groups, talks about them in similar ways. His critical statements seem in part directed towards Marxist intellectuals who adhere blindly to the party line, who follow subserviently as the party tells them what to do. In a generalization that is likely too sweeping, Foucault indicates that this characterization fits most or all of the Marxist intellectuals around him in France: in reference to the “Marxist intellectuals in France,” Foucault claims that “they were playing the role prescribed for them by the PCF” (Foucault 1980 g, 110). There is also a slightly different criticism exhibited above, one aimed at an overly theoretical kind of Marxism, a discourse wherein intellectuals are drawn into endless debates over theory that eventually results in the development of warring factions, “the fragmentation . . . into small bodies of doctrine that [pronounce] excommunication on one another” (Foucault 1991 b, 141). Intellectual Marxists who are part of such “indomitable discursivity” spend so much of their time deciding who is “right” and who is “wrong,” who is “in” and who is “out” on a theoretical level that they ignore entirely the possibility of Marxism as a “moral force” as exhibited in Tunisia. Foucault therefore criticizes a Marxism that is more concerned with theoretical truth than with concrete struggle, 2 and that emphasizes an authoritarian power structure wherein the intellectual follows the dictates of the political party. For Foucault, the power struggles amongst Marxists of his day can be traced in part to their adherence to notions of universal truth. Believing that there is one, universal truth about the way the world is, members of various, sparring factions use their own claims to it against those of others. The “truth,” as something universal and absolute, then, is bound up with a use of power: it seems to provide a ground of legitimacy for disqualifying views that differ from it. The interconnections between truth and power are explained in detail by Foucault throughout many of his texts, and many of his criticisms of Marxists are centered around this point. He argues that the Marxist belief in universal truth spills over into their view of power, leading them to claim that there is one, single truth of power, one accurate description of what power is and how it works. Similarly, Foucault argues, the Marxists’ adherence to universal truth leads them to conceive of a third category in these terms: subjectivity. According to Foucault, Marxists view subjectivity as if there were one truth to the way the subject is, in “reality.” In his own work, Foucault also points to how such a conception of subjectivity can be and has been intricately connected to the use of power. Foucault criticizes Marxism on three interrelated fronts, then he attacks Marxist views of truth, power, and subjectivity. Marxism and truth: scientificity and ideology In the first of his Two Lectures given in 1976, Foucault connects Marxism with what he calls “global, totalitarian theories"' (Foucault 1980 h, 80-81). Later in the lecture he begins to say why: “If we have any objection against Marxism, it lies in the fact that it could effectively be a science” (1980 h 84). In other words, one reason he criticizes Marxism is because it could, and often does, attempt to claim the status of a “science” for itself. For Foucault, this means at least that the basic tenets of Marxism are claimed to be universally true it is thought to provide a framework by which one can analyze any and all societies and thereby discover the (universal) truth about how they develop and operate. It is this very drive to prove it is a science that Foucault finds disturbing, for it signals a desire for power, for the power to disqualify other views as untrue (or in Marxist terms, “ideological”). 3 Thus Foucault asks: “What types of knowledge do you want to disqualify in the very instant of your demand: ‘ls it a science’?” (1980 h 85). Trying to make Marxism into a science means trying to invest it with the power to say what will count as “the truth.” In an interview from 1978, Foucault argues that Marxism has sometimes claimed an overarching kind of status as arbiter of truth: Marxism claimed to be a science or at least a general theory of the ‘scientificity’ of science: a kind of tribunal of reason which would permit us to distinguish what was science from what was ideology. That is, a general criterion of the rationality of every form of knowledge. (Foucault 1991 b, 60). In other words, according to Foucault, Marxism was to provide the criteria by which we could judge all sciences, all forms of knowledge, and decide whether they were truthful or ideological. To try to approach Foucault’s meaning here, it is helpful to take a closer look at the concept of ideology. As Terry Eagleton explains this notion has a long and complex history, and takes on different meanings when used by different theorists (Eagleton 1994). Instead of attempting to elaborate the details of this history, I will point out only a few aspects of the concept of ideology that seem most pertinent to Foucault’s criticism of a Marxist view of truth. In The German Ideology, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels argue that ideological ideas are illusory, that they present reality in a way other than how it “really” is; but they also contend that such ideas fulfill an important social function by serving to legitimate the rule of the dominant, bourgeois class. Marx and Engels argue first of all that ideas are the products of material relations and practices, that our concepts and modes of thought result from the socioeconomic structures and relations in place at a certain point in history (Marx and Engels 1978, 164-165). They then go on to assert that “[t]he ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas: i.e., the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force” (1978, 172). In other words, it is not just that ideas spring from material conditions, but also that the notions that are dominant at any given time are made so by those individuals who are in control of material production: “The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production” (1978, 172). The ruling ideas, however, tend to become detached from their connections to the ruling class, so that they appear to have a kind of independent existence. These ideas, Marx and Engels note, tend to become thereby “abstract,” taking on “the form of universality,” as if they are simply universally true rather than the products of historically-developed conditions (Marx and Engels 1978, 173-174). This phenomenon is crucial to the success of the ruling class, since if its ideas can be presented as universally true, others will conform their thought to them more easily; and the ideas which support the ruling class will thereby be perpetuated. Marx and Engels explain: For each new class which puts itself in the place of one ruling before it, is compelled, merely in order to carry through its aim, to represent its interest as the common interest of all the members of society, that is, expressed in ideal form: it has to give its ideas the form of universality, and represent them as the only, rational, universally valid ones. (1978, 174) It is at this point that the illusion of ideology comes in, since presenting ideas as “the only rational, universally valid ones” when instead they are the products of particular material relations and support the interests of a particular ruling class, amounts to conceiving of things differently than “as they really are and happened” (1978, 170). Terry Eagleton points out that ideological notions, therefore, are both illusory and functional for Marx and Engels: It would appear, then, that to dub an idea ‘ideological’ is not just to call it false or deceptive, but to claim that it fulfils a particular kind of deceptive or mystifying function within social life as a whole. ... On the one hand, ideology has a point, a function, a practical political force; on the other hand it would seem a mere set of illusions, a set of ideas which have come unstuck from reality and now conduct an apparently autonomous life in isolation from it. (Eagleton 1994, 7) It is precisely the notion of ideas as having an “autonomous life,” as existing in an abstract, ahistorical realm of universal truth that is both illusory and functional, since it serves to perpetuate the rule of the dominant class whose interests are served by these ideas. This describes the view of ideology as “false consciousness,” according to Eagleton, which depends on an appearance/reality distinction: “there is a real state of affairs out there, but we represent it to ourselves or others in distorting or obscuring ways” (1994, 11). Ideology is the appearance that obscures the reality while also serving an important social function within that reality. Eagleton argues that Marx later refined his view of ideology, seeing it not so much as “a mere screen which we could slide aside to see things as they really are,” but rather as an appearance which is an inherent part of the reality of capitalist society itself (Eagleton 1994, 11): It is just in the nature of [capitalist] society that it presents itself to our consciousness other than how it is; and this dislocation between appearance and reality is structural to it, an unavoidable effect of its routine operations. . . . There is a kind of dissembling or duplicity built into the very economic structures of capitalism, such that it simply cannot help appearing to us in ways at odds with what it is. (1994, 11-12) In a sense, then, it is part of the reality of capitalism, part of the way it is, that it appears to us “in ways at odds with what it is.” Rather than delving into how this is the case for Marx, and explaining in more depth what this claim might mean, I wish instead to point out that there is still an appearance/reality distinction operating here. In other words, what still seems crucial to the notion of ideology is that it represents things differently from how they “really are,” in their truth. This phenomenon may be built into the operations of capitalism for the later Marx, but there remains an appeal to an undistorted truth about the way things are in “reality.” Foucault parts ways with anyone, Marxist or not, who makes such appeals. To claim that a particular representation of the world is distorted is to imply that there is an objective, universal truth about it; and for Foucault, to do the latter is to set oneself up in the position of the “ruling class” described above. In other words, universal truths are historical constructions that can be easily bound up with the use of power, utilized as a means of coercing others to conform to one’s own conception of reality. For a Marxist to claim a distinction between how things “really” are and how they “appear” in terms of ideology, then, is to set up a relation of power in which competing views are disqualified as “false” and “illusory.” By making claims to have the truth about “the way things really are,” Marxists can work to bring others in conformity to their views through the simple, but effective, threat of error and falsehood. Such Marxists, Foucault implies, are like scientists in that they believe there is a single truth about the way the world “really” is, and that they have access to this truth. But Marxism goes further than this, for Foucault, in its aspirations to be “a kind of tribunal of reason,” providing “a general criterion” that would “permit us to distinguish what was science from what was ideology.” In other words, according to Foucault Marxism sets itself up as the general arbiter of truth for all sciences, all forms of knowledge. Every kind of discipline, under this view, would have to submit its claims to Marxist standards in order pass as “truth” rather than “ideology.” If the capitalist system harbors an inherent duplicity, as Marx’s later views on ideology suggest, then it would seem that we must be on constant alert to root out and eliminate the illusions that are bound to result. Thus active Marxists would have to be concerned about truth claims in all areas of knowledge; and it may be in part for that reason that Foucault calls Marxism a “global” theory. It is also “global” in that it seems meant to provide a general, universal explanation of the way things work, how material production is related to mental production, how our past has “really” moved us toward the present, etc. It provides a purportedly objective picture of the world and uses it to arbitrate between which kinds of discourses and which forms of knowledge will be accepted as truthful, and which will be disqualified as ideology. Marxism also takes on, then, what Foucault calls a “totalitarian” aspect: investing itself with the power of a science (or the “scientificity” of science), it is able to rule tyrannically over the realm of truth, squashing any discourses that oppose it with the damning label of “ideology.” Whether or not this is an accurate portrayal of Marxism (as if there were only one form to speak of) and/or of the efforts of the Marxists of his day is an important question, but one that does not concern me here. Instead, I am presently focusing on the kind of political, intellectual role Foucault rejects in order to develop an alternative. Whether or not Foucault was “right” about Marxism, then, is of less import to the present inquiry than analyzing what he believed about it; and he certainly professed it to function often as a kind of “global” and “totalitarian” discourse. As such it makes claims to universal truth that are importantly connected to a coercive use of power, according to Foucault. Marxism and power: prophecy and obedience Foucault criticizes a Marxist view of power as well as truth, and these two lines of criticism are closely related since truth and power are, for Foucault, intertwined. The Marxist discourses which Foucault criticizes make for a good preliminary illustration of this intersection. As I have noted, Marxism’s claims to “scientificity” suggest a desire for the power to disqualify other discourses. The underlying reason for this kind of intersection of truth and power is rather simple: believing, saying, or being recognized as having the truth gives an institution or a discourse the power to organize things and events in the name of that truth. If Marxism claims for itself the status of a science, the global tribunal of truth, then those who disagree with its pronouncements are not simply “of a different opinion,” they are wrong. The use of coercive power necessary to purge such inaccuracies may be easily granted as legitimate if a discourse or institution is admitted to have access to the truth. The intellectual plays along with this scheme in the ways mentioned above: s/he may participate in highly theoretical debates about just exactly what does/does not count as truth or ideology, and/or s/he may work as a conveyor of truth to others (thereby facilitating the excommunication of other factions in addition to non- Marxists). In this latter capacity, the intellectual often works in conjunction with a communist political party, as a kind of spokesperson for the party’s wishes. According to Foucault, those who adhere to this kind of Marxist discourse (here called “Communists”) give the intellectual a “prophetic” role: They [the intellectuals] were asked to take a prophetic stance, to say: this is what must be done which implies simply that what must be done must adhere to the PC [Communist Party] .... In other words, what the PC demands is that the intellectual be the intermediary that transmits the intellectual, moral and political imperatives of which the party can make direct use. [F]or the PC the real intellectual is the one who calms down reality, explaining how it ought to be and saying immediately how it will have to be on that day when everyone will do as the Communist Party does. (Foucault 1996 b, 262) The intellectual here acts as a prophet, one who has access to the truth and the light (as set forth by the party) and who tells others what to do on the basis of this. Obviously such a situation harbors the potential for oppression, as such “great Marxist obedience” (Foucault 1991 b, 94) requires conformity to whatever is determined to be “the truth,” the solution to our political troubles. If a discourse such as Marxism makes claims to a truth as the one true way, as a kind of universal and final answer, then anything that differs from this answer is opposed to it. Discourses of universality invite oppositional dichotomies, for a truth that is universal and absolute is also self-contained, leaving the “other” outside its boundaries, “not-true.” But when the truth in question is a political ideal, the “other” is not just “false,” it is dangerously in opposition in political terms, when injustice and oppression can cost lives, what is “false” becomes also “dangerous.” That which is “other” to the system is seen as a threat, not only to Marxists themselves and to the various communist parties, but also to all those whose safety and well-being depend upon them. If Marxism aims at “true” liberty, equality, and justice, then anything that differs from it is viewed as a danger to such ideals, an enemy to be fought and eliminated. This is how Marxists reacted to his own studies of power, Foucault claims: Foucault did not follow the “great Marxist obedience,” and some of his work was treated with hostility and intolerance by some Marxists due to “the absolute refusal of traditional Marxists to accept the most minimal critical observation that could injure even slightly Marx’s prestige and theoretical supremacy” (Foucault 1991 b, 106). 4 Of course, the same would apply to any of the various discourses that may serve as “others” to Marxism. Foucault asserts that Marxists (especially Stalinists) often resort to the tactic of “having at all times only one adversary. Also, or rather above all, when you strike on several fronts, you must do it in such a way that the battle seems like a battle against one and the same adversary” (Foucault 1996 b, 256). In some sense, this is an inevitable result of believing in and thinking one has found the, singular, “truth” if there is but one “truth,” all else would seem to fall into the category of “false,” unified and homogenized in opposition. There are many forms of error, but they are all ideological and dangerous; and this means that even if the battle is fought on many fronts, the enemy remains the same. Foucault notes a religious connotation in this kind of attitude: “There are a thousand devils, the Church used to say, but there is only one Prince of Darkness” (1996 b 256). Everything that differs from the Marxist line becomes simply opposed, homogenized and demonized. This leads inevitably to misinterpretations and mischaracterizations of discourses deemed to be “other,” for they are all construed along the same lines: “against us,” “not” Marxist. Everything is read into the structures of Marxist discourse, for the purpose of judging the fit and condemning those who fail. Foucault asserts that this is mainly an exercise of power, since the evidence upon which such condemnations are made is often rather flimsy: [T]heir problem, as well as their strength, lies in the fact that what interests them is not what they themselves say, but what they do when they say something. And what they do is precisely this: to constitute a singular enemy,... to begin a procedure of condemnation .... The nature of the evidence upon which he is condemned is of little importance, since, as we well know, the essential thing in a condemnation is not the quality of the evidence but the force of the one who presents the evidence. 5 (1996 b 257) This process finds Marxists acting as Inquisitors, holding faulty trials in front of a jury of themselves and condemning the unwitting as heretical ideologues. In France the result may be, as it was for Foucault, not too much worse than some angry words and “insulting letters.” 6 Those less fortunate may suffer damage to their intellectual careers, due to lost job opportunities or ostracization from influential academic circles. But this power of condemnation and disqualification can obviously be even more dangerous, as is evidenced by the oppressive and even genocidal results in countries such as the U.S.S.R., China, Cambodia and others. As noted above, Foucault indicates that the type of Marxism he criticizes is not fundamentally different from that practiced by those responsible for such oppression. Instead of considering only the possibility that “they” [the bad Marxists] have perverted the theory, misunderstood it, while “we” [the good Marxists] have the right interpretation such that these atrocities could never issue from our views, according to Foucault Marxists ought to at least consider the possibility that they could be implicated in similar oppressions due to a shared aspect of the theory. What is shared, in Foucault’s view, is a certain intersection of truth and power, a claim to absolute truth that underlies and legitimizes a condemning, disqualifying, and totalitarian use of power. A discourse that claims (and that is accepted by others as claiming) to have access to “the truth” also claims for itself (and may be granted by others) the right to the power to shape the world in its image. The right to power goes along with claims to universal and absolute truth. But what Foucault criticizes in Marxist discourses is not simply the assertion of universal truths, truths that are intertwined with a potentially dangerous use of power; it is also the Marxist view of power itself -- what it is and how it works that he rejects. Foucault argues that Marxism has on hand a “marvelously simple set of formulas” regarding the workings of power, such as the idea of a revolutionary takeover of the State and its eventual withering away; but these may be too simple: “maybe everything is not as easy as one believes” (Foucault 1996 b, 258). He states that through his own experience with Communist Parties and the Soviet Union, it was clear to him that these easy formulas “absolutely did not take into account what was happening at the level of power” (1996 b 258). In other words, the descriptions and prescriptions in regard to truth/ideology as well as political rule and revolution given by Marxism were not adequately capturing what was happening on a more specific and local level, where the mechanisms of power are more complex than the formulas suggested. Foucault indicates that the Marxist model construes power in terms of two opposing sides: power exists on one side, while “on the other side lies that upon which power would exert itself’ (Foucault 1996 b, 260). Part of the problem with this conception is that it is too simple, since power for Foucault is much more diffuse, plural and complex. Such a dualistic model of power assumes that there is a “good” side and a “bad” side; and that the latter consists in a kind of repressive, oppressive, evil power holding down the innocent, right, and good victims. It is a kind of “naturalistic” idea, a theory that beneath an artificial, imposed power one can uncover something natural and good: [lt is] the idea that underneath power with its acts of violence and its artifice we should be able to recuperate things themselves in their primitive vivacity . . . . And also a certain aesthetic and moral choice: power is evil, it’s ugly, poor, sterile, monotonous, dead; and what power is exercised upon is right, good, rich. (Foucault 1996 d, 221) Foucault argues that such an idea is sometimes helpful, “to change the scenery from time to time and move from pro to contra” (1996 d 221-222). Such changes of scenery can be beneficial in that they can at least encourage the questioning and criticism of dominant uses of power and the truths produced thereby. To “move from pro to contra” is to express one’s desire for change, and to stimulate others to think about why change might be needed and how it might be brought about. It is perhaps a useful preliminary step in social and political transformation. But ultimately, Foucault maintains, the dualistic view of power upon which such efforts rest is false, an oversimplification; and reversals from one side to the other ought to be geared towards eventually moving out of the dualism altogether. Otherwise, efforts at change will be ineffective - simply cheering over and over for the “good” side does not, in itself, do much to change the basic structure of relations of power that operate in a dualistic way, with opposing “sides.” Part of the problem here is that the Marxist view of power is intricately bound up with the apparatus of the State, according to Foucault (Foucault 1980 g, 115). Foucault indicates Marxists view the structure of power as modeled exclusively on the workings of power within the State. Not only does describing power relations along the lines of the State mean “grasping them as essentially repressive” -- a point similar to the above it means conceiving of power in a fundamentally inaccurate way. Foucault asserts that “relations of power . . . necessarily extend beyond the limits of the State,” meaning that to analyze power simply in terms of the State is to ignore many of its important elements: “The State is superstructural in relation to a whole series of power networks that invest the body, sexuality, the family, kinship, knowledge, technology and so forth” (1980 g 122). To be effective, analyses of power should be directed towards these more complex relationships. Thus the “marvelously simple formulas” of Marxism do not, as Foucault maintains, capture what is going on in the more complex power relationships upon which the power of the State rests. But it is not simply that the Marxist model of power is not very useful for effecting change, it is also potentially dangerous since it can lead to a repetition of the kind of oppression one hopes to combat. Foucault notes that the dualistic view of power, coupled with its concentration in the State apparatus, leads to an oppositional conception of the State vs. the Revolution: the evil, repressive, powerful State will be taken over by the repressed, the revolutionaries, the good. The oversimplification of the workings of power here can lead to a reinscription of oppression, merely with a change of players: [T]he State consists in the codification of a whole number of power relations which render its functioning possible, and . . . the Revolution is a different type of codification of the same relations. This implies that there are many different kinds of revolution,. . . and further that one can perfectly well conceive of revolutions which leave essentially untouched the power relations which form the basis for the functioning of the State. (Foucault 1980 g, 123) This latter type of revolution is rather likely to occur, according to Foucault, when driven by Marxist discourses that emphasize power as existing mainly in the State. He argues that a number of problematic consequences result from this view as it is put forth in Marxist revolutionary movements, all of them culminating in the repetition of oppressive State power through similar structures that were supposed to be the targets for change. 7 The U.S.S.R. provides a good example of this process, and Foucault insists that recognizing that “power isn’t localised in the State apparatus” is a necessary condition for “avoiding a repetition of the Soviet experience and preventing the revolutionary process from running into the ground” (Foucault 1980 a, 60). Nothing will change, Foucault argues, unless the more local and complex relations of power beyond the State are addressed; and if nothing changes, the revolutionaries may themselves become agents of a dangerously oppressive abuse of power. We can trace these aspects of the Marxist conception of power back to an adherence to universal truths. According to Foucault, many Marxists view power as having a single structure that underlies and unifies all of its various manifestations: the way that power is and operates. As Foucault puts it, Marxists tend to formulate “a kind of metaphysics of Power with a capital P” (Foucault 1996 b, 258). This “metaphysics of Power” locates it in a dialectical relation with an equally homogenous non-power, as two opposing sides. Power is thought to have a universal, unified structure that is cleanly separated and closed off from what is “not”-it. Foucault argues instead that power is much more complex than such a “simple formula” would indicate, that it operates in multiple, heterogeneous ways, and that one of its effects is to produce the very idea of its opposite as non-power. When one crosses to the “other side,” the “good side” of non-power, then, one ends up mainly supporting the power relation one hoped to resist. Noting that the operations of power are multiple and heterogeneous helps reduce the chance that power will appear as a unified, homogenous concept standing against its opposite, that which it is “not.” Rather than presenting a “metaphysics of Power” to unify all of its various manifestations, Foucault addresses power in specific locales and emphasizes how these particular contexts affect the way power operates in different ways. Marxism and subjectivity: unity and consciousness Foucault also expresses another concern about Marxism that is related to the above criticisms, having to do with the conception of subjectivity that is often involved in Marxist discourses. Specifically, he argues that a “unitary subject” is usually presupposed by Marxists, a conscious subject upon whom ideology works its deceptions: [W]hat troubles me with these analyses which prioritise ideology is that there is always presupposed a human subject along the lines of the model provided by classical philosophy, endowed with a consciousness which power is then thought to seize on. (Foucault 1980 a, 58) The main problem with such a view, for Foucault, is that by focusing on the ways power affects an already-formed subject, it ignores the ways in which power works to constitute subjects. It obscures the notion of subjection in the formation of the subject: “subjects are gradually, progressively, really and materially constituted through a multiplicity of organisms, forces, energies, materials, desires, thoughts etc.,” through “continuous and uninterrupted processes which subject our bodies, govern our gestures, dictate our behaviours etc.” (Foucault 1980 h, 97). In other words, instead of viewing power as something that affects the subject after the fact, as it were, Foucault suggests the need to investigate how power structures work to constitute conscious subjectivity itself. Once again, the Marxist adherence to universal truth plays a crucial role here. The subject is thought to have a single, universal structure, a “truth” that power can then seize upon and affect in various ways. One of the ways power affects subjects is through the production of ideology, through the presentation of concepts that make things appear differently from how they “really are.” In doing so, Foucault indicates, power appears to operate on an already-formed subject, distorting its view of the world. In his own work, Foucault emphasizes instead how subjectivity is created, and created in heterogeneous ways, through the very workings of power itself. For Foucault subjectivity does not have a universal, timeless structure to which one can refer as the “true” view of the subject; rather, subjectivity is a product of historically contingent relations of power and changes in form as these relations change. Foucault therefore criticizes the view, attributed here to Marxists concerned with ideology, that the subject has a universal form that exists prior to and is therefore free from power, that power then seizes upon to distort its perception. Another problem with the Marxist view of the subject and its relationship to power and ideology is that it draws attention away from the body and the effects of power on it, as if power only worked on consciousness through ideology. Foucault argues that such a limited view of power is not likely to ground effective efforts at change. Not only does power work in more local and complex arenas than simply the state, it also works to shape not only thought, but the body as well. A few examples to illustrate at this point can be found in an article by Foucault entitled “The Politics of Health in the Eighteenth Century.” There, Foucault notes how the “correct management” of childhood, of the development and hygiene of the child’s body becomes governed by “new and highly detailed rules” passed primarily from medical experts to families during the eighteenth century (Foucault 1980 d, 172). The family becomes the site of strict laws regarding “the healthy, clean, fit body,” among other things (1980 d 173). Foucault also considers the role of doctors in the exercise of power over the body as medicine becomes an instance of “social control”: “Medicine, as a general technique of health . . . assumes an increasingly important place in the administrative system and the machinery of power, a role which is constantly widened and strengthened throughout the eighteenth century. The doctor wins a footing within the different instances of social power” (1980 d 176). Doctors work to enforce rules of hygiene and to prod people to seek medical treatment when sick. The body, no less than the consciousness, is subject to power in the area of medicine and hygiene, at least. There are many other examples throughout Foucault’s writings that illustrate ways in which the body is subject to relations of power. 8 In an interview, Foucault claims that his view differs from that of Marxists who try to “elicit the effects of power at the level of ideology,” because the latter (though claiming to be “materialists”) do not express enough concern for the ways power affects the body: “I wonder whether, before one poses the question of ideology, it wouldn’t be more materialist to study first the question of the body and the effects of power on it” (Foucault 1980 a, 58). Though he doesn’t go on to make this point in the interview, it seems that such an approach would be more conducive to recognizing how consciousness and its (ideological) ideas are produced by power relations rather than pre-existing them. If one begins an analysis of power by addressing its ideological effects on consciousness, one is less likely to note how it can produce the very consciousness it is said to seize upon. Foucault, in Discipline and Punish, provides a “genealogy of the modern ‘soul,’” as he puts it, a history of how our current conception of conscious subjectivity was produced by particular practices of power (Foucault 1995, 29). More specifically, he argues that this consciousness was created by relations of power that operate mainly on the body so that in investigating the effects of power on the body, one can come to see how one of these is the production of the conscious subject as we now conceive it. 9 By thinking that subjectivity has a single, universal structure, the Marxist (according to Foucault) misses the ways in which it is produced by relations of power, in part through their operations on the body. 10 Freeing the subject from ideology will do little to address the ways in which this subject is already bound up in relations of power and can work to support them. 11 Foucault insists, then, that “[t]he essential political problem for the intellectual” does not lie in making sure people aren’t duped by ideology, in making sure they get the truth (Foucault 1980 g, 133). It is the adherence to notions of universal truth that causes problems for Marxists, according to Foucault, in regard to the areas of truth, power, and subjectivity. It is because they aspire to an absolute, universal, scientific truth in their conception of the world, including the notions of power and subjectivity, that they fall prey to Foucault’s criticisms. This leads them into a coercive use of disqualifying power on the basis of a claim to scientific truth, to a conception of power as a unified, homogeneous opposite to non-power, and to a conception of the subject as something that power seizes upon rather than its product. Foucault argues, therefore, that the main political question for the intellectual is not one of ideology or “alienated consciousness”; it is instead one of “truth itself’: “The problem is not changing people’s consciousnesses or what’s in their heads but the political, economic, institutional regime of the o production of truth” (1980 g 133). What the intellectual should be focusing on as a political problem is the “regime of truth,” the way “truth” (in Foucault’s sense of what is taken as “true”) is produced, circulated, and defended, and the intellectual’s own role within such processes and its structures. For Foucault, it is this questioning of the workings of truth, and its connection to the workings of power and subjectivity, that Marxist discourses have failed to do; and it appears that this may be part of their danger, their oppressive potential in his view. But they aren’t alone in this. The type of Marxist intellectuals criticized by Foucault fall into a more general category that he calls “universal” intellectuals. In a by now well-known passage from an interview, Foucault distinguishes the “universal” intellectual from the “specific,” arguing that the former is (fortunately, according to Foucault) giving way to the latter. Many intellectuals on the left have followed the “universal” model, which, according to Foucault, leaves much to be desired since it involves them in problematic relations between truth and power such as those described above. In other words, playing the role of the “universal” intellectual places one squarely within the regime of truth that ought instead to be criticized, according to Foucault. The decline of the universal intellectual In an interview entitled “Truth and Power” (Foucault 1980 g), Foucault describes a shift in the political function of the intellectual one which has, he argues, already taken place to a certain extent (at least among those intellectuals on the Left). For a long time, according to Foucault, “the ‘left’ intellectual spoke and was acknowledged the right of speaking in the capacity of master of truth and justice” (Foucault 1980 g, 126). Such a “universal” intellectual, as Foucault labels this figure, works within the assumption of a universality of truth, providing his statements about political justice with the legitimacy of at least potentially tapping into what is “truly” just for all. 12 The universal intellectual, then, acts as “spokesman of the universal,” the one who has access to the truth and can therefore speak for everyone. 13 He stands as the conscience of the masses, who, it was assumed, would agree with what he said if they only had access to his knowledge. The universal intellectual places himself‘“somewhat ahead and to the side’ in order to express the stifled truth of the collectivity” (Foucault 1977 a, 207-208). What the masses cannot say, whether because of ignorance, lack of class consciousness, or intimidation and forced silence, the intellectual can express through both his writings and his political activism. He therefore acts as their (perhaps unelected) representative, their spokesman, the guardian of their interests. In this position, he can also take on a kind of legislative role -- the intellectual as representative not only can express the needs and demands of his “constituents”; he may also possess the power to legislate for them, to tell them what they must do, to set down the law. This, Foucault says, describes a “legislative function” to which intellectuals have aspired for a long time: “‘See what must be done, see what is good, follow me’” (Foucault 1996 d, 225). Such a role, then, allows the intellectual to speak for the masses as a representative of their interests, expressing what they cannot; but it also allows this “representative” a legislative function, wherein he speaks for them in the sense of dictating not only what they should do to make sure their interests are addressed, but also perhaps what their ultimate interests really are. Foucault asserts that the “universal” intellectual function seems to have been derived from a specific figure: “the man of justice, the man of law, who counterposes to power, despotism and the abuses and arrogance of wealth the universality of justice and the equity of an ideal law” (Foucault 1980 g, 128). The intellectual as “man of law” stands in relation to the people as their representative in the name of a universal justice that stands opposed to abuses of power. He is supported in this position by the universality of his ideals, the truth of their justice he can represent all because what he says and what he fights for apply equally to all. Foucault claims that while the “universal” intellectual derives from the “man of law,” still he “finds his fullest manifestation in the writer, the bearer of values and significations in which all can recognise themselves” (1980 g 128). It is clear that the type of “writer” to which he refers here is the one who writes in a universal voice, the one who proclaims the truth as we all, as rational beings, do or should see it. He is the writer who speaks of the nature and abilities of “man,” who lays out his rights and responsibilities, who defines his freedom and dignity as a rational creature. He writes, speaks and acts as the representative of a universal “mankind.” The notion of the universal intellectual as “representative” is brought out clearly in a written “conversation” between Foucault and Gilles Deleuze, entitled “Intellectuals and Power” (Foucault 1977 a). There, Deleuze agrees with Foucault that a change is occurring in the intellectual’s political role, and he ties this to a changing relationship between theory and practice. 14 In the past, Deleuze claims, this relationship was thought of in terms of separation, resemblance, and representation: theory and practice were considered separate, self-enclosed realms that yet resembled each other enough for theory to serve as a kind of “schematic” for practice. Under this view, theory “represents” practice working in signs and symbols, the theorist can map out actions in words, abstracting and generalizing to create a guide that can cover various, highly particular issues in the realm of practical action. Theory, then, is seen as representing practice in the same way that a map represents terrain; and their relationship is understood, Deleuze states, “in terms of a process of totalization” (Foucault 1977 a, 205): it is as if one can work completely in the realm of theory, if one desires, moving from point to point rationally and thereby creating a coherent whole that can then be “applied,” in its entirety, to practice. The theory can be adjusted through practical work, of course - one can revise one’s theory if, in trying to apply it to the “real world” of action, one finds that the map is not entirely accurate - but the idea is that in so doing, one is choosing to move to a wholly different realm, that of “action” rather than “words.” These two realms have been considered, Deleuze argues, separate and self-contained; and while they can influence one another, it is possible to remain mainly an intellectual who works “in theory,” and rarely, if ever, dirties his hands with practical actions. Such a view of theory and practice influences how the political role of the intellectual is conceived. Specifically, as theory is considered representative of practice, the intellectual takes on a similar role: his political role is fulfilled by standing “somewhat ahead and to the side” of the realm of practice, not fully within it, but existing in a realm of theory that resembles it enough to speak on its behalf. In other words, if theory functions as the representative of practice, it is easy to see how the political role of the intellectual may have become that of the “spokesman,” the representative who need not involve himself directly in the concerns of his constituents, because he resembles them enough to speak for them without actually taking a direct part in their struggles. In terms of intellectual, academic work, this means that Marxist intellectuals, for example, might be able to stay away from the violence of revolutionary practice while discussing the revolution itself on a separate, theoretical level. Foucault indicates several problems with the “universal” intellectual role as “representative,” and argues that this role is being taken up less and less by modern intellectuals. In part, the problem with the “universal” intellectual, according to Foucault, seems to be his tendency to consider the truth as something free from power. Seeing himself as “the man of justice, the man of law,” this intellectual figure acts as if his universal truths about law and justice can be used in opposition to power. But Foucault argues that truth and power cannot be counterposed in this way, since the two are closely connected: [TJruth isn’t outside power, or lacking in power: contrary to a myth whose history and function would repay further study, truth isn’t the reward of free spirits, the child of protracted solitude, nor the privilege of those who have succeeded in liberating themselves. Truth is a thing of this world: it is produced only by virtue of multiple forms of constraint. (Foucault 1980 g, 131) One problem with the “universal” intellectual and his pronouncements of timeless truths, then, is that he mistakenly speaks and acts as if he is promoting thereby a liberation from power. He does not recognize the ways in which the truth he holds dear is “a thing of this world,” bound up with relations of power. The “universal” intellectual, thinking that he is resisting certain practices of power with his truth, may instead be perpetuating these in more subtle ways through his efforts at liberating the truth from power. 15 Similarly, Foucault seems concerned with the “universal” intellectual’s close ties to a potentially oppressive or dominating power. Foucault argues that power is dominating when it becomes coercive to the point that there are few alternatives open beyond the course of action actively encouraged by the practice of power (Foucault 1996 e, 434). The “universal” intellectual role may harbor such a danger for oppression, since it can reduce the freedom of others to make their own ethical and political choices. The “universal” intellectual possesses an important authority as someone who is thought to have access to truths that are absolute and unchanging: his pronouncements of such truths are usually intended to be, and often taken as, indisputable. This intellectual does not invite, allow, or even perhaps tolerate differing views those who do not agree are simply “wrong.” Such a situation would not appear oppressive if one thought that there were indeed such a thing as universal, ahistorical truth and that the “universal” intellectual was probably someone who had access to it. But given that Foucault rejects the first claim (and the second, therefore, along with it), he does view the relation of power that exists between the “universal” intellectual and his audience as potentially oppressive and dominating. Instead of considering the “universal” intellectual as simply promoting “the truth” and behaviors that accord with it, Foucault shows instead that the truth this intellectual pronounces is a contingent, historically constructed one, and that in forcing others to conform to it he is not leaving much room for alternative ways of thinking, being, and acting. The point is that the “universal” intellectual is holding to contingent, historically constructed truths while also thinking them to be absolute and timeless. Further, this intellectual acts as if his truths are universal, using them to play the role of the “representative” for others. In so doing he may be intolerant to alternative views, thinking that he himself has the one truth to which all ought to adhere. As a figure of authority, the “universal” intellectual may have the potential to coerce others into agreeing with his purportedly universal view, thereby engaging in a dominating and oppressive practice of power. Closing off alternative views in this way is also problematic according to Foucault because those actually enmeshed in the particular relations of power to be resisted may have a better idea as to what they ought to do than the intellectual does. 16 Foucault argues that an intellectual who is standing “somewhat ahead and to the side” of those engaged in struggle may not have a better picture of how the latter ought to view their conditions than they do. In other words, while the “universal” intellectual rejects alternative views of the situation as “erroneous” and in need of modification according to his/her “truth,” it may be that these alternative views are not so problematic after all. It may be that the intellectual does not have enough information, does not share the point of view of those he hopes to influence, and therefore can’t provide a better understanding of the situation then they already have. The “universal” intellectual, of course, might be likely to believe that he knows “the way things really are,” and if others disagree then their view is, according to him, simply “erroneous.” This intellectual would probably consider his view to be “objective,” and therefore more accurate than any “subjective” interpretation attached to a particular point of view. That he may not share the point of view of those to whom he is giving advice, then, would not seem to be a drawback. This intellectual may not realize that, as Foucault indicates, the advice given to others by intellectuals may actually make things worse: “[R]emember all the prophecies, promises, injunctions and plans intellectuals have been able to formulate in the course of the last two centuries and of which we have seen the effects” (Foucault 1996 c, 462). Foucault does not name these “effects” specifically, but he does imply here that intellectual prophecy can well have negative results. One can consider the kind of point Foucault is probably trying to make by imagining an intellectual who delves into many different types of struggles (or potential struggles, hoping to provoke their outbreak) across a nation or even the globe, offering counsel on the basis of his own view of the situation from afar. This intellectual may even travel to various places to give speeches, participate in protests, etc., but still without being directly involved otherwise in the struggle, its preconditions, or its aftermath. If this intellectual is a “universal” one, he may likely think he has access to an objective viewpoint and can make appeal to such universal notions as “justice,” “fairness,” and “rights” that describe the situation accurately and prescribe solutions. He may believe that through such universal truths, values and ideals a generalized, objective picture of oppression and its remedies may be formulated to fit any particular situation. The “universal” intellectual may then apply this general strategy to any and all social and political problems he perceives, filtering the specific conditions of each through the lens of his theory. Foucault criticizes such efforts to formulate and apply “global, totalitarian theories” that would unify all relations of power and remedying resistances under a single, coherent, explanatory structure (Foucault 1980 h, 80). Specific, local criticisms and resistances are more effective, according to Foucault, due to the heterogeneity of power relations at different sites. For Foucault, a relation of power exists wherever the behavior of one individual is directed or governed by that of another, but this can occur in a variety of ways that cannot be reduced to a single structure, “a metaphysics of Power with a capital P” (Foucault 1996 b, 258). Thus it is crucial for the intellectual to avoid trying to fit particular situations to his “global” theory, and to allow those involved to formulate their own responses to specific power relations. Otherwise, he may be convinced of having a superior, objective viewpoint, and may be likely to try to change the minds of these others. Instead, their view may provide for strategies of resistance that have a better chance of success, given their proximity to the particular circumstances of their specific struggles. In his conversation with Deleuze, Foucault insists on this point vehemently, arguing that the uprisings in Paris in May of 1968 showed that the intellectual is no longer even required by others to play the role of a “spokesman.” During the short but influential uprisings of “the events of May,” Foucault claims, it became clear that “the masses” no longer need the intellectual to tell them what to do, what to think, how to act, or to represent their interests to others, because “they know far better than he and they are certainly capable of expressing themselves” (Foucault 1977 a, 207). 17 Theory, therefore, and theorizing intellectuals, are no longer needed to take on a representative or legislative function for practice, and the practicing masses. We (the intellectuals) have come to recognize, Foucault suggests, that they know better than us what to do and what their interests are, and they have no problem articulating these. Deleuze agrees, saying that “only those directly concerned can speak in a practical way on their own behalf’ (Foucault 1977 a, 209). The idea here seems to be that as we, as intellectuals, come to recognize that “the masses” no longer need us to represent them, we begin to rethink our estimation of our political role as theorists, as well as the political status of theory in general. Theory, and theorizing intellectuals, are not required to serve as guides for practice and even if they continue to act as such, Foucault implies, those whom theory is meant to guide are not likely to listen anymore anyway, since recent events have shown that they no longer need such road maps. Therefore, if intellectuals engaged in theory are to have political impact, it must be within a role different than that of the “representative.” 18 There are several ethical concerns embedded in this discussion of the “universal” intellectual’s “representative” function, in addition to the practical concern that the intellectual may no longer be needed to fulfill this role for others. One of these is expressed in a statement by Deleuze directed towards Foucault: “In my opinion you were the first... to teach us something absolutely fundamental: the indignity of speaking for others” (Foucault 1977 a, 209). Even in the very act of speaking for others there seems to be something ethically problematic, as if those others were not to be given the responsibility (and dignity) of speaking their own views. This may be the case whether or not “the masses” actually listen to and are coerced by the intellectual’s pronouncements of truth. Foucault expresses a somewhat different ethical concern in an interview from 1977: “[I dream of the intellectual who] contributes to the raising of the question of knowing whether the revolution is worth it... it being understood that they alone who are willing to risk their lives to bring it about can answer the question” (Foucault 1996 d, 225). Foucault’s tone here suggests that the intellectual has a moral duty to avoid speaking for others, to refrain from proclaiming the need for a revolution that could potentially send those others to their deaths while he remains safe in the realm of “theory.” The “representative” model of the relationship between theory and practice (and theorizing intellectuals and the practicing masses), then, could allow for calls to action emanating from intellectuals as theorists but impacting others as agents of practice in dangerous and perhaps even life-threatening ways. Not all political actions involve a significant degree of danger to those engaging in them, of course; but Foucault also indicates elsewhere that it is not morally permissible for intellectuals to instruct others to engage in political actions, to tell them “what to do” regardless of the level of danger involved. This seems to be because the intellectual is in a position of power as someone who is likely to be followed. The intellectual is bound up, by his very position as an intellectual, in societal power structures due to his/her role as a provider of truth. Foucault explains that the intellectual is part of what he terms the “regime of truth,” a regime that can be roughly characterized as the system of interconnections between truth and power in a particular time and place. In modem Western societies, the intellectual participates in the regime of truth due to his/her attachments to social institutions of education, research, and/or the media, since these function to produce and circulate “truth”: In societies like ours .... ‘[t]ruth’ is centered on the form of scientific discourse and the institutions which produce it;. . . it is the object, under diverse forms, of immense diffusion and consumption (circulating through apparatuses of education and information . . .); it is produced and transmitted under the control, dominant if not exclusive, of a few great political and economic apparatuses (university, army, writing, media) . . . (Foucault 1980 g, 131-132) If the intellectual is part of a university, s/he plays an integral role in an institution that is charged with producing and disseminating the truth. Or, if s/he is a writer or a media personality, s/he functions within different institutions that can still be considered purveyors of truth. Intellectuals who are invited to speak as “experts” on news programs, for example, are clearly playing the role of a provider of truth, someone who tells others what to do. Even if the intellectual writes fiction, his/her audience can and often will attempt to find some true “message” within the text, a kernel of the truth as spoken by the intellectual. This may be because once the intellectual is given the status of intellectual by societal structures of power (which may be multiple and various one need not be attached to a university to be granted the status of “intellectual”), one becomes an “agent” of this regime in all or nearly all of one’s public words and actions: Intellectuals themselves are agents of [a] system of power . . . . that transforms [the intellectual] into its object and instrument in the sphere of “knowledge,” “truth,” “consciousness,” and “discourse.” (Foucault 1977 a, 207-208) The intellectual qua intellectual, it is implied here, is viewed by the public at large as an agent of the regime of truth, as someone with privileged access to truth and knowledge. Acting as the instrument of power in the sphere of truth and knowledge, the intellectual is entrusted with the responsibility of speaking the truth and is recognized by many as being one of the most likely figures to possess it. In this position, then, the intellectual is involved in a relationship of power with his audience - his status expresses, without saying it in so many words, that here is a person that ought to be heeded, that ought to be followed because he speaks the truth. Further, in modern, Western societies, Foucault argues, truth “is centered on the form of scientific discourse”; “the truth” is that which is universal and timeless. The intellectual in such societies, then, is likely to be viewed as an “agent” of a regime of universal truth, a “universal” intellectual. This brings up a problem, however: it appears that for Foucault, intellectuals in modem, Western societies are likely to be received and treated as “universal” intellectuals even if they intend to avoid playing this role. If such an intellectual attempted to speak in a non-universal way, to present (for example) truths that are contingent and historically constructed rather than timeless and absolute, s/he may find him/herself in the position of being misinterpreted as a “universal” intellectual by others anyway, due to his/her role as agent of the regime of truth. Foucault himself appears to have been very worried about the authority he carried as an intellectual and the misinterpretations to which his writings were subject, to the point of wishing he could be (and sometimes trying to be) anonymous in his work. 19 Indeed, he offers anonymity as a solution to the problem of misinterpretation of the intellectual’s work by his/her audience (Foucault 1996 a, 454). Perhaps he feared that his position as an intellectual encouraged his readers to believe that he was providing them with universal truths, that he was telling them what to do even when he tried not to do so. That Foucault may have been concerned about this possibility is reflected in an interview conducted in 1982 by Stephen Riggins. Riggins asks him a question in this interview that applies directly to the point under discussion here: Q: Many people look at you as someone who is able to tell them the deep truth about the world and about themselves. How do you experience this responsibility? As an intellectual, do you feel responsible toward this function of seer, of shaper of mentalities? (Foucault 1996 f, 380) Foucault responds that he is not “able to provide these people with what they expect,” but that they interpret his work as if he provides it anyway: I never behave like a prophet. My books don’t tell people what to do. And they often reproach me for not doing so (and maybe they are right) and at the same time they reproach me for behaving like a prophet. (1996 f 380) Foucault insists that he doesn’t engage in “prophecy,” that he doesn’t tell others the (universal) truth about the way things “really” are and what must be done about them. But he also points out that he has nevertheless been read by some as a prophet. Foucault argues that such a misinterpretation occurred, for example, in the reception of his early work, Madness and Civilization. This text, he asserts, has been thought by many to express “an anti-psychiatry position” when this was not at all his intent: “I have done nothing else but write the history of psychiatry until the beginning of the nineteenth century. Why should so many people, including psychiatrists, believe that I am an anti-psychiatrist?” (1996 f 380). Foucault’s first answer to his own question is that the psychiatrists “are not able to accept the real history of their institutions,” “the shameful, dirty stories of [their] beginning” (1996 f 380). But he indicates that there is more to it than this in his very next statement: “So you see, there really is a call for prophetism” (1996 f 380). One could interpret this statement as an explanation for why his work on madness was misread because his readers feel a need for “prophetism,” and look to intellectuals such as himself for what Riggins calls above “the deep truth about the world and about themselves.” Those who misinterpret Foucault as an “anti-psychiatrist” may do so because they are looking, within his genealogical study, for the universal truth about whether psychiatry, in its modern form, is good or bad and what must be done about it as a result. They may interpret the “shameful, dirty stories” of psychiatry’s beginnings as evidence of Foucault’s own opposition to it, because they expect the intellectual to stand outside of and in opposition to power on the side of a liberated and liberating truth. If psychiatry is associated with a constraining power over madness, then the intellectual is expected to be on the side of the truth about how bad psychiatry is, to be “anti-psychiatry.” Foucault complains that all he has done is trace the history of psychiatry, that he has said nothing, good or bad, about its modern practice. He may perceive that “the call to prophetism” is at fault, since he himself suggests that this call needs to be eliminated: I think we have to get rid of [the call to prophetism]. People have to build their own ethics, taking as a point of departure the historical analysis, sociological analysis and so on, one can provide for them. . . . All this prescriptive network has to be elaborated and transformed by people themselves. (1996 f 380) For people to “build their own ethics,” however, seems to require that they stop looking for “what must be done” from others such as intellectuals. If not, they will continue to find statements of universal truth even in the work of intellectuals who try explicitly to avoid them; and they will continue to find, therein, recommendations as to what they ought to do. 20 This could mean that even if the intellectual tries to work with others in developing a plan of action, tries not to impose his/her viewpoint on that of those involved in resistance, s/he may be interpreted in ways that have the same effects as if she were prophesying outright. We might think that perhaps the intellectual could work closely with “the masses” to develop the best strategies for resistance, and in the process could state his/her views as to the nature of the struggle and what ought to be done as long as these views were not expressed as universal truths. The intellectual might instead express the subjective, contingent character of his/her views and remain open to discussion of them with others. Foucault himself suggests that intellectuals ought to collaborate more closely with “the masses”: I’m not convinced that intellectuals starting from their bookish, academic, and erudite investigations can point to the essential problems of the society in which they live. On the contrary, one of the main opportunities for collaboration with “non-intellectuals” is in listening to their problems, and in working with them to formulate these problems .... (Foucault 1991b,151) It seems the intellectual might be able to recognize his/her own “academic” distance from many of the specific problems and struggles taking place around him/her, and to realize the need to listen carefully to those more directly involved instead of simply trying to convert them to his/her position. However, it may be that simply by virtue of his/her position as an intellectual, as an “agent” if the regime of truth, others may tend to consider the intellectual’s views as better than their own, as more in line with the universal truth that s/he is supposed to possess and transmit. It is possible that even if the intellectual means only to offer tentative suggestions, his/her audience may tend to give up their previous views in favor of that offered by the intellectual. This danger, if Foucault is indeed as concerned about it as I am suggesting he might be, would explain his seemingly absolute refusal to play the prophet, a refusal that leaves out even the cautious and limited suggestions the intellectual might make in collaboration with others. He insists that the intellectual avoid telling others what to do, avoid playing the prophet and instead keep silent in matters of truth and “what ought to be done.” Foucault claims that he refuses to play the prophet, and he argues that prophecy is not part of “the role of the intellectual today”: [W]hen I write a book I refuse to take a prophetic stance, that is, the one of saying to people: here is what you must do and also: this is good and this is not. (Foucault 1996 b, 262) I absolutely will not play the part of one who prescribes solutions. I hold that the role of the intellectual today is not that of establishing laws or proposing solutions or prophesying, since by doing that one can only contribute to the functioning of a determinate situation of power that to my mind must be criticized. (Foucault 1991 b, 157) By engaging in prophecy the intellectual manages to play a “universal” role as an “agent” of the regime of truth; and in so doing the intellectual contributes to “the functioning of a determinate situation of power” that, Foucault indicates here, s/he ought to criticize instead. Indeed, Foucault argues that the regime of truth is to form the main focus for the intellectual’s political efforts: “The essential political problem for the intellectual is . . . the possibility of constituting a new politics of truth. The problem is . . . the political, economic, institutional regime of truth” (Foucault 1980 g, 133). It may be that in addressing and criticizing this regime, the intellectual can undermine his/her own position as its agent and thereby reduce the “call to prophetism from others.” 21 Foucault argues that these efforts of avoiding prophecy and attacking the regime of truth can be taken up by a new kind of intellectual, one that he calls the “specific” intellectual. Rather than speaking and acting in the realm of the universal, as if s/he can propose global solutions and act as the representative of all the “specific” intellectual operates in more local arenas, addressing particular problems with special attention to their specificity. According to Foucault, the “universal” intellectual is already giving way to the “specific.” He agrees with Deleuze, who argues that intellectuals are no longer working to “represent” others: DELEUZE: A theorising intellectual, for us, is no longer a subject, a representing or representative consciousness. Those who act and struggle are no longer represented, either by a group or a union that appropriates the right to stand as their conscience. . . . Representation no longer exists; there’s only action theoretical action and practical action .... (Foucault 1997 c, 206-207) There is no more “representation,” Deleuze argues, only action; the intellectual, in other words, even when engaging in “theory,” can be considered as performing political action. Representation is no longer the model through which we view the political role of the intellectual, according to Deleuze, because our view of the relationship between theory and practice has changed. He argues that we have come to recognize that this relationship, rather than being one of a resemblance between separate, self-contained spheres, is more of a “system of relays within a larger sphere, within a multiplicity of parts that are both theoretical and practical” (Foucault 1977 a, 206). Deleuze’s point here seems to be that practice works as a relay to get us from point to point in our theories (and vice versa): “No theory can develop without eventually encountering a wall, and practice is necessary for piercing this wall” (Foucault 1977 a, 206). The strict demarcation between theory and practice is breaking down, Deleuze seems to be saying, so that it is no longer possible to consider oneself to be a “theorising intellectual” who works with words but does not thereby act. Theory and practice function instead as a “system of relays within a larger sphere,” a sphere wherein both theory and practice are political “action:” “theoretical action and practical action.” There are several ways in which theory might be considered a type of political “action.” One could say at least that the writing and disseminating of theory (especially if it is directed towards concrete and particular issues rather than universal and abstract notions) might act as a stimulant to critical thought, which is a crucial part of encouraging others to act in resistance. Perhaps Deleuze is saying that the closer theory comes to practical issues and their specific conditions and concerns, the more likely it is to stimulate discussion and action amongst its audience. It is clear at least that for Deleuze, the relationship between theory and practice is no longer one of representation, where theory stands in as the general schematic for the practice, revealing its truth. Instead, they have come to be seen, according to Deleuze, as allies who work alongside one another within the larger sphere of political action. Foucault agrees that the relationship between theory and practice is being reconsidered by intellectuals: “A new mode of the ‘connection between theory and practice’ has been established” (Foucault 1980 g, 126). This is due, he argues, to the fact that intellectuals are starting to work less in the mode of the universal, “the just and true for all,” and are focusing more and more on specific areas of inquiry. Rather than theorizing about and speaking of universal notions such as “liberty,” “justice,” and the “rights of man,” intellectuals are now more concerned with particular social and political issues in specific arenas (such as the conditions of twentieth century French prisons). This tends to change the previously dominant view of the relationship between theory and practice, Foucault implies, because in these specific inquiries intellectuals are starting to get “a much more immediate and concrete awareness of struggles” (1980 g 126). It has, in other words, brought them closer to the realm of what may have seemed a previously distant “practice.” Intellectuals who operate in more local arenas are able to experience the oppressions and abuses that might lead particular individuals (such as French prisoners) to engage in resistance against conditions and actions they find intolerable. In this way intellectuals are able to get a better understanding of the reasons why one might want to engage in struggles such as working for prisoners’ rights, what goals prisoners might want to achieve, and which strategies might work better within such struggles. Foucault also argues that this change in the relationship between theory and practice leads to a different view of the relationship of the theorizing intellectual to those involved in what used to be called “practice” - the difficult work of political struggle outside the bounds of the intellectual academy. According to Foucault, “theory does not express, translate, or serve to apply practice: it is practice.... it is an activity conducted alongside those who struggle for power, and not their illumination from a safe distance” (Foucault 1977 a, 208). If theory is no longer considered to be similar to yet separate from practice, but instead, as Foucault claims, is itself practice, then the intellectual can less easily be assumed to occupy a position separate from those engaged in struggle, in the role of their representative rather than their colleague. No longer “ahead and to the side,” the intellectual, then, even when doing “just theory,” is performing political action “alongside” those already in the fray. Perhaps Foucault means here that the intellectual who is more directly involved in particular social and political concerns and resistances will be more likely to engage in a cooperative effort with others who are similarly involved (and/or even more invested than the intellectual). The intellectual’s theorizing activities, then, might be conducted more “alongside” these others in the sense that s/he would check his/her theory more often against their views of what ought to be done, and against the specific and changing conditions of the struggle. No longer standing ahead with his/her theory, representing to others what their interests are, what their goals ought to be, and what strategies must be undertaken, this intellectual would operate more as their cooperative ally than as their leader. It appears that for Foucault, the “specific” intellectual is the figure who best embodies this confluence of theory and practice. This intellectual, according to Foucault, derives not from the “man of law,” but from a different figure: “the savant or expert,” someone with a “direct and localised relation to scientific knowledge and institutions” (Foucault 1980 g, 128). The “specific” intellectual takes on a political role when s/he “intervene[s] in contemporary political struggles in the name of a ‘local’ scientific truth” (1980 g 129). Examples of this intellectual figure abound - Foucault names the evolutionist and the atomic scientist, specifically. The atomic scientist, Foucault notes, entered crucially into political debates during the mid-twentieth century, as he “[had] at his disposal, whether in the service of the State or against it, powers which can either benefit or irrevocably destroy life” (1980 g 129). But this is only a particular example of a more general figure, one whose relationship to a precise kind of scientific knowledge affects his role in the political realm - he no longer enters as a representative of all, as the bearer of universal truth and values; rather, he takes on the figure of the expert, the one with a specific kind of scientific knowledge that gives him something to contribute to the discussion of political issues. As this type of intellectual gained prominence in the West, Foucault argues, we see the waning of the intellectual’s “universal” function: “we are at present experiencing the disappearance of the figure of the ‘great writer’” (1980 g 129). 22 It is clear that Foucault finds certain aspects of the “specific” intellectual attractive. Rather than purporting to speak for all, to represent all, this intellectual invokes a particular, localized knowledge and addresses quite specific issues. Accordingly, he is able to engage in “local, specific struggles” against “local form[s] of power,” something which Foucault indicates is quite significant: “[i]t would be a dangerous error to discount him politically . . .” (Foucault 1980 g, 130, 131). The specific intellectual engages in political struggles on a “real, material, everyday” level, considering issues and questions that are much more concrete and local than the lofty, universal rights and dignities invoked by the “universal” intellectual (1980 g 126). A specific intellectual could be involved in community struggles against local problems such as a manufacturing plant closure, the relocation of a hazardous waste facility, etc. Throughout much of his work Foucault emphasizes such specificity, particularity, and localization over notions of universality in terms of political issues and struggles. Thus there are some ways in which one could say Foucault himself is a “specific” intellectual. 23 He nevertheless notes a number of dangers associated with this intellectual position, and suggests that it may need to be modified. Some of the problems involved with the political role of the “specific” intellectual have to do with its specificity. Foucault notes that this intellectual runs several risks involved with the “local” character of his political work: The danger of remaining at the level of conjunctural struggles, pressing demands restricted to particular sectors. The risk of letting himself be manipulated by the political parties or trade union apparatuses which control these local struggles. Above all, the risk of being unable to develop these struggles for lack of a global strategy or outside support.... (Foucault 1980 g, 130) Working on a more specific and local level than the “universal” intellectual, this figure runs the risk of his work being, for that reason, less effective on a larger scale. For example, a “specific” intellectual who struggles alongside university staff workers to achieve better wages, benefits, and working conditions may end up limiting his arguments in such a way that they apply only to a particular group; more widespread issues of workers’ struggle for a living wage are not necessarily helped by this, as arguments which work in a university setting may not work for a commercial or industrial setting. Still, one might ask why Foucault is concerned at all about connecting local, discontinuous struggles to each other. Might it not be enough that the intellectual intervene in specific struggles in ways that are effective there, but that cannot easily translate to other arenas? After all, Foucault criticizes the idea of trying to unite all strategies of resistance under one, global and universal program, and emphasizes the need for multiple, particular efforts. Why, then, would he be so concerned that such efforts might not be easily linked up into larger structures? One reason may be because if efforts at change are restricted to isolated locales, they may not bring about transformation in some of the more general structures of discourse and practice that contribute to the problems experienced on the local level. It is indeed the case that for Foucault power does not have a single, unitary nature that permeates all power relationships, and that it can and does operate differently in different contexts; but this does not mean that there are no aspects to it that cut more generally. According to Foucault power operates from the bottom up: the multiple, various mechanisms of power in specific locales, “which each have their own history, their own trajectory, their own techniques and tactics,. . . have been and continue to be invested, colonised, utilised, involuted, transformed, displaced, extended, etc., by evermore general mechanisms and by forms of global domination” (Foucault 1980 h, 99). 24 There are general aspects to power that affect various, specific relations of power in multiple locations; it is just that this does not occur due to an imposition of power from the top down as something with a singular structure. For example, the relations of power in which university staff and migrant farm workers find themselves may share general aspects such as attitudes about work ethic and loyalty to one’s employer that manage to keep workers dedicated even under the most difficult working conditions and low pay scales. Making changes in each specific locale may ameliorate conditions there for a time, but if we do not address the more general aspects of power such as the deeper attitudes that inform working conditions (though these general attitudes may have been developed from the bottom up, according to Foucault, they still nevertheless can have effects in the other direction once they are established). Further, Foucault seems concerned to promote change on a grander scale than a few isolated arenas, even if this change must take place through addressing these specific arenas in their heterogeneity rather than through offering a global plan for change. This might be more easily effected if each of these multiple efforts at resistance and change were not utterly isolated, but incorporated themes and goals that could translate to other arenas because this might then work to stimulate others into engaging in their own efforts at resistance. If the university staff workers can see some of their own concerns reflected in the struggles of the migrant farm workers, they might be encouraged to think more critically about their own situation and perhaps to work towards change themselves. Finally, the isolation of particular efforts at resistance can weaken these efforts because it can reduce their ability to recruit support from others, to enter into the coalitions often necessary to bring about change in majority-led democracies. Foucault mentions a struggle concerning penal reform in France during the 1970 s as an example where this problem with isolation can be readily seen. This struggle, he argues, “has developed ‘in solitary’, among social workers and ex-prisoners,” and one result is that it has taken on a “whole naive, archaic ideology which makes the criminal at once into the innocent victim and the pure rebel -- society’s scapegoat and the young wolf of future revolutions” (Foucault 1980 g, 130). Developed “in solitary,” separated from other movements and political strategies, this struggle isolated itself from those not involved in it, who see deep problems with the tone and substance of the reformers’ arguments. Many do not agree with the view of the convicted criminal as an “innocent victim,” or “society’s scapegoat,” and would certainly not join any revolution with the criminal as its “young wolf.” Consequently, the struggle that formulates its strategies and goals with this kind of rhetoric manages to bring about little change, and continues only to repeat “its monotonous, lyrical little chant, heard only among a few small groups” (1980 g 130). We must address efforts at resistance to the specifics of particular struggles, but in so doing we must not ignore the value of being able to also forge links between them. In an interview first published in 1977 Foucault provides an indication of how such a linkage of heterogeneous struggles may be possible. There, he indicates that it is the regime of truth that can serve as a ground for connecting various efforts at resistance to power. In addition, the intellectual acting as an “agent” of the regime of truth can help bring about this connection. The intellectual’s position as an “agent” of this regime may serve as a danger for the intellectual’s political efforts, since it can encourage a “call to prophetism”; but through this position the intellectual may also be able to link up the multiple, discontinuous struggles in which he and others may be engaged. Foucault indicates that the regime of truth has a somewhat general character that allows the specific struggles in which the intellectual participates to be connected into larger movements of resistance. According to Foucault, “(t]he intellectual can operate and struggle at the general level of that regime of truth which is so essential to the structure and functioning of society”; and it is for this reason that “his position can take on a general significance and that his local, specific struggles can have effects and implications which are not simply professional or sectoral” (Foucault 1980 g, 132). Foucault’s meaning here is not entirely clear. We can make an initial approach to it by noting that Foucault treats the “regime of truth” as something both general and specific - as diffused and multiple, but also as something unable to sustain attacks on local levels without also being affected on a more general level. Perhaps Foucault is saying that if the intellectual attacks the mechanisms that work to produce truth in the specific arena in which he works, and if he refuses to serve as the “establisher of truth” there, somehow this may also affect the more general, societal “regime of truth.” The problem of how to link up various efforts at resistance may be best approached within the context of Foucault’s role as an intellectual exile. If we consider the Foucauldian intellectual as one who plays a “universal” role while also exiling him/herself from it, this provides us with an interesting way to explain how the specific struggles in which s/he engages can be linked up into practices of resistance with a more extensive impact. As I discuss in detail in Chapter Three, in playing a “universal” role, the intellectual speaks and acts as if s/he were appealing to universal truths, working through them to undermine faith in them. In this sense, the intellectual may be received as if s/he is, indeed, addressing problems in a more general way even when working on a specific level. For example, in Madness and Civilization Foucault focuses on practices of treating madness that took place within a limited time period in a particular region, mainly Europe from the sixteenth through the eighteenth century. Yet in so doing he manages to bring up more general questions about society’s relation to madness not just the society under discussion in the text, but also that of Foucault’s readers, in their various times and places. Though Madness and Civilization does not discuss any modern practices, it can lead us to question them. As a kind of historical narrative, this text purports to reveal some of the predecessors of modern practices, providing an indication of how they may have developed; and further, (like Foucault’s other genealogies) it shows this history to be one of accidents, errors and reversals. 25 Consequently, readers of Madness and Civilization may come to think that modem practices and the beliefs about madness that underlie them are not as solidly “true” or “right” as might have been formerly thought, that instead they may be the result of contingent accidents. Part of the force of this phenomenon may lie in Foucault’s own exile position. Speaking as a “universal” intellectual in exile, Foucault may be interpreted as if he is addressing a kind of universal question about “society’s relationship to madness,” as if there were a universal truth about this. This would give his discourse a generality that, on its face, it might otherwise appear to lack. Yet as an exile, Foucault does not remain in the position of a “universal” intellectual; rather, he moves through this position in order to encourage others to question it and the universal truths to which he seems to make appeal. In this way, Foucault’s “localized” discourse may take on a “universal” character while also managing to undermine this universality from within. After distinguishing between the “universal” and the “specific” intellectual roles and noting that the latter needs to be “[r]econsidered but not abandoned,” Foucault concludes that what needs to be modified in the “specific” intellectual function is a greater focus on the regime of truth and the intellectual’s place in it. In other words, according to Foucault what is now important for the intellectual’s political role is to somehow address this regime as a “specific” figure, on a local level: It seems to me that what must now be taken into account in the intellectual is not the ‘bearer of universal values’. Rather, it’s the person occupying a specific position but whose specificity is linked, in a society like ours, to the general functioning of an apparatus of truth. (Foucault 1980 g, 132) For Foucault in the late 19705, then, the political role of the intellectual is a “specific” one, but one that is also linked to “the general functioning of an apparatus of truth” to the “regime of truth.” Even as s/he works in specific, local struggles, the intellectual’s societal position binds him/her to the larger regime of truth especially if s/he is connected with a university or other apparatus of truth. But even if s/he is not so directly connected with the official institutions of the regime of truth, his/her position as an intellectual already confers the status of “truthprovider,” and thus links him/her to the larger regime whereby truth is produced. The intellectual’s political role, then, is centered around this regime it forms “[t]he essential political problem for the intellectual” (1980 g 133). For a long period, the ‘left’ intellectual.... was heard, or purported to make himself heard, as the spokesman of the universal. To be an intellectual meant something like being the consciousness/conscience of us all. I think we have here an idea transposed from Marxism, from a faded Marxism indeed. Just as the proletariat... is the bearer of the universal (but its immediate, unreflected bearer, barely conscious of itself as such), so the intellectual, through his moral, theoretical and political choice, aspires to be 1 James Miller presents another important aspect of the Doctor’s Plot not mentioned by Foucault himself in the interview with Trombadori quoted above: “This putative plot was first ‘unmasked’ by Soviet newspapers in January, 1953. In a series of inflammatory articles, Party journalists charged that a cabal of traitorous doctors, most with ties to an international Jewish organization, had conspired to murder prominent Bolsheviks and to poison Stalin himself.... The slanderous accusation pandered to anti-Semitic sentiments and provoked a government sponsored campaign to purge Jews from positions of public responsibility in the Soviet Union The blatant racism of this propaganda initiative, combined with the evident mendacity of the charges, left [Foucault] aghast . . .” (Miller 1993, 58). 2 “What strikes me about Marxist analyses is that it’s always a question of “class struggle,” but less attention is paid to one word in this expression, namely “struggle.” . . . [W]hen they speak of “class struggle” . . . they worry especially about defining this class, where it is situated, who it encompasses, but never concretely about the nature of the struggle” (Foucault 1996 d, 224-225). Foucault is here presenting the idea of “struggle” in a positive light in general, though one may well wonder if perhaps he would view some kinds of struggle as better than others (e.g., the struggle of workers against oppressive working conditions would probably be viewed more favorably by Foucault than the struggle of neo-nazis to garner permits to hold marches in communities that are trying to keep them out). Still, as I argue in Chapter Two, rather than saying precisely which kinds of actions against power are good and which are not, Foucault claims that he wants to leave this decision up to others. In so doing, he indicates that any and all efforts to resist relations of power that individuals or groups find oppressive are moves in a positive direction. 3 Of course, if one believes one’s science to provide (or come as close as possible to) universal truths, then the idea of disqualifying other claims and beliefs is not problematic - one would then simply be disqualifying falsehoods in the name of truth. But Foucault questions and criticizes the notion that the truths we find through science or other processes of thought can be universal and absolute. According to Foucault, all truth claims have a history, and by investigating this history we can find that they are contingent and therefore malleable. For Foucault, when we make claims to universal truth, then, we are taking something contingent and giving it a status meant to disqualify other beliefs and knowledges. This is more a practice of power than one of protecting “truth.” I explain Foucault’s view of truth in detail in Chapter Two. The various communist parties . . . did not respond to this by saying: perhaps we ought to take it into consideration; rather, the response was: if it is something new, it is a danger and therefore an adversary. (Foucault 1996 b, 256) 4 ln an interview from 1978 Foucault notes that the most intense criticism of his work by Marxists was directed towards The Order of Things. His interviewer (Duccio Trombadori) argues that in that text Foucault underestimates Marx’s cultural and socio-political importance by refusing to acknowledge that with the advent of Marxism came an “epistemological break with an entire cultural horizon” (Foucault 1991 b, 103). For this, Foucault recalls, there was intense criticism from Marxists, who even sent him “insulting letters” (1991 b 107). s Foucault illustrates his point here with an example drawn from Marxist criticisms of his own work: “There is hardly any relationship between what I have actually said and the things they attribute to me. . . . [T]hey are well-skilled in telling lies .... They know very well that every honest reader, reading what has been written about me and what I myself have written, will see that these [things they have written] are lies” (Foucault 1996 b, 257). 6 See note four, above. 7 Foucault lists three consequences of focusing on the State as an element of Marxist struggles. First, the revolutionary movement itself becomes like the State in order to fight it: “[it] must possess equivalent politico-military forces and hence must constitute itself as a party, organised internally in the same way as a State apparatus with the same mechanisms of hierarchies and organisation of powers” (Foucault 1980 a, 59). Second, it is clear that through the revolutionary takeover of the State, even though this apparatus will be undermined, it must be kept intact to some extent so that it can be “employed against the class enemy” (1980 a 60). Finally, the revolutionaries will have to find someone to run the state, and they will have to call on “the old class which is acquainted with he apparatus, namely the bourgeoisie” (1980 a 60). Foucault concludes that it was some such series of events that took place in the U.S.S.R., and indicates that revolutionary movements that are similarly focused on the State will likely suffer a similar fate. and Punish includes in-depth discussions of how power works to discipline individuals through addressing itself to their bodies, creating what he calls “docile bodies” (see especially Foucault (1995, 135-169). Foucault’s three-volume History of Sexuality explains how bodies are subjected to practices of power in regard to issues of sexuality and its ethical dimensions (Foucault 1990 a; 1990 b; 1988 a). 9 See Foucault (1995, 3-31) for an overview of how Discipline and Punish is meant by Foucault as a genealogical history of the development of the modern soul through practices of power that address themselves to the body. 10 In Chapter Two I discuss in significant depth how, according to Foucault, the modern conception of the “individual” (and the way we modern individuals conceive of ourselves, experience ourselves as subjects) is produced through practices of disciplinary and normalizing power. I then take up again the question of how subjectivity is produced by power in Chapter Five, where I consider Foucault’s suggestion that we can conceive of ourselves as works of art as an alternative to the way subjectivity has been produced through discipline and normalization. 1 is not to say that for Foucault, it would be better if the subject had no connection to power at all. As I argue in later chapters, this is not only impossible, according to Foucault, it is not even promising as a utopian dream. It is not the case that for Foucault power is all “bad,” and the goal is to try to eliminate it in as many aspects of life as possible. Rather, some relations of power are more problematic than others in that they are more oppressive and constraining, leaving less room for resistance and freedom of thought and action (though which relations of power are “bad” enough to warrant resisting is a decision Foucault leaves to others to make it is up to those involved in the particular relations at issue to decide when the constraints are strong enough to require efforts at changing them). It is necessary to recognize the ways in which our conception of subjectivity is connected to power in order to decide which of these connections are acceptable and which are not. 12 Even if the intellectual were acknowledged to be fallible, even if his statements about justice might not, indeed, be true, the “universal” intellectual according to Foucault was someone who worked under the assumption that such absolute truth (in the political realm, among others) was at least possible; and the intellectual was one of the more likely candidates of persons who had access to this truth. Thus the universal intellectual , Foucault argues, spoke as if\\e were pronouncing the true and the just for all, and this was recognized as a legitimate political role. 13 The term “spokesman” is Foucault’s (1980 g 126), and I follow his lead in using male pronouns in describing the universal intellectual. I do so not to indicate that male intellectuals in general are more likely to be of the “universal” type than female ones; rather, I want to emphasize that under Foucault’s own description, if this is the character of the intellectual that was dominant in the past, such a figure (who not only spoke as the voice of truth, but was acknowledged as having the right of speaking thusly) was, indeed, most likely to be male. Of course, the universal function of the intellectual can now be taken up more easily by both male and female intellectuals than has generally been the case in the history of the Western intellectual, given that men and women enjoy relatively more equal footing in their status as intellectuals in many fields now, at the end of the twentieth century. Still, the question of gender in the issue of the intellectual function is an important one that seems to be entirely ignored by Foucault, whether considering the past or present situation of intellectuals. It is not a question that I take up here in any detail, as my focus lies in explicating and analyzing what Foucault himself said about intellectuals and how he comported himself as an intellectual. The issue of gender ought to be considered a significant part of any future development of the intellectual role of “prophet in exile,” but I leave it as an open question in the present inquiry into the basic structure of this role. 14 1 focus on Deleuze in this section because he provides a more in-depth discussion of the changing relationship between theory and practice than does Foucault in this “conversation” between the two. This shift in how theory and practice are viewed is connected to the change in the role of the intellectual in important ways, as discussed below. It is clear from the discussion in “Intellectuals and Power” that Foucault agrees with Deleuze’s estimation of the relationship between theory and practice, and Foucault himself praises Deleuze’s work in an essay in the same volume entitled “Theatrum Philosophicum” (Foucault 1977 d). There Foucault discusses in more general terms the necessity of thinking difference beyond dialectics, beyond the models of opposition, negation and representation. Such a discussion could certainly be transferred over to the following evaluation of the relationship between theory and practice given by Deleuze i.e. it seems clear Foucault would agree, since what Deleuze seems to be trying to do in this section is problematize the view of theory and practice that would make of them self-enclosed realms whose difference is expressed in terms of negation (theory is not practice, and vice versa) and representation (theory represents practice). 15 In Chapter Four I discuss in detail how trying to “liberate” oneself or “the truth” from power can end up mainly supporting and perpetuating the relations of power from which one hopes to achieve liberation. 16 The situation described here is one where the intellectual is relatively far removed from the particular struggles and efforts at resistance being proposed or undertaken, is not himself directly involved in the specific power relations at issue. This would be the case for an intellectual who lives his life mainly at an academic institution without having direct experience with, for example, the conditions and concerns of workers at an automobile factory. If this intellectual takes on a “universal” role, he may believe himself to possess, and act as if he possesses, the right answers as to how auto workers ought to conduct their labor struggles. Foucault’s point here is that in such a situation, the workers themselves may have a better idea than the intellectual if, when, and how to engage in resistance. It is of course still possible that intellectuals may be more directly involved with specific relations of power and struggles against them; in which case this criticism of intellectual prescription may not apply. 17 0ne might argue that even if this were the case, it would follow only that those involved in those particular struggles in France at that time no longer need the intellectual to tell them what to do. Foucault, however, generalizes from this example to indicate that the intellectual is no longer needed by anyone engaging in resistance to act as their representative and their prophet. This is a problematic conclusion given the evidence upon which it is based. In a later section of this chapter I consider other problems with the claim that the representative and legislative function of the intellectual is dead. 1 B The point being made here by Foucault and Deleuze that “the masses” no longer need the intellectual is problematic. Empirically, it seems false; and in that case it is important to ask why Foucault and Deleuze insist on saying otherwise. In a later section of this chapter I consider several criticisms of this pronouncement that the intellectual is no longer needed to play any kind of representative role. 19 See the interview with Foucault entitled “The Masked Philosopher,” where he insisted on remaining anonymous (though clearly he did not do so forever, since we now know it was his voice in the interview) (Foucault 1996 j). Foucault states in this interview that he wished to give it anonymously “[o]ut of nostalgia for the time when, being completely unknown, what I said had some chance of being heard” (Foucault 1996 j, 302). He argues that an author’s name attached to a text tends to clutter the ideas presented therein if that author is already known to the reader. The latter will tend to judge the new text on the basis of previous ones, or on the basis of what s/he has heard about the author through others or through the media. Too often, Foucault laments, they will think a text, an idea, etc. good or bad simply on the reputation of the author as determined by structures of power in the society: contrary to what often happens, Foucault insists that he “will never be persuaded that a book is bad because its author was seen on television. Or that it is good for the same reason” (Foucault 1996 j, 303). He proposes what he here calls a “game,” that “[f]or one year books will be published without the author’s name” (Foucault 1996 j, 302). In an interview conducted four years later, Foucault still holds the same view: “[T]he only law for book publication, the only law concerning the book that I would like to see passed, would be to prohibit the use of the author’s name more than once ... in order that each book might be read for itself. There are books for which recognition of the author provides the key to their intelligibility. But outside of a few great authors, this knowledge of the author’s name has no real use. It serves only as a screen” (Foucault 1996 a, 454). Such statements by Foucault show that he was very concerned about how his texts were received by his audience, and how they might be distorted and misinterpreted. But the form this concern takes seems to reveal a desire that is antithetical to Foucault’s own criticisms of the universal intellectual function. In wanting to take the author’s name off a text (his own or others), Foucault indicates that he hopes the ideas presented therein will be taken on their own, analyzed and evaluated without being cluttered by the readers’ association of them with a particular author. But this sounds like a situation where ideas seem to come from nowhere in particular, presented without acknowledging the perspective of their author. This would appear to incorporate precisely the kind of “suprahistorical perspective,” “faceless anonymity,” and “apocalyptic objectivity” that Foucault elsewhere criticizes due to the tendency of such efforts to indicate pronouncements of universal, ahistorical truths (Foucault 1977 b, 158, 152). In other words, while writing as an intellectual and identifying that fact by attaches one’s name to one’s texts may indeed run the risk of having one’s texts read as presenting universal truths due to the expectations placed on intellectuals by audiences, the attempt to adopt a “faceless anonymity” may do the same (if not, perhaps, in an even stronger way). Thanks to Kathleen Higgins for bringing this point to my attention. is perhaps not being entirely fair in this interview to those he characterizes as misinterpreting his work, since Madness and Civilization does at times seem to champion a madness that is constrained by a power construed in mainly negative terms power is there often described as that which represses madness, holds it down, attempts to push it away, hide it from view and eventually eliminate it. Foucault admits as much in an interview first published in 1977: “Until [The Order of Things], it seems to me that I accepted the traditional conception of power, power as an essentially legal mechanism, what the law says, that which forbids, that which says no, with a whole string of negative effects: exclusion, rejection, barriers, denial, dissimulation, etc. Now I find that conception inadequate. It was enough for me, however, in Madness and Civilization . . . , for madness is a privileged case: during the classical period, power was exercised over madness primarily in the form of exclusion. ... So ... I was able to use, without too many problems, a purely negative conception of power” (Foucault 1996 k, 207). One of the problems he may have faced with using “a purely negative conception of power” in Madness and Civilization could have been that his audience ends up misinterpreting his text if the power associated with psychiatry’s development (and of which it is possible to find signs in modern psychiatric practice) is presented by Foucault as mainly repressive of madness, then it is not surprising that his readers might conclude that he holds an “anti-psychiatry” position. If power is thought to constrain simply by saying “no,” it would seem that the obvious response to it would be to champion the “other side” of this “no,” that which is repressed and held down; and to negate the negative use of power itself by expressing an “anti-psychiatry” view. Little wonder that some interpret his work in this book as providing “simple cheers” for the “‘good side’ of insanity”: “long live insanity” (Foucault 1996 d, 222). I analyze the “negative” conception of power, and the problems associated with it according to Foucault, in detail in Chapter Two. 21 Whether and how the Foucauldian intellectual can eliminate the “call to prophetism” is a very complex matter that I discuss in detail in Chapter Three. use of the atomic scientist or the evolutionist as examples of specific intellectuals is confusing, since both of these figures make appeal to universal truths in regard to their own “scientific” claims. Perhaps Foucault is referring to a difference in how the scientific knowledge of such intellectuals is put to use the atomic scientist, Foucault indicates here, started to use his knowledge to intervene in specific political debates (regarding the use and abuse of atomic weapons). He acted as an “expert” not in order to act as “the rhapsodist of the eternal,” theorizing about universal goodness and justice; rather, he brought his expert knowledge to bear on more particular, concrete issues (Foucault 1980 g, 129). But there is still the problem that in doing so this intellectual still searches for and speaks as if he possesses universal, scientific truths. It is likely in part for this reason that Foucault claims that “we are now at a point where the function of the specific intellectual needs to be reconsidered .... but not abandoned” (Foucault 1980 g, 130). After making this point Foucault goes on to argue that the intellectual, while continuing to operate in local and specific arenas, ought to be more cognizant of the workings of the regime of truth, and address it as a problem (1980 g 130-131). This indicates that while the atomic scientist and others in a similar position may have provided an early model for the specific intellectual, their ties to universal truths (and the power connected to these) need to be reconsidered and problematized by the modern, specific intellectual. 23 For the most part, Foucault eschews appeals to universal truths and values, to “global” solutions to social and political problems. However, there are aspects of his work wherein he does not hold to this avoidance of the universal. One might point, for example, to his prescriptive remarks about the role of the intellectual: e.g., “I hold that the role of the intellectual today is not that of establishing laws or proposing solutions or prophesying . . .” (Foucault 1991 b, 157). On the other hand, we could say in Foucault’s defense that he does qualify his statement by arguing that this is the role of the intellectual “today,” rather than universally, absolutely. He may therefore be generalizing about intellectuals, but not offering as global or universal a view as one that was less situated historically. Nevertheless, I argue in Chapter Three that Foucault does make appeal to more universal truths and values in his genealogical texts, but that we can read this as part of a particular kind of intellectual role he may be playing: that of a “prophet in exile.” I explain how Foucault may be able to utilize universal truths while also bringing his audience to question them, thereby undermining the very universal claims to which he also makes appeal. 24 1 discuss this operation of power from the “bottom up” in more detail in Chapter Two. 25 In Chapter Three I discuss the kinds of accidents and errors Foucault locates in the history of treatments of madness. II The Intellectual as Exile That Foucault criticizes the “universal” intellectual position does not mean that he exits it entirely, nor that he suggests other intellectuals do so. There are problems associated with this role, certainly, but these will not be alleviated by trying to move completely outside of it. If the intellectual attempts to oppose this role entirely, s/he will end up in the position of its negative underside, a position that is just as “universal” as its “other side.” Instead of providing truths meant to be universal and absolute, the intellectual would be rejecting these, universally and absolutely. By saying “no” to the “universal” intellectual role, then, one merely reinstates it on the other side -- one plays a role of universal opposition. Instead of attempting such an exit, Foucault engages in a movement of exile from the role of the “universal” intellectual. The “specific” intellectual of which he speaks, and which seems to fit his own work to some extent, could be considered not as one who rejects the “universal” intellectual function entirely, but who occupies it while also maintaining a critical distance from it. This movement of exile can help the intellectual avoid being a “universal” intellectual, through the process of acting as one. In Chapter Three I explain in detail how this movement of exile might be possible by providing a reading of Foucauldian genealogy that exhibits an exile on Foucault’s part. At this point, I think it possible to take the outline of the idea of intellectual exile presented here so far and note how viewing Foucault’s political intellectual as an “exile” provides a helpful context in which to address some of the problems that remain from the above discussion. Some of these difficulties have to do with the way the intellectual is viewed by others, how his/her discourse and actions are interpreted by his/her audience. First, I think Foucault’s concerns about the intellectual’s use of power when s/he speaks the truth may be exaggerated, at least insofar as we might try to adopt Foucault’s views to modern American intellectuals. Foucault, of course, was most directly acquainted with the way intellectuals were received in France in the mid- to late twentieth century; but if we are to take up his suggestions for the political role of the intellectual in our own time and place, it will be helpful to consider which aspects of it do not seem to fit our situation. It is not clear that the intellectual in modern America is in a dangerous enough position as an “agent” of the regime of truth to justify what seems to be an absolute avoidance of making claims to truth and of giving suggestions as to what others should do. While it is true that some intellectuals may be treated by the American public as purveyors of truth in the sense described above, it is far from clear that all intellectuals, as intellectuals, are viewed in this light. Anecdotal evidence can likely be provided by nearly any group of modem American intellectuals that audiences sometimes treat the intellectual as if s/he is “out of touch,” stuck in a lofty tower spinning out abstractions that the public either cannot understand or finds implausible if they do. Intellectuals’ recommendations as to what others ought to do are not always taken seriously by “the masses.” Though I agree that intellectuals can be received as agents of the regime of truth, I don’t think that this danger is as great, here and now, as Foucault seems to suggest. 26 Further, we have to consider carefully what kinds of intellectual figures we are talking about here, since some intellectual figures may be considered by their audiences to have more authority as agents of the regime of truth than others. There are of course differences in intellectual status due to considerations such as the prestige of the institution to which one is attached, the popularity of one’s writings amongst one’s peers or the general public, etc. But intellectuals are also received variously by the public according to things like gender, ethnic, cultural, national, and religious differences and affiliations. For example, it is quite possible that white male intellectuals are more likely to be treated as agents of the regime of truth in modem America than female intellectuals of color. I think that a detailed discussion of how intellectuals are received by “the masses” in a particular society is required to support the claim that the intellectual is an “agent” of the regime of truth, and within this discussion one must be sure to consider carefully the differences between intellectuals that could lead to some being considered to wield more power than others (e.g., gender and ethnic differences). Foucault has not provided us with such an analysis, and his insistence that the intellectual not tell others what to do, apparently for fear of a problematic use of intellectual power thereby, seems therefore unjustified in the strong form in which he presents it. Certainly, the relation of power that exists between the intellectual who speaks the truth (even a contingent one) and his/her audience is dangerous, and Foucault is right to point out the ways in which intellectual prophecy can be oppressive, drowning out the voices of those directly involved in resistance. But he seems to respond to this danger in an extreme way, suggesting that intellectuals remain entirely silent on the issue of telling others what is good/bad and what must be done they must refuse to be prophets rather than provide any notion of truth as to what others ought to think and do. Another problem with Foucault’s refusal to prophecy is that it leads him to an apparent inconsistency. Recall that the intellectual may continue to be viewed as a “universal” one even if s/he is intending not to play this role (due to his/her position as an “agent” of the regime of truth). This means that it would be very easy for an audience to take what Foucault or another “specific” intellectual says in relation to particular, local issues and “globalize” it. Foucault himself argues that he doesn’t try to “universalize” what he says, that his objective “isn’t to propose a global principle for analysing society” (Foucault 1996 i, 275, 285). But he may be read by others as doing so anyway. How can the intellectual guard against this happening? Should s/he even try? It seems Foucault would answer in the affirmative, since he himself insists in interviews that his work is not to be seen in this way. But notice what is then happening: Foucault is dealing with how he is viewed by others through the means of telling others how to view him. In other words, he is playing the part of the intellectual as leader, telling others what to think and do by insisting that they not look to him for answers as to what to think and do. Similarly, while Foucault claims that the “specific” intellectual does not act as a representative or leader for others, what should happen if they still choose to view him/her this way? According to Foucault, intellectuals need no longer act as representatives or leaders for the masses, to provide them with knowledge they are to operate “alongside” those who struggle, not ahead of them. The Foucauldian intellectual is to work as an ally, addressing the regime of truth in order to help those who already know what to do, what the struggle is about, and how it should be undertaken. The intellectual as ally functions as any other member of the struggling group as one doing his or her part in the area in which s/he can best be of use. It is certainly possible for the intellectual to view him or herself in this way, and to try to act accordingly; but the problem is that this does not mean s/he will always be viewed by others in this way. It may happen that, within a particular area of struggle, a group of people decides that they want the intellectual to be their representative, to speak for them. Given the intellectual’s position of power as a part of the regime of truth (since s/he is often seen as a “keeper of the truth”), it would not be surprising to find the intellectual being called upon to function in such a representative capacity. Many factors may contribute to this: his/her words may carry more weight than those of a non-intellectual, s/he may be able to attract media attention more easily, etc. 27 In addition, s/he may be called upon to act as a leader, of a sort, within the struggling group itself. Here, rather than representing the group and its struggle to the rest of society, the intellectual would be representing the group to itself, as it were working to combine various ideas and interests into a plan for action, helping to resolve disputes, etc. The intellectual may even garner “followers” outside the particular groups in whose struggles s/he engages, people who admire his/her work and treat him/her as an authority from which they discover “what to do.” What is the intellectual to do when called upon to step “ahead” in such ways? S/he could simply demur as an “individual,” saying that s/he is not comfortable doing so, etc. -- but that doesn’t seem to help address the problem that the intellectual would like others to stop viewing all intellectuals as representatives or leaders. For that, s/he will have to tell others how to consider and deal with intellectuals; s/he will have to tell them “what to do.” Foucault himself struggled with this problem, as is evidenced by the number of times he insists in interviews that he does not mean to act as a “prophet.” To add to the examples of such statements already given above: What I write does not prescribe anything, neither to myself nor to others. (Foucault 1991 b, 29) Ido not wish, as an intellectual, to play the moralist or the prophet.. .. The masses have come of age, politically and morally. They’re the ones who’ve got to choose individually and collectively. (1991 b 172) It is possible that he felt the need to insist so adamantly that he was not acting like a prophet because others continued to treat him as one. What is the Foucauldian intellectual to do if and when others view him as a representative, leader, or prophet? Foucault may have chosen to address the problem by telling others not to view him in this way. This, however, brings up an apparent inconsistency: Foucault ends up telling others “what to do” by saying that they shouldn’t turn to him to find out “what to do.” The above difficulties are part of a more general issue regarding the relationship between the intellectual and the “masses.” In their conversation entitled “Intellectuals and Power,” Foucault and Deleuze speak of closing the gap, in a sense, between the intellectual and the “masses.” Besides the problems associated with speaking of the “masses” as one, unified body, there is a different problem related to the above discussion: Foucault and Deleuze both argue that the masses no longer need the intellectual for guidance, and yet Foucault also claims in other texts that the intellectual (even in the “specific” function) is the “object and instrument” of the regime of truth. 28 In other words, there is a tension between Foucault’s claims that the “universal” intellectual position is already waning, that intellectuals have begun to give it up because they realize the masses no longer need the intellectual to act as representative and prophet, and his claims that the intellectual ought to work to encourage the waning of the “universal” intellectual, to undermine his/her position as “object and instrument” of the regime of truth. Indeed, that Foucault deems it necessary to discuss and prescribe “the essential political problem for the intellectual” at all, saying that it is to address the regime of truth, indicates that the waning of the “universal” intellectual is not occurring all on its own but requires some kind of encouragement from Foucault himself. There is an unresolved tension between the claim that “representation no longer exists” and the indications in Foucault’s assertions about the role of the intellectual that it continues to do so. Not only does the former claim fail to hold up empirically, since neither intellectuals nor their audiences have even now (nor in 1972, when the claim was made in the conversation between Deleuze and Foucault) given up entirely on the function of the intellectual as representative; the fact that it is made even without empirical justification tends to give it the character of “representation” itself. 29 R. Radhakrishnan addresses these kinds of difficulties in an essay entitled “Toward an Effective Intellectual: Foucault or Gramsci?”. Among other things, Radhakrishnan asks about the position of Foucault and Deleuze themselves in relation to what they are saying in their conversation regarding intellectuals: If it is true that the people have found their voice, and furthermore, that Foucault and Deleuze are ‘in the way’ of the people’s movement, how then do we understand and interpret the ‘representations’ that Foucault and Deleuze are compulsively producing about the nature of the movement?” (Radhakrishnan 1990, 68) In other words, if the masses no longer need the intellectual to guide them, then what is the status of Foucault’s and Deleuze’s statements about the role of the intellectual? If the masses already know that they don’t need intellectual representation, why the insistence by these two intellectuals that this is the case? To whom are these statements directed? Are they meant as “representations,” once again, of what the masses need? Are Foucault and Deleuze telling the masses to no longer listen to the intellectual? Radhakrishnan suggests that this may be the case, that Foucault still continues to speak as a “representative” even while declaring that he is not doing so. According to Radhakrishnan, “the masses continue being spoken for by Foucault” (1990, 74) for example, he is telling them that “representation is dead,” that they no longer need him, that they already “know perfectly well.” Radhakrishnan rightly asks, “What are the masses themselves saying?” (1990, 74). Foucault isn’t listening, Radhakrishnan indicates, since he argues that Foucault “will not allow his agenda to be interrogated, transformed, and recontextualized by the agenda of the ‘masses’” (1990, 75). Radhakrishnan argues that Foucault does not go far enough in problematizing his own position as an intellectual, that he declares himself free of all “global” systems while still participating in them. Another way of putting this point is to say that Foucault does not succeed in closing the gap between himself and the “masses” - he does not operate “alongside” those who struggle, but still stands “ahead” of them. According to Radhakrishnan, Foucault insists on his own agenda for what an intellectual is and should do, regardless of what the masses might say. Radhakrishnan himself does not argue for a complete closure of this gap, but instead holds that there can be a different kind of “representative” relation between the intellectual and others than that which Foucault criticizes: “[b]etween the leaders and the people there can be a sense of an active political community that makes the act of representation genuine and historically real” (Radhakrishnan 1990, 73). It is possible, Radhakrishnan argues, to have intellectuals who act as representatives in a positive way, avoiding many of the problems noted above with the “universal” intellectual position. An intellectual can work closely with the participants in particular social and political movements and manage thereby a fruitful and non-coercive leadership. Radhakrishnan provides several examples: Martin Luther King, Mohandas Ghandi, Jesse Jackson, W.E.B. Dußois, and many many others were not coercive leaders, nor did they usurp the sovereignty of the people they spoke (and speak) for. . . . These leaders seek confirmation with the people and proceed to elaborate programs of action that take into account questions and details of organization. (1990, 73) Such intellectuals do not simply operate in the abstract realm of theory, above and ahead those directly involved in political movements; nor do they act coercively in playing the role of the “representative.” Radhakrishnan argues that “Foucault fails to make crucial distinctions between forms of representation that are legitimate and those that are coercive, between leaders and intellectuals who are organic with the movement and those that are traitors .. .” (1990, 73). As a result, Foucault ends up rejecting the intellectual position of “representative” altogether; yet he still, nevertheless, acts as one. Radhakrishnan, however, does not emphasize a point that I find to be crucial, namely that Foucault ends up acting as a “representative” precisely because he refuses to do so. In other words, by taking up a strictly opposing position, by negating directly that which he is “against,” Foucault cannot help but be bound up within the same structure of that which he opposes. This is a dialectical move that Foucault himself actually rejects in other contexts. 30 Within Hegel’s dialectic, the one-sided terms of the Understanding pass into their opposites due to an “indwelling tendency outwards” (Hegel 1975, 116) whereby their affirmations pass over into their negations, their opposites. This means in part that the opposing term is not entirely different from that which it negates. In the famous triplet Being- Nothing-Becoming, while Being and Nothing are opposites, they are also “the same,” Hegel argues, and are united in Becoming. This movement is of course quite complex, and one cannot simply take Hegel to be saying that Being and Nothing are identical. 31 Still, within the dialectical movement each opposing term is not entirely separate from the other, since each flip-flops into the other. This is partly because they are of the same logical structure they are like mirror images of one another, reflections across a border of contradiction. Nothing is that which Being is not, and vice versa; and this means that each is defined through simply negating the other. In this sense, each mirrors the other with the difference turning on the negation which separates them. Foucault claims that we need to move away from dialectical thinking about truth, power, and resistance in developing strategies for political struggle: “One must try to think struggle and its forms, objectives, means and processes in terms of a logic free of the sterilising constraints of the dialectic” (Foucault 1980 e, 143- 144). But in his own work Foucault may be nevertheless stuck within this logic he hopes to escape. One could say that Foucault remains within the logic of the dialectic precisely insofar as and because he tries to reject it. He does not always attempt such rejection, but to the extent that his work points to it, he remains within the logical structure he wants to escape. Specifically, if he attempts to exit, to move to the “outside” of the kind of logic which engages “sides,” which functions through the contradictions and negations of inside/outside borders (in which each side is “not” the other), he will be using the very dialectical logic of contradiction he is attempting to escape. Within the logic of contradiction, that which is “opposed” to a term actually helps to define that term, and thus supports it. In other words, when one attempts to oppose or negate something, one sets up a boundary between one’s position and that of the opposed position; but this can work to support rather than upset or destabilize the “other side” by acting as that which it is “not,” and thereby helping to define and consolidate it. Foucault himself recognizes this problem to a certain extent, as he notes in an interview that movements of negation and reversal are limited in their effectiveness. Describing dualistic views of opposition, where there are thought to be two, unified sides negating each other, Foucault argues that mere reversal, the upholding of one side against another, is ultimately not helpful. If one chooses to resist a certain discourse or practice with a simple negation, with a rejection and a refusal, one will not be successful in effecting change: Because these reversals of pro to contra are quickly blocked, unable to do anything except repeat themselves .... As soon as we repeat indefinitely the same refrain of the anti-repressive ditty, things remain in place - anyone can sing the tune, without anyone paying attention. (1996 d 222) In this passage Foucault is describing a particular kind of practical problem with strategies of resistance that involve mere reversal. Part of this difficulty is that it is likely no one will listen. This is because if one declares oneself or a political movement to be purely “against” the dominant view in a particular area, this dominant view can simply ignore one’s claims as irrational or view them as the very type of thing that needs to be put down. If one rejects the dominant discourse, one puts oneself on the opposite side, where the dominant discourse can, in its turn, simply reject one’s claims. For example, if one wishes to reject the repression of madness by the dominance of reason, and does so by negating reason outright and championing the discourses of the mad, it is quite likely that no one will pay attention one’s own claims will be rejected, ignored, or forcibly put down by rational discourse itself. This will not work to promote change, as Foucault notes: instead, the “contra” side simply repeats itself with no one listening, and “things remain in place.” Indeed, putting oneself on the “other side” in this way even helps to consolidate the other side by providing precisely the sort of thing that that side is “against.” This allows them to define themselves better, rather than working to upset their position. Thus Foucault argues that “the reversal of values and of truths” cannot just “stop with simple cheers (long live insanity, delinquency, sex) . . .” if it wants to promote change (1996 d 222). Within this problem associated with “reversals” lies another it is not just that no one will listen to one’s “anti-repressive ditty,” it is also the case that this ditty simply repeats the same kind of tune as that which one rejects; one is still remaining within the same logic of the side one opposes, the logic that produces “two sides.” By simply saying “no” to a discourse or practice, one is retaining its structure as that which is rejected, that which follows the “not” in one’s own claims: against a discourse x I proclaim not-x. While one may thereby reject the substance of the claims of x, one retains its logical structure and its organization one is simply saying “no” to whatever x says. For Foucault, this means that one does not escape the logical mechanisms that produce “two sides” in the first place. He asserts that movements of reversal, of flipping over from pro to contra, can be helpful (/’they are used to promote an escape from this dualistic logic in some sense: One must pass to the other side - the “good side” - but in order to extract oneself from these mechanisms which make two sides appear, in order to dissolve the false unity, the illusory “nature” of this other side with which we have taken sides. (Foucault 1996 d, 222) In other words, “taking up sides” can be helpful as long as one does not stop with mere reversal (in this case, “long live the death of universal truth!”). The point is to use this opposition to investigate the mechanisms that encourage unity and totality on both sides the “untruth” of an utter irrationalism or nihilism would simply uphold the “false unity” about which Foucault is skeptical. Ultimately, the hope expressed above is that we can escape, “extract” ourselves from “the mechanisms which make two sides appear.” Foucault is not forthcoming here on how this is to work. Further, there is a potential problem with this goal: if the point is to “extract oneself’ from the mechanisms of truth that produce the “two sides,” then one is likely to simply reproduce once again the logic of “sides.” In other words, if one attempts to get “outside” this logic, one will be trying to pass to the “other side” of it; and this will, of course, not manage an “extraction.” The problem is with the effort to “extract oneself’ in the first place negating, refusing, going “outside” will not ultimately take one out of the “mechanisms which make two sides appear.” Thus Foucault seems to recognize certain problems associated with the dialectical logic of negation, opposition, reversal, and “taking up sides,” but is also nevertheless caught within it by trying to exit it, to negate it. This is a symptom of what I will call the “exile” character of Foucault himself and the Foucauldian intellectual. The intellectual as exile distances him-/herself from dominant discourses while remaining within them; and within such a position there is a tendency towards rejection and refusal, a straining towards an impossible “outside.” As Foucault himself argues, it may at times be helpful to pass to the “other side,” but staying there will not ultimately work to promote change. I argue that throughout much of his work, especially in his genealogical texts such as Discipline and Punish and the three volumes of The History of Sexuality, Foucault occupies the position of an intellectual exile, operating within the dominant regime of truth while maintaining a critical distance from it. This means that he takes up the role of a “universal” intellectual, working in and through it to undermine both this position and the regime of truth that tends to put the intellectual into it. But at times Foucault attempts nevertheless to escape the position of the “universal” intellectual representative and prophet entirely, and it is then that he ends up most caught up within it. Viewing Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual in this way provides a means to resolve some of the tensions in the relationship between the intellectual and the masses discussed here. We no longer have to worry that the intellectual may continue to be regarded by others as a representative, that the masses may wish to hold him/her up as a leader, because as an exile, the intellectual can occupy this position while also distancing himself from it and thereby working to undermine it. In addition, we can understand why and how Foucault both insists that he does not play the prophet and yet manages to do so anyway. In one sense, this is not a problem at all if the intellectual is occupying an exile position - such an intellectual utilizes the role of a prophet and representative in order to criticize and unsettle it. To the degree that this occurs in Foucault’s case, then, he may indeed be both playing the prophet and, ultimately, not doing so. Still, I have argued, the exile position can lead the intellectual to try to exit entirely the “universal” position from which s/he is exiled. I think that Foucault exhibits this tendency when he insists that the intellectual must not engage in any kind of prophecy. This seems an extreme requirement, since it doesn’t appear to be the case that all intellectuals will always be received as dangerous “agents” of the regime of truth. It would seem possible for the Foucauldian, “specific” intellectual, in collaboration with others, to put forth suggestions as to what ought to be done that are expressed as contingent rather than universal and absolute. But Foucault seems to rule out this possibility through his utter refusal of prophecy. Further, in thereby trying to exit the “universal” intellectual position, Foucault ends up merely digging him/herself more deeply into this prophetic role. In what might appear a paradox, it is through playing the prophet that the intellectual can avoid actually being one. In Chapter Three I argue that, despite his claims to the contrary, Foucault does manage to prophesy in a way that ends up providing contingent and changeable truths, through playing the role of a “universal” intellectual while at the same time undermining this role. There are a number of questions that remain to be answered in regard to this exile movement of the intellectual. First, how does this movement work, exactly? How is it possible for the intellectual to function within and through the regime of truth in order to undermine it? Further, recall that as an exile, the intellectual takes up the position of a “universal” intellectual while also distancing him/herself from it; and this brings up another question. What is the difference between taking up the “universal” position as an exile and taking it up so as to occupy it in a more fundamental way? How can the intellectual be sure s/he is doing the former and not the latter? In order to address these questions well, it is necessary to consider more carefully the regime of truth that is to form the target for this intellectual’s activities. Foucault asserts that the intellectual is to approach the regime of truth as a “problem,” but just what is s/he to do about it? What, exactly is problematic, and what sort of response is called for from the intellectual? If we can determine what the Foucauldian intellectual is to do about the regime of truth, then we can better map his/her movement of exile in relation to it. It is important, then, to take a closer look at this regime and its dangers if we are to understand Foucault’s political intellectual. 26 It is of course possible that it wasn’t as great in Foucault’s own time and place, that he exaggerated the dangers associated with the intellectual in the French society of his day as well. I will not consider this question here, however, as it would require an in-depth, sociological study of the position of intellectuals in France during the second half of the twentieth century - a topic that could well fill an entire book. 27 1 t may also be the case that the intellectual’s audience is still bound up in the current regime of truth, which makes of the intellectual its “object and instrument.” Such an audience would be likely to treat the Foucauldian intellectual as a “universal” one whether s/he intends this to happen or not. I address this phenomenon in more detail, including how Foucault appears to have dealt with it, in Chapter Three. 28 It is surprising to see Foucault and Deleuze speak in such general terms as “the masses” and “the worker’s struggle,” as if these could all be lumped into one category given their emphasis on particularity in the rest of their conversation. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak notes this and other related problems in this conversation, arguing that Deleuze and Foucault fail to carry their critique of the “sovereign subject” far enough and inaugurate instead a subject centered in Western, European assumptions (Spivak 1988). 29r. Radhakrishnan notes further that the statement “representation no longer exists,” since it cannot be justified empirically as a description of the current state of affairs, must mean something like the following: “although the world is rife with forms of representation, theory has proved that ‘representation’ is defunct” (Radhakrishnan 1990, 66-67). But, he points out, wouldn’t this simply “revalorize that very forwardness of theory that Foucault finds so irrelevant and indefensible?” (1990, 67). 30 See, e.g. (Foucault 1980 e, 143-144; 1977 d, 181-187). 31 According to Hegel, Being and Nothing are both the same and not the same, for they are still distinguished. Even the proposition, Being and Nothing are the same, expresses both the unity of Being and Nothing (in the predicate) and also their distinctness (in the subject) (Hegel 1969, 90). We could therefore think of this statement as expressing two opposing propositions: Being and Nothing are the same, and Being and Nothing are not the same. Hegel argues that it is necessary to consider these opposing propositions as a union, “a union which can only be stated as an unrest of incompatibles, as a movement" (1969, 91). This movement is expressed by Becoming, the unity of Being and Nothing which is “inherent unrest the unity, . . . through the diversity of Being and Nothing that is in it, is at war within itself’ (1975, 131). Becoming is the unity of opposites that are both the same and different, and it is therefore a movement, a back and forth between sameness and difference. Chapter Two The Poison of the Regime of Truth As I have shown, Foucault considers the “universal” intellectual a holdover from “a faded Marxism” - one where the intellectual considers himself (and is considered by others) the “representative” of the masses, the one who has access to universal truths and values and can therefore act as the spokesman of all. He also takes on an authoritative, leading function due to his status as emissary of the truth: he can and does tell others what must be done (since he is the one who is supposed to know). In this role, the “universal” intellectual functions in and through the regime of truth, acting squarely within and upon the mechanisms and apparatuses that produce truth. He thus remains firmly entrenched in the regime of truth rather than questioning it, rather than seeing it as a “problem” (as Foucault claims it is the role of the intellectual to do). The “universal” Marxist, as well as any other intellectual acting “universally” in the political realm, fails to address the crucial issue of truth and its production, truth and its connection to power, the regime of truth. But what is this regime, and how is the intellectual to approach it? I work to clarify the regime of truth here by approaching its two aspects - truth and power - and their interconnection. 1 I also explain the dangers involved in this regime and how these dangers can be resisted and changed. Throughout, I consider various positions of “in-betweenness” and “exile” as exhibited in Foucault’s work, in relation to both truth and power. PROPHETS IN EXILE: A DIAGNOSIS OF MICHEL FOUCAULT’S POLITICAL INTELLECTUAL by Christina L. Hendricks, 8.A., M.A. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements NU9CRIPK for the Degree of WITHOUT o*l • ■ Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin August 2000 I Truth: Between Universal Certainty and Total Skepticism In his discussion of the difference between universal and specific intellectuals, Foucault defines ‘truth’ in the following way: [BJy truth I do not mean ‘the ensemble of truths which are to be discovered and accepted’, but rather ‘the ensemble of rules according to which the true and the false are separated and specific effects of power attached to the true’ . . . . (Foucault 1980 g, 132) He modifies this statement somewhat a few lines later: “‘Truth’ is to be understood as a system of ordered procedures for the production, regulation, distribution, circulation and operation of statements” (1980 g 133). While this view of truth is not entirely clear here, we can see at least that it does not adhere to a traditional “correspondence theory of truth.” In other words, just as Foucault rejects the “representative” function of the intellectual, he also refuses to view truth as a matter of representation. For Foucault, truth does not describe a process whereby a statement, word, or concept comes to accurately represent some “real” state of affairs. It is instead a system of rules, of procedures for the regulation and distribution of statements whereby the “true” is divided from the “false.” 2 These rules do not produce a truth that is justified by its correspondence to “reality,” by its accurate representation. Rather, that which counts as “true” does so in virtue of the rules themselves, which can be arbitrary and can change from one time period to another, and even from one discourse or discipline to another. Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow explain: “Foucault holds that what counts as truth is determined by the conceptual system or, more accurately, the discursive practices of a particular discipline” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 31). What is considered to be “true” is that which conforms to a set of rules determining the truth, and these rules can vary amongst disciplines. They do not ground the truth in a “reality,” nor are they themselves thus grounded; Foucault does not posit a truth that works in this way. There are no objectively true “essences” beneath interpretations, no primal “origins” to be found once we peel away the layers there are only interpretations, and these adhere to systems of rules that work to divide what is said to be “true” from what is not. This view of truth emerges from Foucault’s early work on archaeology, 3 where, as Dreyfus and Rabinow argue, Foucault claims that certain statements are justified as true based on their conformity to a particular method or system of rules: a statement gains the status of “true” by “passing some sort of institutional test, such as the rules of dialectical argument, inquisitional interrogation, or empirical confirmation,” where “an authorized subject asserts (writes, paints, says) what on the basis of an accepted method is a serious truth claim” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 48). “True” statements, then, are constituted as such “by the current rules of a specific truth game in which they have a role” (1983, 54). In other words, the “truth” of a statement is determined by a set of rules, an established method that sets up the conditions a statement must fulfill in order to be considered “true.” Truth, then, is not a matter of correspondence, of describing the world in a way that conforms to “the way it is.” What is “true” is instead simply that which conforms to a certain set of rules; and while one who lives under the rules may believe that they provide the closest approximation to a correspondence of concept and reality, Foucault himself does not advocate such a view in his archaeological work. Foucault explains his archaeological method in his 1969 text, The Archaeology of Knowledge. There he introduces the notion of the “rules of formation” that govern the production of truth in what he calls “discursive formations.” Foucault explains that the latter are “large groups of statements” like those that “we call medicine, economics, or grammar,” whose unity is difficult to account for due to the heterogeneity, gaps, divisions and incompatibilities within these groups (Foucault 1972 a, 37). He argues that the coherence of discursive formations works through a “system of dispersion,” and that these “dispersed” groupings of statements are governed by “rules of formation”: “The conditions to which the elements of this division [in the system of dispersion of a discursive formation] (objects, mode of statement, concepts, thematic choices) are subjected we shall call the rules of formation. The rules of formation are conditions of existence (but also of coexistence, maintenance, modification, and disappearance) in a given discursive formation” (1972 a 38). Which statements are to count as meaningful in a particular discursive formation, how they are to coexist with other statements, how they are to be changed and perhaps eventually dropped, are all determined by a set of rules of formation. But these rules are specific to the discursive formation itself. Dreyfus and Rabinow note that rather than claiming to find “ahistorical, abstract laws,” the archaeologist “only claims to be able to find the local, changing rules which at a given period in a particular discursive formation define what counts as an identical meaningful statement” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 55). Given that these rules define what is to count as meaningful within a particular discursive formation, they will also be involved in defining what is true. Having defined “serious speech acts” as those with a claim to knowledge and truth within a discursive formation due to their passing of certain “institutional tests” and their conformity to rules (1983, 48), Dreyfus and Rabinow explain that the truth of these statements is only a function of their relationships to other statements: “What gives speech acts their seriousness ... is their place in the network of other serious speech acts and nothing more” (1983, 58). This notion of “truth” as a system of rules producing “true” and “false” statements is extended into Foucault’s genealogical work, with the main difference being that there he places an emphasis on the role of power in this system. 4 In a 1970 lecture entitled “The Discourse on Language,” Foucault presents his plan for future work, work which he characterizes in part as genealogical. Here, in this early “transitional” text between archaeology and genealogy, Foucault already explains the latter as involving an analysis of power. Having discussed various forms of “exclusion, limitation and appropriation” involved in the production of discourse and its “truth,” Foucault explains that genealogy considers “how series of discourse are formed, through, in spite of, or with the aid of these systems of constraint. ..” (Foucault 1972 b, 232). In a 1971 essay entitled “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” Foucault extends and elaborates the focus of genealogy on the role of power in the production of truth, in the production of discourse and the rules which delineate what is “true” within it. There, Foucault cites Nietzsche and asserts that truth is an “error” (Foucault 1977 b, 144), that “the development of humanity is a series of interpretations” (1977 b 152), and that beneath the “veil” of interpretation one finds not “truth” or the certainty of an “origin,” but “dissension,” “disparity” and other interpretations (1977 b 142, 143-144). As Dreyfus and Rabinow point out, this means that for Foucault the genealogist, there are no deep, hidden truths waiting to be uncovered; instead, one could say, there are “only interpretations”: Interpretation is not the uncovering of a hidden meaning. . . . The more one interprets the more one finds not the fixed meaning of a text, or of the world, but only other interpretations. These interpretations have been created and imposed by other people, not by the nature of things. (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 107) But these interpretations also have an intimate relationship to the exercise of power, according to Foucault. He refers to interpretation as “the violent or surreptitious appropriation of a system of rules, which in itself has no essential meaning, in order to impose a direction, to bend it to a new will, to force its participation in a different game, and to subject it to secondary rules . . .” (Foucault 1977 b, 152). In other words, the various interpretations that have held sway throughout human history (including the ones under which we presently live) are each the product of a “violent or surreptitious” appropriation and bending of a system of rules “in order to impose a new direction.” As Michael Mahon explains, “[t]he genealogist sees the present state of affairs and present needs as ... a result of struggle and relations of force and domination .. .” (Mahon 1992, 112). 5 One way of looking at this is to say that what we currently view as the “truth” about the present is an interpretation that has resulted from struggles and dominations, from practices of power. What now enjoys the status of “truth,” on this view, achieved that status through overturning, disqualifying, or silencing other views and knowledges. The rules that produce “the truth” are appropriated, changed, and used (variously over the course of history and in the service of varied interests) in order to interpret the world in a way that is meant to rule out other interpretations. This “genealogical” view is a development of Foucault’s earlier “archaeological” views on truth here, too, there are no claims made for a kind of absolute, timeless “truth” about the world, a “way things are” that can be discovered and conceived in terms of concepts that manage an accurate “correspondence” to reality. With genealogy as with archaeology there is the suggestion that that which is accepted as the “true” interpretation is so due to the functioning of a “system of rules”; only now there is an emphasis on the part played by power in the production of truth through these rules. The introduction of genealogy links truth to power: ‘Truth’ is linked in a circular relation with systems of power which produce and sustain it, and to effects of power which it induces and which extend it. A ‘regime’ of truth. (Foucault 1980 g, 133) The “regime of truth,” then, appears to correspond to the interconnection of “truth” (as a system of rules for producing the “true”) and systems of power. In this reciprocal relationship, the systems of rules which form the “truth” are “produced and sustained” by systems of power, and the “truth” itself also induces “effects of power.” It is this complicated network that the intellectual must address. The “why” and the “how” of this intellectual role, however, are not yet clear. In what ways are truth and power linked, and what specific dangers result from this connection in the regime of truth? How is the intellectual to respond? Should s/he, for example, reject any and all claims to truth due to their connection to power? Foucault himself has been characterized by some commentators as doing precisely that. Though he does at times appear to be such a total skeptic in his texts and interviews, Foucault also makes it clear that he does not mean to reject all truth claims whatsoever. I think that Foucault’s difficult relationship to the truth can be best explained by appeal to his intellectual role as an exile. Specifically, I argue that as a genealogist, Foucault operates in-between absolute certainty and total skepticism in regard to truth. A total skeptic? In his genealogical histories, such as those addressing madness and punishment, Foucault continually works to undermine claims to universal truth. Many commentators emphasize this aspect of Foucault’s genealogies. John Rajchman, for example, characterizes Foucault’s work under the theme of “dispersal,” due to its constant questioning of universalities, continuities and absolutes: Foucault’s history tries to “disperse” what is presumed to be essentially whole. We have no whole lives, since there is no one thing to which all things attributed to us refers. What we call Reason and Nature are empty abstractions, since there is no one thing that all our sciences are about, and no one style of reasoning they all employ. There is no single way to classify us, our knowledge, or our world. (Rajchman 1985, 55) Rajchman also contends that Foucault is “anti-universalist” (1985, 62), since in his genealogies Foucault performs historical analyses that focus on disparity and particularity rather than on the “unified narratives” traditionally provided by historians: “[i]n the place of universalist narrative, he looks for the plurality and singularity of our origins . . .’” (1985, 3). In other words, rather than providing a narrative that emphasizes what is universal and absolute, Foucault focuses on what is specific and contingent. In his historical analyses he points to what is “singular” in the sense of being specific to a particular time and place, that which divides and differentiates within the movements of history rather than that which unifies and traces points of sameness. In a similar vein, David Shumway argues that one of Foucault’s strategies in his genealogies is “discontinuity”: “Foucault... treatfs] history as if it were discontinuous. That is, he looks for ruptures, breaks, gaps, displacements, mutations, shifts, interruptions, thresholds, etc.” (Shumway 1989, 19). Shumway notes that Foucault is suspicious about assumptions of continuity within history, about notions such as “progress” and continuous “evolution” without gaps. In his genealogical texts Foucault points out the gaps, the differences, Shumway asserts, but does not explain the causes for them; and this makes his histories appear intensely discontinuous: “It is this absence of causal explanation that makes Foucault’s view of history seem so radically discontinuous” (1989, 20). As Shumway explains, Foucault focuses on the differences, discontinuities, and differences between historical periods. If in his genealogies Foucault rejects certainty and emphasizes disparity and discontinuity instead, then is he something of a “total skeptic” or a nihilist in regard to truth? Some of Foucault’s critics would respond in the affirmative. Charles Taylor, for example, argues that Foucault attempts to take a neutral stance in regard to truth, a perspective outside of all claims to truth from which he can discuss and explain them without adopting any of them. According to Taylor, Foucault adopts a “stance of neutrality between the different historical systems of power” that he analyzes; and he thereby ends up taking an “outsider’s perspective” in regard to the truth claims produced by each of these systems of power (Taylor 1986, 79, 98). Taylor contends that “in his major works, like The Order of Things and Discipline and Punish, Foucault sounds as though he believed that, as an historian, he could stand nowhere” (1986, 98). In other words, according to Taylor Foucault not only works to undermine certainty in his texts, but also attempts to stand outside of all truth claims himself, hoping instead to provide a neutral description of their production by power. Taylor characterizes this as a problematic aspect of Foucault’s work, since it is in tension with the discussions of domination and illusion in which Foucault also engages. Foucault attempts to take a neutral stance in regard to truth, while at the same time providing non-neutral analyses of it, Taylor argues. Taylor claims that Foucault’s regime of truth is “a system of control which operates in us largely through masks, disguises and false pretences” (1986, 80) it produces truths for us that, from an outsider’s standpoint, are not the “universal” truths they might seem (since they are instead contingently and historically created). There is a problem here, according to Taylor, in that the claim that power produces an illusory truth implies that there exists a more correct truth as an alternative: “Mask, falsehood makes no sense without a corresponding notion of truth” (1986, 92). Taylor argues that Foucault refuses to accept the notion of a “more true” truth beyond illusory ones because he insists on trying to retain his “outsider’s perspective” each statement of truth is a product of particular power relations, and from a position outside of each system of power, no truth claim can be said to be “more true” than any other. Foucault ends up unable to accept the implications inherent in his own view, Taylor argues, and is thereby stuck in a “paradox”: his view both requires adherence to some notion of truth and expresses an avoidance of truth altogether (1986, 99). 6 Paul Veyne agrees that Foucault is a nihilist of a sort, but Veyne does not interpret this as a problem. Veyne characterizes nihilism as “the name we can give to periods of history where thinkers feel that truths are without truth and without foundation” (Veyne 1992, 340). He argues that we are currently in such a period of nihilism in the West, that “there exists ... an uneasiness in thought which is referred to as historicism or relativism” (1992, 340). This uneasiness is, nevertheless, an unnecessary one according to Veyne. Though we recognize the relativity of truth, its lack of absolute, universal ground or foundation, he argues, this need not be a cause for concern since we at the same time know that we still hold certain ideas and opinions very strongly. “All that remains” for us to do, according to Veyne, is “to accept that this is the case and to learn that one can get along very nicely without foundations and even without truth” (1992, 340). We have been doing this already, in other words; we can simply now learn to be less uneasy about it. Foucault can help teach us this lesson, according to Veyne, who characterizes Foucault’s position on the question of truth and foundations with the following statement: “Let us draw the consequences from the impossibility of finding foundations and in so doing take note that finding foundations would be as useless as it is impossible” (Veyne 1992, 343). It is not necessary to search for ultimate foundations, since it is quite possible “to live and to want what one wants without justifying oneself and saying that one is right” (1992, 343). Veyne explains that according to Foucault, the concern for foundations was specific to a particular period of history from which we are now emerging, namely the “anthropological age,” from Kant to Husserl (1992, 342-343). Rather than being concerned over our inability to prove oneself right on the basis of absolute truths, we are coming to be able to realize that “knowing what one wants ... is enough, especially since there is nothing more one can do” (1992, 343). 7 Veyne contends that through this kind of serene acceptance one can manage to get beyond nihilism, as Foucault does. This movement beyond nihilism, however, is one that moves acceptingly through it: “one emerges from nihilism when one has thought it through serenely to the very end” (1992, 341). One accepts the impossibility of finding foundations for truth, loses the uneasiness about this, and realizes that one can still “want what one wants” and that this is “enough.” 8 For Taylor, Foucault is something of a nihilist in regard to truth, a “total skeptic,” because he attempts to avoid adhering to any claims of truth, choosing instead to describe the production of various truths by power in a neutral fashion. For Veyne, on the other hand, Foucault moves through nihilism and beyond it through a serene acceptance. In so doing, Foucault is able to still adhere to certain values, ideals, and opinions without having to argue that these are justified in any foundational way. I am more inclined to agree with Veyne than with Taylor, as I do not think that Foucault adopts a neutral stance in his genealogical work. Rather, I believe that he takes up a position within the present system of power and the truths produced by it, moving through these for the purpose of eventually undermining them. I therefore agree with the kind of movement described by Veyne, that Foucault takes up something from the here and now, something significant in the present (for Veyne, Foucault takes up nihilism which, Veyne says, is prevalent at present), and moves through it to something else. But my position is somewhat different than Veyne’s, as I argue that Foucault adopts the dominant truths of the time in order to move through them and destabilize them. He addresses himself to an audience who still holds certain truths dear, as if they were universal and absolute, and brings them to question these through his own movement of exile from them. 9 Foucault’s exile from universal truth can perhaps best be introduced by reference to John Rajchman’s characterization of Foucault’s genealogical work. According to Rajchman, Foucault is indeed a skeptic, but he is not a total one: Foucault’s work has been “misunderstood” as exhibiting nihilism, irrationalism, or anarchism, Rajchman argues (Rajchman 1985, 4). In his Introduction to Michel Foucault: The Freedom of Philosophy, Rajchman describes Foucault as a skeptic: “Foucault is the great skeptic of our times. ... He is the philosopher of dispersion and singularity” (1985, 2). Rajchman then goes on to discuss the various ways in which Foucault’s work exhibits skepticism, including: (1) Foucault shows how practices and/or beliefs and values that had been thought to be “natural” or selfevident are instead historically constituted and bound up with various uses and abuses of power; (2) Foucault upsets notions of “universalist history,” the “unified narratives” that would give us a firm, uniform system with which to interpret the past or enact social change for the future; (3) Foucault destabilizes assumptions of unity in our knowledge and reasoning, our discourse and its logic, and even ourselves as subjects (1985, 3). Still, after characterizing Foucault as a skeptic, Rajchman argues that it would not make sense to say of Foucault that he is a “total skeptic,” since he is skeptical about “totality” itself: He does not have a total skepticism because he is skeptical about totality. Thus he does not analyze knowledge, rationality, or subjectivity in general. His skepticism proceeds case by case. It has no end; it is a permanent questioning. (Rajchman 1985, 4) Rajchman points out that for Foucault, “it does not make sense to place everything in doubt at once” (1985, 4). In other words, Foucault does not stand back from all claims to truth and knowledge and refuse them all, all at once and forever more. According to Rajchman, Foucault doesn’t even attempt to analyze something like “knowledge” or “rationality” in general. Instead, Rajchman argues, in his genealogical work Foucault proceeds on a case by case basis, questioning some things while holding others constant. At the same time, however, Foucault realizes that everything could be subject to question, even if not all at once. This leads Rajchman to argue that Foucault’s skepticism has no end, that it is a “permanent questioning.” Rajchman provides an interesting and important response to charges of nihilism leveled against Foucault. If Foucault were to express a “total skepticism” in regard to truth, this would be in tension with his own attempts to undermine claims to universal truth. To reject all truth claims, universally, is to set up another universal truth. Foucault is skeptical of the truth value of even his own assertions, subjecting them to question as well. He is ready to question any belief in regard to its truth, any practice in regard to its practical and moral value, etc.; but he does not do this for all of them simultaneously. He must hold some beliefs and values constant to form a basis for criticizing others. In that sense, Foucault acts as an exile: he questions the set of truths and values that currently hold sway without rejecting it entirely, using some to take a critical view of others. He remains within the current regime of truth while also criticizing it, undermining it from within. Looking at Foucault’s relationship to truth as an intellectual exile provides a helpful way to read statements by Foucault which would seem to indicate a “total skepticism” on his part, and which might therefore appear to go against his criticism of universal truth. In what is reported to be the last interview of his life, Foucault agrees that he could be characterized as a skeptic of a sort, but he also claims that he disagrees with the skeptical program because it has “never been total”: Q: Insofar as you don’t affirm any universal truth but raise paradoxes in thought and make of philosophy a permanent question, are you a skeptic? MF: Absolutely. The only thing that I will not accept in the program of the skeptics is the attempt made to arrive at a certain number of results in a given order for skepticism has never been total! It tried to raise problems in a given domain and then to valorize in other domains certain notions considered to be useful; secondly, it seems to me that for the skeptics, the ideal was to be optimistic, knowing relatively few things but knowing them in a sure and irrevocable way, whereas I would like to use philosophy in a way that would permit me to limit the domains of knowledge. (Foucault 1996 m, 473) Foucault notes here that his skepticism about “universal truth” goes beyond that of previous skeptics, for unlike them he does not provide skeptical arguments about some things in order to affirm the absolute certainty of others; he doesn’t eliminate those things we don’t or can’t know for certain in order to isolate those we do or can. Foucault does not provide, after he has performed a skeptical critique, a resulting list of those few things it is left for us to know. The reason for this has much to do with the way that Foucault’s skepticism differs from that of many other philosophers who have practiced skepticism in the past, including Descartes, Hume and Kant. For them, skepticism was practiced from the standpoint of a search for universal, certain truth those things are regarded skeptically that cannot be proven universally true with certainty (or, in the case of Descartes, one must regard with skepticism those things which can be doubted). Whatever can then be shown to be certain is presented as a positive “result”: the truth at last, however limited it may turn out to be. But Foucault is not simply skeptical about those things that are not universally certain; he is skeptical about the notion of universal truth in general. One might thus say that Foucault questions even the criterion that drives previous versions of skepticism, and that leads other skeptics to their conclusive “results.” Their search for certainty motivates their inquiries and their skeptical conclusions, while Foucault is skeptical about such a search in the first place. It may seem, on the basis of the above quote, that Foucault is claiming a kind of “total skepticism” for his work, and that whereas the skepticism of others has not been total, his manages to be so. It is indeed the case that previous skeptics may have questioned some things in order to be certain about others, and that Foucault does not; but this doesn’t mean that he rejects all truth all at once in a gesture of utter nihilism. His skepticism may be “total” in the sense that he is skeptical about all claims to certainty and universal truth, but, according to Rajchman, he does not refuse or even criticize them all at once. Instead, Foucault appeals to some claims to truth in order to criticize others. Jon Simons agrees, arguing that in this process Foucault adheres to truths that are not universal and absolute, for the purpose of criticizing truths that are taken to be so. According to Simons, Foucault tries to break the “tight bond between truth and science in our political economy of truth ... by telling non-scientific truths” (Simons 1995, 93). As Simons notes, Foucault insists that there are different kinds of truth beyond the “scientific,” universal one: “I believe too much in the truth not to assume that there are different truths and different ways of saying it” (Foucault 1996 a, 453). Simons refers to this quote from an interview to show both that Foucault does not reject notions of truth altogether, and that for Foucault there are different ways of speaking it. According to Simons, Foucault speaks nonscientific, non-universal truths in resistance to social and political practices that are grounded in universal ones. Simons insists that Foucault does not attempt to resist notions of truth by escaping truth altogether; rather, for Foucault “there is no way to challenge dominant regimes of truth other than to criticize politics on the basis of some form of truth” (Simons 1995, 94). One has to attack dominant truths, not by rejecting truth outright, but by appeal to other kinds of truth. I agree with Simons that Foucault utilizes a discourse of truth in order to undermine dominant truths, but I think that he remains more firmly entrenched in the dominant regime of truth than Simons indicates. I argue in Chapter Three that Foucault does, indeed, appeal to “scientific,” universal truths in his genealogies, moving through them to unsettle them. In other words, he works within the sphere of dominant, universal truths while also distancing himself from these, utilizing them to bring about their disturbance. Simons appeals to a passage in an interview entitled “Ethics of the Concern for Self as a Practice of Freedom” in order to support his view that Foucault uses alternative notions of truth against dominant, “scientific” ones; but I believe that this same passage supports my view that Foucault may be an exile who utilizes universal truths while also distancing himself from them. In this passage, Foucault begins by noting that we in the West are under a stringent “obligation to truth,” and that, “[t]hings being as they are, nothing so far has shown that it is possible to define a strategy outside of this concern” (Foucault 1996 e, 444). In other words, within the current concern for truth and the obligation to speak it, strategies of political resistance will have to be developed that respect this obligation. Foucault then goes on to say that we can remain within the dominant concern for truth while yet undertaking movements therein that differ from what is usually expected, to the point of even resisting the problematic effects of dominant truths: “It is within the field of the obligation of truth that it is possible to move about in one way or another, sometimes against effects of domination that may be linked to structures of truth or institutions entrusted with truth” (1996 e 444). So far, we might still say that Simons’ view is correct, that Foucault may be saying we can respond to the obligation to truth by speaking truths other than “scientific,” universal ones. This view seems supported by another of Foucault’s claims in this passage, namely that one can “[escape] from a domination of truth not by playing a game that was totally different from the game of truth, but by playing the game differently or playing another game, another hand, with other trump cards” (Foucault 1996 e, 444). This statement might seem to indicate that Foucault means to play a game of truth different from the dominant one, wherein universal truths reign. But the example he gives to illustrate this point may speak otherwise: [T]here has been a whole so-called “ecological” movement... that was often in opposition, as it were, to a science or, at least, to a technology underwritten by claims to truth. But this same ecology articulated its own discourse of truth: criticism was authorized in the name of a knowledge of nature, the balance of life processes, and so on. (Foucault 1996 e, 444) The ecology movement of the latter half of the twentieth century, Foucault notes, based itself on its own claims to truth; and even as described in this passage by Foucault, these truths could be said to be “universal” ones. The “knowledge of nature,” the “balance of life processes” cited by Foucault as the truths supporting the ecology movement, could easily be “scientific” claims with the character of universal truth. Indeed, it is to the extent that such claims do take on the force of universalist “science” that they are most effective in a community that still places a high value on this kind of truth. In other words, it may be precisely because the ecology movement appealed to universal truths that it enjoyed a certain amount of success, that many people were willing to listen to their claims and change their behavior as a result. Foucault concludes this passage in the interview by indicating that political resistance can take place from within the discourse being resisted, by going through it to reveal its effects. He argues that one can undertake resistance in the political sphere only by “playing a certain game of truth, by showing its consequences, by pointing out that there are other reasonable options, by teaching people what they don’t know about their own situation, their working conditions and their exploitation” (Foucault 1996 e, 444). In other words, criticism and resistance of dominant truths and the social and political practices grounded in them can be (and perhaps are best) undertaken not by rejecting those truths and practices, but by working within them to reveal strategies and effects that are problematic. I argue throughout the present study that Foucault takes up an exile position in relation to the current regime of truth, for the purpose of criticizing it. This means that he remains within this regime to a certain extent -- appealing to its truths, working within its relations of power, and accepting the ways it structures subjects while also distancing himself from it. Here we begin to see how it may be possible for Foucault to remain within current discourses of truth while also working to undermine them. As Rajchman argues, he may be able to criticize some notions of truth while holding fast to others. Simons claims that in so doing Foucault actually appeals to non-universal truths for the purpose of questioning universal ones. I, on the other hand, argue that Foucault operates within discourses of universal truth in some aspects of his genealogical work, moving through them to undermine them from the inside. In Chapter Three I provide a detailed discussion of how this process might work. I would like to emphasize, however, that if Foucault is indeed playing the role of an intellectual exile, this helps to resolve the paradox in Foucault’s work cited by Charles Taylor. Taylor argues that Foucault attempts both a neutral and an engaged stance in regard to truth, that he tries to stand outside of all claims to truth while also criticizing some of them; but his critical assertions require appeal to notions of truth that he rejects in his endeavor to remain neutral. If we view Foucault as an exile from the current regime of truth, we can say that he utilizes current notions of truth in the process of undermining them. Rather than trying to remain neutral, then, we can say that Foucault engages himself in the current regime of truth, but not in a way that provides support to it. Instead, he operates within this regime while maintaining a critical distance from it. A good way to begin discussing the character of Foucault’s exile from the truth is to take a closer look at his description of genealogy. It is through an investigation into Foucault’s genealogical work that his “betweenness” as an intellectual exile most clearly appears between universal certainty and total skepticism. 10 Foucault’s Nietzschean Genealogy^ l In his genealogical histories, Foucault performs historical analyses that focus on disparity and particularity rather than on the “unified narratives” traditionally provided by historians. He takes particular truth claims that have been thought to be self-evidently true, analyzing them on a case by case basis, and looking within them for “the workings of a singular and contingent historical practice” (Rajchman 1985, 3). In other words, choosing limited domains, such as mental illness, medicine, or punishment, during a limited time frame and within a limited geographic location, Foucault addresses specific, concrete truth claims and performs a “genealogy” of them in the spirit of Nietzsche. Genealogy, Foucault explains in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” shows that what has been considered self-evidently, unquestionably true has a historical development, and one that proceeded not by a teleological growth from a stable and eternal “origin,” but rather through a series of contingencies and accidents: Genealogy ... [identifies] the accidents, the minute deviations —or conversely, the complete reversals -- the errors, the false appraisals, and the faulty calculations that gave birth to those things that continue to exist and have value for us; it is to discover that truth or being do not lie at the root of what we know and what we are, but the exteriority of accidents. (Foucault 1977 b, 146) Foucault directs his genealogical inquiries towards “those things that continue to exist and have value for us,” towards things that are important to us, here and now “what we know and what we are.” He takes things which we believe to be selfevidently, ahistorically true, specific claims in particular areas, and shows their contingent, historical development. As Foucault explains in an interview conducted in 1981, in his genealogical studies such as those of madness and punishment in Madness and Civilization (Foucault 1988 b) and Discipline and Punish (Foucault 1995), he is very much concerned with the present: [T]he question I start off with is: what are we and what are we today? What is this instant that is ours? Therefore, if you like, [the type of history I do] is a history that starts off from this present day actuality. (Foucault 1997 f, 158) Thus in his genealogies Foucault is not concerned to provide timeless analyses of something such as punishment or delinquency for the purpose of asserting some sort of absolute, universal truth about how it should be handled in society. Instead, he performs a genealogical analysis of what we hold true now, of what we now believe to be the truth of delinquency, for example, and shows that this truth is neither ahistorical nor obvious it has a particular, contingent development. The kinds of questions Foucault asks are therefore not of a “universal” type (e.g., How ought we to deal with delinquency in general? What is the (universal) solution to the problem of criminal behavior?), but instead begin from the present (e.g., How do we, right now, respond to delinquency; and how have such procedures developed over time?). 12 As Dreyfus and Rabinow put it, Foucault’s work can be characterized in part as “a special kind of history that focuses on the cultural practices that have made us what we are” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 122). In his genealogies Foucault begins from the present, from what we take to be self-evidently true here and now, and provides a historical analysis of it that tells a different story than what we may often hear genealogy undermines the notion of an ahistorical, timeless truth, explaining how it is historically constituted. Genealogy gives us a different perspective on our own present and future than what we may have had previously. Genealogy also undermines the idea that our present state of affairs is the result of a teleological, continuous development or “progression,” as Foucault explains: Genealogy does not pretend to go back in time to restore an unbroken continuity that operates beyond the dispersion of forgotten things; its duty is not to demonstrate that the past actively exists in the present, that it continues secretly to animate the present, having imposed a predetermined form to all its vicissitudes. (Foucault 1977 b, 146) Genealogy does not present a historical analysis of “who we are and what we are today” in order to show how this has developed in a continuous progression within some constant “form” imposed from the past. Rather than providing us with an “original essence” from which we have progressed to the present, genealogy shows instead that our historical development is characterized by accident and upheaval, leaving disparity where we might hope to find the identity of an “origin”: [l]f he listens to history, [the genealogist] finds that there is “something altogether different” behind things: not a timeless and essential secret, but the secret that they have no essence or that their essence was fabricated in a piecemeal fashion from alien forms. . . . What is found at the historical beginning of things is not the inviolable identity of their origin; it is the dissension of other things. It is disparity. (1977 b 142) Genealogy presents a past that is not a comforting one of “progress,” nor one that adheres to ahistorical, universal truths. It upsets, fragments, destabilizes: “[genealogy] is not the erecting of foundations: on the contrary, it disturbs what was previously considered immobile; it fragments what was thought unified; it shows the heterogeneity of what was imagined consistent with itself’ (1977 b 147). Genealogy is in a significant sense profoundly disturbing Foucault notes that while we would like to hear that “the present rests on profound intentions and immutable necessities,” genealogy instead “confirms our existence among countless lost events, without a landmark or a point of reference” (1977 b 155). Genealogy has, then, a certain character of critique it presents a history that disturbs, not just our view of the past, but of our present as well: “[i]t is a question, basically, of presenting a critique of our own time, based upon retrospective analyses” (Simon 1971, 192). Part of this critique involves pointing out that procedures which may seem like timelessly true solutions to problems such as crime are actually only recent strategies. In regard to the issue of punishment, for example, Foucault states (in regard to his book Discipline and Punish ): “[W]hat I wanted to do was to show how much finally this equivalence which for us is clear and simple between punishment and depriving people of their liberty is in reality something relatively recent” (Foucault 1997 f, 161). In other words, Foucault worked to question something that previously seemed obviously true, namely the idea that stripping people of their liberty is “the simplest, most logical, most reasonable, most equitable form of punishing someone for an infraction of the law” (1997 f 161). Michael Mahon explains that Foucault’s “[g]enealogy focuses on what we typically hold to be ahistorical, self-evident, and substantial in order to reveal its rootedness in history.... it undermines the apparent necessity which undergirds our knowledge and practices” (Mahon 1992, 108). This, in turn, works to disturb our view of these present practices. For example, if a genealogy exhibits the recent historical development of our view of incarceration when it was previously thought to be a self-evident truth, this is likely to change our present view of this practice. We may be less likely to see it as the only option for punishment, and more likely to consider others more seriously. Genealogy thus works as a kind of critique of our present practices through an analysis of the past, upsetting certain convictions and forcing a rethinking of some aspects of “who and what we are today.” But though disturbing, genealogy is also characterized as a kind of “cure,” as something that can have beneficial effects. Foucault claims, citing Nietzsche, that the task of genealogical history is to become a “curative science” (Foucault 1977 b, 156). In his Genealogy of Morals Nietzsche speaks often of a “disease” perpetuated by the morality under which we now live, the values that contribute to a degeneration of “life”; and he there proposes the need for a “cure” one that begins at least with the exposure of the disease through the genealogy itself. 13 Foucault thus claims that Nietzsche’s genealogy “reaches the lingering and poisonous traces in order to prescribe the best antidote” (1977 b 157). It is performed from within the moral value system of the “here and now,” presenting a critique of that system based on the “poisonous traces” that still linger, “here and now.” In other words, Nietzsche’s genealogy begins with the symptoms now apparent, tracing them back in time not for the purpose of making some grand statement about morality in general or truth in general, but in order to move towards a cure of these specific symptoms through this specific history. 14 Foucault characterizes his work similarly, as Michael Mahon points out, citing an interview published in 1967: Using the medical language reminiscent of Nietzsche, Foucault refers to his own work as diagnostic and curative. Since Nietzsche, according to Foucault, philosophy has the mission of diagnosing the present, “to say what we are today, what it means to say what we say.” (Mahon 1992, 121) 15 Foucault, then, performs genealogical investigations into the present, into “what we are” and “what we say” today, for the purpose of diagnosis and cure. Foucault’s diagnostic and curative genealogical inquiry involves an investigation into the historical development of the present and its “poisonous traces,” but this occurs from within the perspective of the present itself. In other words, Foucault retains his position in the present, deliberately adhering to a specific point of view rooted therein, with its particular truth and value claims. Foucault insists that the genealogist, unlike the traditional historian, refuses “to silence his preferences ... to blur his own perspective and replace it with the fiction of a universal geometry,... to adopt a faceless anonymity” (Foucault 1977 b, 158). The genealogist does not attempt to stand behind or above the “here and now” in a realm of universality, of “faceless anonymity,” to make general proclamations regarding truth, power, poisons, or cures. Instead, he acknowledges his own perspective, his own preferences, his own sense of injustice, and uses these in his diagnostic enterprise. In describing the genealogist thusly, Foucault claims he is following Nietzsche, whose historical work reveals its “grounding in a particular time and place,” since his “version of historical sense is explicit in its perspective and acknowledges its system of injustice. Its perception is slanted, being a deliberate appraisal, affirmation, or negation . . .” (1977 b 156, 157). Nietzsche’s “slant” is organized around the notion of “life”: he argues for using history “as a means to life” (Nietzsche 1957, 11), and he thus incorporates in his genealogical work affirmation of that which is conducive to life, and criticizing that which is not. 16 Foucault’s “slant” is organized somewhat differently, as the focus in his appraisal of disease and cure centers on the “power” and “domination” involved in the “truths” of the present, in “what we are” and “what we say.” The rules and laws by which we become what we are and through which we are able to say what we say are involved in an “endlessly repeated play of dominations” (Foucault 1977 b, 150). Rejecting the notion that the rule of law is a peaceful substitute for the violence and domination involved in a lawless state of war, Foucault argues that the law, resting on the authority of universal “truth,” perpetuates domination (if only more insidiously): [l] t would be false to think that total war exhausts itself in its own contradictions and ends by renouncing violence and submitting to civil laws. On the contrary, the law . . . permits the perpetual instigation of new dominations and the staging of meticulously repeated scenes of violence.. . . Humanity does not progress from combat to combat until... the rule of law finally replaces warfare; humanity instills each of its violences in a system of rules and thus proceeds from domination to domination. (Foucault 1977 b, 150-151) The rule of law is one way by which domination can be achieved without always having to resort to physical force (except when the law is broken or is threatened); it is a means of governing others by getting them to govern themselves according to the precepts of a rule taken to be based in universal truth. The law, when it works best, takes its authority from the certainty of truth, to which many will submit even without the threat of physical violence. But Foucault sees a violence in this process nonetheless, a harm that he appraises from his own perspective, with his own preferences and notions of injustice. This harm is due to the coercion accompanying claims to universal truth such truth is so highly valued in the current regime of truth that it can be used to force individuals to think and act in conformity to it. It “dominates” through its supposed certainty: since it is thought “true” in an absolute and unquestionable way, dissent and nonconformity are discouraged at best, or even silenced and prohibited. Similarly, knowledge is implicated in a process of violence, according to Foucault, due to its claims to universal truth as well: “all knowledge rests upon injustice ... the instinct for knowledge is malicious .... Knowledge . . . creates a progressive enslavement to its instinctive violence” (1977 b 163). 17 I would like to point out two significant things about these claims regarding the violence involved in law and knowledge. First, these claims indicate that “truth” and “knowledge” are products of power a contention that Foucault focuses on in a later discussion of genealogy, outlined in Chapter Three. Second, the above claims regarding knowledge and power exhibit Foucault’s “situatedness,” his refusal to blur his own perspective, his acceptance of certain notions of injustice and “poison.” In them he appeals to certain moral values taken to be meaningful and “true” by many including himself, at least at the present time. Investigating Foucault’s methodological strategies in detail, Dreyfus and Rabinow conclude that he works to take a step back from the truths and practices of the “here and now” without trying or pretending to be able to completely step out of them. They note that Foucault “realizes that he himself is produced by what he is studying; consequently he can never stand outside it” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 124-125). He does indeed distance himself to a certain extent from his involvement in the present and its beliefs and concerns, in order to analyze and criticize them; but he does not step so far out that he no longer shares these concerns and/or the moral convictions that accompany them, such as the condemnation of domination and oppression. Still, it is important to note that Foucault would not say that the moral “truths” to which he adheres in his genealogies are timeless absolutes even a concept as basic as “liberty” (as a moral good) is, he insists, a historically developed notion rather than being “fundamental to man’s nature” (Foucault 1977 b, 142). Dreyfus and Rabinow explain that Foucault is able to employ terms, concepts, moral values and political questions that are meaningful at the present time and place while still acknowledging that they may not be so at another time or place. That they are historically contingent and transitory does not mean that they are ultimately meaningless, since/or us they can be of crucial importance that my moral values may not be timeless universals does not mean that I shouldn’t work to change that which I find to be wrong in order to stop what I perceive to be harm, here and now. According to Dreyfus and Rabinow, our present communities exhibit an important coherence in their shared beliefs and values, even if these have no ultimate, underlying fixity; and it is this that allows Foucault to appeal to presently meaningful ideas and issues and also to declare them historically contingent and changeable: Since we share cultural practices with others, and since these practices have made us what we are, we have, perforce, some common footing from which to proceed, to understand, and to act. But that foothold is no longer one which is universal, guaranteed, verified, or grounded. We are trying to understand the practices of our culture, practices which are by definition interpretations. They quite literally and materially embody a “form of life,” to use Wittgenstein’s phrase. This form of life has no essence, no fixity, no hidden underlying unity. But it nonetheless has its own specific coherence. (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 125) According to Dreyfus and Rabinow, Foucault does not try to step outside of the present with its shared meanings and moral values, but instead chooses certain instances of claims to self-evident truth that he now, using “situated” criteria, deems “poisonous” in order to show their historical contingency. 18 I believe this is an accurate and intriguing way to view Foucault’s position in regard to the present regime of truth, and I elaborate on it in my discussion of his exile character as an intellectual (in Chapter Three). We might say, then, that the “curative aspect” of genealogy involves the questioning of particular truths held today, one at a time; it does not require a rejection of all things considered “true” at once, of all knowledge. As Dreyfus and Rabinow argue, Foucault as genealogist does not try to stand apart from his own historical place by rejecting every one of his beliefs and values, all at once. He stands back from some while using others to criticize them. 19 Todd May agrees, but puts the issue slightly differently. May asks whether Foucault’s work means that “all knowledge is suspect, that we should withhold our assent from everything” (May 1993, 112). He then answers that this is not and cannot be the case: “in order for genealogy to function, not all knowledge can be suspect at the same time. . . . criticism is always situated; one does not criticize something except in the name of something else to which one gives one’s assent” (1993, 112-113). Thus it is not just that Foucault is a product of a particular history and cannot step out of it; it is also that the very kind of critical project in which he is engaged requires that he assent to some things in order to use them to criticize others. He assents, for example, to the notion that domination and oppression by power can be harmful, and he investigates certain manifestations of such oppression that are occurring here and now in order to historicize them and exhibit their possibly harmful effects. Still, as noted above, this does not mean that those things to which Foucault gives his assent are to be taken as absolute, unchanging truths. May notes this explicitly: This does not mean that genealogy is immune to critique; the categories genealogy holds constant in any of its analyses can always be put up for investigation by another history .... Not everything can be questioned at the same time, but anything can be questioned in its turn. (May 1993, 112- 113) It would not make sense to for Foucault to try to question everything at once, for then there would be no basis upon which to justify his efforts at questioning or critique. But as discussed above, having a basis doesn’t mean asserting that it is the only basis Foucault can assent to a number of things “here and now” upon which he can base his criticism of others, but these things need not be considered timeless or absolute; rather, they are part of a historically constituted “form of life,” and therefore need not be taken as universally true. They too can become the object of a genealogical analysis, in their turn. As Foucault explains, genealogy disturbs anything that claims to be immobile which would include also those things that the genealogist holds constant in his analyses: [Genealogy] disturbs what was previously considered immobile; it fragments what was thought unified; it shows the heterogeneity of what was imagined consistent with itself. What convictions and, far more decisively, what knowledge can resist it? (Foucault 1977 b, 147) Whatever the genealogist holds fast in order to question others can itself be questioned (but even then, of course, something else must be held constant). Further, even the genealogist’s historical analysis itself cannot be considered “immobile” in the sense of being certain, a “universally” accurate picture of the past, since it too could be subject to genealogical disturbance. Thus the genealogist’s histories are not presented as “true” in the “correspondence” sense, as Dreyfus and Rabinow explain: “[for the genealogist] [t]he correspondence theory of reality is dead. The search for finalities should be over. Hence Foucault cannot be claiming to give us a true history of the past. . . which represents it correctly . . .” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 120). To summarize Foucault’s view of genealogy as presented in his 1971 essay: genealogy is directed at upsetting, fragmenting, and disturbing what was previously thought to be “unified,” “immobile,” and “self-consistent”; it works to “dispel the chimeras of the origin” and substitute “disparity” (Foucault 1977 b, 147 142, 144). Further, genealogy rejects the traditional view of history, the “historian’s history,” that employs a “suprahistorical perspective” and a belief in “eternal truth”: The historian’s history finds its support out of time and pretends to base its judgments on an apocalyptic objectivity. This is only possible, however, because of its belief in eternal truth, the immortality of the soul, and the nature of consciousness as always identical to itself. (1977 b 152) Genealogy eschews such “metaphysical” assumptions, “refuses the certainty of absolutes,” and instead “distinguishes, separates, and disperses” with a “dissociating view that is capable of. . . shattering the unity of man’s being through which it was thought that he could extend his sovereignty to the events of his past” (1977 b 153). All of this points to John Rajchman’s diagnosis of Foucault as an “anti-universalist.” Foucault the genealogist works to fragment and disperse what was thought unified and unchangeable, to show the historical development in what was thought eternal, to question what was thought certain. Genealogy does this in part by tracing the history of conflict and domination that underlies what we presently take to be “who we are and what we are.” It not only shows that what was previously held “unified” or “immobile” or absolute and timeless is historically constituted through contingent and accidental processes, but also exhibits the exercise of power and the violence and domination behind this historical development: “Genealogy . . . seeks to reestablish the various systems of subjection ... the hazardous play of dominations” (1977 b 148). What reaches the status of the “true” does so by adhering to a series of rules, which themselves have been appropriated and manipulated through an exercise of power. The “true” is thus produced by power (and, reciprocally, it also carries with it effects of power in that it can be used to “disqualify” other views due to its status as “truth”). There is in Foucauldian genealogy a questioning and fragmenting of that which is considered “unified” and “universal,” “absolute” and “certain,” through a historical analysis that shows it to be not only contingently developed, but also constituted through exercises of power and domination. All claims to absolutes, to self-evidences, to universal truths are subject to such a genealogical critique; but this can’t be done all at once. The point of genealogy seems to rest in some kind of critique of the present, in disturbing that which was previously thought to be selfevident or universally true if it can be shown that this “truth” rests not only on a historical contingency, but one bound up with an exercise of power, this is likely to induce questions in the genealogist’s audience, and perhaps even provide an impetus to change present practices and conditions. With this early discussion of genealogy we begin to get an outline of the political role of the Foucauldian intellectual, since, as I will argue, this intellectual acts politically in part through producing genealogy. Note that the genealogist, as described in the early essay “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” fits the picture of the specific intellectual in various aspects. The genealogist is not a “universal” figure, since s/he works to disturb and disperse unified, universal claims. Further, s/he provides historical analyses of particular issues and concepts within a limited time frame and geographical location rather than addressing universal, absolute truths or values. Nor does the genealogist claim any sort of universal truth for his/her own statements or the things s/he holds fast in order to justify his/her questioning and criticism of others these too may be subject to genealogical analysis at a later time. S/he resembles the “specific” intellectual in focusing on particular, concrete issues, and s/he exhibits also elements of the “expert” through meticulous, historical analyses. Finally, the genealogist does not fail to address the regime of truth, since it is the exposure of the interconnection between truth and power that forms a main focus of genealogical work. Foucault’s 1971 essay on genealogy provides an early depiction of one way to address the regime of truth, of the intellectual as genealogist providing new interpretations of the past that work as critique of the present. The intellectual role sketched there is filled in throughout his later work, receiving more depth but retaining the same overall structure. The genealogist in the “in-between” of truth It is becoming clear that the status of the genealogist is in-between dogmatism and skepticism in regard to truth. There are no dogmatic claims to certainty here, no proclamations of ahistorical, universal truths indeed, Foucault argues that the genealogist “refuses the certainty of absolutes.” Even the historical tale genealogy tells is not claimed to be a kind of “true correspondence” to reality. But neither does the genealogist work to question or criticize all claims to universal or self-evident truth all at once. S/he proceeds, and must proceed, on a case-bycase basis that leads, as Rajchman claims, to an endless process, a “permanent questioning.” In one sense, then, Foucault the genealogist cannot be said to be a nihilist, since he must use some notions of truth, meaning and value in order to criticize others. He does use values of “liberty” and “nonviolence” to question and perform an implicit critique of truths and knowledges which function through the exercises of power, domination, and “murderous” malice (Foucault 1977 b, 163). But even these things that Foucault holds fast can themselves be questioned through other genealogical analyses, showing that he does not adhere to them dogmatically. Couldn’t one say, however, that Foucault still has a kind of “total skepticism” in regard to universal truth and certainty? Doesn’t it appear that, even if he can’t question everything at once, his genealogical work implies that all universal truths ought to be questioned; and in that sense, doesn’t it seem as if there is an implicit kind of refusal of all universal truths, all absolutes, working here? Of course, in order to hold a consistent skepticism with regard to universal truth, Foucault would have to question any “universally true” claims he might make himself including a claim such as: “There is no universal truth, no certainty, no absolutes.” In other words, Foucault could not consistently claim that, universally, there is no universal truth. This problem illustrates the movement mentioned above in regard to dialectics -- that in passing over to the “other side” as a negation, an opposition, one does not escape the structural logic of the side one opposes. Recall the discussion in the first chapter where I explained that Foucault seems to recognize this problem, since he argues that passing to the “other side” cannot be the ultimate answer. He would thus likely say that an oppositional move proclaiming the absolute value of the “good side” of pure untruth against the utterly corrupt and dangerous “bad side” of truth manages only to play along with the mechanisms of truth that set up such sides in the first place, to buy into the notions of unity and totality. It means thinking of untruth as total, as a unified “side” opposed to the unified “side” of truth; which, for Foucault, does not get to the heart of the mechanisms which produce the two “sides” in the first place. Still, Foucault admits, sometimes reversal can be “provisionally useful,” as long as it doesn’t stop there (Foucault 1996 d, 221-222). Foucault therefore may “pass to the other side” occasionally, indicating a rejection of universal truth; but to stop with such a strategy is unhelpful. A pure reversal keeps the mechanisms of that which one is criticizing intact a universal rejection of universal truth keeps universality in place. Foucault does not spend alot of time on the opposite side of universal truth, espousing a universal negation of it; though there are indeed times when Foucault indicates this kind of “total skepticism” or nihilism of the “other side” of universal truth in his work, such as when he claims that genealogy “refuses the certainty of absolutes,” and “all knowledge rests upon injustice.” Such statements can be misleading, since they seem to provide evidence of a critique and/or rejection of universal truth or knowledge on Foucault’s part. We could think of such claims as exhibiting brief movements to the “other side,” as reversals with which Foucault does not mean to rest. Instead, he may hope to use these reversals in order to induce a new way of thinking that can ultimately help one to “extract oneself from these mechanisms which make two sides appear” (Foucault 1996 d, 222). It has not yet been made clear, however, how moving to the “other side” will itself help to provoke such an extraction. It seems difficult to escape the “mechanisms which make two sides appear” by using it, by taking up an “other side” oneself. Foucault himself doesn’t explain the workings of this process, asserting only that it can be performed. 20 Todd May offers another explanation for Foucault’s occasional “universal” rejections of truth and knowledge. May argues that Foucault may not always be as careful as he perhaps ought to be when he is speaking generally about his work, about what genealogy in general can do and about some of the results it can provide. According to May, in his genealogical histories Foucault carefully refrains from making claims about knowledge in general or the “truth” of what he says: each genealogy is “a historical account of how a certain domain of knowledge came about,” that “makes no direct claims about the epistemic status of those discourses” (May 1993, 81; italics mine). In other words, in works such as Discipline and Punish Foucault discusses the historical emergence of our present discourses of punishment (a “certain domain of knowledge”), without addressing “knowledge in general” or even making claims about the epistemic “truth” of the history he presents. But May then remarks: However, to say that knowledge is only a matter of history is to make a direct epistemic claim where none was shown. Foucault is careful not to do this in his histories, but not so careful in his methodological account of genealogy. (1993, 81) It could be argued, as May indicates here, that Foucault is simply not always being careful when he is describing his work or his genealogical method in general. Sometimes he may argue that “knowledge is only a matter of history,” as May puts it, or that “subjectivity is historically constituted by practices of power”; 21 and indeed, such potentially problematic statements “knowledge” or “subjectivity” in general occur either in interviews, where Foucault is often called upon to describe the character of his work “in general,” or in texts such as “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” where Foucault describes his genealogical method in very general terms. Given the structure of such “generalized” discussions, perhaps one should not make too much of the “general” statements that are present therein. It could be argued that in attempting to investigate his views, one should look less to the texts in which Foucault outlines his method in a general fashion than to those in which he practices it in careful detail. It is possible that certain “sloppy” statements may exist in the former without crucially jeopardizing the character and consistency of the latter. 22 In sum, when Foucault makes statements indicating a “universal” rejection of universal truth, he could be considered as moving briefly to the “other side,” or as being at times sloppy and outright inconsistent. His genealogical project seems to require skepticism about universal truth, a willingness to question it (thought not altogether and all at once) but not an utter negation or refusal. Rather than exhibiting a “total skepticism,” a “universal” rejection of universal truth, I argue that Foucault’s genealogical texts reveal a process of stepping-back from universal truths, a distancing movement that works to question and criticize without cutting off completely. In other words, rather than drawing a line between himself and claims to universal truth, proclaiming his rejection of them, his placement “outside,” the genealogist steps back and questions them, considers them in a new way through a historical analysis that takes on the character of critique changing the traditional way of viewing our present truths and values as well as the usual story about their historical development. This is not the same as a rejection or refusal; but it is a kind of distancing, a process of exile. The Foucauldian genealogist exhibits a movement of exile in the sense described by Edward Said. The intellectual as exile steps back in order to resist, to dissent against certain aspects of dominant discourses and practices, while still remaining tied to the dominant society and to these discourses themselves to the degree that they are not completely refused. The genealogist does not (ideally) outright reject those things s/he questions, does not move to the “other side” and oppose them; rather, s/he presents a genealogical, historical analysis of them that works as a kind of question and critique. Recall that according to Said, the intellectual exile “exists in a median state ... beset with half-involvements and halfdetachments” (Said 1994, 49). The genealogist takes up a position in-between fully accepting and fully rejecting that from which s/he is exiled, through a process of moving through certain beliefs, truths, values, etc. towards their eventual disturbance. In his genealogies Foucault works to question particular beliefs, values, practices, etc. that have meaning for us now, to which we ascribe a universalist kind of truth. But he does not do so by rejecting all claims to universal truth, by expressing a “total skepticism” and thereby attempting to remain outside of the domain of universal truth entirely. Instead, he takes up a position in the present, adhering to many of its truths and values while also exiling himself from them. 23 One way he does this is to recognize that all seemingly “universal” truths are historically constructed and therefore changeable. Rather than rejecting them on this basis, however, Foucault uses some claims to universal truth and value in order to criticize others, while accepting that the former can also be questioned through a similar process. Said also argues that the intellectual exile possesses a “double perspective” in that s/he is able to see things “not simply as they are, but as they have come to be that way” (Said 1994, 60). The Foucauldian genealogist clearly exhibits this kind of double perspective, as s/he offers a historical narrative to show how what seems “unchangeable, permanent, irreversible” is rather “contingent, not. . . inevitable” (Said 1994, 60-61). Further, the genealogist does so by operating with and within particular truths and values held to be universal at present, moving through them to tell a story of their past. S/he does not stand outside of them as if s/he did not belong to the present in which they find their meaning; rather, s/he gives a history of them from the perspective of the present, peppering this history with norms and values that have meaning here and now. For example, in The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault traces the notion of a “true self’ and its natural sexuality as repressed by power, back to a development out of Christian practices of confession. He explains that the idea of “liberating sexuality” by eliminating its repression by power assumes a “natural,” “true” sexuality at the bottom of this repression, when instead this “truth” has been produced by practices of power. In reading the historical narrative Foucault provides to make this point, we find a tone that reveals such practices to be oppressive in a way that Foucault seems to find problematic (and that we will likely do as well). He argues, for example, that the Christian confession initiates a process whereby sex is forced to speak by power: [There has been a] multiplication of discourses concerning sex in the field of exercise of power: an institutional incitement to speak about it, to do so more and more; a determination on the part of the agencies of power to hear it spoken about, and to cause it to speak through explicit articulation and endlessly accumulated detail. (Foucault 1990 a, 18) This process began (roughly) with the practice of confession, whereby one was required to speak about one’s sexual desires and activities to a figure of authority. In the confession, Foucault asserts, “sex was taken charge of, tracked down as it were, by a discourse that aimed to allow it no obscurity, no respite” (Foucault 1990 a, 20). Foucault then argues that the notion of a “true self’ and its “true sexuality” have developed out of such practices of compulsion. We may think we have this hidden core of truth, a hidden sexuality that power works merely to repress; but this idea has been developed out of a practice of power itself. 24 Foucault speaks as if he finds the practice of confession problematically oppressive, from the same point of view as most anyone else who accepts many of the dominant truths and values of the present sex is forced, compelled to speak over and over and in explicit detail; it is “taken charge of,” allowed “no respite.” To those who value individual liberty and freedom, this practice is bound to be viewed critically; and to the extent that Foucault treats it as such with his tone of writing, he seems to adhere to this value that is of great importance here and now. In this way, he remains within the present system of truth, accepting and utilizing some of its claims to universal truth and value while working to undermine others. 25 In The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault seems to appeal to notions of freedom and liberty in order to criticize the idea of a “true sexuality” repressed by power. Said also argues that the intellectual exile exhibits a “restlessness” due to his/her “half-involvements and half-detachments”; s/he is “constantly being unsettled, and unsettling others” (Said 1994, 53). We have seen that the Foucauldian genealogist as described in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” works to unsettle what was previously thought stable, absolute, unified, etc. In addition, the genealogist is always willing to be unsettled him/herself, as s/he engages in a process of “permanent questioning,” always ready to take a critical stance towards even those claims to which s/he may have appealed in the past. This gives the genealogist a kind of freedom, as Said argues, a liberty to experiment and invent rather than remaining tied to the stability of never-changing truths. Foucault quotes a passage from Nietzsche that seems to point to at least one kind of freedom the genealogist enjoys, namely the freedom of not being tied to a particular identity: “The study of history makes one ‘happy, unlike the metaphysicians, to possess in oneself not an immortal soul but many mortal ones’” (Foucault 1977 b, 161). 26 The genealogist, ready to question any universal truths (including those that contribute to his/her “identity”), is no longer tied to any notion of a “true self’ within. S/he is free to create new and multiple identities, to continually change him/herself. 27 As an exile, however, the Foucauldian genealogist is in a somewhat precarious position in regard to universal truth. Within the movement of exile there may be the tendency to try to go “outside,” a kind of yearning or straining for an impossible exit impossible, because a successful exit to the “outside” simply keeps one within the structural logic of the “mechanisms of truth that produce sides.” It may seem at times as if Foucault’s work oscillates between “inside” and “outside” in various respects. For example, it may appear both that: (a) Foucault attempts to get “outside” universal truth altogether in a movement of “total skepticism,” and that (b) he nevertheless, in the process, makes universal claims himself by (absolutely) “refusing the certainty of absolutes.” He could also be thought to be asserting a kind of “universal certainty” for his own historical claims and value judgments in his genealogies and elsewhere, since he doesn’t always emphasize how these, too can be subject to question. 28 According to my view of Foucault as an intellectual exile, both this latter evidence of Foucault’s being fully “inside” universal truth, as well as the former view of his attempts to move fully “outside” are mistaken, but understandable, views given the position of the intellectual as exile. The exile is in a position “in-between” that can result in occasional movements to each side. This intellectual sits precariously in a position of exile, neither fully within or without but exhibiting aspects of both. Even though he argues that genealogy reveals the production of truth through power, Foucault does not express a “total skepticism” in regard to truth in his genealogies. As I will argue, simply because truth is produced by power does not mean that it is all bad, since not all power relations are necessarily bad, evil, or heavily oppressive. For Foucault, power is everywhere, and it is not necessary to try to avoid each of its manifestations or effects. Foucault does indeed criticize some claims to universal truth in his genealogies, but he does not reject all such claims due to their connection with practices of power. Like Said’s exile, Foucault exhibits “half-involvements” and “half-detachments” with claims to universal truth. He expresses them with a critical distance, using some to undermine others while also recognizing that each can be questioned in turn if it is found to perpetuate practices of power that are too oppressive. The connection between truth and power, however, and the differing degrees of danger and oppression in practices of power, have yet to be fully explained. Foucault argues in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” that truth and power are connected, but he does not carefully explain there how this is the case. Further, his tone in this essay makes it sound as if truth and knowledge are always produced by strongly oppressive practices of power e.g., “knowledge rests upon injustice”; “knowledge creates a progressive enslavement to its instinctive violence’" (Foucault 1977 b, 163) when later texts indicate that this is not necessarily the case. It is important to take a closer look at the “regime of truth” that is made up of the connections between truth, knowledge, and power, in order to determine how the intellectual might be able to exile him/herself from it. 'The following is a somewhat brief, limited overview of Foucault’s views regarding truth and power. It is by no means meant to be exhaustive, as it includes only those aspects necessary to an understanding of his view on the political role of intellectuals. Throughout the discussion I will point to other sources where more detailed analyses can be found. 2 ln certain aspects of this view of truth one might find similarities between Foucault and other twentieth century philosophers who consider truth to be a property of statements. Dreyfus and Rabinow provide an interesting comparison of Foucault’s view with those of John Searle and Noam Chomsky, pointing out that Foucault eventually admitted certain similarities between his conception of “statements” and Searle’s “speech acts” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 45-48). term “archaeology” denotes a particular type of investigative method for Foucault, a specific way of approaching and describing systems of thought and their truth claims. For a detailed discussion of Foucault’s archaeological method, see the first part of Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow’s Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 3-100). For a more concise explanation of this method, see Shumway (1989, 97-107). I provide a brief discussion the difference between archaeology and genealogy (the method that informs Foucault’s later work) in a later footnote. 4 The question of what distinguishes archaeology from genealogy for Foucault is a difficult one to answer, and his commentators do not agree on where this distinction lies. Foucault attempts to describe his own transition from archaeology to genealogy in a lecture given in 1970 (“The Discourse on Language”), emphasizing that genealogy focuses more on the role of power in the production of truth than does archaeology. Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow insist that “[t]here is no pre- and post-archaeology or genealogy in Foucault’s work,” that he continued to use both kinds of investigation while giving different weight to each at different times (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 104). They argue that archaeology favors theory over practice in that the archaeologist describes “in theoretical terms the rules governing discursive practices” (1983, 102). Further, the archaeologist attempts to bracket “truth and seriousness,” claiming that he is “totally detached from the realm of serious discourse of his day” (1983, 102-103). In his genealogical work, however, Foucault focuses more on the way practices give intelligibility to statements and knowledges than on the “rules of formation” that he earlier emphasized (1983, 103). Foucault begins to investigate practices such as medicine, punishment, religious confession, etc. and shows how these contribute to what we consider to be true or meaningful. Further, in his genealogical work Foucault no longer tries to stand outside of the discourses and practices of his time, refusing to accept their truth for himself as a theorist: “The investigator is no longer the detached spectator of mute-discourse monuments. Foucault realizes and thematizes the fact that he himself... is involved in, and to a large extent produced by, the social practices he is studying. Foucault introduces genealogy as a method of diagnosing and grasping the significance of social practices from within them” (1983, 103). Dreyfus and Rabinow conclude that archaeology is a kind of “strict analysis of discourse” while genealogy pays more attention to “that which conditions, limits, and institutionalizes discursive formations” (1983, 104). David Shumway makes a similar point, arguing that what characterizes Foucault’s genealogies is a movement away from his archaeological view of discourse “solely as a matter of the relations of key terms and the possible statements that may be derived from them” (Shumway 1989, 103). According to Shumway, Foucault began to recognize that such discursive structures with their abstract rules do not exist in isolation from social practices: “[t]hat kind of structure is now seen as part of a larger practice that is not merely linguistic or intellectual, but social. . . . [Genealogy] no longer treat[s] discursive practices as radically isolated from nondiscursive, social contexts” (1989, 103). In other words, the very idea of studying discourses and their “rules of formation” in the detached way that characterizes archaeology is itself a function of historical, social practices and processes. It was developed at particular times and places under particular conditions. In his genealogies, Foucault begins to focus more on the historical and social practices that give rise to discourses and their meaning and truth, the practices of power that produce the truth. For Shumway, then, the difference between archaeology and genealogy “is a matter of whether discourse, or its external limits and conditions, will receive more emphasis” (1989, 108). Shumway agrees with Dreyfus and Rabinow that “Foucault never rejected archaeology,” but simply added genealogy to it (Shumway 1989, 108). also emphasizes that for Foucault, this doesn’t mean that this domination is under the control of individuals and their conscious intentions. Instead, it works through a “struggle of forces” (Mahon 1992, 112). For Foucault, this must be the case because individuals, along with their intentions, are themselves produced by such “struggles of forces,” by the workings of power (Foucault 1980 h, 97). Thus Foucault does not suggest that the force involved in interpretation is under the conscious control of any one or a group of individuals; no one can claim responsibility for it, he argues (Foucault 1977 b, 150). 6 Peter Dews, in Logics of Disintegration, expresses criticisms of Foucault’s work that are similar to those of Taylor. He argues that Foucault tries to take a neutral stance in regard to power at times, simply describing its workings and its production of truths, while at other times he approaches power critically (Dews 1987, 162). When doing the latter, Dews argues, Foucault ends up appealing to notions of truth to ground his normative stance, notions that he also works to undermine in his own texts (1987, 167-170). 7 Though I agree with Veyne that Foucault rejects the search for foundations and absolute truths as fruitless, I am not certain if he would support the claim that “knowing what one wants ... is enough.” He may agree with Veyne that one does not have to justify what one wants as “right” in the sense of having a foundation in truth (but then the evaluation of wants and desires on the basis of criteria of “truth” seems an odd enterprise anyway - it is not often the truth value of our wants that is at issue in regard to justifying them); but this does not, by itself, mean that knowing what one wants is enough. We can still ask for justification for those wants (especially if they are to be acted upon) in terms of ethical criteria that are not based in a firm foundation of absolute truth. I am inclined to think that Foucault would press for something like this sort of justification, given that his criticisms of oppressive power relations carry a normative force that implies some kind of ethical criteria. This brings up the thorny problem of justifying the normativity in Foucault’s texts, a problem that I address and work to resolve in Chapter Four. B lt is not clear exactly how through such a “serene acceptance” one manages to get beyond nihilism, however. Isn’t it rather that one is simply accepting it? Perhaps we could defend Veyne in this claim by arguing that nihilism is a condition that is defined in the context of a general acceptance of truth. In other words, we could argue that nihilism is what one reaches when, having hoped and expected to find truth, one realizes that this search is and will always be fruitless. If we give this contextual definition to nihilism, then it would refer to a condition that requires the backdrop of a serious search for truth. Once this search is abandoned, and we calmly and “serenely” accept that “one can get along very nicely without foundations and even without truth,” then we are no longer experiencing a condition of nihilism, under this view. I do not know if Veyne would agree to this kind of defense of his point, nor am I certain that this definition of nihilism would be acceptable to many; but it is a possible route to explaining how, in accepting nihilism and thinking through it, one might be able to get beyond it. 9 I provide an in-depth explanation of this movement of exile, and how it may be able to accomplish the goal of bringing others to question the beliefs and values they hold dear, in Chapter Three. In what follows here I outline a way in which Foucault can be considered an exile from claims to universal truth. 10 It is difficult to say with precision which of Foucault’s texts should be labeled “genealogies,” especially given the disagreement amongst his commentators as to where the break between “archaeology” and “genealogy” lies (disagreements that were never entirely cleared up by Foucault himself) (see Mahon (1992, 101-106) for a concise overview of some of these disagreements). In what follows I adhere to a view of genealogy that characterizes it as a historical narrative designed to reveal the contingent development of that which many take to be absolute and timeless. As Michael Mahon puts it, “[t]he task of genealogy is to reveal the historical conditions of existence” (1992, 104); though here I focus on how genealogy reveals the historical conditions of what is thought to have no history. Under this view, I characterize Madness and Civilization, The Birth of the Clinic, Discipline and Punish and the three volumes of The History of Sexuality as genealogies. The first of these, of course, was written long before Foucault specified his work as “genealogical,” but it does provide a historical analysis that generally follows the structure of genealogy as described by Foucault himself (discussed below). It will not be my purpose here to evaluate each of these studies and judge how well they do or do not fit the picture of genealogy given in the following section. Some may fit it better than others, and I leave this for the reader familiar with these studies to decide. Instead, I will be mainly concerned here with providing several of the most significant elements of Foucault’s notion of genealogy in general, they impinge on his view of truth and its relationship to power. 1 Foucault’s Nietzschean Genealogy forms part of the title of a book by Michael Mahon, in which he compares Foucault’s version of genealogy with that of Nietzsche (Mahon 1992). 12 In his focus on the present, Foucault even rejects advocating what ought to be done in regard to present practices and relations of power. In other words, not only does he avoid asking about or providing the universal remedy for criminal behavior, he even avoids providing a provisional remedy for criminal behavior in its present forms, as it has developed historically. He is quite adamant that, as he states interview, he does not and will not provide solutions to the problems he raises: “[W]hat I want to do is not the history of solutions .... I would like to do genealogy of problems” (Foucault 1983, 231). I investigate this refusal and why Foucault might have insisted upon it in Chapter Three. 13 The “illness” of which Nietzsche speaks is described in his Genealogy of Morals as “bad conscience.” This is a conscience characterized by self-denial, guilt, a sense of responsibility and resentment, and it is the result of the “instinct for freedom” (or what he also calls the “will to power,” the instinct directed towards activity and life) being “pushed back and repressed, incarcerated within and finally able to discharge and vent itself only on itself’ (Nietzsche 1989, 87) See the Genealogy of Morals, Second Essay, § 16-§25 (1989, 84-96) for an in-depth discussion of this illness and the beginnings of a movement towards a “cure.” The Third Essay, especially §25- §27 (1989, 153-161), contains a further discussion of a possible “cure” (though this is not explicitly the topic of the Third Essay, but it is arguably implied there). This cure is one that seems to involve the self-overcoming of the illness of bad conscience that requires its exposure and understanding in the first place which, of course, the Genealogy of Morals itself can help accomplish. Still, the “cure” to which Nietzsche refers remains rather obscure, as do the curative aspects of genealogy as described here so far. How genealogy can contribute to a “cure” is made clearer in the chapters that follow. 14 At least, this is how Foucault perceives it see Foucault (1977 b 152-160). Much interesting work could be and has been done to compare Foucault and Nietzsche, and to evaluate Foucault’s interpretation of Nietzsche’s work. Michael Mahon, for example, compares Foucault’s genealogical project to Nietzsche’s, in Foucault’s Nietzschean Genealogy: Truth, Power, and the Subject (Mahon 1992), bringing out similarities and differences between the two. I will not here evaluate the accuracy of Foucault’s interpretation of Nietzsche’s genealogical method, as my main focus is on what Foucault took himself to be doing. I am much less concerned with whether Foucault gives an accurate characterization of the views of those whom he cites as influences than I am with what his descriptions of these views reveals about his own. 15 Mahon cites an interview with Paolo Caruso as the source for this quote from Foucault (Caruso 1969, 103). 16 In the second of his Untimely Meditations, “The Use and Abuse of History,” Nietzsche argues that “[h]istorical study is only fruitful for the future if it follows a powerful life-giving influence . . .” (Nietzsche 1957, 12). One of the ways in which it can do this, Nietzsche argues, is to consider the past in a “critical” way: “[one] must bring the past to the bar of judgment, interrogate it remorselessly, and finally condemn it. . . . It is not justice that sits in judgment here, nor mercy that proclaims the verdict, but only life . . .” (1957, 21). In The Will to Power (§254), Nietzsche defines “life” as the “will to power” (Nietzsche 1968, 148). Thus part of using history as a means to promoting life could involve judging it with respect to that which is or is not conducive to life. This is, at any rate, what is exhibited in his genealogical history of morality, since in the Genealogy of Morals and Twilight of the Idols Nietzsche criticizes the history of our ethical concepts with an eye to their contribution to “life” (see, e.g., Genealogy of Morals Second Essay §ll-§l2, §l6-§lB (Nietzsche 1989,73-79, 84-88); Third Essay §ll, §l3-21 (1989, 116- 118, 120-143); see also Twilight of the Idols, “Morality as Anti-Nature” (Nietzsche 1990, 32-56). To consider Nietzsche’s concept of “life” in enough detail to carefully compare it to Foucault’s view of the uses of history and genealogy would require an in-depth inquiry beyond the bounds of the present study. I explain below that Foucault’s criteria for appraisal are somewhat different than Nietzsche’s, since he does not speak in the same terms and appears to have more of an emphasis on abuses of power by institutional structures than does Nietzsche. Dreyfus and Rabinow argue that Foucault’s view differs from Nietzsche in that the former “depsychologizes” certain aspects of the latter’s approach: “whereas Nietzsche often seems to ground morality and social institutions in the tactics of individual actors, Foucault totally depsychologizes this approach and sees all psychological motivation not as the source but as the result of strategies without strategists. . . . Foucault . . . finds force relations working themselves out in particular events, historical movements, and history” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 109). Still, there are interesting similarities between Nietzsche’s regard for “life” and Foucault’s regard for “freedom.” Part of the use of history for life, according to Nietzsche, involves the attempt to “plant a new way of life .... to gain a [new] past a posteriori from which we might spring, as against that from which we do spring . . .” (Nietzsche 1957, 21). This is actually quite similar to some of the things Foucault says about his work providing for a “transformative experience,” an experience whereby our view of the past is altered in a way that also changes our view of the present and ourselves. For Foucault, this process of transformation involves a practice of freedom. I discuss Foucault’s notion of a “transformative experience” in Chapter Three . speaks often of “knowledge,” especially in its relation to “power”; and both of these terms require further elucidation. Foucault gives careful explanations of what he means by “power” in various texts and interviews, and I review these later in this chapter. It is more difficult to say with precision what Foucault means by “‘knowledge.” Perhaps the clearest explanation of this can be found in The Archaeology of Knowledge. By way of introduction, the translator of the English edition, A.M. Sheridan Smith, explains in a footnote that the English word “knowledge” has two French equivalents, connaissance and savoir. Smith explains the former in the following way: “Connaissance refers here to a particular corpus of knowledge, a particular discipline biology or economics, for example” (Foucault 1972 a, 15 n. 2). According to Smith, savoir “is usually defined as knowledge in general, the totality of connaissances” ; but Foucault uses this term “in an underlying, rather than an overall, way” (1972 a 15 n. 2). Smith refers to Foucault’s own definition of these two terms, without citing where this definition comes from: “By connaissance I [Foucault] mean the relation of the subject to the object and the formal rules that govern it. Savoir refers to the conditions that are necessary in a particular period for this or that type of object to be given to connaissance and for this or that enunciation to be formulated” (1972 a 15 n. 2). Foucault himself explains his usage of savoir in The Archaeology of Knowledge, but his discussion is complex and his meaning far from clear. To provide a fully adequate explanation of Foucault’s view of savoir from this text would require a lengthy discussion of the main points of the text as a whole. Rather than enter into such a discussion, I will give a few basic points that will characterize Foucault’s view of savoir in enough depth for my present purpose. Recall that according to Foucault’s notion of archaeology, truth is a function of statements and the rules governing them, so that the rules dictate which statements made in what ways are to count as “true.” In The Archaeology of Knowledge Foucault argues that savoir refers to a “group of elements,” “on the basis of which coherent (or incoherent) propositions are built up,” which “form the precondition of what is later revealed and which later functions as an item of knowledge or an illusion, an accepted truth or an exposed error . . .” (Foucault 1972 a, 182). This indicates that savoir is linked to the rules that provide truth and meaning to particular statements. But there is more to it than this, as Foucault also argues that “[k]nowledge [savoi r] is that of which one can speak in a discursive practice” (1972 a 182). In other words, knowledge as savoir encompasses not only the rules that produce true statements and the true statements themselves, but also, it seems, other elements “of which one can speak” in a particular kind of discourse including statements that are false, or whose truth value is undetermined, perhaps. What Foucault means by this is far from clear, though we can say at least that knowledge as savoir includes, but is not limited to, that which is considered true at any particular time and place. Many English translations of Foucault’s texts do not provide a distinction between connaissance and savoir, translating both as “knowledge.” For my purpose here, I am mainly concerned with Foucault’s view of truth, and it is clear at least that both connaissance and savoir are intimately connected with claims to truth. Consequently, I will treat references to “knowledge” in Foucault similarly to the way I treat references to “truth,” even though there are differences in meaning between the terms. I think that in terms of the relationship of knowledge and truth to power, the former two terms can be treated in such a roughshod way without losing too many crucial aspects of Foucault’s meaning. 18 Both Dreyfus and Rabinow and Foucault himself refer explicitly or implicitly to some commonly shared, relatively coherent “form of life,” as Dreyfus and Rabinow put it here. In describing genealogy as a critique of the present (see, e.g., Foucault (1997 f 158-162)), Foucault indicates that “we” share certain beliefs and values in the present, ones that he works in his genealogies to question and undermine. I, too, make reference to a kind of shared “form of life” in my description of the intellectual as an exile from the common beliefs, values, and ways of living that are dominant in the society in which the intellectual lives. Foucault himself does not spell out clearly who shares the common views, and neither have I. This notion is perhaps best conceived of as including things which are widely accepted in a particular society (though not by all) as not only true, but true in a universal way true for everyone whether they accept them or not. For example, in our society it is widely accepted that capitalism is the best economic system for many reasons, including the financial rewards it can provide for individuals and the society as a whole, and the freedom it provides for individual members to live their lives as they choose. This view is taken to be of such universal validity that the United States and other powerful nations see no problem with coercing (through organizations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank) other countries into developing capitalist systems. Though not all members of American society agree with this view of the benefits of capitalism, it is arguably dominant in a way that Marxism is not. The notion of a common “form of life” is necessarily fuzzy, given the wide variety of beliefs and values among individual members of any given society. Perhaps the best way to approach it is by particular beliefs and ways of thinking and acting that seem generally dominant. In his genealogies, Foucault operates in this more specific way, taking particular views that currently hold sway and working to undermine them. It may not be possible to unite these into a coherent “form of life,” though for the purpose of explaining the general structure of genealogy it seems necessary to refer to something like a group of common views. 19 0ne might ask, then, whether Foucault means that everything should be questioned at some point, even though practically, not everything can be questioned all at once. I address this question briefly in the next section of this chapter. It can also be addressed by referring to Foucault’s role as an intellectual “prophet in exile,” which is explained in depth in Chapter Three. There I argue that Foucault, and the Foucauldian intellectual, may be viewed as working to bring their audience to question not only those things under discussion in any particular genealogy, but also the role of the intellectual as a “prophet” who tells them what to think and do. If this effort is successful, it would mean that one’s audience would be better willing and able to turn to themselves for answers as to how they ought to think about particular issues and what they should do about them. Thus the question as to what ought to be criticized, questioned, struggled against, or resisted is one that, according to Foucault, should be answered by those who decide for themselves what to think and do. It is not for the Foucauldian intellectual to make others question everything, nor to tell them which things ought to be questioned and which not; instead, I argue that the Foucauldian intellectual works to encourage others to decide this for themselves. 20 1 am actually not convinced that passing to the “other side” can manage to help one escape from the dualistic structures that make the two sides appear, as Foucault suggests. I believe instead that Foucault’s work can be most helpful in promoting fruitful resistance to power precisely when he does not try to escape to the “other side,” when he avoid taking up a position of strict opposition or negation. It is his movements of exile that I find most politically effective in his role as an intellectual. I take up this issue in more detail in Chapter Three. 21 See Foucault (1996 e 440) for examples of statements by Foucault that seem to make this sort of “universal” claim. 22 0ne might also say that perhaps Foucault sometimes makes appeals to universal truths because of the exile position he occupies as a genealogist. Recall that in his genealogies Foucault presents a history of knowledges and practices we currently find meaningful and true, for the purpose of disturbing and unsettling them. He begins from what has meaning for us now and tells a story of its development that makes it seem less stable and certain. It would not be surprising, then, to find him appealing to universal truth claims, since these are what we now find important, and they are the very claims Foucault is working to undermine. For example, perhaps Foucault speaks at times as if there were such a thing as “knowledge in general” because that is what many, here and now, believe many take things such as “knowledge,” “rationality” and “subjectivity” to have something like a stable, ahistorical essence. If this is the case, then one could argue that Foucault sometimes speaks in universalist terms about such issues because it is precisely these terms and the universal truths they seem to denote that he investigates for the purpose of eventually undermining them. In other words, in his genealogies Foucault takes that which many believe to be the essence of something like subjectivity and shows not only that it is historically constituted, but that it is only one of many possible forms of subjectivity. Along the way it is possible that he may adopt the language of the present belief in something like a single “subjectivity in general,” as he shows that if such a label makes sense at all it is as a manifold of multiple possibilities that cannot be reduced to a single, ahistorical essence. Such a movement could be described as one of exile, since Foucault would be speaking universal truths, drawing his readers in with them, while at the same time maintaining a critical distance from such truths. He would be utilizing what is meaningful to many of his readers here and now, while also bringing them to question these truths through a historical narrative of their development. This explanation doesn’t quite work in regard to Foucault’s occasional universalist rejections of universal truth, however, as he does not bring up such rejections in order to perform a genealogy of them. 23 1 argue in Chapter Three that the Foucauldian genealogist actually accepts and utilizes universal truths as universal, in order to eventually undermine their seemingly absolute and timeless status. Thus this intellectual does not only accept some of the dominant discourses, truths, and knowledge of his/her day, s/he also speaks them as if they are, indeed, universal. 24 How this development takes place is actually a rather complex process, and it would be too cumbersome to discuss it at this point, when I mean mostly to focus on the tone of Foucault’s argument rather than its substance. I discuss how the notion of a “true self and sexuality” develop out of the Christian confession in Chapter Four. 25 1 argue in Chapter Three that Foucault may also be able to utilize particular truth and value claims that are meaningful here and now in order to disturb those very claims themselves. In other words, in addition to appealing to some truths in order to undermine others, in his genealogies Foucault may also work to upset the very truths to which he makes appeal. cites this passage from Nietzsche as appearing in The Wanderer (Opinions and Mixed Statements), 17. 27 1 n later texts, especially the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality, Foucault begins to focus on the notion of fabricating oneself, creating oneself as a work of art. I discuss this process and its emancipatory capacity in Chapter Five. 28 Actually, I believe that Foucault’s genealogies are most effective at achieving the goal Foucault claims for them (to encourage a transformation in how his audience views particular issues such as madness and punishment) precisely when they are taken to provide historical “facts” in a universalist sense of corresponding absolutely with events in their “reality.” I discuss this point in Chapter Three, where I argue that by presenting his historical narratives as “fact,” Foucault can get the attention of those who respect such universalist truths. I argue that part of Foucault’s political role as an intellectual involves trying to bring those who are currently entrenched in the present regime of truth to question their beliefs and values themselves, without Foucault telling them directly that they ought to do this. Such an endeavor requires a complex movement of exile, through which one appears to espouse universal truths (such as presenting historical narrative as “fact”) in order to induce others to initiate their own critical distance from them. II The Regime of Truth: Truth and Power I examine the connection of truth and power in the regime of truth, according to Foucault, by considering the two sides of the relation separately: first I consider how truth produces effects of power, and then, conversely, how power produces effects of truth. Though these two discussions are thus separated for the purpose of clarity, it should be remembered that these two movements function together and reciprocally support one another in the regime of truth. I trace the development of this interconnection from Foucault’s early work in Madness and Civilization to his some of his later texts, including Discipline and Punish and The History of Sexuality Vol. I. Discipline and normalization: how truth and knowledge produce effects of power Clearly, discourses which are given a “truthful,” “scientific” status wield a great amount of social, political, and even economic power in Western societies. This is the case not only in the sense that they have the authority to pronounce disqualification on knowledges that don’t meet their standards or structural rules, but also in the sense that they can have a wide range of influence in many different aspects of the socioeconomic and political arena. Foucault sums up this idea in a general fashion: [W]e are ... subjected to truth in the sense in which it is truth that makes the laws .... In the end, we are judged, condemned, classified, determined in our undertakings, destined to a certain mode of living or dying, as a function of the true discourses which are the bearers of the specific effects of power. (Foucault 1980 h, 94) Those discourses which are accorded the status of “true” or “scientific” wield a significant amount of power over us in that they invest the societal mechanisms which work to judge, classify, and determine our activities. Indeed, Foucault claims that “it is impossible for knowledge not to engender power” (Foucault 1980 f, 52). Numerous examples can be found throughout Foucault’s writings to explain how truth produces power. In his early text, Madness and Civilization, Foucault discusses a process of constraint in the name of truth and knowledge that is similar to the notions of discipline and normalization that he will develop later. Describing the structure of an asylum for the insane established by Samuel Tuke in the late eighteenth century, Foucault notes how the “truth” of morality and religion worked to restrain patients by instilling in them a sense of guilt. In other words, the truth of the Law including that of religion, morality, reason and society was invested with an authority that sanctioned the punishment of unreason in the insane, and the resulting development of a sense of guilt and responsibility on their part. The authority and threat of the Law and its truth worked to keep patients in a state of fear, constraining them to mold themselves to its precepts: [T]he insane individual [is] . . . kept in a perpetual anxiety, ceaselessly threatened by Law and Transgression. Now madness . . . would be afraid, without recourse or return, thus entirely in the hands of the pedagogy of good sense, of truth, and of morality. (Foucault 1988 b, 245) The truth of reason, sense, and morality takes on a pedagogical role that invests it with the power of an authority. Foucault notes that one of the important aspects of Tuke’s asylum was the increased liberty it gave to its patients as compared to earlier houses of confinement, a liberty that was revealed in a lowered emphasis on physical restraint. But he also points out that a different form of restraint replaced it, one that is linked to the authority of reason, truth and the law: [T]he partial suppression of physical constraint was part of a system whose essential element was the constitution of a ‘self-restraint’ in which the patient’s freedom ... was ceaselessly threatened by the recognition of guilt. . . . [O]ne was in the grip of a positive operation that confined madness in a system of rewards and punishments, and included it in the movement of a moral consciousness. (Foucault 1988 b, 250) Physical force wasn’t needed for coercion if the power of the law, invested within the patients themselves through a sense of guilt and responsibility, could enable a “self-restraint.” This could be achieved partly through the embodiment of the law in an individual, a “keeper” or guard who confronts the mad “not as a concrete person . . . but as a reasonable being, invested by that very fact, and before any combat takes place, with the authority that is his for not being mad” (Foucault 1988 b, 252). According to Foucault, reason manages a victory over unreason without relying extensively on the use of material force but it is still, nonetheless, able to achieve this victory through a relationship of power. In addition, the authority of truth and knowledge may be invested in the person of the physician, whose role in the late eighteenth-century asylum, Foucault insists, depended not so much on his actual scientific knowledge as on the power granted to the idea of it. Foucault argues that the physician’s authority does not come “by virtue of a medical skill or power ... that would be justified by a body of objective knowledge” (Foucault 1988 b, 270). Instead, the physician was more of a moral and social authority than a scientific one, a personality whose powers “borrowed from science only their disguise, or at most their justification” (1988 b 271). Here the implication is that it is not so much the content of knowledge, or its actual possession by a particular individual, that is productive of an authoritative power. Rather, it is the notion of knowledge itself, of truth and science even as a kind of empty concept that can be taken on as a “disguise” that is linked with power. This point is made clear in Foucault’s description of the physician-patient relationship within the asylum: In the patient’s eyes, the doctor becomes a thaumaturge;... it is because he is a doctor that he is believed to possess these powers, and while ... his moral action was not necessarily linked to any scientific competence, it was thought, and by the patient first of all, that it was in the esotericism of his knowledge ... that the doctor had found the power to unravel insanity; and increasingly the patient would accept this self-surrender . . . submitting from the very first to a will he experienced as magic, and to a science he regarded as prescience and divination .... (Foucault 1988 b, 275) Here, the physician’s knowledge is experienced as magical an authority whose source seems practically divine. This power is attached to a figure thought to be a “scientist,” who claims for his knowledge the character of positivism. Foucault explains further that the physician’s powers, experienced here as the mysterious authority of positivistic “science,” have their beginnings in a moral authority linked to the physician as a paternal and judicial figure. The patient submits to the physician as a figure of moral and rational power initially; and this aspect of the relationship is forgotten as psychiatry envelops itself in positivism (Foucault 1988 b, 272-274). Once it does, this power takes on its “magical” character, experienced by the patient as an authority attaching to the “man of science” and his “scientific knowledge.” It is important to note here how for Foucault reason, truth, knowledge and science carry with them a tremendous power even if they are merely a “disguise” - even they are taken on as a mask that hides the workings of another kind of relationship and another kind of power. The patient surrenders himself to this “scientific” authority, whether “disguise” or not, submitting to the constraints of a power which he experiences as grounded in a knowledge with the status of “truth.” These early points regarding the asylum, as found in Madness and Civilization, resonate in Foucault’s later discussions of discipline and normalization in Discipline and Punish. Foucault argues that the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw the rise of “disciplines” in the West: “methods .. .which made possible the meticulous control of the operations of the body, which assured the constant subjection of its forces and imposed upon them a relation of docilityutility” (Foucault 1995, 137). According to Foucault, various methods for coercion and control of bodies that were already in existence (in monasteries, armies, etc.) were extended and developed during this time period, creating new and more elaborate disciplinary measures that were applied in schools, hospitals, asylums and factories as well as in military and penal institutions. These disciplines worked a “subtle coercion,” dominating bodies and their activities in very small and detailed, yet also constant ways - they worked “an infinitesimal power over the active body” that “implies an uninterrupted, constant coercion,.. . exercised according to a codification that partitions as closely as possible time, space, movement” (1995, 127). The result of such discipline was the development of “docile bodies,” bodies that can be “subjected, used, transformed, and improved” (1995, 136). This docility is thus intimately connected with the body’s utility a docile body is also a useful body, one that can be “transformed” and “improved” in order to increase its utility. Foucault emphasizes the multiplicity involved in disciplinary power, the dispersion of its elements in their infinitesimal detail: It is ... a multiplicity of often minor processes, of different origin and scattered location, which overlap, repeat, or imitate one another, support one another, distinguish themselves from one another according to their domain of application, converge and gradually produce the blueprint of a general method. (Foucault 1995, 138) While it is possible, therefore, to outline a kind of “general method” of disciplinary power, it should not be thought of as a kind of univocal process operating throughout various parts of society, as if directed by a single source, “from above.” Discipline may be übiquitous in its functioning, but it is also multiple a complex system or network of different yet overlapping, repeating, mutually supporting processes. Foucault provides numerous and detailed examples of disciplinary power as it was manifested in eighteenth century France in schools, hospitals, factories, and the military. He shows how discipline works by: (a) distributing individuals in space, such as enclosing them in fortress-like walls or partitioning them according to their functions; (b) dividing and ordering time so as to maximize its use, dictating to the smallest detail how activities and movements were to correspond to particular moments; (c) instituting repetitive and graduated exercises on the body in order to make it “progress” towards a determined goal; (d) ordering bodies and activities into composites so that the forces of their various elements can work in a concerted fashion for the maximization of useful effect. 29 These were, Foucault states, “always meticulous, often minute, techniques” (Foucault 1995, 139); and they combined to form a “‘mechanics of power’ .... [that] produces subjected and practised bodies, ‘docile’ bodies” (1995, 138). The body subjected to such techniques could hardly escape being shaped, formed into something obedient and useful. Foucault focuses on three particular instruments of disciplinary power that are involved in the “correct training” of bodies: surveillance, normalizing judgment, and their combination in the practice of examination. Surveillance is an instrument of disciplinary power that “coerces by means of observation; an apparatus in which the techniques that make it possible to see induce effects of power” (Foucault 1995, 170-171). This is because a continual observation makes its objects highly visible and therefore subject to control, whether from outside or by the observed themselves. As Foucault explains, “[i[t is the fact of being constantly seen, of being able always to be seen, that maintains the disciplined individual in his subjection” (1995, 187). This observation and supervision was divided up and carried out by multiple functionaries and facilitated by architectural and procedural techniques, forming a complex system of surveillance that is hierarchized and continuous, yet whose power does not emanate only from the top: It was . . . organized as a multiple, automatic and anonymous power; for although surveillance rests on individuals, its functioning is that of a network of relations from top to bottom, but also to a certain extent from bottom to top and laterally; this network ‘holds’ the whole together and traverses it in its entirely with effects of power that derive from one another supervisors, perpetually supervised[l]t is the apparatus as a whole that produces ‘power’ .... (1995, 177) It was . . . organized as a multiple, automatic and anonymous power; for although surveillance rests on individuals, its functioning is that of a network of relations from top to bottom, but also to a certain extent from bottom to top and laterally; this network ‘holds’ the whole together and traverses it in its entirely with effects of power that derive from one another supervisors, perpetually supervised[l]t is the apparatus as a whole that produces ‘power’ .... (1995, 177) It was . . . organized as a multiple, automatic and anonymous power; for although surveillance rests on individuals, its functioning is that of a network of relations from top to bottom, but also to a certain extent from bottom to top and laterally; this network ‘holds’ the whole together and traverses it in its entirely with effects of power that derive from one another supervisors, perpetually supervised[l]t is the apparatus as a whole that produces ‘power’ .... (1995, 177) continual observation makes possible a judgment that contributes to a normalization of individuals. Foucault argues that surveillance and normalization combine, in disciplinary systems, in the instrument of the examination: “[t]he examination .... is a normalizing gaze, a surveillance that makes it possible to qualify, to classify and to punish” (Foucault 1995, 184). “The examination” includes various rituals and practices for observation and classificatory judgment; Foucault lists the medical or psychiatric exam and the exams given to students in educational institutions as among the many possible manifestations of the examining apparatus. All forms of examination utilize methods of observation, of scrutinizing individuals in order that each may be “described, judged, measured, compared with others . . . [and then] trained or corrected, classified, normalized, etc.” (1995, 191). The examination combines surveillance with a judgment whose effect is normalizing, forming an effective and widespread instrument of discipline. The “norm” takes on a tremendous power in various disciplinary systems: The Normal is established as a principle of coercion in teaching with the introduction of a standard education .. . ; it is established in the effort to organize a national medical profession and hospital system capable of operating general norms of health; it is established in the standardization of industrial processes and products .... (Foucault 1995, 184) Its power to coerce derives in part from its claim to a sort of “truth” the truth of the “normal,” a kind of “natural” truth, the “way things (naturally) are or ought to be.” Clearly, many of the disciplinary mechanisms described above were forced upon individuals and their bodies; but the notion of the “norm” allows for a more subtle and insidious form of power to operate, one that encourages a self-control due to the desire to be like the “norm.” Foucault argues that disciplines come to define a code of rules that are taken to be “natural.” These rules do not participate in a discourse of law and right, but nevertheless have a “truth” of their own that is accompanied by power: “It is human science which constitutes their domain, and clinical knowledge their jurisprudence” (Foucault 1980 h, 107). The “norms” established within the disciplines, then, carry with them the authority and power of “science” and “clinical knowledge.” Foucault provides examples of this in his discussion of “The Politics of Health in the Eighteenth Century” (Foucault 1980 d). In this article, he claims that the health of the populace became an important objective of political power in the eighteenth century, one to which various rules, regulations and institutions were dedicated. 30 Among these were the institution of medicine itself and the doctors who participated in it: Medicine, as a general technique of health . . . assumes an increasingly important place in the administrative system and the machinery of power, a role which is constantly widened and strengthened throughout the eighteenth century. The doctor wins a footing within the different instances of social power. (Foucault 1980 d, 176) In addition to taking care of sick patients, Foucault notes, doctors were assigned the task of “observing, correcting and improving the social ‘body’ and maintaining it in a permanent state of health” (1980 d 177). They were entrusted with teaching hygienic practices and advising individuals to get medical treatment for illness, among other things. Their power in doing so was derived partially from that bestowed on them by political leaders, but mostly from their status as possessors of clinical knowledge (since it is in the latter that the former is ultimately rooted). Here, the “norm” of health, established through the scientific knowledge of the doctor, is accompanied by pervasive practices of power: “a whole series of prescriptions relating not only to disease but to general forms of existence and behaviour (food and drink, sexuality and fecundity, clothing and the layout of living space)” (1980 d 176). While some of these may have been enforced through some kind of external force (or the threat of it), it is clear that, at least by now, many individuals follow prescriptions for health of their own accord (even demanding a “right” to be provided with medical care and hygienic living and working space). Part of this self-control, or self-restraint according to rules of medicine can be explained by the power of the “scientific” or “truthful” status of medical knowledge our practices of health, whether past or present, conform to what the medical authorities say, due to the presumed “truth” of their discourse. 31 The “norm” as natural rule, then, carries a coercive power that attaches to its status as “scientifically true.” This notion expands upon and extends Foucault’s discussion of the eighteenth century asylum in Madness and Civilization, where external, physical force is replaced to some degree by the self-constraint of guilt in the face of reason and the law. The asylum works to “normalize” its patients, through the efforts of both the guard and the physician. The guard, as noted above, has power “as a reasonable being, invested by that very fact. . . with the authority that is his for not being mad” (Foucault 1988 b, 252). In other words, the guard conforms to the “norm,” and by this fact wields a certain power it is in front of this norm, this natural rule, that the patient feels guilt and shame, and works to restrain himself before external force becomes necessary. The physician, of course, carries with him a more coercive power, due to his possession of a knowledge that appears to the patient as esoteric and magical. Here too one can see the workings of what Foucault will later develop as the concept of normalization, since as the patient submits to the will and direction of the doctor, he is coerced into conformity to a medical/psychological norm. Indeed, Foucault argues in an interview after Discipline and Punish was published, that Freud (whom Foucault had characterized in Madness and Civilization as retaining the doctor-patient couple as described above, as increasing the “thaumaturgical virtues” of the physician, giving him a “quasi-divine status” (Foucault 1988 b, 277)) had participated in “the great nineteenth century effort in discipline and normalisation” (Foucault 1980 a, 61). The processes of discipline and normalization find a kind of culmination in the phenomenon of “panopticism,” which is still very much present today. Taking its name from an architectural structure envisaged by Jeremy Bentham, panopticism, for Foucault, marks the refinement and extension of disciplinary power throughout the social body. Bentham’s Panopticon most clearly useful as a prison design, but also functioning well (in altered forms) in medical, pedagogical, and employment contexts was a structure that would separate individuals into “cells” that rendered them constantly visible from a central point of observation. But, as Foucault points out, Bentham insisted that the power exercised within the Panopticon be both “visible and unverifiable” in that those observed would be visible while being able to see neither each other nor (most crucially) the observer(s). The result, according to Foucault, is that there is instilled in those observed “a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power”: [The idea is] that the inmates should be caught up in a power situation of which they are themselves the bearers. To achieve this, it is at once too much and too little that the prisoner should be constantly observed by an inspector: too little, for what matters is that he knows himself to be observed; too much, because he has no need in fact of being so. . . . [T]he inmate must never know whether he is being looked at at any one moment; but he must be sure that he may always be so. (Foucault 1995, 201) The Panopticon, then, works to achieve a kind of “self-restraint,” where one’s permanent visibility renders one obedient, drives one to conform. As in Samuel Tuke’s asylum, the physical restraint of bars and walls is replaced by a more subtle form of coercion: in the “panoptic institutions . . . there were no more bars, no more chains, no more heavy locks,” because “he who is subjected to a field of visibility, and who knows it, assumes responsibility for the constraints of power . . . he inscribes within himself the power relation . . .” (Foucault 1995, 202). Similar to the examination, the power within panopticism is exercised in part through its relation to truth and knowledge. It was used to “normalize” “to alter behaviour, to train or correct individuals” (Foucault 1995, 203) and it was able to perform this function because its use of power had appeal to truth in the form of knowledge. “[CJlinical medicine, child psychology, educational psychology, the rationalization of labour” were some of the various bodies of knowledge that allowed for the “multiplication of the effects of power” in panoptic institutions (Foucault 1995, 224). 32 There is, therefore, a “self-restraint” due not only to the permanent “visibility” of the observed individuals, but also due to their relationship to truth and the “norm” they stand observed by emissaries of a knowledge with the status of truth and science, a knowledge that subtly coerces with the power of the “normalizing judgment” discussed above. The individual is (self-)coerced by being constantly visible, but s/he is doubly coerced, in a sense, by being visible to the truth. The phenomenon of panopticism is not restricted to particular buildings, institutions, or even past centuries, but is present even today in multiple forms throughout various social structures. Foucault insists that the Panopticon, rather than being simply an architectural design, “must be understood as a generalizable model of functioning; a way of defining power relations in terms of the everyday life of men” (Foucault 1995, 205). Panopticism is therefore a kind of general technique of power that can operate in many different institutions in a variety of ways. Its essential structure, that of a central point of observation surrounded by “cells” of visibility, need not be restricted to the design of buildings; it can be implemented in less physically tangible ways, such as through the institution of the police. 33 Foucault argues that the development of a centralized police force involved a “permanent, exhaustive, omnipresent surveillance, capable of making all visible, as long as it could itself remain invisible” (1995, 214). The police apparatus accomplishes a “faceless gaze” over the entire society one where individuals are nearly always visible, able to be seen, even if they are not always actually observed. Many of the minute activities and behaviors of life are subject to this gaze: the police are concerned with “the dust of events, actions, behaviour, opinions ‘everything that happens’ . . .” (1995, 213). Foucault argues that panopticism was multiplied and extended throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, forming a “disciplinary society” that is still with us today: “[w]e are . . . in the panoptic machine, invested by its effects of power, which we bring to ourselves since we are part of its mechanism” (Foucault 1995, 217). Pan optic mechanisms, due to their ability to create “useful” individuals through self-restraint in the face of visibility and truth, have been implemented in “the most important, most central and most productive sectors of society. . . . [including] factory production, the transmission of knowledge, the diffusion of aptitudes and skills, the war-machine” (1995, 211). We are still in a “disciplinary society,” or, as Foucault sometimes also terms it, a “society of normalisation” (Foucault 1980 h, 107) we are still required to conform to what medical and psychological knowledge, the moral law, and our teachers and professors dictate as “norms.” “The judges of normality are present everywhere,” Foucault asserts at the end of Discipline and Punish'. We are in the society of the teacher-judge, the doctor-judge, the educatorjudge, the ‘social worker’-judge; it is on them that the universal reign of the normative is based; and each individual, wherever he may find himself, subjects to it his body, his gestures, his behaviour, his aptitudes, his achievements. (Foucault 1995, 304) From Madness and Civilization to Discipline and Punish and beyond, we can see that for Foucault the “truthful” status of scientific knowledge binds it to a power that coerces, disciplines, normalizes. This may occur through external pressures that organize our space and time, for example, or (and perhaps most significantly) it may occur more subtly, through a process of self-control in the face of the “truth.” Significantly, in terms of the present study, some of the “judges of normality” that are still present today, according to Foucault, function within the modem university. This point is especially important to the question of the political role of intellectuals, as it is within the pedagogical setting of colleges and universities that many modern intellectuals find their home. As David Shumway points out, the university is “an institution thoroughly traversed by disciplinary technologies”: Not only is the university the place where the regime of truth often comes into contact with the political regime that both supports the university financially and makes use of its knowledge for political ends, but the internal life of the university is also regulated by disciplinary strategies such as academic rank and tenure examinations .... (Shumway 1989, 131) Foucault himself agrees, but he also notes that “the university hierarchy is only the most visible, the most sclerotic and least dangerous” of the multiple mechanisms by which “knowledge constantly induces effects of power”: these effects, “[diffused, entrenched and dangerous . . . operate in other places than in the person of the old professor” (Foucault 1980 f, 52). But indeed, they do operate in the person of the professor, old or no, as well as in other figures within the university setting. The knowledge that produces effects of power within the university as a modern institution is one of the major factors shaping the political role of the intellectual according to Foucault. Examination and confession: how power produces effects of truth and knowledge In addition to showing how truth produces effects of power, Foucault explains how the relationship between truth and power moves in the other direction as well. “The exercise of power perpetually creates knowledge,” Foucault asserts, indicating that knowledge can be created through power (Foucault 1980 f, 52). But even more strongly, he claims as well that knowledge and truth are only produced by power: “[t]ruth ... is produced only by virtue of multiple forms of constraint” (Foucault 1980 g, 131). According to Foucault, that which comes to have the status of a “truthful” discourse, or one of “scientific” knowledge, achieves this status through the use of power, conflict and struggle. We can find the beginnings of this idea in Madness and Civilization. Recall how Foucault describes the doctor/patient relationship in the eighteenth century asylum, where the patient surrenders more or less completely to the doctor, whose “scientific” knowledge seems to him magical and divine. Foucault notes that there really wasn’t anything mysterious about the power invested in this relationship, as it initially had links to the power involved in familial and sociopolitical relations, and thus it is of “a moral and social” kind: The physician could exercise his absolute authority in the world of the asylum only insofar as, from the beginning, he was Father and Judge, Family and Law his medical practice being for a long time no more than a complement to the old rites of Order, Authority, and Punishment. (Foucault 1988 b, 272) In other words, the power of the physician came, at first, not from his clinical knowledge as part of a positivistic “science,” but rather from his position as paternal and moral authority: [l]t is by bringing such powers into play, by wearing the mask of Father and of Judge, that the physician, by one of those abrupt short cuts that leave aside mere medical competence, became the almost magical perpetrator of the cure .... it was enough that he observed and spoke, to cause . . . madness at last to yield to reason. His presence and words . . . restored the order of morality. (1988 b 273) The physician’s power, then, seems as magical as that of the Father in the eyes of the patient, who, Foucault notes, is viewed as a child within the asylum (1988 b 252). The mere presence and words of the Father, as keeper of the moral law and of reason, are enough to restore order and intimidate the transgressions of madness into a self-restraint through guilt. It is upon this beginning that the “science” of psychiatry developed, according to Foucault. He argues that the moral and paternal aspects of the physician’s power and practice were forgotten “to the very extent that he [the physician] enclosed his knowledge in the norms of positivism” (Foucault 1988 b, 274). In other words, the positivism that developed in the practice of psychiatry after this time was built on and masked a relation of power between doctor and patient: If we wanted to analyze the profound structures of objectivity in the knowledge and practice of nineteenth-century psychiatry from Pinel to Freud, we should have to show in fact that such objectivity was from the start a reification of a magical nature, which could only be accomplished with the complicity of the patient himself, beginning from a transparent and clear moral practice, gradually forgotten as positivism imposed its myths of scientific objectivity; a practice forgotten in its origins and its meaning, but always used and always present. (1988 b 276) The scientific objectivity of positivistic psychiatry, Foucault asserts here, is thus built on and produced by a relation of power between physician and patient the relation of the power of the moral authority in the figure of the “Father and Judge” to the self-surrendering figure of the child in the patient. This power is masked in its beginnings as it is developed and extended through the practice of psychiatry as a “science,” though it is still “always used and always present,” Foucault asserts, even today: “What we call psychiatric practice is a certain moral tactic contemporary with the end of the eighteenth century . . . overlaid by the myths of positivism” (1988 b 276). Two things are especially important to note here. First, Foucault argues that the objectivity of psychiatry as a science was a “reification” of a moral practice (complete with power) involved in the relation between physician and patient. This means, among other things, that this science was developed out of a practice of power - in this case, the power exercised by the moral authority of the physician. Second, Foucault asserts that this “reification” was only possible “with the complicity of the patient himself,” as stated in the above quote. In other words, the development of psychiatry as an “objective science” can only occur if the patient complies with the physician’s role as authority. If he does not, if the patient refuses to submit to the authority of the physician as Father and Judge, as bearer of the moral law and of reason, then it will be more difficult (if not impossible) to establish the status of the science as objectively “true.” Without this submission, the doctor’s power to cure vanishes, and so, then, does his claim to possess “scientific” knowledge. These two elements, already present in Madness and Civilization remain significant in Foucault’s later, more detailed discussions of how power produces effects of truth. The most extensive coverage of this process can be found in Discipline and Punish, where Foucault places special emphasis on the productive nature of power: We must cease once and for all to describe the effects of power in negative terms: it ‘excludes’, it ‘represses’, it ‘censors’ .... In fact, power produces; it produces reality; it produces domains of objects and rituals of truth. The individual and the knowledge that may be gained of him belong to this production. (Foucault 1995, 194) Here Foucault asserts that power produces “rituals of truth” as well as knowledge specifically, it produces knowledge of individuals, which are themselves fabricated by a particular exercise of power. According to Foucault, the “individual” comes into effect at the same time as and through the production of knowledge about him/her, and vice versa. Foucault argues that the individual is created by disciplinary mechanisms that also provide for the creation of knowledge about individuals: the “sciences of man” (1995, 193). Foucault lists a number of disciplinary mechanisms that contribute to the formation of the individual, at the center of which is the examination. The examination helps to create “individuals” through a surveillance that allows for their differentiation: “[i]t establishes over individuals a visibility through which one differentiates them and judges them” (Foucault 1995, 185). This is true of the many forms of the exam, but can be seen quite clearly in the form it takes within the institutions of learning. In the school, the examination functions as a way to observe students, to place them under the gaze of the teacher, who can then use the examination results to compare, classify, rank, and judge the students allowing for the development of their “individuality.” Foucault notes that this process is furthered by the processes of documentation that go along with the examination: “[t]he examination that places individuals in a field of surveillance also situates them in a network of writing; it engages them in a whole mass of documents that capture and fix them” (1995, 189). Not only are the examination results documented, they are also used to produce other documents that describe the individual’s activities and aptitudes, that indicate their rank in comparison with others, etc. This information is then used to calculate averages and norms, to form general categories in which each individual can be placed. One result of these examination and documentary procedures is that students become highly “individualized,” with their specific sets of skills and aptitudes categorized and recorded into the formation of a “case”: “The case ... is the individual as he may be described, judged, measured, compared with others, in his very individuality . . .” (Foucault 1995, 191). The student becomes an individual case, observed and recorded, Foucault notes, for the purpose of documenting his use value. The process is similar in other forms of the examination, such as those found in hospitals, asylums, and prisons. The examination works to produce individuals through the processes of surveillance and documentation within various institutions, allowing for the establishment of one’s own, particular, “individuality” through an exercise of power. Examination is a combination of surveillance and normalizing judgment; but whereas in the preceding section I explained how the examination attaches effects of power to truth, here we can see that it also works to produce a kind of truth through power the “truth” of the individual. Foucault notes that, “[b]y assessing acts with precision, discipline judges individuals ‘in truth’,” it assigns to them the “truth” of their individuality (Foucault 1995, 181). This “truth” consists of all the various pieces of information gathered through the examination process, from the individual’s state of physical and mental health, to his scholastic and technical skills, to his moral character and potential for criminal behavior: “the features, the measurements, the gaps, the ‘marks’ that characterize him and make him a ‘case’” (1995, 192). The examination, as Foucault asserts, combines “the deployment of force and the establishment of truth” (1995, 184); it creates and establishes truth through the deployment of disciplinary power in the form of surveillance and documentation, a force that fabricates “individuals” and their “truth.” Foucault insists that the individual is therefore not something primary and “natural” that comes to be simply repressed by power, since it is actually an effect of power: [l]t is already one of the prime effects of power that certain bodies, certain gestures, certain discourses, certain desires, come to be identified and constituted as individuals. The individual, that is, is not the vis-a-vis of power; it is, I believe, one of its prime effects. (Foucault 1980 h, 98) Foucault is here criticizing the liberal, Enlightenment view of humans as autonomous and essentially free “individuals,” separate and independent. Under this view we conceive of ourselves as isolated atoms who can be described, categorized, counted and conceived as separate units before such counting and categorization takes place. Further, such individuals as units are thought to be naturally free and autonomous as if this is the way we simply are, naturally and originally, and part of this is a natural condition of freedom. Foucault argues, on the other hand, that this conception of ourselves as individuals has been historically and contingently developed, and that it is in part the result of various practices of power. Rather than simply being the “way we are,” then, the notion of the “individual” has been created through disciplinary practices such as the examination. Our view of ourselves as essentially autonomous and free is a product of various forms of restraint. The establishment of individuals allows for the creation of whole bodies of knowledge, the “sciences of man.” The examination lies at the heart of this process as well, since it produces an accumulation of knowledge regarding students, medical and psychiatric patients, employees, criminals, etc. In the schools, for example, Foucault argues that the examination allows not only for a verification of the exchange of knowledge from teacher to pupil, but also the establishment of a knowledge of pupils moving in the other direction: “[t]he examination enabled the teacher, while transmitting his knowledge, to transform his pupils into a whole field of knowledge” (Foucault 1995, 186). Through the documentation of the pupils’ examination results, a body of pedagogical knowledge can be established, “a pedagogy that functions as a science” (1995, 187). This is of course equally the case in other disciplinary systems as well - the accumulation of information about individual “cases” allows for the development of classificatory schema that can establish norms, and that can also suggest means for achieving them. The examination, therefore, allows for the creation of the “individual” and his/her “truth,” but also for the constitution of a comparative system that made possible the measurement of overall phenomena, the description of groups, the characterization of collective facts, the calculation of the gaps between individuals, their distribution in a given ‘population.’ (Foucault 1995, 190) This “comparative system” generated by the accumulation of information regarding individuals, achieved through the examination and the documentation of its results, is part of the establishment of knowledges and sciences of individuals. Foucault indicates that it is here that the “birth of the sciences of man” can probably be found (1995, 191). Giving an indication of which sciences these are, Foucault distinguishes them from the “sciences of nature” and provides a few examples: “psychology, psychiatry, pedagogy, criminology,” as opposed to “knowledge of the animals, the plants or the earth” (1995, 226). In other words, the disciplinary power that produces the “individual” also provides for the establishment and development of various bodies of knowledge about him/her, the “sciences” of the human individual, the “sciences of man.” Thus, Foucault claims, “a specific mode of subjection was able to give birth to man as an object of knowledge for a discourse with a ‘scientific’ status” (Foucault 1995, 24). This functioning of the examination was developed and extended as disciplinary mechanisms began to achieve the general, societal “panopticism” described above. Indeed, Foucault notes, the examination is still an essential part of our current disciplinary systems (1995, 226); and we therefore still witness the production of “scientific” knowledge about individuals, about our mental and physical health, our learning capacities, our tendencies towards criminal deviancy, etc. We still live with “calculable man” and “knowable man,” products of sciences made possible through the development and spread of disciplinary and normalizing mechanisms such as the examination (Foucault 1995, 193, 305-306). We can therefore see how, for Foucault, an exercise of (disciplinary) power can be crucial to the production of knowledge, and why “we should abandon the belief that ... the renunciation of power is one of the conditions of knowledge,” and “admit rather that power produces knowledge . . .” (1995, 27). In a later work, The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault describes another mechanism of power that works to produce individuals and their truth the confession. He argues that a peculiar phenomenon started to gain momentum from the eighteenth century and continues today, namely a “multiplication of discourses concerning sex in the field of exercise of power itself: an institutional incitement to speak about it... a determination on the part of the agencies of power to hear it spoken about” (Foucault 1990 a, 18). This “institutional incitement” to speak about sex, rooted in “agencies of power,” functions through the mechanism of the confession. The confession was first developed as a religious technique, but according to Foucault it began to be put to use during the eighteenth century to induce the production of discourse about sex. During this time the confession developed from a particular religious practice into a much more general, societal constraint required by the “public interest”: “a political, economic, and technical incitement to talk about sex” (1990 a 23). Foucault explains that this phenomenon was due in part to a growing concern, in eighteenth century Western societies, with questions of “population”: “birth and death rates, life expectancy, fertility, state of health, frequency of illnesses, patterns of diet and habitation” (Foucault 1990 a, 25). Issues regarding the “population” were considered economically and politically important: “population as wealth, population as manpower or labor capacity, population balanced between its own growth and the resources it commanded” (1990 a 25). In order to address such issues, investigations into the sexual activities of members of society were necessary one had to study “the birthrate, the age of marriage, the legitimate and illegitimate births, the precocity and frequency of sexual relations . . .” (1990 a 25). Making sex speak through mechanisms of confession was one way, according to Foucault, that the analysis necessary to address “population” issues was conducted; and the growing importance of such issues in the eighteenth century West explains in part the spread of confessional mechanisms therein as well. According to Foucault the development and extension of the technique of confession could be seen in practices and institutions ranging from the schools to medicine to criminal justice (1990 a 27-32). But what is most significant for the present purpose of illustrating the trutheffects of power is that the confession, like the examination, is productive of truth: [N]ext to the testing rituals, next to the testimony of witnesses, and the learned methods of observation and demonstration, the confession became one of the West’s most highly valued techniques for producing truth. (Foucault 1990 a, 59) The confession produces a “true” discourse because it is a speech made by the “one who knows,” by the one who is in contact with his own consciousness, the thoughts that remain hidden from others and therefore otherwise “secret.” Foucault asserts of the confession, therefore, that “[i]ts veracity is . . . guaranteed ... by the bond, the basic intimacy in discourse, between the one who speaks and what he is speaking about” (1990 a 62). The confession, spreading throughout various social institutions and infiltrating numerous practices, was regarded as capable of revealing some deep, hidden “truth” within the one making it. It is also important to recognize that this technique for producing truth is a function of power: The confession is a ritual of discourse . . . that unfolds within a power relationship, for one does not confess without the presence (or virtual presence) of a partner who is not simply the interlocutor but the authority who requires the confession, prescribes and appreciates it, and intervenes in order to judge, punish, forgive, console, and reconcile .... (Foucault 1990 a, 61-62) The confession produces its truth through a relationship of power: one confesses, or is forced to do so, in front of another who takes on the status of an authority. It is to this authority that the “secret truth” inside is revealed, to one who has the power of an explicit or implicit coercion. In this way power is productive of truth it brings out a hidden truth from inside individuals through the technique of confession. It also, therefore, plays a role in the creation of “individuals,” as Foucault notes: “[t]he truthful confession was inscribed at the heart of the procedures of individualization by power” (1990 a 59). In other words, by revealing truths about individuals, their innermost secrets, the confession helps to establish one’s “individuality,” one’s own hidden, essential, “truth.” Like the examination, then, the confession functions as a technique of power for producing individuals and their truth. 35 The confession is also productive of knowledge, according to Foucault. Specifically, it is crucial to the establishment of a scientia sexualis, a science of sexuality. Foucault claims that “[f]rom the Christian penance to the present day, sex was a privileged theme of confession,” and thus the truth about oneself revealed by the confession is intimately bound up with sex (Foucault 1990 a, 61). With the spread of confessional techniques throughout societal institutions, a body of truths about sex was able to be developed and catalogued, and a knowledge thereby established that soon took on the mantle of a science. According to Foucault, during the nineteenth century the confession was adapted to the rules of “scientificity,” of scientific discourse, thereby creating something we still have today: “a complex machinery for producing true discourses on sex ...” a scientia sexualis (1990 a 68). The individual and his/her “truth” are created through confession, and as the truth of the individual is adapted to scientific discourse, knowledges of sex, sexuality, and the subject are made possible all of which are rooted in the exercise of power that permeates the confession itself. This science, these knowledges, the confession and its power all continue today, Foucault asserts, though their forms may have changed over the years. “We have since become a singularly confessing society,” according to Foucault; the confession now “plays a part in justice, medicine, education, family relationships, and love relations, in the most ordinary affairs of everyday life .. .” (1990 a 59). We continue to participate in the rituals of power that work to produce our truth and our knowledge about ourselves as individuals, through the mechanism of confession - the “confession of the flesh” (1990 a 19). These, then, are a few examples of the ways Foucault explains the production of truth, knowledge, and scientific discourse through the exercise of power. Through techniques of power such as the examination and the confession, discourses are produced that take on the status of “truth” and “science.” This is the second movement in the reciprocal relation between truth and power, the interconnection that Foucault insists upon in much of his work: [P]ower and knowledge directly imply one another;. . . there is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations. (Foucault 1995, 27) We now have some insight into the complex relationship between truth and power, how each produces and sustains the other. Still, despite the “universal” tone of the passage just quoted, it wouldn’t be quite accurate to say that this relationship between truth and power is a kind of timeless, absolute truth. The disciplinary mechanisms described here, according to Foucault, occur through “the emergence, or rather the invention, of a new mechanism of power” in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: disciplinary power (Foucault 1980 h, 104). 36 It is disciplinary power that functions through surveillance and normalization to create knowledge: “[the disciplines] engender . . apparatuses of knowledge (savoir) and a multiplicity of new domains of understanding” (1980 h 106). The above discussion then, applies specifically to disciplinary power. Of course, this doesn’t by itself show that no other form of power is productive of truth and knowledge, but it at least indicates that they may not do so in the same way nor perhaps even as well: the disciplines, Foucault asserts, are “extraordinarily inventive participants in the order of. . . knowledgeproducing apparatuses” (1980 h 106). Further, Foucault makes an even stronger case in Discipline and Punish for the reciprocal relationship of truth and power being mainly restricted to this “new mechanism of power”: Taken one by one, most of [the disciplinary] techniques have a long history behind them. But what was new, in the eighteenth century, was that, by being combined and generalized, they attained a level at which the formation of knowledge and the increase of power regularly reinforce one another in a circular process. . . . First the hospital, then the school, then, later, the workshop ... became, thanks to [the disciplines], apparatuses such that. . . any growth of power could give rise in them to possible branches of knowledge .... (Foucault 1995, 224) Taken one by one, most of [the disciplinary] techniques have a long history behind them. But what was new, in the eighteenth century, was that, by being combined and generalized, they attained a level at which the formation of knowledge and the increase of power regularly reinforce one another in a circular process. . . . First the hospital, then the school, then, later, the workshop ... became, thanks to [the disciplines], apparatuses such that. . . any growth of power could give rise in them to possible branches of knowledge .... (Foucault 1995, 224) Taken one by one, most of [the disciplinary] techniques have a long history behind them. But what was new, in the eighteenth century, was that, by being combined and generalized, they attained a level at which the formation of knowledge and the increase of power regularly reinforce one another in a circular process. . . . First the hospital, then the school, then, later, the workshop ... became, thanks to [the disciplines], apparatuses such that. . . any growth of power could give rise in them to possible branches of knowledge .... (Foucault 1995, 224) Taken one by one, most of [the disciplinary] techniques have a long history behind them. But what was new, in the eighteenth century, was that, by being combined and generalized, they attained a level at which the formation of knowledge and the increase of power regularly reinforce one another in a circular process. . . . First the hospital, then the school, then, later, the workshop ... became, thanks to [the disciplines], apparatuses such that. . . any growth of power could give rise in them to possible branches of knowledge .... (Foucault 1995, 224) This is the case for every society, but I believe that in ours the relationship between power, right and truth is organised in a highly specific fashion. If I were to characterise ... its intensity and constancy, I would say that we are forced to produce the truth of power that our society demands, of which it has need, in order to function: we must speak the truth; we are constrained or condemned to confess or to discover the truth. Power never ceases its interrogation, its inquisition, its registration of truth: it institutionalises, professionalises and rewards its pursuit. (Foucault 1980 h, 93) Similarly, of course, we are still subject to the effects of power that are produced by truth in the other direction “true,” “scientific” discourses and knowledges still carry power over us in that they form the “norms” to which we are constrained to conform (1980 h 94). The regime of truth may have had its beginnings in the growth of the disciplinary power discussed above, but it certainly continues to exist for us today; and it is to this that the modern intellectual is to address him/herself, according to Foucault. Before considering precisely what the Foucauldian intellectual is to do in the face of this regime, it is important to elucidate just what is “wrong” with it, in what ways it is dangerous enough to call for some kind of response from the intellectual. What are the “poisonous traces” lingering in the regime of truth for which, as Foucault indicates, genealogy can have a curative effect? Making this clear will provide the necessary context for discussing the “cure” or “antidote” to which Foucault’s political intellectual can contribute. the chapter on “Docile Bodies” in Discipline and Punish (Foucault 1995, 135-169) for an elaboration of these specific disciplinary methods. 30 While Foucault addresses the reasons for this development in his article, the main issue here lies elsewhere specifically, I am less concerned at this point with saying why this occurred than with showing how it occurred, according to Foucault. It is the latter which will illustrate how the “norm” as natural rule did and can wield significant power. An interesting example of this can be found in discourses of nutrition and dieting in the last half of the twentieth century. In the span of a few decades, the U.S. populace bounced between various nutritional practices designed to stabilize or reduce bodily weight, from (1) “counting calories,” to (2) drastically reducing all fats, to (3) reducing only one kind of fat, to (4) reducing carbohydrates and increasing protein and vegetables (this is the current recommendation, and in some sense brings us back to (1)). Each of these were and are based on the “truth” of medical knowledge, and on this basis more or less alone (with little to no external force) many people (especially women) followed the recommendations. This is not to illustrate that medical knowledge is “untrue” (for indeed, each of the above 4 recommendations have their use, in things such as reducing the chances of heart attack, etc.); rather, I mention it as an example that exhibits the power of “scientific” discourse - its “truthful” status induces a self-control whose power is thus somewhat hidden and subtle. 32 As I elaborate below, however, these bodies of knowledge were themselves able to be produced by the power exercised in panopticism not only do truth and knowledge produce effects of power, but they are themselves products of power, according to Foucault. example of a panopticism that need not adhere to a particular building structure could be found in the techniques of surveillance and control in a modern office environment. While such an environment may indeed include a physically “panoptic” structure, it need not necessarily do so, since “visibility” can now be achieved without a direct line of sight: central computers can and often do track employee work activities, intra- and inter-office communications, and even restroom breaks in order to maintain workers at the “norm” of adequate productivity. In such a panopticon, employees can even work at home and still be “visible.” 34“[T]he examination is at the centre of the procedures that constitute the individual as effect and object of power . . .” (Foucault 1995, 102). In the chapter of Discipline and Punish entitled “Docile Bodies,” Foucault describes some of the other disciplinary techniques that contribute to the formation of the individual. Recall that disciplinary systems order space and time, and some of their procedures clearly help work to “individualize.” For example, Foucault argues that discipline often orders space through “partitioning,” where “[e]ach individual has his own place; and each place its individual” (1995, 143). Space, within disciplinary systems such as schools, hospitals, and factories, is therefore “cellular,” in order to avoid the “unusable and dangerous coagulation” of individuals: “to be able at each moment to supervise the conduct of each individual, to assess it. . . “ (1995, 143). This cellular partitioning for the purpose of supervision and assessment allowed for the practice of ranking, which Foucault also lists as a mechanism contributing to individualization. The rank locates individuals not so much in a particular space (though it may also do this) as within a graded series of units: “[discipline is an art of rank .... It individualizes bodies by a location that does not give them a fixed position, but distributes them and circulates them in a network of relations” (1995, 146). Finally, the ranking of individuals then allows for the assigning of exercises tailored to each according to their individual needs and skills; disciplinary systems set out, “for each individual, according to his level, his seniority, his rank, the exercises that are suited to him” (1995, 158). “Exercises,” as used by Foucault here, seems to refer to multiple kinds of practical training: he gives as examples exercises in drawing, in learning to read and write, and military drills in marching, shooting, etc. These exercises (regardless of context) are designed to be graduated, with a series of stages that work to order and regulate time so as to maximize its use: “[t]he ‘seriation’ of successive activities makes possible a whole investment of duration by power: the possibility of a detailed control and a regular intervention ... in each moment of time; the possibility of characterizing, and therefore of using individuals according to the level in the series that they are moving through . . .” (1995, 160). There is implied here, then, an “individualization” through the ordering of exercises in time, through which individuals are tracked and targeted for improvement, all for the sake of greater use value. 35 1 n Chapter Four I discuss in more detail how individual subjects are produced by techniques of power such as the confession. also speaks of discipline as a new mode of power in Discipline and Punish (Foucault 1995, 192-193, 215-221). III Between Tyranny and Anarchy: Poison, Power, Resistance In this section I investigate the problematic aspects of the regime of truth in order to exhibit the “poison” to which the intellectual is to address his/her political efforts. This involves a discussion of Foucault’s view of power; and I move from there to consider the possibility of resistance to power as an approach to the “cure.” As will become clear, the regime of truth is not “tyrannical” in its exercise of power, nor does it require a resistance that aims at “anarchy.” Instead, power and resistance operate within the regime of truth in a reciprocal, agonistic relationship between tyranny and anarchy. Poison: subjection and governmentality The question of the “poisonous traces” in the regime of truth is fairly easily approached, as they clearly have to do with the interconnection of truth and power. Foucault explains that this regime affects us through “a form of power which subjugates and makes subject to” (Foucault 1983 b, 212). This “form of power” is related to the disciplinary and normalizing power described above, which, as Foucault contends, “subjects” us in two ways: “There are two meanings of the word subject', subject to someone else by control and dependence, and tied to his own identity by a conscience or self-knowledge” (1983 b 212). We become “subjects” to disciplinary power in the sense that we are under the control of others, and also that we are linked to a particular identity. Both work to limit and subjugate. Foucault’s discussion of disciplinary power clearly indicates how individuals become subject to the control of others through mechanisms such as surveillance, the examination, and the confession. Foucault describes this as a process of “government,” where the latter is given the broad meaning he says it had enjoyed in the sixteenth century: ‘Government’ did not refer only to political structures or to the management of states; rather it designated the way in which the conduct of individuals or of groups might be directed: the government of children, of souls, of communities, of families, of the sick. ... To govern, in this sense, is to structure the possible field of action of others. (Foucault 1983 b, 221) The regime of truth, through its exercise of disciplinary and normalizing power as it functions alongside and through truth, works to “govern” in the sense that it directs the conduct of those under its purview. We are continually directed by disciplinary mechanisms in schools, businesses, public spaces, etc., which are constantly structuring our “possible field of action.” In a lecture delivered in 1978, Foucault asserts that “from the 15th century on and before the Reformation, one can say that there was a veritable explosion of the art of governing men” (Foucault 1997 c, 27). One of the fundamental questions of this period, he argues, was “How to govern?”: “how to govern children, how to govern the poor and beggars, how to govern a family, a house, how to govern armies, different groups, cities, States and also how to govern one’s own body and mind” (1997 c 27). In a lecture given at the College de France in 1978, Foucault explains that several different kinds of questions and issues became important in the sixteenth century, all having to do in some sense with the idea of “government.” He lists as examples “the question of the government of the self,” or the “ritualization of the problem of personal conduct”; “the government of souls and lives” that was the concern of religious institutions; the “government of children and the great problematic of pedagogy”; and, of course, “the government of the state by the Prince” as evidenced by Machiavelli’s The Prince (Foucault 1991 a, 87). Foucault defines “governmentality” in an interview from 1981, as “the group of relations of power and techniques which allow these relations of power to be exercised” (Foucault 1997 f, 156). Given this general definition, it is clear that the “governmentality” he describes as beginning in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries did not end there. Indeed, he argues that it has become more intense: [l] t is certain that this govemmentality did not end, from one perspective, it became even more strict with the passing of time. The powers in a political system like those that existed in the Middle Ages . . . were, in the end, rather loose. . . . [T]he number of objects that become objects of govemmentality reflected inside political frameworks, even liberal ones, has increased a great deal. (1997 f 156-157) Considering the expanse of disciplinary and normalizing mechanisms, the continued surveillance and confessions which we undergo today, it is not difficult to see what Foucault means here. Still, Foucault insists that “govemmentality” need not only be understood as “containment, surveillance and control” (Foucault 1997 f, 157), nor as domination in the sense of “pure violence or strict coercion” (Foucault 1997 a, 182). He argues instead that govemmentality involves both processes whereby individuals are directed by others and those whereby they direct themselves: Governing people, in the broad meaning of the word ... is not a way to force people to do what the governor wants; it is always a versatile equilibrium, with complementarity and conflicts between techniques which impose coercion and processes through which the self is constructed or modified by himself. (1997 a 181-182) In other words, governmentality does not simply involve the type of techniques of coercion and domination such as many of those described above under disciplinary power. Foucault admits that he himself placed too much of a focus on this aspect in some of his work: “When I was studying asylums, prisons, and so on, I insisted, I think, too much on the techniques of domination. What we can call discipline is . . . only one aspect of the art of governing people in our society” (1997 a 182). The other aspect involves, as mentioned in the above quote, those “processes through which the self is constructed or modified by himself,” or what he also calls “techniques of the self.” 37 These form the focus of much of Foucault’s work after The History of Sexuality Volume I. One important element of this aspect of governmentality has to do with the production of subjects through power a governmentality that “subjects” individuals to their own identity, creating “subjects.” 38 In an essay first published in 1982, Foucault asserts that there have been, in recent years, a number of struggles developing against what he terms the “government of individualization,” against a form of power that creates subjects: This form of power applies itself to immediate everyday life which categorizes the individual, marks him by his own individuality, attaches him to his identity, imposes a law of truth on him which he must recognize and which others have to recognize in him. It is a form of power which makes individuals subjects. . . . (Foucault 1983 b, 212) The “form of power” to which Foucault refers could very well be that described as “disciplinary,” since mechanisms such as the examination and the confession require that we pay attention to and conform ourselves to a “truth” produced by such mechanisms themselves. But these exercises of power are not merely “repressive,” they are also productive; specifically, they produce subjects by producing a “truth” about individuals that the latter become obliged to recognize. One becomes attached to his identity, as Foucault puts it, and this is a kind of subjection only here the subjection is to oneself, one’s individuality. This is not, of course, entirely separate from the governmentality whereby one’s actions are directed by others: it is partly by the latter mechanisms that one’s identity is formed; one subjects oneself to this identity and its truth in part to avoid mechanisms of governmentality imposed by others; and one’s subjection to an identity makes one’s behaviour easier to direct. Thus Foucault explains that the “modern state” is a structure “in which individuals can be integrated, under one condition: that this individuality would be shaped in a new form, and submitted to a set of very specific patterns” (Foucault 1983 b, 214). In other words, the structure of the modern state is one wherein the identity of individuals is shaped and patterned in a particular way; individuals are tied to a specific kind of identity, presumably because this has been found to help in their “government.” The selfcontrol of individuals as regards their identity, their self-government, would then be an integral aspect of their government by the state. According to Foucault, this “government of individualization” is the subject of various struggles, “struggles which question the status of the individual” and attack “that which ties the individual to himself and submits him to others in this way (struggles against subjection, against forms of subjectivity and submission)” (Foucault 1983 b, 211, 212). This indicates a critical attitude which Foucault has characterized as “the art of not being governed quite so much,” or at least not “like that and at that cost” (Foucault 1997 c, 29). This attitude is not necessarily new, since, he argues, it developed alongside the early processes of “governmentality.” But it certainly continues and can be seen in present struggles that “assert the right to be different” and “attack everything which separates the individual, breaks his links with others, .. . forces the individual back on himself and ties him to his own identity in a constraining way” (1983 b 211-212). The presence and prevalence of this critical attitude, the “art of not being governed quite so much,” indicates the “poisonous” aspect of governmentality, as well as part of its “cure” the constraints are strong enough that they draw out struggles against them, strategies of resistance. But Foucault notes that this governmentality and its poison are part of the regime of truth, since the struggles are directed against this complex of truth and power: “What is questioned is the way in which knowledge circulates and functions, its relations to power. In short, the regime du savoir [the regime of knowledge, or the regime of truth]” (Foucault 1983 b, 212). We now have a pretty clear indication of the “poisonous traces” involved in the regime of truth, the problematic aspects to which the intellectual can direct genealogy as a “cure.” This regime works to govern, to constrain partly through mechanisms of domination and coercion, and partly through the production of individuals and their truth resulting in a subjection to one’s individuality. In both senses we become “subjects,” subjected and subjugated. This “poison” is already being addressed by various struggles, which Foucault characterizes as part of the main philosophical and political problem of today: “the political, ethical, social, philosophical problem of our days is ... to liberate us both from the state and from the type of individualization which is linked to the state” (Foucault 1983 b, 216). This is what those already involved in struggle are doing, and, as I will argue, it forms the “political” problem for the intellectual as well. The “cure” that the intellectual can help bring about, then, will have to do with resisting individualization by techniques of truth and power within the regime of truth. It is not the case, however, that for Foucault all practices of power, even if they are disciplinary and normalizing, are dangerous, evil, “poisonous.” That we are governed, and govern ourselves (and others) does not constitute the “poison” of the regime of truth in and of itself. Thus becoming a subject through the “governmentality” of disciplinary power is not necessarily entirely poisonous. 39 It is only some aspects of government that require resistance; and further, according to Foucault it is those directly involved in particular practices of governmental power who must decide when, why, and how to resist them. In other words, Foucault will not say that power is all “bad” and ought to be resisted or eliminated; but neither will he say exactly which practices of power do fall into this category. He does, however, provide a general description of when resistance is likely to take place, namely when power approaches or reaches what he calls a “state of domination.” That there are already struggles taking place against the subjugation, the “government of individualization” within the regime of truth, according to Foucault, indicates that some people have found the ways in which they are governed to be too restrictive, too dominating. Even then, these “poisonous” practices of subjection are not overwhelming, since they still leave room for resistance. This is due in part to Foucault’s view of power, since for him power operates in such a way that it always provides for the possibility of its own resistance. To understand why only some practices of power are “poisonous” for Foucault, when resistance might be called for, and how resistance works, it is necessary to consider his descriptions of both power and resistance. The “agonism” of power and resistance Foucault speaks of power as a relation between individuals or groups, and one that always leaves open the possibility of resistance. The latter, too, is a kind of relation that Foucault sometimes characterizes as an “opposite” to relations of power. But a closer look at both power, resistance, and their connection reveals that they don’t appear to act like opposites in the sense of two “sides” existing outside one another and negating each other. Foucault describes their relationship as an “agonism,” a reciprocity where each side responds to, and calls forth a response from, the other. These responses are more than simple negations, oppositions of one side towards the other. As an approach to the agonistic relationship between power and resistance, I begin by describing each of the elements of the relationship in turn. Foucault argues at times that what is really at stake in his genealogies is power, and it is to the question of power that he turns at the end of a lecture given in 1976 at the College de France: “[w]hat, we must ask, is this power . . .what are these various contrivances of power ... ? What are their mechanisms, their effects and their relations?” (Foucault 1980 h, 87-88). He goes on to say that the conception of power that had informed much of his work up to that point needs to be rethought: It is obvious that all my work in recent years has been couched in the schema of struggle-repression, and it is this . .. which I have now been forced to reconsider . . . because I believe that these two notions of repression and war must themselves be considerably modified if not ultimately abandoned. (1980 h 92) It seems mainly the question of repression that forms Foucault’s focus for modification, which will then force a change in the character of conflict and struggle within and through power. Foucault claims that the model of power as repressive is inadequate to the mechanisms and practices of power today, that the forms of power now evident are “something quite other, or in any case, something much more, than repression” (1980 h 92). In various texts and interviews Foucault explains why the notion of repression as a model of power is problematic, and offers alternative ways to think about it that provide some interesting implications for the question of struggle and resistance. Foucault asserts in several interviews that the conception of power that informed Madness and Civilization followed, for the most part, the model of repression that takes power to be a function of a law which says “no”: When I wrote Madness and Civilization, I made at least an implicit use of this notion of repression. ... In defining the effects of power as repression, . . . one identifies power with a law which says no, power is taken above all as carrying the force of a prohibition. (Foucault 1980 g, 118- 119) Until [The Order of Things], it seems to me that I accepted the traditional conception of power, power as an essentially legal mechanism, what the law says, that which forbids, that which says no, with a whole string of negative effects: exclusion, rejection, barriers, denial, dissimulation, etc. (Foucault 1996 k, 207) The view of power as “repressive” is a common one, adhering to the traditional notion of the law as that which stops, hinders, denies, rejects. Though Foucault later came to conceive of power differently, he argues that for the case of madness, at least, the repressive model was basically adequate: “during the classical period, power was exercised over madness primarily in the form of exclusion; one saw then a great reaction of rejection which involved madness” (1996 k 207). Still, the problem with this model is that it makes it appear as if there is some sort of natural or essential truth that is being held down from the outside in the case of madness, this view of power makes it seems that there is some essential kernel of madness that is somehow “natural,” that power simply hinders and keeps in check. In other words, it appears as if power only works to hold back something that already exists. Foucault later argued instead that power is not only negative and hindering, it is also productive'. “[Power] produces things, it induces pleasure, forms knowledge, produces discourse. It needs to be considered as a productive network which runs throughout the whole social body, much more than as a negative instance whose function is repression” (Foucault 1980 g, 119). We have seen how Foucault argues starting with Discipline and Punish mainly, but also emerging from elements of Madness and Civilization that power produces individuals and their truth, as well as bodies of knowledge, sciences. The change from a notion of power as purely repressive to that of power as also productive is one of the most important aspects of Foucault’s conception of power. Along with this alteration in Foucault’s view of power come several others that are significant enough to the political role of the intellectual to warrant discussion here. When power is no longer conceived as the repressive force of a law, the model of a centralized body wielding power as if it were a “thing,” a possession, is also subject to change. Foucault notes this in the beginning of Discipline and Punish, where he introduces the disciplinary power that he will elaborate in the rest of the book: [T]he power exercised on the body is conceived of not as a property, but as a strategy . . . one should decipher in it a network of relations, constantly in tension, in activity, rather than a privilege that one might possess .... In short, this power is exercised rather than possessed; it is not the ‘privilege’, acquired or preserved, of the dominant class, but the overall effect of its strategic positions .... (Foucault 1995, 26) Foucault insists throughout the rest of his later writings that power is not something possessed by a dominant class or individual, and then used to repress or hinder others; it exists instead in a “network of relations,” as noted in the above quote. In other words, it is not as if the one who has the “upper hand” possesses a power which s/he may wield as a force at his or her bidding and will, for power inheres in a relation rather than being something one can “hold” and “wield.” “Power is relations,” Foucault argues, “power is not a thing, it is a relationship between two individuals, a relationship which is such that one can direct the behaviour of another or determine the behaviour of another” (Foucault 1997 f, 155). Power exists, therefore, in relationships; but, as Foucault argues in an essay entitled “The Subject and Power,” the relations that constitute power are of a particular type. Specifically, power is manifested in a relationship not so much between individuals as between actions: The exercise of power is not simply a relationship between partners, individual or collective; it is a way in which certain actions modify others. Which is to say, of course, that something called Power . . . which is assumed to exist universally in a concentrated or diffused form, does not exist. Power exists only when it is put into action .... (Foucault 1983 b, 219) This reiterates the contention that power is not a “thing” that exists independently, something to be taken up and wielded by an individual or a group. It exists instead between individuals or groups, in their relations; but significantly, it exists between their actions'. “In effect, what defines a relationship of power is that it is a mode of action which does not act directly and immediately on others. Instead it acts upon their actions . . .” (1983 b 220). This is a crucial point for the question of resistance to power if power always acts upon the actions of others, it presupposes and requires a subject capable of acting. This means that power cannot simply and totally dominate or repress; in its exercise there must be room for others to act. Indeed, Foucault argues that the exercise of power leaves open a field of multiple possibilities for action, meaning there is a certain amount of freedom left to those “under power,” so to speak: [A] power relationship can only be articulated on the basis of two elements which are each indispensable if it is really to be a power relationship: that “the other” (the one over whom power is exercised) be thoroughly recognized and maintained to the very end as a person who acts; and that, faced with a relationship of power, a whole field of responses, reactions, results, and possible inventions may open up. (Foucault 1983 b, 220) What is of special significance here is that this “whole field of responses, reactions, results” includes, in an important sense, the possibility of resistance to power. It is also important to note that the relationship that constitutes power does not hold simply between an individual or group who is constantly “in power” while others are always and only “under power,” for Foucault insists that power “circulates” through a network of relations, wherein individuals are “always in the position of simultaneously undergoing and exercising this power . . .” (Foucault 1980 h, 98). This means also that power is diffused throughout various social relationships if individuals are both undergoing and exercising power, as Foucault maintains, then power must be seen as existing in various, multiple relationships between individuals. If one is subject to power in a particular relationship, one is also exercising it in another, or perhaps the same one in a different way. Thus Foucault insists that power is, in a sense, “everywhere”: Between every point of a social body, between a man and a woman, between the members of a family, between a master and his pupil, between every one who knows and everyone who does not, there exist relations of power .... (Foucault 1980 c, 187) The network of relations within which power exists is multiple, complex, and dispersed throughout the social body. Foucault even goes so far as to assert that it is not possible to escape to some kind of “outside” to power. In response to an interviewer’s question as to whether Foucault’s view of power assumes that it is “always already there,” Foucault replies in the affirmative: It seems to me that power is ‘always already there’, that one is never ‘outside’ it, that there are no ‘margins’ for those who break with the system to gambol in. .. . I would suggest rather .. . that power is co-extensive with the social body; there are no spaces of primal liberty between the meshes of its network. (Foucault 1980 e, 141-142) In other words, power infuses our relationships and our practices and institutions to such a degree that there is no time, place, or set of circumstances under which it can be said that we have completely “escaped” power, that we are “outside” of it entirely. While this seems a rather bold claim, it becomes more plausible when one recalls several points. First, according to Foucault power is involved in any relationship where one individual can direct or determine the behavior of another or others - a situation that exists more often than one might immediately think. Also, power is involved in the very creation of individuals themselves, and in the establishment and documentation of the “truth” about them. In addition, power works within the development of knowledges and sciences, and throughout the various mechanisms that contribute to these. Adding these together, one begins to see how and why for Foucault power could be “co-extensive with the social body”: in our relationships, and in our own individuality, power relations are at work. 40 It is not the case, however, that power is übiquitous because it “takes over” everything starting from a central source; Foucault insists that power “comes from everywhere” instead of emanating from one point outward: The omnipresence of power: not because it has the privilege of consolidating everything under its invincible unity, but because it is produced from one moment to the next, at every point, or rather in every relation from one point to another. (Foucault 1990 a, 93) It is for this reason that Foucault advocates an “ascending” analysis of power rather than a “descending” one. The latter would begin with power in its most general forms and ask how it is that power extends into and permeates more local and particular social mechanisms and relations; while the former begins with these “infinitesimal mechanisms” and asks how they have been and still are “invested, colonised, utilised, involuted, transformed, displaced, extended etc., by ever more general mechanisms” (Foucault 1980 h, 99). Foucault argues that one should use an ascending analysis when investigating practices of power, because otherwise one misses a crucial element of how the network of power relations works: rather than moving from the top down, as it were, extending mechanisms of control from some central source such as the state or the sovereign, power is installed in local, micro-mechanisms and relations that are “colonised” and “utilised” by more general mechanisms. 41 The more particular power relations have “their own history, their own trajectory, their own techniques and tactics” (1980 h 99); they are not simply reproductions of the larger relations on a smaller scale. One cannot manage an adequate analysis of power, then, if one addresses it from the top down, as if power emanated only from above and existed all the way down in the same kind of relations. An ascending analysis is necessary to analyze the multiplicity and heterogeneity of power relations, as well as to understand how these are used to form larger, more general relations. It is therefore clear why Foucault rejects viewing power as if it were simply a function of the state, of something “at the top” that extends its dominating forces downward. Instead, he insists that the power of the state is in a certain sense dependent on the more local mechanisms of power: [R]elations of power, and hence the analysis that must be made of them, necessarily extend beyond the limits of the State. ... [T]he State can only operate on the basis of other, already existing power relations. The state is superstructural in relation to a whole series of power networks that invest the body, sexuality, the family, kinship, knowledge, technology and so forth. (Foucault 1980 g, 122) Foucault is here arguing that the power of the state works through the annexation, the colonization and utilization, of more local, particular power relations and networks. In other words, the reason the state can exercise power is because there are already in place a certain number of power relations in more local arenas of social institutions and practices. The power relation that exists between the state and its citizens through law, the police, the courts, etc., depends upon many other relations of power that discipline and normalize individuals in a way that coerces them to conform to law (such as the power relations that exist in the family, the school, etc.). The state, by itself, would likely be unable to enforce its laws against a citizenry that was not already somehow predisposed to follow them it simply lacks the resources and the ability to do so. The power of the state, therefore, exists only insofar as it rests upon other relations of power within the social body. To summarize these various aspects of Foucault’s view of power, we can say that: (1) power is not only repressive, it is also productive; (2) it is not a “thing” that can be possessed, but a relation - or rather, a complex network of relations between actions; (3) this network of power relations exists “everywhere” throughout society, with multiple and heterogeneous forms and tactics, and thus there is no “outside” to power; (4) power is not exercised from the “top down,” but rather the relations of power at the “top” are dependent on the relations of power below. Foucault himself summarizes a number of these points in The History of Sexuality Volume I, where he also adds a few new developments to his earlier views of power. By this point, power for Foucault has become even more complex. It is described as a network of “force relations,” but he now argues that power must also be understood as the process which, through ceaseless struggles and confrontations, transforms, strengthens, or reverses [these force relations]; as the support which these force relations find in one another . . . [or] the disjunctions and contradictions which isolate them from one another; and lastly, as the strategies in which they take effect, whose general design ... is embodied in the state apparatus, in the formulation of the law, in the various social hegemonies. (Foucault 1990 a, 92-93) Power, for Foucault, is at this point simply a name for something utterly multiple and complex: “it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society” (1990 a 93). 42 The idea that power is “everywhere” is even more accurate under this view of power, since “power” includes the myriad of force relations in society as well as the relations between these and the strategies in which they operate as they are embodied in larger apparatuses such as the state and the law. The notion of the “omnipresence of power,” as Foucault terms it, could lead one to think that there is nothing to be done about it, that we are powerless to resist this immense network of power relations and their effects. But Foucault has insisted since Discipline and Punish that those upon which power is exercised could always, at least potentially, struggle against it. He argues that power relations “define innumerable points of confrontation, focuses of instability, each of which has its own risks of conflict, of struggles, and of an at least temporary inversion of the power relations” (Foucault 1995, 27). That “power is everywhere” does not mean that we are doomed to a perpetual oppression. Not only is power not entirely “bad,” it is always accompanied by the possibility of resistance. In The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault makes an even stronger statement: “Where there is power, there is resistance,” and further “this resistance is never in a position of exteriority in relation to power” (Foucault 1990 a, 95). Here, Foucault indicates that power is always accompanied by, not just the possibility of resistance, but actual manifestations of it. As I argue in what follows, however, I don’t think that this strong statement describes well the relationship between power and resistance as Foucault himself explains it. 43 For Foucault, power relations include the possibility of resistance within; indeed, Foucault asserts that the very existence of power relations “depends on a multiplicity of points of resistance: these play the role of adversary, target, support, or handle . . .” (Foucault 1990 a, 95). These “points of resistance” need not be actual struggles, but rather potential ones. It is not the case, then, that for Foucault resistance to power comes from “outside” of it, nor is there something like a general, unified force of resistance (such as a revolutionary movement) struggling against power in its many forms and mechanisms. Since power relations are multiple, diffused throughout various social relationships, institutions, and practices, the points of resistance upon which it depends are also multiple there are myriads of possible “resistances,” operating just as übiquitously as power relations. These resistances function along with and through relations of power themselves, acting as an opposing force: “[t]hey are the odd term in relations of power; they are inscribed in the latter as an irreducible opposite” (Foucault 1990 a, 96). Wherever there is power, there is also the potential for a resisting, opposing force to struggle against it. This conception of the structure of power relations allows Foucault to insist both that “power is everywhere” and that, nevertheless, resistance to it is still possible. This is important, given Foucault’s insistence, discussed above, that there is no “outside” to power. If power is everywhere, if there are no “margins” to it, no spaces of absolute freedom from power, then it might appear as if we are always doomed to a perpetual domination and oppression. But this is only the case if one thinks of power as merely a repressive, dominating force that can only be resisted from a space free from power. In an interview first published in 1977, Foucault argues that resistance to power is continually possible because it emerges at the same point as power relations; and this makes resistance all the more effective: [Resistance to power does not have to come from elsewhere to be real, nor is it inexorably frustrated through being the compatriot of power. It exists all the more by being in the same place as power .... (Foucault 1980 e, 142) If resistance is the “compatriot” of power, this close relationship may enable the formation of strategies aimed at the specificity of power relations, thereby making resistance more effective. By the time he wrote History of Sexuality Volume I Foucault had begun to argue not just that resistance is always possible within relations of power, but also that it is produced by these very relations. David Shumway argues that in this later text, “Foucault has taken the next logical step and now asserts that resistance is produced by power” (Shumway 1989, 139). There is, for Foucault, a possibility for resistance not simply despite power, but actually because of it. Foucault insists that the multiple resistances accompanying power are not futile, ultimately doomed to submit to domination, even though they are produced by power relations themselves: [B]y definition, they can only exist in the strategic field of power relations. But this does not mean that they are only a reaction or rebound, forming with respect to the basic domination an underside that is in the end always passive, doomed to perpetual defeat. (Foucault 1990 a, 96) Thus even though the various points of resistance are produced by and exist only within power relations, they can still be effective to some extent. But how does resistance work, and how can it be effective? Recall that Foucault argues in “The Subject and Power” that power is exercised within a relationship between actions; and this means that within this relationship there is an element of freedom: Power is exercised only over free subjects, and only insofar as they are free. By this we mean individual or collective subjects who are faced with a field of possibilities in which several ways of behaving, several reactions and diverse comportments may be realized. (Foucault 1983 b, 221) Without such a field of freedom, a space in which there exist several possibilities for action, there cannot be said to exist a power relation in the sense of one action acting upon another. The subject of power must be free in the sense of having at least a few different possible actions available. In this sense, freedom is the precondition for the exercise of power (1983 b 221). This means, of course, that those upon whom power is exercised are always free to choose amongst several possible responses; and, as Foucault notes, one of these responses is “the refusal to submit” (1983 b 221). Foucault insists, actually, that there must always be the possibility of refusal, of resistance, within the field of possible responses, “since without the possibility of recalcitrance, power would be equivalent to a physical determination” (1983 b 221) - power would then be a force that determines, that leaves no freedom to act, and would therefore not be a relation of power in Foucault’s sense of the term at all. For Foucault, then, resistance to power is always available as a choice among a field of possible actions opened up by the exercise of power itself. It need not, of course, be a choice that is exercised, for otherwise power would be continually and perpetually resisted (which it clearly is not). But resistance must always remain at least a possibility in order for a power relationship to exist between actions. This means that there must always be the possibility for “insubordination” and “escape”: For, if it is true that at the heart of power relations and as a permanent condition of their existence there is an insubordination and a certain essential obstinacy on the part of the principles of freedom, then there is no relationship of power without the means of escape or possible flight. (Foucault 1983 b, 225) Still, such talk of escape and flight can be misleading, as the above discussion of power’s übiquity indicates. If resistance is indeed undertaken, it is not the case that this struggle against power allows an escape from power altogether. Foucault describes the relationship between resistance and power as a perpetual struggle where each incites responses from the other, an “agonism”: “a relationship which is at the same time reciprocal incitation and struggle; less of a face-to-face confrontation which paralyzes both sides than a permanent provocation” (Foucault 1983 b, 222). This is not a relationship wherein one manages an “escape” in the sense of leaving the exercise of power behind altogether. Instead, resistance and power incite and respond to one another in a perpetual, reciprocal relationship. This helps explain one way in which power can be said to produce the possibility for its own resistance: when power is exercised in specific ways upon specific actions, it opens up particular possibilities for response that are, in a sense, dependent upon the specific exercise of power itself. This “agonism” between power and resistance is complex enough to warrant a rather detailed investigation here. To begin with, it is important to remember that power is itself a relation, an action upon the actions of others, and thus is not a simple and singular term in its relationship to resistance. Similarly, resistance is a relation a refusal to submit one’s actions to the action of power, or an action against the action of power. As Foucault notes in an interview, “[t]o resist, it [resistance] would have to operate like power” (Foucault 1996 d, 224); and indeed, in “The Subject and Power” he speaks of resistance as a “relationship of confrontation” (Foucault 1983 b, 225). This resisting relationship operates in a particular relation with the relationship of power. In other words, between power and resistance we are speaking of a relationship between two relationships. Foucault does not carefully describe these two relationships and their distinction in “The Subject and Power,” but we can imagine that while in the resistance relation there is a degree of refusal of power on the part of those upon whom it is exercised, in the power relation there is not (while, of course, such refusal remains as a possibility even though it is not exercised). With this interpretation of the two relations of power and resistance, we can then approach the following description of the relation between them: Every power relationship implies, at least in potentia, a strategy of struggle, in which the two forces are not superimposed, do not lose their specific nature, or do not finally become confused. Each constitutes for the other a kind of permanent limit, a point of possible reversal. (Foucault 1983 b, 225) The “two forces” mentioned here are those of power and resistance power relations always include the possibility for a “strategy of struggle,” relations of refusal and resistance. These two forces remain separate, he insists, two different kinds of relations that “do not lose their specific nature.” Foucault goes on to describe how each of these forms a “permanent limit” for the other: A relationship of confrontation reaches its term ... when stable mechanisms replace the free play of antagonistic reactions. Through such mechanisms one can direct, in a fairly constant manner and with reasonable certainty, the conduct of others. . . . And in return the strategy of struggle also constitutes a frontier for the relationship of power, the line at which, instead of manipulating and inducing actions in a calculated manner, one must be content with reacting to them after the event. (Foucault 1983 b, 225) Resistance, or the “relationship of confrontation” works as a “free play of antagonistic reactions” - it is a relationship in which the exercise of power upon actions is met with resisting and refusing reactions. This is not, strictly speaking, a relationship of power, but one of resistance. This latter relation reaches its limit with the replacement of this antagonism by “stable mechanisms” whereby “one can direct... the conduct of others.” In other words, when resistance reaches its limit it is replaced by relations of power, where the actions of those “under power,” so to speak, are conducted in a “fairly constant manner.” Though the potential for resistance exists, it is not exercised. On the other hand, when power relations reach their limit, resistance takes place and power can no longer conduct the actions of others as before but “must be content with reacting to them after the event.” When there is refusal, power relations no longer manage to govern or conduct action in a “calculated” or “constant” manner, but rather in a reactive one. In an interview from 1975 Foucault provides an example of how the agonism between power and resistance functions. He asserts that in the eighteenth century in Europe a “system of control of sexuality ... is established over the bodies of children” in response to the recognition of childhood masturbation (Foucault 1980 a, 56). But this institution of power relations, Foucault argues, provokes certain resistances: [S]exuality, through thus becoming an object of analysis and concern, surveillance and control, engenders at the same time an intensification of each individual’s desire for, in and over his body. . . . The revolt of the sexual body is the reverse effect of this encroachment. (1980 a 57) Here we see power relations developing effects of awareness of and interest in one’s own body, and thereby producing the possibility for struggle against the very control that opened the way for resistance. A relatively stable mechanism of power relations in regard to the bodies of children thus can give itself over to a more antagonistic mechanism, a relation of confrontation. But this in turn provokes “a response on the side of power”: “An economic (and perhaps also ideological) exploitation of eroticisation, from sun-tan products to pornographic films. Responding precisely to the revolt of the body, we find a new mode of investment. . .” (1980 a 57). This illustrates how relations of power that face resistance no longer conduct in a consistent or calculated fashion, but rather by reacting power is reinvested in the body through the exploitation of sexuality and desire as a reaction to the “revolt of the sexual body,” which was itself a reaction to earlier power relations. Thus Foucault concludes that “[f]or each move by one adversary, there is an answering one by the other” (Foucault 1980 a, 57). There is a kind of “indefiniteness” to the struggle between power and resistance, Foucault contends; 44 each incites and provokes the other in their agonistic struggle through a “reciprocal appeal,” leading to an instability of both: At every moment the relationship of power may become a confrontation between two adversaries. Equally, the relationship between adversaries in society may, at every moment, give place to the putting into operation of mechanisms of power. (Foucault 1983 b, 226) Each movement by power or resistance incites the other to respond, meaning that neither is likely to remain without change induced by the other. This reciprocal movement between power and resistance in their agonism, the reversal of each into the other, becomes more likely as each is carried to its extreme. In other words, it is not just that power and resistance provoke each other, but rather that the more intense each gets, the stronger the provocation and the more likely the reversal. On the side of power, Foucault explains the phenomenon this way: It would not be possible for power relations to exist without points of insubordination .... Accordingly, every intensification, every extension of power relations to make the insubordinate submit can only result in the limits of power. The latter reaches its final term either in a type of action which reduces the other to total impotence ... or by a confrontation with those whom one governs and their transformation into adversaries. (Foucault 1983 b, 225) Power pushed to its limit, intensified and strengthened, will either end in total domination (in which case a power relation in Foucault’s sense no longer exists) or in a reversal into resistance and confrontation. As long as power relations hold, there is the possibility for refusing, for insubordination; and this possibility becomes a more likely choice for those “conducted” by power relations the stronger those relations become. A similar movement occurs in the case of resistance, Foucault argues: For a relationship of confrontation, from the moment it is not a struggle to the death, the fixing of a power relationship becomes a target at one and the same time its fulfillment and its suspension. (Foucault 1983 b, 225) Relations of struggle and confrontation, if pushed to their limits, end either in the death of an adversary or the “fixing of a power relationship.” In other words, the more intense a struggle between adversaries, the more likely one or both will work to set up a relatively stable power relationship whereby the other’s actions can be more carefully and consistently conducted. The limits of both power and resistance, then, could lie in a reversal from one into the other, or in a death of some kind (such as a reduction to “total impotence”). 45 It is not just that power and resistance can undergo reversals, therefore, but also that each is more likely to reverse into the other the stronger it becomes. In sum, though power is “everywhere,” the possibility for resisting it exists everywhere as well. This is because power relations are actions upon other actions, requiring a subject with a certain field of possible actions, and amongst these will be the potential for refusal and resistance. Power relations, then, exist in an “agonistic” relationship with relations of resistance - each incites and can give itself over into the other, the more so as each intensifies. Power and resistance are “coextensive,” as Foucault explains in an interview first published in 1977: “[Tjhis resistance I am speaking of is not a substance. It is not anterior to the power which it opposes. It is coextensive with it and absolutely its contemporary” (Foucault 1996 d, 224). Resistance is always possible, since it exists for Foucault as an “irreducible opposite” within relations of power (Foucault 1990 a, 96). Still, it is as yet unclear what Foucault means by characterizing resistance in terms of an opposition to power. Conceiving of it in this way indicates that power and resistance might be thought of as two opposing “sides” that negate one another. Of course, in this case the opposition would be a complex one, since the “side” of power relations would produce its own opposite “side” of resistance. But according to Foucault, we cannot think of resistance as taking up a side on the “outside” of power, as a pure negation of power from a space of “non-power”: “we must.. . not suppose that power might exist on one side, and that on the other side lies that upon which power would exert itself; nor can we suppose that the struggle develops between power and non-power” (Foucault 1996 b, 260). Foucault rejects, therefore, the notion of an “ontological opposition between power and resistance” (1996 b 260) they cannot be thought of as completely separate, because resistance is dependent upon power relations in the sense that the latter structure the particular possibilities available as choices for refusal. In other words, while power relations require that their subjects be free to choose amongst several responses to the attempt to “govern” or conduct behavior (including the possibility of refusing, resisting), the field of possible responses is shaped by the power relations themselves; and in this sense, “[r]esistance really always relies upon the situation against which it struggles” (Foucault 1996 n, 387). Resistance does not take place from “outside” power relations, from a space devoid of power relations and utterly opposed to them. Instead, it is a kind of refusal that occurs within and because of the particular power relations in which one finds oneself at a given time: “power relationships open up a space in the middle of which the struggles develop” (Foucault 1996 b, 260). It does not make sense, then, to speak of power and resistance as two unified, opposing “sides” that are “outside” one another power relations require the possibility of resistance in order to exist, and resistance takes place through the possibilities for response that power relations themselves provide. It would be misleading, therefore, to conceive of resistance as a purely liberating force, as grounded in a space of “non-power” and opposing or refusing power altogether therefrom. Resistance may be a kind of refusal, but it is not a refusal of power relations altogether. Resistance does not aim at a kind of “total liberation” from power, a utopian dream of the day when power will finally come to an end. To put it somewhat differently, resistance does not originate from nor hope for a total “anarchy” in the sense of an utter absence of power relations. Given Foucault’s view of power relations, such a dream would indeed be impossible for Foucault, since power exists in relationships where “one person tries to control the conduct of the other,” “in human relationships . . . power is always present” (Foucault 1996 e, 441). Further, under Foucault’s view an anarchic hope for the elimination of power relations altogether isn’t even necessary, since power relations must operate along with the possibility for resistance, and they are therefore are not utterly oppressive they do not form a “tyranny” against which one would need to oppose a resistance as “anarchy.” Foucault insists in a 1982 interview that even though many attribute to him the view that power is purely dominating, oppressive and evil, he disagrees: Power is not evil. Power is games of strategy. ... For example, let us take sexual or amorous relationships: to wield power over the other in a sort of open-ended strategic game where the situation may be reversed is not evil; it’s a part of love, of passion and sexual pleasure. (Foucault 1996 e, 447) If power relations exist wherever human beings attempt to control, influence, or otherwise conduct the behavior of others, clearly one cannot say that all such relationships are oppressive or evil. Many are pleasurable, as in the above example, or useful, as could be the case in teaching relationships. In regard to pedagogy, Foucault asserts that he sees “nothing wrong in the practice of a person who, knowing more than others in a specific game of truth, tells those others what to do, teaches them and transmits knowledge and techniques to them” (1996 e 447). 46 Power does not call for a total elimination because it is not, in and of itself, merely evil. But power is dangerous, one could say, and Foucault does acknowledge that sometimes power relations can become hardened into oppressive states wherein there is little freedom to resist. He calls such relations “states of domination,” and says they occur when “power relations, instead of being mobile, allowing the various participants to adopt strategies modifying them, remain blocked, frozen. . . . preventing any reversibility of movement. ..” (Foucault 1996 e, 434). These states of domination seem to describe situations where possibilities for resistance are reduced or blocked entirely, meaning that freedom is remote and marginal if it exists at all: “[i]n such a state, it is certain that practices of freedom do not exist or . . . are extremely constrained and limited” (1996 e 434). Strictly speaking, of course, if the potential for freedom does not exist within such relationships, then they are not “relations of power” in Foucault’s sense (and indeed, he does distinguish between the two (1996 e 447)). But it seems that states of domination can emerge out of relations of power, that the latter can be “dangerous” in this sense. Foucault acknowledges, in response to an interviewer’s suggestion, that it is such domination that is to be avoided: “playing with as little domination as possible” is indeed the “hinge point of ethical concerns” and the crucial element in “political struggle” (1996 e 447). Power relations themselves do not need to be eliminated, but it appears that a reduction in states of domination is an admirable goal, according to Foucault. Still, the difference between power relations and states of domination seems a matter of degree; and some relations of power are more constraining than others, therefore calling for more resistance. In other words, just because power is not all “evil” doesn’t mean that it’s all good, either clearly some relations of power are resisted due to the kind of “governmentality” involved. One could say that the “poisonous traces” in the regime of truth as it involves relations of power have to do with the degree of oppression involved, and this in turn may be a function either of the quantity of constraint or the quality of control within the power relation. It may be the case that a particular relation of power is so constraining as to squeeze out options for movement and response, making it more likely that subjects of this power will note its oppressive effects and recognize the need for resistance. Or it may be that the power relations are of such a kind that they are deemed intolerable and thus resisted. For example, relations of power in a particular racist practice may not be overwhelmingly constraining in the sense of leaving little room for freedom, but may be intolerable in the way that behavior is conducted. A particular racist practice may be a minor anomaly in a society or institution (rather than being part of a larger pattern of racism that touches many aspects of life), but may nonetheless be resisted due to the oppressive tendency in the quality of the attempted control within the power relation, rather than the quantity of constraint. Either way, the point is that power relations don’t have to progress to domination in order to call for resistance or be resisted. Not all power is evil, but some can be poison. Part of the “cure” or antidote for such poison lies in resisting the particular power relations in which it inheres. Resistance is aimed, not at all relations of power, but at those in which the subjects involved have decided that they no longer want to be “governed” in the way the power relations have operated. In a lecture from 1978 Foucault calls this attitude on the part of the governed a “critical attitude,” and explains that it is not a simple opposition to “governmentality” as a whole “we do not want to be governed, and we do not want to be governed at air— it is rather a questioned of not being governed in a particular way: “how not to be governed like that, by that, in the name of those principles, with such and such an objective in mind and by means of such procedures, not like that, not for that, not by them” (Foucault 1997 c, 28). This critical attitude, described by Foucault in this essay as something that developed along with the procedures of governmentality during the sixteenth century in Europe, continues today as a response of resistance to relations of power which try to govern too much or in intolerable ways. We still experience a will not to be governed “quite so much” or “not like that and at that cost” (1997 c 29). Though Foucault claims that resistance is an “opposite” to power, therefore, this must not be taken to mean that it is an opposing force “outside” of power, something like a movement of anarchy against the oppressive tyranny of power. Resistance is an opposition that takes place within that which is opposed, and thus each “side” cannot be thought of as negating the other entirely. In other words, power relations are not entirely and tyrannically opposed to resistance, since they always include it as a possibility; and resistance is not entirely and anarchically opposed to power relations, since it “relies” on them in order to operate. Resistance can’t be a force that aims at an elimination of power altogether, a desire “not to be governed at ally Still, even if resistance and power are not two opposing outrides,” though resistance operates within particular power relations as a refusal to be governed “like that,” how can we think of this as an opposition within that which is opposed? Even within particular circumstances of resistance, where those subject to power relations decide they no longer want to be governed “like that,” resistance is not simply a matter of saying “no,” of refusing to be conducted in a particular way. If this is an “opposition,” there is more to it than mere negation, as Foucault affirms in an interview from 1982: Q: . . . [According to previous conceptions, “to resist” was simply to say no. Resistance was conceptualized only in terms of negation. Within your understanding, however, to resist is not simply a negation, but a creative process; to create and recreate, to change the situation, actually to be an active member of that process. MF: Yes, that is the way I would put it. To say no is the minimum form of resistance. But of course, at times that is very important. . . . (Foucault 1996 n, 386) To take on the “critical attitude” of not wanting to be governed in a particular way is a starting point, a “minimum form of resistance,” but such negation is not the sine qua non of resistance for Foucault. It may be important at times (indeed, sometimes it may be the only choice one has for resisting), but Foucault’s emphasis lies mainly in attempting to modify, to change the power relations to which one is subject, rather than stopping with simply refusing them. Thus the interviewer in the above quote describes Foucault’s view of resistance as a “creative process” where one attempts to “change the situation.” In reference to the perpetual freedom presupposed by power relations, Foucault explains in the same interview that this means power relations can perpetually be transformed: [W]e always have possibilities, there are always possibilities of changing the situation. We cannot jump outside the situation, and there is no point where you are free from all power relations. But you can always change it. So what I’ve said . . . [means] that we are always free. Well anyway, that there is always the possibility of changing. (1996 n 386) Resistance as Foucault describes it here involves a working to transform power relations rather than simply refusing them. Attempting resistance as opposition within the context of particular power relations is conceptually problematic in a similar way as it was in the general discussion of resistance above above just as resistance and power cannot be thought of “in general” as two opposing “sides” because they are not entirely “outside” one another, so too is it the case that resistance cannot be thought of in its particular relationship to particular power relations as something “outside” that can be utterly opposed to that which it resists. Resistance does not, as Foucault says, “jump outside the situation”; it does not escape the power relations being resisted in such a way as to be able to oppose, negate, or otherwise refuse them from some kind of space “outside.” It does not make sense for Foucault to speak of resistance as a mere refusal, then, since this implies that one could step outside of the particular power relation in order to negate it. Even more importantly, resistance to particular power relations must be more than mere negation for Foucault because otherwise the relations of power to which one is subject may not be likely to change very much. If one attempts to resist through a simple refusal, thinking that one has thereby exited the power relation, is now “free” from it, one will still be caught up in it in ways that one might thereby ignore; and one could then end up sustaining the power relation without realizing it. If one were to stop with mere refusal one might get stuck singing the “anti-repressive ditty” mentioned earlier, where few pay attention and “things remain in place” (Foucault 1996 d, 222). If one continues to simply say “no,” either one will be generally ignored (especially if one is “against” things that are generally accepted, in which case one might just be considered irrational or insane) or, if people do pay attention, one’s discourse of pure refusal will fit right into the mechanisms of power one is resisting, perhaps forcing an increase in intensity. In other words, by rejecting the “governance” of certain power relations through negation, rather than working to change these relations, one may be playing into their hands. For example, I may wish to resist the way I am governed in my job as a graduate student teacher in university setting, thinking that I am assigned too many students and am paid too little money. If I choose to resist through a pure negation in the sense of simply refusing to teach, or refusing to teach as many students as is required of me, I am probably going to run up against rules designed to deal with such behavior. In other words, if a particular relation of power is set up in order to lead to a particular kind of conduct, there are probably already mechanisms in place that aim at producing that conduct. If I simply refuse that conduct, go against it, I am likely to be in a position where existing mechanisms can be brought in to discipline me. Or if the mechanisms are not already in place, they can easily be instantiated because I am doing little to change the rules of the game, to move outside of the discourse or practice when I am just saying “no.” In this particular example, I am doing little to change general ideas about, say, running a university like a business and decreasing costs by increasing the workload for graduate student teachers (and other faculty members). My refusal can be answered by submitting me to rules grounded in an appeal to productivity, to financial hardship that is perhaps little swayed by my action. If the rules don’t yet exist, they can easily be put in place by appeals to this general discourse that I am not necessarily helping to upset. I could therefore be said to be inviting an application of the rules within the particular power relations, rather than their transformation if I am simply refusing to act as required, it is easy to respond that here is a case where the rules need to be applied, pressed, to force me to conform. This may even lead to an intensification of the rules or their attendant punishments; but in any case it is unlikely that the overwhelming reaction will involve a major change in the relations of power, their rules, or their practices. It is possible to describe this problem conceptually in the following way. The logic of negation and contradiction is such that if one takes up an opposing position to that which one means to resist, one does not manage to change the latter in any significant way. Recall from Chapter One that this is because in taking up an opposing “side” one places oneself in the position of that which the other is “not,” thereby helping to define and consolidate that other. If I set myself up in opposition to a particular discourse, practice, or truth claim x, I take up the space of negation that x needs in order to define, unify, and perhaps even strengthen itself. In other words, I do not actually effectively leave x behind if I attempt to exit it by opposing it across a boundary of negation. I may think that in saying “no” I am making a clean break with x, but this negative effort actually works in support of x in ways that I may not recognize. X needs not-x in order to be what it is, in order to consolidate its own position and exhibit its character. In addition, if I try to resist x, where x is a particular relation of power, by responding to every initiative on x’s part with a simple “no,” then I am merely mirroring x’s efforts back in the opposite direction without changing their structure. If the power relation I am trying to resist directs me to follow particular rules and laws, and I simply say “no” to these, my attempts to resist manage only to repeat the same rules and laws, negated. I am repeating, mirroring x’s strategies in opposition, and therefore not managing to produce very much change in them. My efforts, if they work as pure negation, will then do little to upset x’s position or strategies. An attempt at complete separation, the setting up of a rigid boundary of opposition, will not lead to an effective transformation of that which is resisted an “exit” is not a good way to “escape,” since trying to move to the “outside” of what one is resisting doesn’t effectively get one outside of it after all. If I want to effect real and lasting change, I will have to resist in some other way. Still, efforts at disobedience and purely negative refusal can sometimes be helpful, and Foucault does acknowledge, that saying “no” can be very important on occasion -at least as a first step. 47 But the point is that one mustn’t simply stop there, for things are most likely to just remain in place if one does. Resisting a power relation by mirroring its strategies in reverse seems unlikely to produce effective change in it, as one is mainly repeating its efforts backwards and thereby retaining their basic structure. This may be a start to fruitful strategies of resistance but they must go beyond simple repetition and reflection. Instead of such “negative” resistance, Foucault emphasizes resisting movements that are more “creative,” that can work a transformation in existing power relations. This resistance, Foucault sometimes indicates, seems capable of managing a kind of “escape.” But how can resistance, being produced by and existing within power relations, help bring about an escape from them? An escape that is not an exit There are a number of places quoted above where Foucault connects resistance with an escape: “there is no relationship of power without the means of escape or possible flight” (Foucault 1983 b, 225); resistance can occur in “finding a way to escape from [means of governing]” (Foucault 1997 c, 28). But resistance can’t be thought of as something that escapes power entirely, that exists somehow outside relations of power, as Foucault insists that resistance is produced by and exists within power relations. Resistance develops as a response to the particular power relations to which one is subjected. Perhaps resistance, though not itself escaping the particular power relations in which it is inscribed, can manage to bring about some kind of escape from them. It could not, of course, result in an escape from power relations altogether, but could it bring about an escape from being governed “like that, for that,” and “by them”? Foucault suggests as much when he argues that resistance can manage to transform power relations, especially insofar as it is addressed to them in their particular forms and practices. As Foucault explains, particular resistances can and have resulted in “very specific transformations ... in a number of areas that concern our ways of being and thinking, relations to authority, relations between the sexes, the way in which we perceive insanity or illness . . .” (Foucault 1997 d, 126-127). In this sense, might it be said that resistance can manage to effect an escape from particular relations of power? In a recent article, Olivia Custer addresses this question, suggesting how it might be that resistance could be thought of as productive of escape. Custer explains that for Foucault, one can manage an escape by finding new ways to respond to power relations, ways that these relations leave open as possibilities, but that are not among those encouraged: To escape submission, one must seek to escape the options proposed by the power relation by finding, or inventing, a different option that was yet left open as a possibility. . . . [This] resemble[s] an exercise in spotting the loophole, spotting the possibility that is not among those encouraged, but which yet remains possible. Refusing submission, refusing the practices offered will be positively described as inventing a way to escape not from the power relation as such but at least from the alternatives it puts forward. (Custer 1998, 140) This is a different kind of activity than the resistance which would simply say “no” or do the opposite of what the power relation encourages. It does not constitute an attempt to exit the power relation, to move to its “outside” in some ultimately futile hope of liberating oneself from it entirely. Instead of trying to get “outside” and thereby remaining “inside” the power relation, this kind of resistance works an escape (seemingly paradoxically) from within the power relation itself. If the negative “other side” of a power relation is not, after all, the “outside” one might have hoped, perhaps moving in the other direction might offer a helpful alternative. What Custer suggests here is that for Foucault resistance begins from a position within a particular power relation and manages a transformation of it that, while not a pure “exit” to its “outside,” could indeed contribute to a kind of “escape.” This kind of resistance is creative, rather than purely oppositional, in the sense that one attempts to find or invent possible responses that the power relation hadn’t encouraged and isn’t necessarily prepared to answer. This means that one would not be simply inviting an application or intensification of the existing rules, since this may not be called for by the power relation’s response. Given the “agonism” between relations of power and relations of resistance, there will indeed be an answering move by the former to this new resistance; but the point is that this move will likely be something different, resulting in a kind of shift or change in the power relations themselves. Custer insists that what is being escaped here are the alternatives put forward by the particular power relation, not the power relation itself: It is important to note that the “escape” that must be invented is an escape from the alternatives set up by the governing structure. However this is not an escape from the power relation per se. In this sense it is better thought of as a displacement. (Custer 1998, 140) Custer explains that this cannot be thought of as an escape from the power relation itself because, as discussed above, “any action within a power relation exploits a possibility which that power relation opened” (1998, 140-141). In other words, the resisting action that one finds or invents may escape the particular alternatives encouraged by the power relation, but it is still a product of the power relation itself and therefore can’t be said to escape it. Custer therefore refers to this kind of “escape” as “an escape that is not an exit” (1998, 139). I agree that in resisting one does not escape one or all power relations in the sense of completely freeing oneself from them. Even when one manages to transform a power relation through the creative process of resistance described by Custer, it is not as if one is then free from that relation altogether, as if one has “exited” it. Custer is correct in asserting that any resisting action takes place within a space opened by the power relation itself. Still, there is some sense in which one could be said to escape the particular kind of power relation in which one previously found oneself, through this kind of resistance. The resisting action itself is, indeed, still a part of the previous power relation in the sense just described; but if it calls forth a new answer within its agonistic relationship with power and thus transforms or displaces the power relation, in a real sense one has managed to escape the particular form of power relation that existed previously. Granted, one has not escaped the power relation per se, as Custer argues, since power does respond to the resisting action with a new answer, a transformed relation. One is not therefore free from power altogether, nor from all aspects of the particular power relation resisted. But one has importantly escaped from being governed “like that,” since at least some aspects of this power relation have been transformed; and this may be enough to escape some of its oppressive elements. 48 The most effective resistance is one that doesn’t attempt to exit what is resisted through pure negation and opposition, but works to change it from within in the sense described above. Such efforts at resisting power relations would not merely say “no” to them as a direct refusal, a simple reversal of power’s strategies through returning them in the purely opposite direction. This type of resistance doesn’t operate from a space utterly “outside” of the power relation, as if one could be utterly free of it. An “oppositional,” rather than a “creative” resistance takes up the opposing, negative “side” that the “side” of power needs to define and consolidate itself. Further, performing a simple reversal by just saying “no” to whatever power puts forth only manages to mirror the same strategy in reverse, thereby effecting little change. Effective resistance as described by Foucault (and elaborated here) would avoid such simple oppositions and attempts to exit by working within the power relation to be resisted, thinking creatively to find responses to it that could promote its transformation by provoking new responses on its part. Those practicing this kind of resistance might thereby manage an “escape” by producing substantial change in relations of power, rather than sustaining them by attempting an “exit.” If trying to go “outside” power relations only puts one further “inside” them as support, then perhaps this attempt at escape from within could prove more effective. This interpretation of resistance suggests an intriguing way to conceive of the relationship between power relations and resistances that gives resistance a character of in-betweenness. Resistance is not opposed to power in the sense of being “outside” of it, since a particular mode of resistance is part of the power relation that makes it possible. Resistance occurs within power relations, since “by definition” it “can only exist in the strategic field of power relations,” according to Foucault; “resistance is never in a position of exteriority to power” (Foucault 1990 a, 96, 95). We have seen that resistance works within power relations by taking up possibilities for action that are produced by the very relations of power being resisted. But that resistance works within power in this way does not mean that it simply upholds and supports the power relations against which it is directed, since it can work to bring about change in them. Foucauldian resistance exists within power relations while at the same time being distanced from them, and avoiding claims to an “outside.” This resistance openly relies for its existence on the very the power relations it hopes to change, and does not attempt to leave them altogether. It works only to achieve a kind of distance within, a stepping-back without an exit. Foucauldian resistance is that of an exile, exhibiting “half-involvements” and “half-detachments” regarding the relation of power in which it functions. It is made possible by and only operates within a particular relation of power in that its actions are those made possible by that relation; but it chooses those actions that do not work to support the power relation directly, that are likely to lead to a change. In that sense Foucauldian resistance is taken up by those who remain within a particular power relation while also looking beyond it, yearning for an “outside” that they yet do not directly attempt to reach through negation or refusal. Those who engage in this kind of resistance work towards an escape from specific relations of power but do so only by operating within and through them. They work for “an escape that is not an exit,” through a movement of resistance that has the character of an in-between between being fully within and supporting the existing power relations, and being outside of them as something completely “other” and thereby still operating as their support. The space “in-between” in which resistance operates can be further illustrated by considering the question of whether we are always “trapped” by power. Foucault insists that we are not, responding to an interviewer’s question in 1982 that gets to the heart of this issue: Q: You write that. . . where there is power, there is resistance and that resistance is never in a position of externality vis-a-vis power. If this is so, then how do we come to any other conclusion than that we are always trapped inside that relationship that we can’t somehow break out of it. MF: Well I don’t think the work [sic] trapped is a correct one. It is a struggle, but what I mean by power relations is the fact that we are in a strategic situation towards each other.... [T]he continuation of this situation can influence the behavior or nonbehavior of the other. So we are not trapped. (Foucault 1996 n, 386) The question of our possible entrapment by power is an important one, and Foucault’s response here doesn’t clearly get at the concern driving it. It is indeed the case that for Foucault one is always inside a relationship of power; and in that sense the interviewer’s question is a pressing one: isn’t it the case that we are always “trapped” inside power relations? Foucault’s response is that we are not trapped because we can always change, alter, transform the relations of power through resistance and struggle. This can “influence the behavior or nonbehavior of the other” within which we are engaged in a power relation, and thus we are not trapped in the exact same relation as before. Yet we are still, of course, within a power relation of some kind, with this “other” and with other “others.” Thus the interviewer is correct to say that we are still inside a power relationship, and yet Foucault is correct to say that it need not be exactly the same one if we can manage to resist. This presents an interesting picture of “in-betweenness” in terms of the practice of resistance. Resistance is itself within the particular relation of power that makes it possible and against which it resists, but being thus “inside” it also manages enough of a distance to not be “trapped” within it resistance need not merely uphold the power relation that makes it possible, but can alter it from within. It operates from an inside that is somehow yet not fully inside, an inside that is distanced enough to produce a change. This shows, of course, that power relations harbor within themselves the possibility for their own transformation. Activities of resistance merely focus on possibilities that the power relation may have not recognized or downplayed, but that are there within nonetheless. Resistance takes advantage of a space of freedom within power relations themselves, a freedom to take a step back from them while still remaining within them, a freedom to distance oneself without exiting. This could be thought of as a movement of “exile,” and those who resist may thus be considered exiles of a sort, exercising a freedom to move about while still retaining ties to “home.” These are the exiles who stay “at home,” but who also manage a critical distance from this space within in order to effect its transformation. These resisting exiles share many characteristics of the exiles Said describes, including the “median state” of “half-involvements and halfdetachments” in regard to the relations of power they resist. They will also exhibit a “restlessness” in that they will always be willing to unsettle themselves and others: they will not rest content with successful resistances, as if achieving a change in relations of power means that no more resistance will be necessary. Resisting exiles will be aware that “everything is dangerous,” and that even the changes for which they worked may settle into problematic results. They also share the “double-perspective” of Said’s exile in that they are able to see the relations of power in which they live both from the perspective of the dominant view and from that of the “distanced” position they have taken up. Having exiled themselves from particular relations of power and the truths and knowledges produced therein, the resisting exiles can still view such truths in the dominant way as universal absolutes, and can also view them from another perspective: seeing them as contingencies that have come to be thought of as universal through particular, historical processes. These exiles recognize certain relations of power within which they live, and their attendant truths, both as they are (in terms of the present, dominant view) and as they have come to be (Said 1994, 60). Finally, resisting exiles are able to experience a freedom from the dominant view that can result in a freeing “escape” from particular relations of power. They can free themselves from these relations, not in the sense of eliminating them altogether, but transforming them into something less “poisonous.” There is still, however, the question of “recuperation” could one say that power relations manage to recuperate their exiles? In other words, since resistance still remains within power relations to the degree that it calls forth a response from them in the relationship of “agonism” described above, does this mean that power relations co-opt or recuperate the strategies of resistance, rendering them in a sense futile? It seems Foucault would have to say that this is at least possible, but he does insist that the “agonistic” relationship between power and resistance need not always be thought of as a “recuperation” of resistance by power: “For each move by one adversary, there is an answering one by the other. But this isn’t a ‘recuperation’ in the Leftists’ sense. One has to recognize the indefiniteness of the struggle . . .” (Foucault 1980 a, 57). The tone of this claim indicates that rather than describing the “agonism” as a movement whereby a stronger adversary always manages to recuperate the moves made by the weaker, it should be thought of as a struggle wherein each influences the other. In other words, a move by one may call forth a responding move by the other; but this doesn’t mean that the second has “recuperated” the first in the sense of rendering its efforts futile. The first may affect the second in a significant and highly effective way it may have brought about change that drastically affects the real lives of real people. The idea, of course, is that resistance can bring about transformations in relations of power that change conditions for the better, that reduce domination and oppression. It is always possible that this calls forth a response that eventually produces bad or worse conditions once again; but these can then be addressed by a new strategy of resistance, a new response in the “agonism.” In sum, although Foucault describes resistance as an “opposite” to power, this characterization can be misleading. It can too easily suggest either that resistance forms an anarchical “outside” to power, or that it operates within power as a simple negation. The first of these, resistance is outside power, is an inaccurate portrayal of the relationship between power and resistance; and the second, resistance negates power from within, does not capture well the “creative” capacity of resistance. Rather than just refusing or negating the particular power relations within which it operates, resistance at its best works to find or invent new responses, alternative routes that force a change in the power relations themselves. Thus the “agonism” between power relations and resistance relations is not welldescribed as an “opposition” at least not if this term indicates a pure negation across two sides. It is a reciprocal relation of mutual incitement, but one where each does not simply negate the other; rather, resistance works “creatively” to find new alternatives, and power is forced to transform in its response. These are perhaps “opposing” moves in a sense, but not in the strict sense of a pure negation. If that were the case, it seems, power might be more likely to “recuperate” resistance -- since, as noted above, such negations may not force much of a transformation in power relations themselves. Rather than a kind of pendulum swinging back and forth between “pro” and “contra,” between something like power as tyranny and resistance as anarchy, this agonism is perhaps better thought of as an irregular, zig-zagging type of movement in-between these two extremes: a movement wherein relations of power may travel along a particular line until they are forced in a new direction by resistance, a process that continues over and over again. This resistance comes not from “outside” the previous movement, but is an “exiled” force from within - a force “inside” that tends toward an impossible “outside,” managing a distance from power relations that transforms them and thereby guides them in ever new directions. Towards a cure Recall that for Foucault, power is not all “evil” - power permeates all human relations in that it occurs wherever one individual or group attempts to control the behavior of another, and this is not always oppressive or otherwise “bad.” It is therefore not necessary to resist all power relations, and thus it does not make sense to speak of the entire regime of truth as poisonous. Foucault insists that he does not think that since everything is permeated by power relations, this means that “everything is bad: “My point is not that everything is bad, but that everything is dangerous, which is not exactly the same as bad. If everything is dangerous, then we always have something to do” (Foucault 1983 a, 231-232). Everything is “dangerous,” perhaps, because power relations are mobile and changeable, and those that are not now “bad” could become so. We always have something to do, then: at the least, we can be vigilant, aware of the movements of power relations and how they may become or have already become poisonous. If it should somehow be that our particular conditions present no poison at the present time, we can perhaps help others who are not so fortunate, keeping a watchful eye out within our own sphere in case our distraction should open the way for a possible oppression. For Foucault, then, the omnipresence of power is not cause for an utter pessimism and apathy, but rather for a “hyper-activism” and an “absolute optimism” (Foucault 1983 a, 232; Foucault 1991 b, 174). There are dangers everywhere, but this does not mean that we must give up in the face of perpetual evil since resistance is always possible, there is always something that can be done. Foucault argues that in this field of continual danger, “the ethico-political choice we have to make every day is to determine which is the main danger” (Foucault 1983 a, 232). There may be, of course, many dangers facing us at a given time, and as we may not have the resources to address them all, we must choose the one that seems most dangerous. This leaves us with a question, however: who is to decide which relations of power are the most dangerous, the most poisonous, and therefore to be resisted? It would be problematic, given his exhortation against intellectuals telling others “what to do,” for Foucault to argue that it is the intellectual who is to make this decision; and indeed, he does not say this explicitly. 49 Foucault argues that those involved in particular relations of power must decide themselves if, when, and how to resist: [l]f I don’t ever say what must be done, it isn’t because I believe that there’s nothing to be done; on the contrary, it is because I think that there are a thousand things to do, to invent, to forge, on the part of those who, recognizing the relations of power in which they’re implicated, have decided to resist or escape them. (Foucault 1991 b, 174) It is up to those who are implicated in certain relations of power to decide when they have become poisonous enough to do something to change them. This emphasis on self-determination is one of the reasons that Foucault rejects the idea of a single, unified, “revolutionary” movement - if those involved in particular power relations are left free to decide whether they even need to be resisted, and if so, when and how, then the movements of resistance will take on a much more “multiple” character than those often considered by discourses of “revolution.” As Foucault explains, resistances take place within local, particular arenas as part of complex network of power relations and resistance relations, where it does not make sense to speak of a single kind of “revolt” or “revolution”: [PJoints of resistance are present everywhere in the power network. Hence there is no single locus of great Refusal, no soul of revolt, source of all rebellions, or pure law of the revolutionary. Instead there is a plurality of resistances, each of them a special case .... (Foucault 1990 a, 95-96) Foucault admits, however, that sometimes “revolution” does take place on a kind of grand scale. But this occurs, he says, through “the strategic codification of these [various] points of resistance” (1990 a 96). In other words, any massive movement of resistance, if it is effective, takes place through a strategic bringingtogether of more local movements that have their own shape and structure. Just as the power within the state does not work from “top to bottom,” neither ought “revolutionary resistances” to operate in this way according to Foucault. The power of the state does not trickle from the authorities at the top down into the more local power relations; it is rather that the power at the top depends on a certain annexation and use of the multiple power relations already in place in society. The functioning of resistance works similarly: if there is to be a kind of general force of resistance at the “top,” so to speak, this can only occur through a strategic combining of resistances already taking place (or, if not yet taking place, at least allowed to possess their own structure and force of motivation to come into existence). To start at the top and try to plan a revolutionary movement that forces everyone into the same kind of resistance against the same enemies at the same time simply doesn’t fit Foucault’s picture of the way power and resistance work. It is up to those involved in their own particular power relations to decide if, when, and how to exile themselves and engage in specific and concrete efforts of resistance and it is to be expected that these efforts will have multiple characters, depending on the particular relation of power being resisted. It should be noted here that the resisting exiles I have described here will not only be resisting particular relations of power, they will also be distancing themselves from certain claims of truth. Recall that the regime of truth connects truth and power in mutually supportive ways, and resisting relations of power also means resisting some of the truths linked to them. The resisting exiles, therefore, will also exile themselves from certain truth claims. They will not be able to reject all of the truth claims involved in the particular relations of power they resist, since their resistance will depend on these relations and their truth-effects. But they can distance themselves from these truth effects enough to question some on the basis of others, keeping in mind all the time that the latter can themselves be questioned in turn. These resisting exiles are in-between dogmatism and skepticism, tyranny and anarchy, choosing their particular battles against those relations of power and truth they find poisonous, and thereby working at a cure. The cure that can be brought about through resistance is not one whereby things are made better “once and for all,” whereby people are finally liberated from oppressive power relations and never need worry about their return. It is instead a situation of ongoing struggle, where exiles need always be ready to resist should power respond with a new oppression. But this does not paint a gloomy picture of a perpetual domination, since along the way conditions can be made better, people can experience more freedom from oppression in real, significant ways. And as long as there are power relations, there is always the possibility for resistance. There is an important question that is as yet left unanswered in this discussion of the “poison” of the regime of truth and its curative antidote in resistance: what is the role of the intellectual here? If power relations produce within themselves the potential for their own resistance and transformation, and if it is up to those involved to decide whether and how to engage in resistance, then where should the intellectual’s political efforts be directed? Resistance is always already possible, and, Foucault insists, it is not the intellectual’s role to tell others what they must do. Foucault argues that it is the regime of truth that is to be the target for the intellectual’s political efforts; and this indicates at least that the Foucauldian intellectual is to play some part in helping to neutralize the “poisonous traces” therein. Yet the details of the political role of the Foucauldian intellectual are not yet clear. THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN THE GENERAL LIBRARIES PERRY-CASTANEDA LIBRARY LIMITED CIRCULATION DATE/TIME DUE DATE/TIME RETURNED 37 Foucault does not perhaps give himself enough credit here as regards his earlier writings. As discussed above, his explanations of discipline and normalization do already show how power works not just from the outside, where we are controlled by others, but also through mechanism of self-control. But it is true that the notion of the “subject” and the techniques whereby it can create and modify itself do not become a focus for him until later texts. 38 Foucault seems to rely heavily here on the linguistic connection (present in French as well) between the verb “to subject” and the noun “subject” the “subject,” for Foucault, is created when the individual becomes “subject” to his/her own identity. In this sense we become “subjects” when we are made into individuals and catalogued, categorized accordingly, made to conform our thoughts and actions to the identity thereby attached to us. This is not a thorough or detailed theory of subjectivity; nor does Foucault provide such a theory in the rest of his work. I address his view of subjectivity in depth in Chapter Five, though even there I have filled in quite a bit myself from the bare outlines Foucault provides. 39 1 n his later work, Foucault begins to speak of forms of subjectivity that would not be so poisonous as those that are the product of the “government of individuation.” Specifically, he seems to encourage what I call an “aesthetic subjectivity,” wherein we create ourselves aesthetically, as works of art. I discuss this notion of an aesthetic subject, and compare it to the kind of subject Foucault criticizes here, in Chapter Five. 40 Colin Gordon explains Foucault’s point by arguing that power is exercised through the same conditions that make possible the relationships and practices which make up the social body: “If we say that all human practices are possible only within relations and subject to conditions which are only finitely modifiable at a given point and time, then the exercise of power can be conceived as the general aspect of practice within which these relations and conditions function as a material and a terrain of operation. . . . Hence for Foucault power is omnipresent in the social body because it is coterminous with the conditions of social relations in general” (Gordon 1980, 246). In a lecture from 1976, Foucault illustrates the difference between an “ascending” and a “descending” analysis of power, using as an example the practice of confining madness in seventeenth century Europe. If conducting a descending analysis of power, one might say that since the bourgeoisie was in power during the time of the internment of the insane, and since the latter were useless in terms of capitalist production, those in power used their power to lock them away. But Foucault suggests that such an analysis is “simultaneously correct and false” - there is something accurate in this, but it does not describe the whole picture (Foucault 1980 h, 100). He insists that the internment of the insane and other such general exercises of power developed out of a colonization and use of smaller, more local mechanisms of power; and these latter were put in place due to multiple and various reasons that cannot be reduced to the needs of some generalized group like “the bourgeoisie.” He argues that the bourgeoisie didn’t need “the exclusion of the mad,” but rather “the techniques and procedures themselves of such an exclusion”: “the mechanisms of the exclusion of madness . . . [began] to reveal their political usefulness and to lend themselves to economic profit. . . [therefore] they came to be colonised and maintained by global mechanisms and the entire State system” (1980 h 101). Foucault characterizes the ascending analysis of power as more accurate than a descending one; but it is also the case that it provides a better means of developing a strategy for resistance to power. If one believes that power only comes “from the top,” and thus addresses one’s resistance only to the top, one risks missing the multiple mechanisms of power that operate at a more local level, which, according to Foucault, the general mechanisms themselves depend upon. 42 1 will follow Foucault’s lead and speak of “power” plain and simple at times, relying on this idea that in so doing we are both using a name to stand for something much more multiple and complicated. 43 Foucault does seem at times (such as when he makes the above statement) to argue that resistance always accompanies power (also: “there are no relations of power without resistances” (Foucault 1980 e, 142)). But this claim is empirically difficult, if not impossible, to justify how would he explain those relations of power in which people seem to comply without any recognizable form of resistance or struggle? To use a banal example, many people accept without complaint their “government” by certain traffic laws, such as following traffic signals and staying within the borders of lanes. Certainly there may be those who refuse to follow such rules, and I suppose insofar as that may always be the case, then we could say that “where there is power, there is resistance.” But the force of this statement seems to imply more than that there will always be at least a small number of people who resist any given relation of power in such a situation it would not be the case that wherever there is power, there is resistance. Still, even if something like this limited sense of how resistance always accompanies power is all Foucault means to assert, I believe that interpreting his view of the relationship between power and resistance as revealing the übiquitous possibility for resistance provides a better approach when it comes to explaining this relationship in detail as I do below. 44 He also states, however, that this indefiniteness does not mean that the struggle “won’t someday have an end” (Foucault 1980 a, 57). Foucault does not go on to explain his meaning, and his interviewer does not pursue the issue, leaving the reader intrigued and frustrated. Given what I have argued above in regard to disciplinary power as a particular form of power that need not continue forever, perhaps Foucault is merely indicating here that just because the agonistic relation between power and resistance is now as he’s described it, this does not mean that it might not change. 45 1 t is important to think about these movements of power and resistance as occurring within specific relations. In other words, it is not the case that power relations as a whole reverse into resistance relations or vice versa; rather, this occurs within particular arenas and between particular individuals or groups at particular times. It is there that at the limits of power one could find a reduction to “total impotence,” or at the limits of resistance one could find a death in neither case is it the reduction of power or resistance “in general” to death. It is the death of particular adversaries at particular times that can occur. Thus Foucault should not be taken to be saying here that by pushing power or resistance to its extreme one can “kill off’ the other in toto. statement here seems in tension with some of his other statements regarding the political role of the intellectual and the role he himself takes up, where he insists that he does not tell others “what to do.” This tension might be resolved by considering Foucault’s political role as that of an exile from the role of the universal intellectual. In Chapter Three I argue that we can read Foucault’s genealogies as providing universal truths that he also undermines. We might then say that it would be legitimate for him, or any other intellectual exile, to tell others what to do as long as such an intellectual also distances themselves from their own prescriptions. 47 1 t may even be the case (though Foucault doesn’t mention this) that a refusal such as the above, exercised on a grand scale, or over time, can eventually result in a change in rules, in a discourse, or practice. A strike in one or a few companies or factories, for example, may do little by itself to change the rules of business practice if they are structured mainly around a refusal. But on a larger scale or over a longer period of time, such efforts may manage to produce certain transformative effects. the example mentioned above regarding my desire to resist the power relations in which I find myself as a graduate student teacher. If I find a way to resist “creatively” by inventing or finding new responses, I may change the relations of power significantly enough to be able to say that I have “escaped” the previous ones. One way I might do this is to stage, along with my colleagues, a “teach out” by holding my classes outside (this action has actually been done, to some success, on several campuses). The purpose would be to make public the amount of teaching graduate students do at the university, the number of students they have, etc. If I combined this with some other efforts at “publicizing” the problem (such as gathering information regarding teaching loads for graduate students at campuses all over the state, along with information regarding salaries and cost of living, and publishing this in newspapers, etc.), then I might perhaps manage to change the power relations in which I previously found myself. I might encourage enough of the public to notice the problem, to respond that the education of their children might be endangered, etc., and to convince their legislators to try to manage graduate student teaching differently. This is at least a possibility, and one that could result in an alteration of the power relations such that I have escaped the ones in which I previously existed. There are, of course, problems with this particular example and its strategy that are not considered carefully here, but this seems to be the kind of action that would illustrate the “creative” resistance discussed above. 49 Still, the Foucauldian intellectual does play a role in guiding others to choose which relations of power they ought to resist, even if s/he does not tell them directly what they ought to do. I discuss this point in some detail in Chapter Three. Chapter Three Intellectual Antidote I The Intellectual as Genealogist: A Prophet in Exile Foucault argues that rather than trying to change people’s minds, to tell them what to think and to do, the intellectual ought to address his/her efforts to the regime of truth. In Chapter Two I investigated this regime in detail, pointing out some of its “poisonous” aspects. Recall that for Foucault, the intellectual is not to tell others what they ought to find “poisonous” and what they ought to do about it. This decision, he insists, must be left up to those involved in particular relations of power. What, precisely, is the intellectual to do, then, about the regime of truth toward which s/he is supposed to direct his/her work? Foucault provides several clues in essays and interviews, including his discussion of the “specific” intellectual as opposed to the “universal” one. In Chapter One I discussed briefly the figure of the “specific” intellectual, which, according to Foucault, is (fortunately) replacing that of the “universal” intellectual in Western democratic societies of late. Rather than appealing to universal truths so as to act as the “spokesperson” for the interests of all, making prophecies as to what must be done, the “specific” intellectual acts as an expert in a particular field of knowledge, and intervenes in political discussions as such. S/he does not claim to be able to access and represent the best interests of all, does not function as the bearer of universal values such as “the just-and-true-for-all” (Foucault 1980 g, 126); s/he takes on instead the role of the “savant or expert” (1980 g 128). Foucault indicates that the “specific” intellectual, given that s/he eschews universalist claims to truth, would be likely to take on a political role in particular resistances to power on a more local, rather than general, level: asylum, the laboratory, the university, family and sexual relations). (1980 g 126) Rather than trying to create and disseminate “global, totalitarian theories” within which all the world’s ills can be fit and through which they can be resolved (1980 h 80), the “specific” intellectual addresses problems in the particular relations of power in which s/he finds herself. But there is more to the political role of the “specific” intellectual than this, since in working to resist the particular power relations under which s/he lives, the intellectual’s role is not clearly differentiated from that of any other individual who decides to engage in resistance. The “specific” intellectual does, however, have a particular political role to play, one that has to do with his/her position within the regime of truth. As an intellectual, this figure is linked, “in a society like ours” (even in his/her specificity), “to the general functioning of an apparatus of truth” (Foucault 1980 g, 132). In other words, as an “expert” in a specific type of knowledge, this intellectual participates in the regime wherein truth and power are linked truth is produced as an effect of power since the rules governing its formation are established as a result of relations of power; and truth is also used to direct the behavior of individuals, to “govern” them in various power relations. What counts as the intellectual’s “knowledge,” what rules set him/her up as an “expert,” are a function of power relations; and s/he engages in relations of power with others when s/he expresses the truth s/he possesses, “governing” their actions thereby. Foucault argues that, given his/her link to the regime of truth, the political role of the “specific” intellectual is to “struggle” against this regime in the specific arena in which s/he works (1980 g 132). But what might it mean to “struggle” against the regime of truth in one of its particular manifestations? Foucault argues that it does not mean, at least, that the “specific” intellectual ought to try to break the close relation between truth and power that exists in the regime of truth, that s/he ought to attempt the “liberation” of truth from power: It’s not a matter of emancipating truth from every system of power (which would be a chimera, for truth is already power) but of detaching the power of truth from the forms of hegemony, social, economic and cultural, within which it operates at the present time. (Foucault 1980 g, 133) The point, then, is not to try to liberate truth from the effects of power it produces, nor to free it from the exercise of power that, for Foucault, inevitably lies behind it. The truth, Foucault indicates here, is and will likely continue to be bound up with power. 1 The task is instead to try to free the “power of truth” from the “hegemony’ that constrains it today. In the interview in which this statement appears, Foucault does not explain what he means by “detaching the power of truth” from its present, hegemonic forms. Barry Smart, in an article that concerns Foucault’s critique of hegemonic forms of power specifically, defines hegemony in the following way: Hegemony contributes to or constitutes a form of social cohesion not through force or coercion, nor necessarily through consent, but most effectively by way of practices, techniques, and methods which infiltrate minds and bodies, cultural practices which cultivate behaviours and beliefs, tastes, desires, and needs as seemingly naturally occurring qualities and properties embodied in the psychic and physical reality (or ‘truth’) of the human subject. (Smart 1986, 160) In other words, in its hegemonic forms power works to “infiltrate minds and bodies,” developing “behaviours and beliefs, tastes, desires and needs” as if they were “naturally occurring,” part of the “truth” of the self. If Smart’s description here is faithful to Foucault’s view, then when the latter suggests that intellectuals work to separate the power of truth from its hegemonic forms, perhaps he means we ought to work to criticize the type of power that produces seemingly “natural” truths in this way. This is what Smart argues Foucault does in his analyses of the relationship between truth and power, among which are his genealogical studies (Smart 1986, 163). I take Smart’s view of “detaching the power of truth” from “forms of hegemony” as a guide, and consider Foucault’s other claims regarding the political role of the intellectual in order to further explicate what this task might mean. Intellectual strategists In the numerous essays and interviews where Foucault makes reference to the role of the intellectual, he sometimes argues that the intellectual should play the role of a “strategist.” For example, in an interview first published in 1977, Foucault laments what he calls “the lack of a strategic analysis appropriate to political struggle,” and suggests that this should be part of the role of those developing theory: The role for theory today seems to me to be just this: not to formulate the global systematic theory which holds everything in place, but to analyse the specificity of mechanisms of power, to locate the connections and extensions, to build little by little a strategic knowledge. (Foucault 1980 e, 145) This notion of using theory strategically, of developing a “strategic knowledge” is echoed in many of Foucault’s statements about the political role of the intellectual during the early to late 1970’5. In the interview quoted here he refers to “the notion of theory as a toolkit,” wherein one constructs a theory as “an instrument, a logic of the specificity of power relations and the struggles around them” (Foucault 1980 e, 145). Part of his meaning may be illuminated by considering similar statements made by Gilles Deleuze in his conversation with Foucault entitled “Intellectuals and Power”: A theory is exactly like a box of tools. ... It must be useful. It must function. . . . [Proust] said it so clearly: treat my book as a pair of glasses directed to the outside; if they don’t suit you, find another pair; I leave it to you to find your own instrument, which is necessarily an instrument for combat. (Foucault 1977 a, 208) Here Deleuze expresses the idea of using theory as a “tool,” an “instrument” specifically, “an instrument for combat.” This implies that theory ought to be “useful” in the context of struggle, of resistance to power. But Deleuze agrees with Foucault that the intellectual must leave the decision up to others as to whether and how to take up this “instrument,” as evidenced by the reference to Proust: if it doesn’t suit you, find another. The intellectual’s task of creating a “strategic knowledge,” then, may involve developing “a logic of the specificity of power relations” that could be useful to others engaged in resistance. In other words, one beneficial thing an intellectual might do when engaging in theory, according to Foucault, is to analyze and explicate the workings of specific power relations so as to provide assistance to those struggling against them. This would fit Foucault’s description of the “specific” intellectual as someone who addresses the regime of truth in the specific arenas in which s/he works, for the purpose of detaching truth from hegemonic forms of power: the strategic knowledge s/he can provide may be one way of doing this. We can get a clearer picture of how the intellectual might provide strategic knowledge from a few of Foucault’s other statements about the role of the intellectual. In an interview first published in 1975, Foucault argues that the intellectual “no longer has to play the role of the advisor,” and that “the project, tactics, and goals to be adopted are a matter for those who do the fighting” (Foucault 1980 a, 62). Foucault reiterates here that it is not for the intellectual to tell others what they must do their goals and tactics are to be decided by themselves, for themselves. The intellectual’s role is instead to provide what appears to be a kind of strategic knowledge: What’s effectively needed is a ramified, penetrative perception of the present, one that makes it possible to locate lines of weakness, strong points, positions where the instances of power have secured and implanted themselves .... In other words, a topological and geological survey of the battlefield that is the intellectual’s role. (1980 a 62) According to Foucault’s statements in this interview, it appears that those directly involved in resistance are to decide whether, when, and how to resist, and the intellectual’s input should be aimed at developing the best strategies to carry out the goals thus defined. S/he can do this by conducting an analysis of “the present” that reveals the points of strength and weakness in the relations of power being resisted. The intellectual, in other words, would let those involved in struggle know where the relations of power they wish to resist are weak, where there exists potential for action that could promote a change in the relation of power. If resistance involves finding the loopholes in particular relations of power, actions that it leaves open but does not encourage and that can lead to a transformation of those relations, then the role of the intellectual as strategist seems to be to point out these loopholes to others. S/he is to provide a “survey of the battlefield,” revealing fruitful areas for attack. Those involved in the battle may then choose to use this “instrument of combat” or not, at their discretion. Foucault makes similar assertions about the role of the intellectual in other interviews from the mid- to late 1970’5: I dream of the intellectual destroyer of evidence and universalities, the one who, in the inertias and constraints of the present, locates and marks the weak points, the openings, the lines of power .... (Foucault 1996 d, 225) In reality, what I want to do ... is to solve this problem: to work out an interpretation, a reading of a certain reality such that, on one hand, this interpretation could produce some of the effects of truth; and on the other hand, these effects of truth could become implements within possible struggles. . . . Deciphering a layer of reality in such a way that the lines of force and the lines of fragility come forth; the points of resistance and the possible points of attack; the paths marked out and the shortcuts. (Foucault 1996 b, 261) Statements such as these support the idea that the role of the Foucauldian intellectual is that of a strategist, someone who locates “the lines of fragility and the possible points of attack” for those involved in struggle. Returning to the above point regarding hegemony, perhaps the “specific” intellectual as strategist can help “detach the power of truth” from its present, hegemonic forms by providing a “survey of the battlefield” for those who decide, on their own, to combat hegemony in their own way. Given the definition above, hegemonic power relations would be those that “govern” individuals by subjecting them to “natural,” universal truths. This fits well with Foucault’s description of “disciplinary” power; and further, he argues that resistance to such forms of power is (or was, in 1983 at least) already taking place (Foucault 1983, 211-212). The intellectual doesn’t need, then, to tell others that and how they ought to resist these relations of power. What s/he can do is to provide strategic assistance by pointing out possible points of attack, those that would be most likely to lead to a change in the power relations being resisted. In this way, the intellectual can contribute to transforming hegemonic forms of power. It is possible to read Foucault’s own genealogical histories as performing this kind of strategic function, as providing a map of the battlefield for others to use. Foucauldian genealogy reveals the contingency, the constructedness of truths previously considered absolute, and thereby provides a “strategic knowledge” that may be used tactically by those who decide for themselves to engage in struggle. To illustrate this point, I turn to Foucault’s discussion of genealogy in a lecture from 1976, five years after the publication of his early description of genealogy in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History.” In the later text, Foucault emphasizes the connection between truth and power even more than in the earlier one, and focuses on how genealogy can be used as an instrument for struggle. In 1976, Foucault defines genealogy in a way that emphasizes the exposure of past struggles for the use of present and future ones, for the development of tactics and a possible resistance of power: “[l]et us give the term genealogy to the union of erudite knowledge and local memories which allows us to establish a historical knowledge of struggles and to make use of this knowledge tactically today” (Foucault 1980 h, 83). Genealogy becomes a strategic device to be used in struggles against oppressive practices of power. Foucault puts a great emphasis on the link between truth and power in two lectures delivered at the College de France in January of 1976. In his “Two Lectures,” Foucault describes genealogy as a strategic tool to be used in struggles and insurrections already taking place against particular practices of power. Several aspects of genealogy contribute to its efficacy in this role. First, genealogy reveals links between truth and power that are not commonly recognized, thereby exhibiting strategies to be avoided and new points of attack. If notions of truth are closely connected to practices of power, then those involved in struggle ought to be wary of the kinds of truths they espouse, after reading Foucault’s genealogies. By showing the links between truth and power, genealogy also provides further targets for struggle one may have to resist particular kinds of truth as well as the more tangible practices of power against which one may already be struggling. Second, genealogy reveals the weak spots in the connections between truth and power, the links that are not forged very strongly and thus can be fairly easily broken. Genealogy directs those involved in struggle to productive places to attack that they may not have considered before, had they not previously recognized the ways in which truth and power are joined. Foucault notes at the outset of his “Two Lectures” that genealogy is appropriate to a particular historical period, which he characterizes in 1976 as the last 15-20 years (Foucault 1980 h, 79). This is because during that time two things were occurring, according to Foucault (presumably in the West, at least). First, there was a certain “fragility ... discovered in the very bedrock of existence,” “a sense of the increasing vulnerability to criticism of things, institutions, practices, discourses” (1980 h 80). Foucault cites the prevalence of attacks, of revolts against predominant moral views, against the psychological and penal system, etc.; but he also notes that these attacks are dispersed, non-centralized, not emanating from or even able to be summed up by any unified theoretical system such as Marxism. The criticism that was occurring had therefore a “local” character. The second thing that was happening, which contributed to the appropriateness of genealogical work, is described by Foucault as an “insurrection of subjugated knowledges,” which goes hand in hand with the local attacks just mentioned: “this local criticism has proceeded by means of what one might term a ‘return of knowledge’” (Foucault 1980 h, 81). Thus the “insurrections” that are taking place in a discontinuous fashion, in local and specific arenas, work in part through a return of knowledges that have been “subjugated” somehow dominated, put down, or silenced by relations of power. These subjugated knowledges are of two types, namely the “erudite knowledge” and “local memories” to which he refers in his definition of genealogy in this text. Genealogy concerns itself with knowledges that have been subjugated, and works to put these to a “tactical” use. Therefore, genealogy appeals to something that can be implemented strategically by those involved in insurrections and revolts already taking place and it is for this reason, perhaps, that this kind of work is appropriate to the particular time period Foucault cites. Foucault’s genealogy unites “erudite knowledge” and “local memories” as “subjugated knowledges,” blocs of information and kinds of knowledge that have been subjugated, put down, put away, forgotten -- but whose retrieval provides for a possible tactical, strategic use against the processes of subjection. The first category, “erudite knowledge,” refers to “historical contents that have been buried and disguised in a functionalist coherence or formal systemisation” (Foucault 1980 h, 81). This category seems mainly to consist of elements of historical knowledge that have been hidden or disguised by certain processes of systematization, processes that change them, reinterpret them to fit the coherence of the system. Foucault notes that his criticisms of the asylum and the penal system (in Madness and Civilization and Discipline and Punish, respectively) were largely made possible through the return and re-presentation of certain pieces of historical knowledge that had been buried by previous efforts at systematization. Clearly, both studies (as well as The Birth of the Clinic and The History of Sexuality) involve a kind of re-telling of the past, including “historical contents” that are not often noted and certainly not emphasized in traditional histories or theories of madness, punishment, etc. the way they are in these genealogies. Foucault also points out that these “erudite knowledges” include, in addition to things previously buried for the sake of coherence, an access to a kind of history of earlier struggles: “the historical contents allow us to rediscover the ruptural effects of conflict and struggle that the order imposed by functionalist or systematising thought is designed to mask” (Foucault 1980 h, 82). By allowing us to see what has been buried, disguised in the name of the “system,” these “historical contents” therefore also tell a story of conflict, of subjugation. In their return, they bring back the conflict, and with it the possibility of current and future struggle and resistance. The other type of subjugated knowledges that genealogy considers and uses are “local memories”: a whole set of knowledges that have been disqualified as inadequate to their task or insufficiently elaborated: naive knowledges, low down on the hierarchy, beneath the required level of cognition or scientificity” (Foucault 1980 h, 82). These “naive knowledges,” which Foucault also calls “local, popular knowledges,” include the knowledge of the mental patient in contrast to the science of psychology, the knowledge of the ill person in contrast to the science of medicine, the knowledge of the delinquent in contrast to the science of punishment, etc. 2 Foucault argues that these “popular knowledges” aren’t exactly like “general, commonsense knowledge,” because they are more specific: they are “particular, local, regional knowledge[s],. . . incapable of unanimity” (1980 h 82). Each is considered not quite up to par by the criteria of scientificity, and in some sense are therefore not really considered “knowledges” at all. Like the “erudite knowledges,” these have been disqualified, put down by “higher” knowledges or formal systems, which have disguised, buried, or ridiculed them. Also, like the first category of subjugated knowledges, these “local memories” re-present a forgotten or masked history of conflict and struggle. These knowledges serve as reminders that a conflict has taken place, that they seem new only because they have been put down; and in this reminder lies the possibility of reigniting the conflict and re-engaging in struggle. Genealogy as the union of these two types of subjugated knowledges involves “a painstaking rediscovery of struggles together with the rude memory of their conflicts” (Foucault 1980 h, 83). Both of these kinds of knowledge and information provide a record of struggles against the scientific, systematic discourses that would and have subjected them. They bring back “the memory of hostile encounters which even up to this day have been confined to the margins of knowledge” (1980 h 83); and bringing these knowledges to light can be a tactical move against the scientific, systematizing discourses that would have them remain marginal. In uniting the two kinds of subjugated knowledges, genealogy provides for “a historical knowledge of struggles” that can be used “tactically,” strategically, today. By bringing up these past struggles, in effect what Foucault manages to do is to show that the discourses which are currently considered “scientific” and truthful may have reached that status primarily through an exercise of power and subjugation. This means not only that the “sciences” may not necessarily be “more true” (in some kind of traditional, “correspondence” sense of truth) than the knowledges thus put down, but also that they may be resisted in the future as they have in the past. Thus Foucault describes genealogy as a kind of strategic tool to be used in struggle against scientific discourses of truth: A genealogy should be seen as a kind of attempt to emancipate historical knowledges from that subjection, to render them, that is, capable of opposition and of struggle against the coercion of a theoretical, unitary, formal and scientific discourse. (1980 h 85) There is, he claims, a kind of “coercion” involved in “scientific” and otherwise “unitary” discourse; and this use of power to subjugate can be brought out through the re-presentation of struggles in genealogical research. This will then allow for the possibility of future conflict and struggle -- for if what was previously believed to be “scientifically” (and therefore universally) true is shown instead to perhaps have “won” that status through a power struggle, then the possibility of struggling against it again seems quite plausible. One would no longer be struggling against “the truth,” siding with ignorance and error; rather, one would be resisting a particular use of power, a force of domination. It is important to note that Foucault is not advocating the replacement of the dominant, scientific discourses with these “subjugated knowledges.” He insists that the struggle is not simply against “what” the sciences say nor the “how” of their methods (as if we should be replacing these with a different “what” and/or “how”); rather, it is against the effects of “scientificity” and its claims to truth. What is to be resisted can be explained by recalling the “disqualifying power” of discourses that claim the status of “science,” as described above in reference to certain types of Marxism. This power works to “filter, hierarchise, and order [subjugated knowledges] in the name of some true knowledge and some arbitrary idea of what constitutes a science and its objects” (Foucault 1980 h, 83). According to Foucault, those whose discourse aspires to “scientificity,” then, ally themselves with the use of power to dominate, disqualify, and diminish other discourses and other knowledges in the name of what they claim to be “the (scientific) truth.” It is this kind of power and its effects that genealogy works to resist: “[genealogy] is based on a reactivation of local knowledges ... in opposition to the scientific hierarchisation of knowledges and the effects intrinsic to their power” (Foucault 1980 h, 85). It must be emphasized, then, that Foucault’s genealogies are not meant to effect the return of “subjugated knowledges” in order to set them up as replacement “sciences,” to provide better scientific discourses than the ones we have, sciences that are “more true.” Genealogy struggles against “scientificity” itself and its “disqualifying power; it does not introduce subjugated knowledges in order to establish them as “scientific.” Also, genealogy itself does not aspire to “scientificity” Foucault calls genealogies “anti-sciences,” since they are not, as he says, “positivistic returns to a more careful or exact form of science” (Foucault 1980 h, 83). But this should not, on the other hand, be taken to mean that they work to oppose knowledge altogether, “to vindicate a lyrical right to ignorance or non-knowledge”: It is not that with which we are concerned. We are concerned, rather, with the insurrection of knowledges that are opposed ... to the effects of the centralising powers which are linked to the institution and functioning of an organised scientific discourse within a society such as ours. (1980 h 84) The point is not to use these disqualified knowledges in order to praise ignorance, to announce the end of science and truth with a celebratory hurrah: no more scientific knowledge! To do so, of course, would be in effect to set up another type of “scientifically” true picture of the way things are, itself attempting to disqualify other possibilities through the use of power. Instead, genealogy is concerned with: (a) reminding us of past conflicts between scientific discourses and what are, at this point, subjugated and marginal knowledges; thereby (b) exposing the power invested in scientific discourse; and (c) bringing up the possibility of a reengagement of the struggle; therefore (d) providing a tactical tool for future use. Genealogy resurrects the “memory of hostile encounters”; or, as Michael Mahon puts it: The Foucauldian genealogist’s task is to afflict the comfortable by dredging up what has been forgotten, whether actively or passively. He or she counteracts the prevailing social amnesia by emancipating subjected historical knowledges. (Mahon 1992, 120) The genealogist works neither to present a “more scientific” picture of the world, nor to proclaim the end of science altogether. Rather, his or her efforts are directed at reminding us what is involved in the development and perpetuation of discourses that aspire to or reach “scientificity.” With this memory comes the possibility of recognizing whatever dangers may or may not be involved in the disqualifying power of science, as well as the potential for developing and carrying out future strategies of resistance and change. In this discussion of the methods and aims of genealogy can be discerned some important points regarding the interconnection between truth, knowledge and power in the regime of truth, as well as what the intellectual can do in the face of this regime. First, it is clear that for Foucault, “scientific” discourse is accompanied by power. That which we hope to (or manage to) raise to the status of a “science,” Foucault argues, is invested with “the effects of a power which the West since Medieval times has attributed to science and has reserved for those engaged in scientific discourse” (Foucault 1980 h, 85). But also, we have seen how, for Foucault, “scientific” discourses are themselves produced by power. The way such discourses reach their status as “true” is through conflict and struggle, through the use of a “disqualifying power” that subjugates other knowledges. We therefore have here a manifestation of the interconnection between truth and power that, for Foucault, is characteristic of the regime of truth. Moreover, what the intellectual as genealogist can do to intervene in this regime is becoming more clear. Effecting the return of “subjugated knowledges” through genealogical analyses, the genealogist can provide a reminder of past struggles by showing how what is now considered “scientifically” or universally true is the product of an exercise of power. This reminder can potentially give an inducement to others to take action, to at least question and perhaps even change current “scientific” views and “truths” and the relations of power linked to them. Finally, the genealogist can suggest particular ways to attack for those who choose to do so, since his/her analysis of how a particular truth was produced can exhibit specific ways to undermine it. The Foucauldian intellectual as genealogist, then, addresses him/herself to the regime of truth by revealing both how truth and power are connected, and where these connections are weak and might be altered. Foucault suggests that the intellectual can “make things more fragile” through genealogy; and considering in more detail how this is the case will help further elucidate the political role of the Foucauldian intellectual. Making things more fragile Genealogy reveals that some of the truths we have come to accept as universal, timeless, and absolute have instead been historically constructed through often hostile struggles and subjugations of rival claims to truth. For Foucault the re-presentation of these forgotten struggles through genealogy reveals that the truths presently accepted are contingent and vulnerable to change. Further, the genealogical “memory of hostile encounters” may thereby reveal weak spots in current relations of power, as it shows what must be excluded and subjugated for present truths to hold sway; and one might appeal to these exclusions as possible points of attack. Those involved in resistance could, perhaps, simply point to the fact of exclusion, attacking present truths by showing how they can only be such through a process of exclusion. They might also make appeal to the content of what is excluded and attempt to bring it back to re-engage the struggle that it previously lost. How they choose to resist is, according to Foucault, up to them the point here is that the intellectual provides them with a map of weak spots through a survey of the history of current relations of power. How a historical genealogy of something like madness or punishment can reveal such weak spots (and what this might mean) still requires further explanation, however. Foucault argues that genealogy can make things more “fragile” by exhibiting what is contingent in what may have otherwise been taken to be universal, ahistorical, and unchangeable. In the process, the genealogist shows where and perhaps even how power relations that had previously seemed solid and impenetrable can be resisted and transformed. John Rajchman argues that in his genealogies Foucault questions previously-accepted knowledges and truths for the purpose of “freeing” them up, allowing them to be rethought and used in new ways: To question the self-evidence of a form of experience, knowledge, or power, is to free it for our purposes, to open new possibilities for thought or action. Such freedom is the ethical principle of Foucault’s skepticism; it is what has been misunderstood as irrationalism, anarchism, or nihilism. (Rajchman 1985, 4) The Foucauldian genealogist questions ideas that are here and now considered selfevidently true, releasing them from their imprisonment and enclosure in the absoluteness of a truth that admits of no change. The genealogist opens up “new possibilities for thought or action,” possibilities that include resisting particular relations of power and the truths they produce. In so doing, the genealogist helps to “free things up” by exhibiting their contingency. Foucauldian genealogy presents a history of particular concepts and practices that are currently considered ahistorical and absolute. It thereby reveals their contingency as historical constructions and thus “disturbs” and “fragments” their previous immobility and unity, freeing them from the permanency of an absolute (Foucault 1977 b, 147). In an interview from 1983, Foucault explains that the history provided by genealogy “shows that that which is not always was so”: “What reason considers its necessity or much more what various forms of rationality claim to be their necessary existence, has a history which we can determine completely and recover from the tapestry of contingency” (Foucault 1996 h, 359). Moreover, once this history has been revealed, once we see that “that which is” wasn’t always so, we can come to recognize the possibility of transforming what is into something else. In other words, we can then realize that the beliefs, values, truths, and practices we currently accept as absolute may be malleable: “because they are made they can be unmade of course, assuming we know how they were made” (1996 h 359). It is precisely an explanation of the latter that Foucauldian genealogy offers. When an interviewer asks if this process constitutes the focus for “the practical work of intellectuals,” Foucault responds in the affirmative: “I believe so. The work of the intellect is to show that what is, does not have to be what it is” (1996 h 359). We can see how the intellectual as genealogist can accomplish this task by looking at one of Foucault’s genealogies. In Madness and Civilization, for example, Foucault presents (among other things) the history of the practice of confining the mad in asylums and hospitals. He argues that the practice of confinement became firmly established in Europe in the seventeenth century, partly as a means to deal with the problems of growing poverty and increasing numbers of beggars in the streets due to an economic crisis: “reduction of wages, unemployment, scarcity of coin . . .” (Foucault 1988 b, 49). At this time, Foucault argues, poverty was considered a function of idleness, and the solution, therefore, seemed to be work : “[labor] was regarded ... as a general solution, an infallible panacea, a remedy to all forms of poverty” (1988 b 55). According to Foucault, in the middle of the seventeenth century “the unemployed, the idle, and vagabonds” in various parts of Europe were therefore arrested, confined, and put to work in order to make them “contribute to the prosperity of all” (1988 b 50, 51). This confinement had a dual economic function: “cheap manpower in the periods of full employment and high salaries; and in periods of unemployment, reabsorption of the idle and social protection against agitation and uprisings” (1988 b 51). Foucault emphasizes, however, that there was also a moral function to this confinement: he points out that labor was viewed as morally redemptive, and through it the idle were to make up for the sloth that was considered a grave sin (Foucault 1988 b, 55-57). The mad, Foucault argues, were shut up along with the unemployed and the idle, as they, too, did not engage in work and therefore did not “follow the rhythms of collective life” insofar as the latter were defined by “the universal necessity of labor” (1988 b 58): It was in these places of doomed and despised idleness, in this space invented by a society which had derived an ethical transcendence from the law of work, that madness would appear and soon expand until it had annexed them. (1988 b 57) The mad were confined with other figures of idleness, other “forms of social uselessness” at first, but they eventually took over the institutions of confinement as “madness” became a problem separated from poverty and general idleness (1988 b 58, 228). Given just these few points about the practice of confining the mad and its historical development, we can already see how this genealogy might work to show how “that which is not always was so.” We can come to understand at least that confining madness, which still continues in various forms today, has a historical development that is contingent and accidental. According to Foucault, if we can see that certain practices, discourses, knowledges, or truths have been historically constituted, we may realize that they can be changed, that they are not obviously or self-evidently true. Foucault notes this fragility in the case of madness in an interview: “Our relationship to madness is an historically established relationship, and from the second that it is historically constituted, it can be politically destroyed” (Foucault 1997 f, 161-162). The “historicization” of practices such as the confinement of madness reveals that they were developed at a particular time and place, under particular conditions, and this can suggest their present malleability. Foucault claims that the genealogical process of questioning truths, of showing how they have developed historically, is one of “making things more fragile” (Foucault 1997 f, 161): it reveals the fragility of things previously thought to be stable, absolute, unquestionable. Genealogy, by exhibiting the “historicity” of truths, knowledges, practices, etc., can work to “rob them of their evidentiary status,. . . [and] give them back the mobility that they had and that they always should have” (1997 f 162). But why, exactly, does exhibiting that a certain practice or belief is “historically constituted” make it “more fragile,” showing that “it can be politically destroyed?” We may recognize, for example, that madness was not always defined in the way it is now, that its remedies did not always include confinement, etc.; and yet we might still think that we have “got it right” at present, that the history of our present practices describes a progression towards the truth. Foucault’s genealogies do not present the kind of history that would support such an interpretation, however. Recall that for Foucault, genealogical history does not trace a teleological or even evolutionary development: Genealogy does not pretend to go back in time to restore and unbroken continuity that operates beyond the dispersion of forgotten things; its duty is not to demonstrate that the past actively exists in the present, that it continues secretly to animate the present, having imposed a predetermined form to all its vicissitudes. (Foucault 1977 b, 146) Genealogy does not describe our past as a progression towards the present; rather, it seeks to disrupt the continuities we might want to find in our history. It locates and emphasizes instead “the accidents, the minute deviations or conversely, the complete reversals the errors, the false appraisals, and the faulty calculations that gave birth to those things that continue to exist” (1977 b 146). In the example regarding confinement of the mad, notice that what Foucault shows is not a conscious, deliberate practice of shutting the mad away on account of their madness, but rather a somewhat accidental one it began in an unexpected place, in the confinement of the idle as a remedy for poverty. This endeavor itself suffered from a “faulty calculation,” Foucault argues, since the economic goals of confining the poor and idle were not actually realized. 3 Yet the fact that confinement continued despite this failure shows that the moral value of labor was able to be expressed and emphasized during this period -- the idle should work, if not for the economic benefit of the society, then at least for its (and their) moral benefit (Foucault 1988 b, 55). It is through this development that madness came to be confined, Foucault argues, through the attempt and failure of the economic function of confining the idle, and through the contingent lumping together of the mad with others who could not or would not work. This kind of history does not soothe those who would hope to find in it evidence of “progress” towards “the truth.” As Foucault notes, genealogy is not the “erecting of foundations” for truths, but instead “disturbs” and “fragments” them (Foucault 1977 b, 147). The genealogy of the confinement of madness does not provide a solid foundation to support the validity of current continuations of this practice. It began, Foucault states, through historical accident and mishap, through a combination of contingent conditions that came together in no particularly necessary way to produce it. The history of confining the mad reveals accident and contingency rather than a steady progression towards the “truth” about the best way to treat madness. In that sense, this genealogical history may seem to make practices like confinement more “fragile,” since it shows how they may be tied to specific, contingent, and accidental, historical conditions and developments. This might work to undercut the stability of some practices that may have been continued simply on assumption of their absolute and decontextualized validity, towards which we have been progressing for a long time. To further explicate how genealogy can “make things more fragile,” it is helpful to consider Foucault’s notion of “strategy,” since he argues that what he has tried to do in his genealogies is to make the things he studies appear less obvious by revealing them to be “strategies”: It is . . . necessary to place strategic logic inside the things from whence they were produced, to show that nonetheless, these are only strategies and that therefore, by changing a certain number of things, by changing strategies, taking things differently, finally what appears obvious to us is not at all so obvious. (Foucault 1997 f, 161) The confinement of the mad, the practices of surveillance and examination involved in disciplinary and normalizing power, the confessional practices that bring the truth of sex and the self into discourse these are all “only strategies,” according to Foucault. He explains this usage of the term “strategy” in an interview, arguing that it refers to the way practices which have failed to reach their specified objectives can be made a part of a new program with new objectives. He begins by defining the “program” of an institution as “its rationality or its end, that is to say the objectives that it proposes and the means it has of reaching these objectives” (Foucault 1996 q, 425). The effects of a particular practice or institution, however, “rarely coincide with the ends,” and one possible response to this is to “[utilize] these effects for something that wasn’t foreseen at the beginning but which can well have a meaning and a use” (1996 q 425). As a result, particular “strategies” may be formed: [B]eginning from these usages in some new and unforeseen way, one can construct new rational behaviors, different from the initial program but which fulfil their objective .... [The] effects are taken up in different usages and these usages are rationalized, organized in any case by means of new ends. (1996 q 425- 426) In other words, a “strategy” seems to involve the reorganization of practices and institutions whose effects do not coincide with their intended ends, through the postulation of new ends, new objectives that are better met by the existing practices. But Foucault is careful to point out that this process is not centrally organized and directed Foucault assents to an interviewer’s comment that the creation of a strategy is “obviously not premeditated”: “Not at all. There’s no person or group, no titular head of this strategy; but a number of strategies are formed from effects which differ from their initial ends . . .” (Foucault 1996 q, 426). As Colin Gordon explains, “[it] is important... to avoid merging the concept of strategy into that of the programme by way of the image of the grand strategist and his plan” (Gordon 1980, 251). There is no grand programmer to a strategy; rather, “the characteristic of strategy is its artificial, improvisational, factitious nature” (Gordon 1980, 251). We can see a “strategy” at work in the above example of confining the mad. According to Foucault, confinement of the idle was initially directed by a program with certain economic objectives, but when it failed to reach these objectives the practice of confinement was reorganized into a strategy with new objectives that it could meet (namely, the moral improvement of the idle through labor rather than the economic benefits that were hoped for under the original program). This is not the institution of a new program, however, since it is more of an improvisation out of failure conducted in various ways by various groups of people than a centralized, carefully directed plan. Foucault makes this clear: The institution’s first program, its initial finality is . . . displayed and used as justification, while the strategic configurations are not often clear in the very eyes of those who occupy a place and play a role there. But this play is perfectly capable of solidifying an institution ... because several strategies of different groups [can] come to intersect at this particular place. (Foucault 1996 q, 426) The development of a strategy is not like the coherent, careful construction of a program, because a strategy can come into existence gradually, in piecemeal fashion, through the efforts of different groups of individuals who are not consciously working with others under the rubric of a grand plan. The strategy thus developed may eventually become more consciously and centrally organized, but as a strategy it functions through dispersed activities whose intersection and general movement towards new objectives “are not often clear in the very eyes of those who occupy a place a play a role there.” Explaining how, exactly, a strategy can be developed through the intersection of efforts of various groups would require a more detailed examination than I think is necessary for my purpose here, which is to elucidate how genealogy can “make things more fragile.” Through this brief discussion of the notion of “strategy” we can see that this may be accomplished if the genealogist reveals that some of our current practices and institutions are “only strategies.” This point develops further the idea that genealogy exhibits the “accidents” and “failures” within the history of particular practices showing them to be “strategies” reveals that they are accidental “improvisations” out of the failures of careful programs, and that they come together quite by accident, due to the intersection of various activities within the particular practice or institution already set up. For example, the practice of confining the mad developed, Foucault argues, not out of a plan to treat madness per se, but out of the failure of confinement of the idle to reach its original goals, and the contingent fact that the mad happened to be among those confined due to their inability to work. The strategy of confining madness developed gradually, its new objectives appearing as the result not of any central plan, but of heterogeneous efforts not conducted under any coherent “program.” 4 Once we come to recognize the highly conditioned, improvisational nature of practices that Foucault identifies in their history as “strategies,” they may no longer seem so obvious to us. We may then realize the fragile nature of certain practices, their vulnerability to change. As Colin Gordon points out, we can then see that these practices can be reorganized and utilized for different ends now as they have been in the past: [Strategies] constitute an inherently fragile structure and their instruments and techniques are always liable to forms of re-appropriation, reversibility and re-utilisation not only in tactical realignments from ‘above’ but in counter-offensives from ‘below’. (Gordon 1980, 256) In other words, we can reappropriate particular practices for our own ends, thereby contributing with others, perhaps, to the development of new strategies that can themselves be later resisted and revised. 5 But whether we decide to do this or not is left “up to us” having revealed the fragility in particular relations of power and their institutions and practices, Foucault backs off and leaves his readers to decide what, if anything, to do about it. In addition to arguing that, since our relationship to madness is “historically constituted” it can be “politically destroyed,” Foucault points out that there are many ways such a destruction could be accomplished: I say politically in the very widest sense of the term, in any case, there are possibilities for action because it is through many actions, reactions, etc. . . through many battles, many conflicts to respond to a certain number of problems, that specific solutions are chosen. (Foucault 1997 f, 162) While his genealogical researches into areas such as madness and punishment work to “free up” ideas previously thought to be enclosed in an absolute kind of truth, this opens up numerous “possibilities for action” that Foucault himself does not limit by saying which ought to be chosen. He asserts instead that specific solutions to particular problems will be found through a variety of “battles” and “conflicts,” indicating that there may not be just one single kind of action called for after the truth has been made “more fragile.” In other words, this fragility can be made use of in various ways, depending on the particular problems at hand in a variety of different, local arenas. Foucault does not, therefore, present a program for “what must be done” after his researches have freed up certain previously-entrenched ideas. Instead, he insists that his work leaves his readers free to do with it what they will: [My position] consists of saying to the people: I would like to produce some effects of truth which might be used for a possible battle, to be waged by those who wish to wage it, in forms yet to be found and in organizations yet to be defined.. .. [There is a] freedom which I leave here at the end of my discussion for anyone who wants or does not want to get something done. (Foucault 1996 b, 262) Foucault’s work provides ammunition for possible battles, by producing some “effects of truth” by showing how some of our most deeply-held truths are historically constituted and can therefore be changed, and by showing what effects have resulted from these truths and why one might want, then, to change them. But he does not say what these battles must look like, who must wage them and how. He leaves his audience free to decide if, when, and through what organizations and processes they would like to “get something done.” This description of Foucauldian genealogy could compare favorably with the role of the intellectual as “strategist” described above. The genealogist could be said to reveal weak points in particular relations of power, places where it might be useful to attack, while leaving the decision to others as to whether or not to do anything with this information. The picture of the intellectual strategist indicates that the strategic knowledge provided by the intellectual can be taken up and used by those who decide to resist specific power relations, where the “project, tactics and goals” of this resistance are left up to those performing it (Foucault 1980 a, 62). Foucault’s genealogy of punishment and the prison, for example, could be used strategically by groups of individuals who wish to resist current practices of punishment or discipline: this genealogy can show how the current practices are “only strategies,” and how new strategies could be developed through their transformation. The genealogist would thereby reveal places where a fruitful attack could be made, where change could take place according to various goals and methods, devised by various groups engaging in resistance in their own ways. Foucault insists in an interview that the genealogical researches he undertakes are aimed at issues and practices that are already showing signs of fragility to some extent, that are already being resisted, thereby indicating that as an intellectual he is merely providing a strategic tool for a resistance that others have already decided to undertake: [l]n trying to raise concrete problems, what concerned me was to choose a field containing a number of points that are particularly fragile or sensitive at the present time. I would hardly conceive of a properly speculative history without the field being determined by something happening right now. (Foucault 1997 f, 158) He goes on to explain that the issues he decided to investigate in the areas of psychiatry and medicine were ones that were already being felt to be contentious, without always being talked about clearly as such. He explains that his contribution was to “try to detect those things which have not yet been talked about, those things that, at the present time, introduce, show, give some more or less vague indications of the fragility of our system of thought... in our practices” (1997 f 159). One might therefore say that as an intellectual, Foucault offered strategic knowledge through his genealogies that could be used to further practices of resistance that were, to some degree, already being thought about or put into action by others. His role was not to tell them that they ought to resist, nor how or why, but rather to offer a helpful “strategic map” of vulnerable places they might attack. Still, having now delved more deeply into how genealogy shows that “what is, does not have to be” by “making things more fragile,” one could argue that there is more to the function of genealogy in Foucault’s view than the production of strategic information for those who have already decided to engage in resistance. The intellectual as genealogist does not just recommend possible places of attack, but works to encourage attack when none might have been initiated otherwise. In other words, revealing the fragility of practices and institutions seems able to provoke resistance on the part of others rather than simply to show where such resistance should be directed. Foucault himself seems to acknowledge this when he argues that “because [practices] are made, they can be unmade” (Foucault 1996 h, 359). Once the constructedness of a particular practice, institution, relation of power is revealed, we may come to realize that it can be resisted and changed. But if we don’t already see this, if we think that a particular practice is “obviously” valid or justified, the result of a “natural” progression towards the truth, then we are not likely to decide to resist it on our own. The fragility revealed by genealogy may induce us to resist when we might have had no intention of doing so before. There is, therefore, a potential for genealogy to transform its audience in a fairly substantial way, to bring them to the point of wanting to resist particular practices and relations of power rather than leaving this decision “entirely” up to them. In some of his later interviews, Foucault seems to acknowledge this as a goal of his work as an intellectual, giving the intellectual a more active role in shaping the minds of others than I have been considering so far. He argues at times that part of the role of the intellectual is to promote transformation in him/herself and others. This indicates that the Foucauldian intellectual does indeed end up telling others, in some sense, “what must be done.” In an interview first published in 1984, Foucault argues that the role of the intellectual crucially involves working to change the thought of oneself and others: To be at the same time an academic and an intellectual is to try to engage a type of knowledge and analysis that is taught and received in the university in a way so as to modify not only the thought of others but one’s own as well. This work of modifying one’s own thought and that of others seems to me to be the intellectual’s reason for being. (Foucault 1996 c, 461) In this passage, Foucault suggests that the intellectual can and should attempt to change the minds of others, to modify their thought. This is not a model whereby the intellectual simply passes on his/her knowledge to others fully formed, transforming them thereby, because intellectual work according to Foucault should change the thought of the intellectual as well. Ideally, he suggests, it should render the intellectual “permanently capable of self-detachment (which is the opposite of conversion)” (1996 c 461). In other words, rather than trying to “convert” others to his/her point of view, the intellectual should work to change their thought in ways that change his/hers as well, that detach the intellectual from him/herself in the sense of modifying his/her knowledge. In his Introduction to The Use of Pleasure, Foucault explains this idea of self-detachment and transformation, linking it specifically to the work of a philosopher: [W]hat would be the value of the passion for knowledge if it resulted only in a certain amount of knowledgeableness and not, in one way or another and to the extent possible, in the knower’s straying afield of himself? .... [W]hat is philosophy today philosophical activity, I mean if it is not the critical work that thought brings to bear on itself? In what does it consist, if not in the endeavor to know how and to what extent it might be possible to think differently, instead of legitimating what is already known? (Foucault 1990 b, 8-9) 6 The point here seems to be that the intellectual can and should change the thought of others, not through a “conversion” to his/her own view and “knowledgeableness,” but in ways that result in the intellectual’s “straying afield of himself,” thinking critically about his own thought and working to change it. Foucault suggests in an interview that his work changes his own thought because he writes about things he knows little about and writes in order to determine what to think about them, rather than writing so as to communicate what he already knows: If I had to write a book to communicate what I have already thought, I’d never have the courage to begin it. I write precisely because I don’t know what to think about a subject that attracts my interest. In so doing, the book transforms me, changes what I think. (Foucault 1991 b, 27) In the process of research and writing, then, Foucault transforms his own thought about the subjects under discussion in his texts. This is not, in itself, such a radical claim most, if not all, intellectuals would likely agree that they emerge from their writing thinking differently than they did when they began. Foucault claims he is doing something different from the traditional academic enterprise, however, as he does not usually write “knowing in advance what [he wants] to do and where [he wants] to go” (Foucault 1996 c, 461). He does not write, in other words, in order to transmit knowledge he already has, and to convert others with it. He is quite conscious of the ways in which his work transforms his thinking, and he praises the shifts in his own thought, the places where his self-detachment prevents the unification of his views into a single, coherent, scheme: “I wouldn’t want what I may have said or written to be seen as laying any claims to totality” (Foucault 1996 i, 275). In his Introduction to The Archaeology of Knowledge Foucault welcomes the objections of some that he keeps changing his stance, that he often says things that not only differ from, but may even conflict with his earlier views. He responds to an imaginary critic who asks whether he is going to “change yet again, shift [his] position”: What, do you imagine that I would take so much trouble and so much pleasure in writing ... if I were not preparing -- with a rather shaky hand a labyrinth into which I can venture, in which I can move my discourse, opening up underground passages, forcing it to go far afield from itself. . . in which I can lose myself.... Do not ask who I am and do not ask me to remain the same .... (Foucault 1972 a, 17) 7 What, do you imagine that I would take so much trouble and so much pleasure in writing ... if I were not preparing -- with a rather shaky hand a labyrinth into which I can venture, in which I can move my discourse, opening up underground passages, forcing it to go far afield from itself. . . in which I can lose myself.... Do not ask who I am and do not ask me to remain the same .... (Foucault 1972 a, 17) 7 change myself. . .” (Foucault 1991 b, 27). If the Foucauldian intellectual is to work to change him/herself and others, as explained above, then it may be in this way that the first of these tasks can be accomplished the intellectual can both consciously allow him/herself to be altered by his/her work, be willing to change positions and views often, and emphasize this publicly. How, then, can the intellectual manage to transform the thought of others in addition to his/her own? Foucault provides a brief response to this question in an interview first published in 1984: The work of an intellectual... is, through the analyses he does in his own field, to re-examine evidence and assumptions, to shake up habitual ways of working and thinking, to dissipate conventional familiarities, to re-evaluate rules and institutions .... (Foucault 1996 c, 462) The Foucauldian intellectual who transforms the thought of others does so through the particular analyses that “he does in his own field” (similar to the description of the “specific” intellectual), which are designed to “shake up” the way others usually think about the subjects under discussion. This intellectual conducts his/her analyses in unfamiliar ways, so as to alter the reader’s assumptions, their view of current “rules and institutions,” etc. Foucault provides a few more hints as to how this process works in another interview, where he characterizes his own political role as that of revealing political and ethical problems in their complexity so as to show that there are no easy solutions: My role is to address problems effectively, really: and to pose them with the greatest possible rigor, with the maximum complexity and difficulty so that a solution does not arise all at once .... The problems that I try to address, these perplexities of crime, madness, and sex which involve daily life, cannot be easily resolved. I play my role at the moment I make problems evident in all their complexity, by provoking doubts and uncertainties and calling for profound changes. (Foucault 1991 b, 158, 162) Foucault claims that he attempts to change the thought of others by altering their view of the problems under discussion, showing that they are more complex than might otherwise be thought, thereby “provoking doubts and uncertainties” and revealing the profound difficulties one must face in resolving them. Foucault’s statements regarding the capacity of the intellectual to transform his/her own thought as well as that of others indicates another way in which the Foucauldian intellectual might work to detach “the power of truth from the forms of hegemony” in which it currently operates: instead of only offering strategic knowledge for battles whose general aims and methods are decided by others, these statements indicate that the intellectual can also work to change the minds of others and thereby influence their choice of struggles and what they hope to achieve thereby. By revealing problems in their complexity, the intellectual can alter the aims that others might have had otherwise, the solutions they might have proposed themselves. S/he can upset common ways of thinking, can lead others to question their usual assumptions about particular problems and issues, and thereby perhaps change the ways others choose to resist - or even influence their decision whether or not to resist at all. In some of his statements regarding the political role of the intellectual, then, Foucault seems to acknowledge that, despite his claims to the contrary elsewhere, the intellectual can and should have a role to play in changing the minds of others, “changing their consciousnesses or what’s in their heads” (Foucault 1980 g, 133). Yet we still don’t have much detail as to how Foucault, and the Foucauldian intellectual, can manage to produce such transformations in their readers, can “shake up habitual ways of working and thinking.” Foucault states at times that he hopes his work will provoke a “transformative experience” in his readers, an experience that changes our view of ourselves and our present based on a re-telling of the past. This process is closely related to how genealogy “makes things more fragile,” but the emphasis here is on the ways that genealogy can induce change in the intellectual and in his/her audience. I approach this notion of the “transformative experience” somewhat indirectly, through a consideration of Foucault’s claim that his work is a “fabrication,” that it’s “fictional.” His meaning here is rather complex, and looking at it in more detail will provide the means by which to investigate the kind of transformation he hopes his work will accomplish in its readers. Transformative fictions Foucault’s genealogical histories are full of what would appear to be historical “facts” in the traditional sense, corresponding to the way events occurred “in reality.” Yet, as lan Hacking points out, we may find that in these genealogies “the facts are sometimes not quite right, that they are squeezed into a model of brusque transformations,” and/or that “the facts are vastly more complex than what Foucault describes” (Hacking 1986 a, 30, 29). But Hacking waves away what might appear to be important problems in an historical project, namely factual mistakes that could seriously damage its claims: “No matter. His histories stick in the mind. We can add our own corrective footnotes at leisure. These histories matter because they are in part political statements” (Hacking 1986 a, 30). Hacking’s comments here fit well with some of Foucault’s own statements about his genealogical work, as Foucault seems to be less concerned with whether his genealogies are historically accurate than with whether they “stick in the mind,” and what political implications they might have thereby. Foucault at times refers to his genealogical texts as “fictions,” which seems to indicate at least that he does not consider their “truth” of crucial importance. On the other hand, by using this term he doesn’t appear to mean that they are entirely fabricated stories, either. Foucault’s genealogical “fictions” participate in a complex interplay of truth and invention that, he claims, can lead to transformation in himself and his audience. In an interview first published in 1977, Foucault proclaims his texts to be “fictions,” and tries to explain what he means in a way that itself requires further elucidation: I am quite aware that I have never written anything but fictions. I’m not saying for all that that this is outside truth. It seems to me the possibility exists ... to induce effects of truth with a discourse of fiction, and to make it so that the discourse of truth creates, “fabricates” something that does not yet exist, therefore “fictionalizes.” One “fictionalizes” history starting from a political reality that makes it true, one “fictionalizes” a political outlook that does not yet exist starting from an historical truth. (Foucault 1996 k, 213) The interrelationships between truth and fiction exhibited in this quote are dizzyingly complex. In a later interview Foucault provides a discussion of the “game of truth and fiction” that helps elucidate some of these points, and that partly explains how genealogy can work to provoke change (Foucault 1991 b, 37). In this later interview, Foucault argues that while in some ways his genealogies follow the classic structure of a “truthful” document, providing demonstrations and proofs, appealing to other documents and to empirical facts, etc., in other ways they are more like fictions “transformative fictions,” as I will here call them. According to Foucault, in his genealogical researches into madness and the prisons, for example, he was less concerned with writing a “truthful” history than with promoting a transformative “experience” “an experience that changes us, that prevents us from always being the same, or from having the same kind of relationship with things and with others that we had before reading it” (Foucault 1991 b, 41). In other words, Foucault seems most interested in writing a genealogical history that allows for a transformation in the way we view madness or punishment. If this occurs, he argues, it “proves the success of the work, proves that it worked as I had wanted it to” (1991 b 41). It appears, then, that it is less important to Foucault that his genealogical studies be “true” in the traditional sense of a correspondence with the “facts” of the world (complete with sound and valid proofs, satisfactory evidence, etc.) than that they be effective in bringing about such a transformation. Foucault emphasizes this point by referring to Discipline and Punish : Here too the investigation makes use of “true” documents, but in such a way as to furnish not just the evidence of truth but also an experience that might permit an alteration, a transformation, of the relationship we have with ourselves and our cultural universe: in a word, with our knowledge (savoir). (Foucault 1991 b, 37) Foucault claims that his aim is primarily to have himself and to share with others “an experience,” an experience of our present through an investigation into its historical development; and an experience that will allow for a change in our view of present issues: “That is, an experience of our modernity that might permit us to emerge from it transformed. Which means that... we can establish new relationships with what was at issue; for instance, madness ...” (1991 b 33-34). I have already provided an example of how such a transformative “experience” might be brought about, how “we can establish new relationships” with something like madness. One aspect of such a “new relationship” may be that what had before seemed universally, timelessly true comes to be recognized as historically constituted through a haphazard process of “accidents,” “failures,” and “improvisations.” Another example of how genealogy can promote a transformative “experience” can be drawn from the issue of “leniency” in punishment as discussed in Discipline and Punish. Foucault notes that there was a movement for penal reform in France in the eighteenth century, including a push for increased leniency. He shows, however, that leniency was not the only or perhaps even the main objective of the call for penal reform. According to Foucault, the reform movement was mainly concerned not with treating prisoners more “humanely,” but rather with providing for a more efficient and effective form of punishment. Through a lengthy and complex argument, Foucault shows that the primary goal of the reformers was to “[l]ay down new principles for regularizing, refining, universalizing the art of punishing,” “multiplying its circuits” so as to make it more pervasive and effective (Foucault 1995, 89): The true objective of the reform movement. . . [was to] set up a new ‘economy’ of the power to punish, to assure its better distribution ... so that it should be distributed in homogeneous circuits capable of operating everywhere, in a continuous way, down to the finest grain of the social body. . . . [rendering] it more regular, more effective, more constant and more detailed in its effects .... (1995, 80) While this is only a brief outline of one part of a very complex study, we can see already how Foucault works to retell certain aspects of the past in ways that may allow for us to experience the present differently. Having believed previously that the reduction of bodily torture in criminal punishment reflected an increased “humanity,” a concern for the “humane” treatment of the criminal, noting that this may not have been the main objective may lead us to view current practices of punishment (and their claims to “leniency” or “humanity”) differently. Perhaps these too are caught up in an aim that we had not previously recognized: “not to punish less, but to punish better; to punish with an attenuated severity, perhaps, but in order to punish with more universality and necessity; to insert the power to punish more deeply into the social body” (Foucault 1995, 82). In aiming to promote such a transformation, however, the genealogist does not simply fabricate his/her historical analyses without reference to the “facts.” Foucault argues, on the contrary, that the transformative experience he hopes to provide must occur through a presentation of history that is, in some sense, “truthful”: “it is evident that in order to have such an experience through a book like The History of Madness, it is necessary that what it asserts is somehow “true,” in terms of historically verifiable truth” (Foucault 1991 b, 36). Foucault’s genealogies must provide some degree of “historically verifiable truth” in order that they be able to provide for the transformative experience he hopes for. By this he seems to mean that without some degree of verifiability, his audience will not likely take on a new view of the present and its issues why should they, if they think that the history Foucault provides is completely fabricated, if it presents only what might have been, but isn’t, the case? I must believe that the history of discipline and punishment proceeded as Foucault describes to at least a minimum degree, or else I will have no reason to change my view of current practices. If I don’t believe that some of them are “only strategies” in the way he describes their history, they won’t become, for me, “more fragile.” 8 Foucault points out that, accordingly, his genealogies do contain elements of a classically “truthful,” historical document: In the course of my works, I utilize methods that are part of the classic repertory: demonstration, proof by means of historical documentation, quoting other texts, referral to authoritative comments, the relationship between ideas and facts, the proposal of explanatory patterns, etc From this point of view, whatever I assert in my writing can be verified or refuted as in any other history book. (Foucault 1991 b, 33) Still, it is not the historical “facts” that form the most crucial aspect of his genealogies: “what is essential is not found in a series of historically verifiable proofs; it lies rather in the experience which the book permits us to have” (1991 b 36). Foucault is much more concerned with the way a genealogical text “functions as an experience” than with whether or not it can serve as “the demonstration of a historical truth” (1991 b 36). Nevertheless, in order for this to be possible, there has to be some “historically verifiable truth” within the genealogy itself. It seems at least partly due to this emphasis on the transformative capacity of genealogy rather than its truth value, that Foucault claims to be writing “fictions.” For him, this term appears to designate something created, made, fabricated recall that for Foucault it is possible to write a “discourse of truth” so that it “creates, ‘fabricates’ something that does not yet exist, therefore ‘fictionalizes’” (Foucault 1996 k, 213). Foucault’s genealogies present a “discourse of truth” by utilizing elements of a “historically verifiable truth,” and through this they “fictionalize in the sense of creating “something that does not yet exist.” What is created by Foucauldian genealogy is a transformative experience, leading one to develop a new relationship with the practices, institutions, and relations of power at issue in the genealogy. This experience, Foucault asserts, is a “fiction” (in his sense of the term, as something “constructed”): “an experience is neither true nor false: it is always a fiction, something constructed, which exists only after it has been made, not before; it isn’t something that is ‘true,’ but it has been a reality” (Foucault 1991 b, 36). How an experience can be described as a “fiction” in contrast to something that is “true” depends on a contrast Foucault seems to be making between “fiction” as that which is constructed or made as opposed to that which is true or false. This somewhat unfamiliar contrast may make more sense if we recall that in some traditional views of truth, one does not “make” or “create” truth so much as one “finds” or “discovers” truth. That which is constructed, as Foucault points out, “exists only after it has been made, not before,” and thus is not something one “finds” to be “true”. In this sense at least, what is made or created is, itself, not “true.” Still, however, true things can be said about it. Thus it may be true that I have had a transformative experience by reading Foucault’s texts, but the experience itself is not well-described as “true.” Foucault’s genealogical texts are “fictions” in that they are created, fabricated - they present a history that exists only after it has been made, rather than documenting a series of events in correspondence to their “truth.” But they also “fictionalize” in that these texts themselves work to create a transformative experience, another fiction. 9 Foucault’s genealogies are, one could therefore say, “transformative fictions” texts which create transformations out of a “discourse of truth.” Returning to the quote at the beginning of this section, it is now possible to understand more clearly how Foucault “‘fictionalizes’ a political outlook that does not yet exist starting from an historical truth” (Foucault 1996 k, 213). His genealogical texts are capable, he argues, of creating a new “political outlook,” a “new relationship” with particular issues such as madness and punishment; and this occurs “starting from an historical truth,” from stories about the past that, to some degree at least, must be verifiable in the traditional sense in order to be productive of such an experience. They are capable, one might argue, of inducing a new “political outlook” in the sense that they can provoke in their readers a wish to resist and efforts to accomplish this where none might have existed otherwise. In other words, Foucault’s genealogies seem able to encourage others to resist particular practices of power, even if Foucault leaves to others the decision as to whether or not to do so and how. We still need to ask, however, about the nature of the “truth” that Foucault employs to promote transformation, the “truth” that is “used inside an experience,” as he puts it (Foucault 1991 b, 36): is there an explicit or implicit claim here to a sort of universality in those aspects of Foucault’s genealogies that utilize “historically verifiable truth”? It would seem unlikely that this is what he means, given his strong statements in “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” against the kind of timeless, perspectiveless objectivity that such a claim would require. Foucault argues that the genealogist rejects the “suprahistorical perspective” of traditional history (Foucault 1977 b, 152) that would seem to be required in order for him to say that the “historically verifiable” aspects of his genealogical researches are “universally true.” He would have to claim that he is speaking from a perspective outside of history, a move that he characterizes as antithetical to the genealogical project. 10 Instead, if for Foucault there are “only interpretations,” as I have argued, then it would seem that the “truth” of his genealogical work must submit to criteria of truth that do not conform to the classic structures of an absolute, ahistorical, view of truth such as the “correspondence theory.” In arguing that his genealogies incorporate elements of “historically verifiable truth,” perhaps Foucault simply means to say that they are verifiable within a particular interpretation of the world, one that is accepted today and thus is comprehensible by us. In other words, while he doesn’t seem likely to claim that those aspects of his genealogical histories that are “verifiable” are “true” in any absolute, universal sense (as if they presented a view of the world that was not from a particular perspective or the result of a particular interpretation), he may instead be saying that they are true for us, under current criteria for truth. Foucault could say, then, that the historical “facts” that he presents conform to the rules and procedures that are currently productive of truth, without claiming that they are true in a universal sense. 11 And yet, there is a complication here, because I think it is possible that Foucault is making appeal to a notion of universal truths when he presents “historically verifiable” facts in his genealogical texts. In order to see how and why this might be the case, it is necessary to think about Foucault’s political role as an intellectual and his concerns about how his texts are received and interpreted by others. He may have taken the possibility that he would be received as a “universal” intellectual, as an “agent” of the regime of truth by much of his audience, and exploited it in a particular way for the purpose of undermining this very interpretation. In other words, Foucault may have taken up the position of a “universal,” truth-providing intellectual in a strategic fashion, using it to induce others to attack this very position itself. Note that if this is the case, it would actually be consistent with the claim that in his genealogies Foucault is providing “facts” that appear true to us, under current procedures for producing truth. This is because the current regime of truth is productive of universal truths, of claims to truth that are ahistorical and absolute. For Foucault to utilize truth “for us” in his genealogies, then, would be for him to utilize universal truth. It would also mean that Foucault could act as if he were presenting universal truths in his genealogies for a rhetorical purpose, while himself knowing that, as explained above, the “facts” he provides are truths “for us.” 12 There remains, finally, the other part of the enigmatic passage from the 1977 interview quoted at the beginning of this section: Foucault argues that it is possible “to induce effects of truth with a discourse of fiction,” and the meaning of this is still in need of further clarification. In an interview from 1978, Duccio Trombadori in effect asks Foucault this question, after summarizing the ideas presented above regarding the “transformative” effects of Foucault’s genealogical discourse: “to what extent are the transformations which you are talking about in a relationship to truth; or how do they produce ‘truth effects’?” (Foucault 1991 b, 34). In other words, Foucault describes the transformations that are possible as a result of genealogy as “truth effects,” and it is not yet clear why this is the case. In response to Trombadori’s question, Foucault notes first of all that “[t]here is a peculiar relation between the things I’ve written and the effects they have produced” (Foucault 1991 b, 34). To explain, Foucault refers to the way that Madness and Civilization has been misinterpreted by a number of readers. He argues that this text was taken by some to be a direct attack on modern practices of psychiatry, when that was not at all, he claims, his intention. Foucault explains that the reason why this occurred has to do with the transformative capacity of the text as genealogy: I’m convinced that the reason is this: the book constituted for me -- and for those who read or used it -- a transformation of the relation . . . which we ourselves have with madness, the institution of psychiatry, and the “truth” of that discourse. (Foucault 1991 b, 35-36) According to Foucault, then, Madness and Civilization instigated a transformation in what we (and he himself) see to be the “truth” of madness, in what we think is “true” about it. Foucault claims that he hopes to instigate a transformation in the relationship we have with our knowledge (1991 b 37); and it may be that as our relationship to our knowledge thus changes, something different appears to us to be “true.” Foucault states that this transformation makes “our modernity . . . appear modified to us,” suggesting that our “reality” appears differently, that something different seems “true” about it (1991 b 38). Thus one could say that if his genealogical “fabrications” initiate the transformations he hopes for, then in some sense they produce “truth-effects” they lead to something else appearing to be “true” that didn’t seem so before. 13 Foucault provides a further discussion of how his “fictions” can produce “truth-effects” in another interview: “What I am trying to do is provoke an interference between our reality and the knowledge of our past history. If I succeed, this will have real effects in our present history. My hope is my books become true after they have been written not before” (Foucault 1996 p, 301; italics mine). This indicates that the “truth” of his genealogies lies in the “real effects” they produce in the present, in the transformations they initiate. Thus they would become true when such transformations take place. Foucault provides an example by pointing to Discipline and Punish'. I have tried to underline trends in the history of prisons. “Only one trend,” people could say. “So that’s not exactly true.” But two years ago there was turmoil in several prisons in France, prisoners revolting. In two prisons, the prisoners in their cells read my book. They shouted the text to other prisoners. I know it’s pretentious to say, but that’s a proof of a truth a political and actual truth which started after the book was written. (Foucault 1996 p, 301) The “truth” described here seems a function of the effects the book produced. One effect is that prisoners used the text in uprisings, thus perhaps contributing to these uprisings. Another effect could be that the prisoners may have changed the way they looked at penal practices, including their own incarceration; and this could have helped spur them on in their revolts. The latter illustrates the kind of “truth” briefly suggested above perhaps the “truth-effects” of Foucault’s genealogies lie in their ability to change what we see as the “truth” of our present, to alter our view of current practices (such as penal or psychological practices) and thus transform what we consider to be “true” about them. This alteration in what we view as “true” can also, of course, be intricately linked with other “real effects,” such as increased efforts to change practices according to what we now believe to be “true” about them. It appears, therefore, that a text can “become true” according to Foucault if it provokes in its readers an “experience” that transforms the way they view their present, if it makes them change what they think is “true” about it in a way that could promote efforts to change current practices. This seems in contrast to the notion of the “historically verifiable truth” included in genealogy as discussed above; though if one interprets the historical “facts” that genealogy presents not as universally true but as true “for us,” under current truth-producing rules, then the two notions of truth seem similar. In other words, Foucault’s genealogies may utilize facts that are verifiable for us, that appear to us to be true under the current relations of power that produce truth, in order to create new truth effects to change what appears to us to be true. In that sense, Foucauldian genealogy uses what is true (for us) to promote a transformation in what is true (for us). In summary, Foucault argues that his genealogies are “fictions” that can also “fictionalize”: they are fabrications, creations, that have themselves a creative capacity. They can create in their audience (and in their author) a transformative experience, resulting in a “new relationship” with issues such as madness and punishment, and a new “political outlook” on them. This process may be “fictional,” but it also crucially involves “truth”: to induce their transformative effects, Foucault’s genealogies utilize certain “historically verifiable truths” that are, nonetheless, constructed and contextualized rather than objective and universal. Further, Foucault characterizes the change thus produced as a “truth effect,” an alteration, I have argued, in what we perceive to be “true.” How this process can occur has much to do, I think, with the ways that genealogy can “make things more fragile.” In his discussion of the “fictional” nature of his genealogies, however, Foucault seems especially to emphasize their transformative capacities, for himself and for his audience. Perhaps something like this is what Foucault has in mind when he argues that it is part of this role for the intellectual to change him/herself as well as others. It may be at least in part through the transformative experience made possible by genealogy that the intellectual can accomplish this task. Notice that in promoting such transformations, the intellectual seems in some sense to be guiding others, since s/he is inducing a change in their relationship to particular issues, to particular relations of power. The intellectual works to change what appears to be true about issues such as madness and punishment, thereby promoting a different response to them than might have been likely before this transformation. It seems the genealogist functions to promote resistance in “making things more fragile” and modifying the thought of others in doing so. In some sense, then, is s/he not telling others what ought to be done? To what degree do Foucault’s genealogies carry prescriptive force? We might say that the Foucauldian intellectual acts as a strategist, indicating weak spots and places to attack in particular relations of power; but in so doing s/he can also end up influencing others in their decision as to “what must be done.” This intellectual does not “prophesy” in the sense of telling others directly what they must do, but neither does s/he remain entirely silent on this issue. I argue that s/he takes up a position of exile in relation to intellectual prophecy, saying to others what they ought to do while at the same time distancing him/herself from this prophecy and undermining it. Intellectuals have got used to working, not in the modality of the ‘universal’,. . . but within specific sectors, at the precise points where their own conditions of life or work situate them (housing, the hospital, the 'This need not always and forever be the case, however. Foucault may argue that the intimate connection of truth and power may not always have existed given that he works to historicize other claims to universal truth, might he not also be willing to do the same with a claim such as “truth is already [always and forever] power”? On my interpretation of Foucault’s view of truth, as presented in Chapter One, Foucault would be willing to put into question any particular claim to universal truth, though not all of them, all at once. Thus we might say that the close connection between truth and power is contingent, and may change in the future. But for now, at least, the truth cannot be separated from power, according to Foucault. 2 To illustrate Foucault’s point here, consider what happens when a delinquent’s understanding of the reasons for his/her crime and the justification for punishment is put down, shut away by the “true” understanding provided by the scientific knowledge of delinquency and punishment. For example, someone who creates and spreads computer viruses may feel justified in their action by a drive to disrupt global business transactions, perhaps for the purpose of making some kind of political statement or effort at resistance in regard to the spread of capitalism. S/he may then view the punishment that befalls him/her if s/he is caught as the capitalist system working to protect itself, eliminating its enemies. A social scientist and/or a psychologist might understand the situation differently, within the context of their scientific knowledge. They may interpret the virus-maker’s actions as evidence of a need for attention on the part of a persecuted, anti-social individual; and may consider the punishment meted out as retribution for malicious behavior (having little or nothing to do with protecting the capitalist system). The point is not to determine which of these possible interpretations of the act is the “correct” one; it is rather to notice that the view of the “scientists” is likely to be taken as more legitimate than that of the delinquent, and thus will work to disqualify the latter. Another example might be the traditional view of medicine one finds in particular communities such as Native American tribes. These ways of understanding how the body works, how to heal it with things such as ritual ceremonies and plant-derived medicines, are largely ignored or actively rejected by the scientific community. Again, the point here is not so much to determine who is “right” as to notice that those knowledges accepted as “scientifically true” enjoy the power to disqualify others that are said not to live up to this standard. 3 Pointing to the dual economic function of confinement mentioned above, Foucault explains that it “can be regarded as a failure”: confinement of the idle was to both “reabsorb unemployment, or at least eliminate its most visible social effects, and to control costs when they seemed likely to become too high; [and, secondly] to act alternately on the manpower market and on the cost of production” (Foucault 1988, 54). But neither of these goals was realized, Foucault explains, due to an inadequate understanding of economic forces in what appears to us now as “a clumsy dialectic of production and prices” (1988, 55). 4 To describe exactly the way this occurred in the process of confining the mad would be too cumbersome here, as Foucault spends a good portion of Madness and Civilization describing it he explains how madness gradually developed, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, into a category of illness with a particular character that appeared well-suited to confinement. 5 Note, however, that the development of new strategies would not be a centrally organized process like the creation and deployment of a program instead, particular groups could resist in particular ways, reappropriating practices for their own ends, and a new strategy could develop out of these dispersed efforts through their intersection in the practice or institution that is the target for resistance and transformation. & In an interview, Foucault compares this transformative experience to what he calls “aesthetic experience”: “This transformation of oneself by one’s own knowledge is, I think, something rather close to the aesthetic experience. Why should a painter work if he is not transformed by his own painting?” (Foucault 1996 f, 379). This statement brings up the notion of the aesthetic creation of the self that I discuss in Chapter five. Foucault indicates here that part of the intellectual’s role is to create him/herself aesthetically; and it seems also to involve encouraging one’s audience to do the same. 7 I am, of course, asking (and saying) who Foucault himself is in this investigation of his view of the political role of the intellectual. I have discussed the benefits and drawbacks of doing so in my Introduction. Notice also that this suggests another reason for Foucault’s desired anonymity, mentioned above he may wish to remain anonymous in order that his readers not be tempted to unify his work when he himself emphasizes its continually changing character. If he could remain anonymous, the readers of his texts would be unable to force them into the compartments of his previous views. Foucault himself provokes us to try to determine who he is, however, by continually stating in interviews what it is he is trying to do with his work in general. B Note that I am here describing myself as a reader who is steeped in the current regime of truth, who will only be moved to change my views if I believe that the historical “facts” Foucault presents correspond to past events in their “reality.” I argue that Foucault may be purposefully writing his genealogies for an audience that is caught in the current regime of truth, with its emphasis on universal truths; and that he may be read as encouraging them to exile themselves from it through his genealogical texts. 9ft may be misleading for Foucault to use the term “fiction” to describe what he’s doing in his genealogies, since it is commonly used within the context of an understanding of “truth” that Foucault himself questions. In other words, when we refer to something as “fiction,” we are often assuming its opposition to “nonfiction” as that which presents the “true facts,” as that which corresponds to the way the world “really is” or has been in the past. Foucault’s use of the term “fiction” doesn’t seem to fit this traditional usage, since, as I have argued, his genealogical “fictions” effect their transformations through the presentation of “historically verifiable” truth. Still, Foucault seems more interested in the transformative capacity of his genealogies than their truth value; and perhaps even the “facts” presented therein may be written as if they are part of a discourse of “historically verifiable” truth. In other words, perhaps they, too, are “fictionalized” in the sense of being created rather than discovered. I argue below that in his genealogical texts Foucault takes on the role of a universal intellectual prophet, speaking as if he has access to universal, “historically verifiable” truths and facts; but he then also works to bring his audience to question the truths he thus offers by distancing himself from them. This would mean that his genealogies are “fictions” in his sense of the term (something created rather than discovered) even in their presentation of “historically verifiable” truth, for the purpose of “fictionalizing,” or creating, a transformative experience. But even if this is the case, the problem still remains that by using the term “fiction” Foucault runs the risk of being read as if he thinks there are “nonfiction” texts that would reveal a better correspondence to the “facts” than do his genealogies. Perhaps he might respond that there are texts which claim to present such a correspondence, while by using the term “fiction” to describe his own, he is not making such a claim. I argue, however, that he does nevertheless act within his genealogical texts as if he is presenting “historically verifiable” truths. Perhaps the difference between his “fictions” and others’ “nonfictions” would be that he also, as I will argue, backs away from this position of “fact-provider” and brings others to question it, while “nonfiction” texts do not do so. 10 Citing Nietzsche’s notion of “effective history” as that which is involved in genealogy, Foucault argues that it differs from traditional history in an important way because of its “affirmation of knowledge as a perspective” (Foucault 1977 b, 156). The genealogist acknowledges his or her own historical position, a particular perspective, and “composes a genealogy of history as the vertical projection of [this] position” (1977 b 157). It seems unlikely, then, that Foucault as genealogist would claim that what is “historically verifiable” in his genealogies is universally true as a product of a “suprahistorical perspective,” a timeless objectivity. 11 Another possible way to approach the issue of the “historically verifiable truth” in Foucault’s genealogies comes from a brief exchange in a discussion between Foucault and a number of other French intellectuals, published in English translation as “The Confession of the Flesh.” At one point in the discussion, Jacques-Alain Miller comments on the “artificial” aspect of Foucault’s work: J.-A. Miller: [addressing Foucault], . . you like to accentuate the artificial character of your procedure. Your results depend on the choice of reference points, and the choice of reference points depends on the conjuncture. It’s all a matter of appearances, is that what you’re telling us? Foucault: Not a delusive appearance, but a fabrication. J.-A. Miller: Right, and so it’s motivated by what you want, your hopes, your .. . Foucault: Correct, and that’s where the polemical or political objective comes in. . . . (Foucault 1980 b, 212) From these comments, it seems plausible to make the following points. First, one could argue that, as Dreyfus and Rabinow insist, Foucault is not providing a “universally true” history in his genealogies; but this is not necessarily because the events or facts he list axe, false (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 120). Rather, the story he gives is a “fabrication” because his conclusions depend on his starting-points, which depend on his “hopes,” his “political objective,” etc. In other words, perhaps it could be said that Foucault provides certain “historically verifiable” elements in his genealogical histories, but he interprets them in a particular way by weaving them together with a specific thread influenced by his “hopes” and “objectives.” This, then, results in a story that could not be said to be the one true version of history, that is therefore a kind of “fabrication” or “fiction.” But nonetheless, it uses certain elements of “historically verifiable truth”; and these elements, as I argue here, need not themselves be considered “universally true.” 12 That Foucault may have made appeal to universal truths in his genealogies as a strategic move, acting as a universal intellectual prophet in order to eventually undermine this role and the truths presented within it, is a possibility that I explain in detail in a later section of this chapter. 13 In other interviews that took place around the same time (1978), Foucault makes some remarks that appear to support this interpretation. For example, in a separate interview with Trombadori Foucault states, in reference to Madness and Civilization: “I sought to produce a history, the most rational one possible, of the constitution of a knowledge (savoir), ... of something that I could even define as the “truth of madness.” That of course doesn’t mean that by means of this type of “knowledge” one has effectively organized criteria that are capable of uncovering madness in its truth; no, it’s rather an experience that is constituted, the truth of madness’ . . .” (Foucault 1991 b, 66-67). Here Foucault associates the “truth of madness” with “an experience that is constituted” an “experience” in the sense above, a transformation brought about by a “fabrication.” This is, as he notes, not the same as truth in the classic sense, where one “uncovers” the truth about madness; but what kind of truth is it? I am suggesting here that genealogy can constitute a new “truth” of madness in the sense of changing what seems “true” about it a truth as it appears to us, rather than an objective, decontextualized truth. Of course, in the current regime of truth, truth may appear to us precisely as a universal, decontextualized truth. But this, Foucault recognizes, is an appearance that can change, a “truth-effect” that can be altered rather than the necessary, timeless truth those deeply enmeshed in the current regime of truth might believe it to be. None of this should be taken to mean, however, that the “transformations” Foucault means to achieve through the writing of genealogy must be only changes in what appears to be true to those who have undergone such transformations. Recall how Foucault describes the transformative experience he hopes his genealogies can induce: “an experience that changes us, that prevents us from always being the same, or from having the same kind of relationship with things and with others that we had before . . .” (1991 b 41); “an experience of our modernity that might permit us to emerge from it transformed. . . . [meaning that] we can establish new relationships with what was at issue . . .” (1991 b 33-34). Establishing “new relationships” with particular issues (such as madness, punishment, etc.) and with others can certainly include changing what seems to us to be “true” about such issues and our relations with others; but it can also include more than this. For example, we may emerge from reading genealogy with new emotional responses towards particular issues and/or other people. I focus here on how we may undergo change in what appears to be true, because I am trying to explain how Foucault’s genealogies could be said to produce “truth-effects,” as he himself claims they do. II The Foucauldian Intellectual Between Prophecy and Silence Duccio Trombadori asks Foucault in an interview whether, in trying to promote a transformation in his audience, he is not prescribing to them how they ought to think and what they ought to do: Foucault. I would reject this term “teaching”; such a term would reflect the character of a work, of a systematic book that leads to a method that can be generalized, a method full of positive directions .... In my case it’s another matter entirely: my books don’t have this kind of value. They function as invitations ... for those who may want eventually to do the same thing, or something like it, or, in any case, who intend to slip into this kind of experience. (Foucault 1991 b, 39-40) Foucault. I would reject this term “teaching”; such a term would reflect the character of a work, of a systematic book that leads to a method that can be generalized, a method full of positive directions .... In my case it’s another matter entirely: my books don’t have this kind of value. They function as invitations ... for those who may want eventually to do the same thing, or something like it, or, in any case, who intend to slip into this kind of experience. (Foucault 1991 b, 39-40) Foucault. I would reject this term “teaching”; such a term would reflect the character of a work, of a systematic book that leads to a method that can be generalized, a method full of positive directions .... In my case it’s another matter entirely: my books don’t have this kind of value. They function as invitations ... for those who may want eventually to do the same thing, or something like it, or, in any case, who intend to slip into this kind of experience. (Foucault 1991 b, 39-40) Foucault indicates here that his work functions merely as an “invitation” to action, a suggestion that leaves others free to decide if they want to do something or not. What he rejects is intellectual activity that provides a systematic program, a general method with “positive directions” as to what others ought to do in any given situation. Specific relations of power require specific means of resistance, and a “global” theory is not adequate to formulate them. Foucault reinforces the characterization of his genealogies as “invitations” in another interview: [ln my books] I say to [people]: roughly speaking, it seems to me that things have gone this way; but I describe those things in such a way that the possible paths of attack are delineated. Yet even with this approach I do not force or compel anyone to attack. So then, it becomes a completely personal question when I choose, if I want, to take certain courses of action with reference to prisons, psychiatric asylums, this or that issue. (Foucault 1996 b, 262) Yet I believe that Foucault does more than simply delineate “possible paths of attack” in his genealogies he himself acknowledges that he works to modify his own thought and that of others, in part by encouraging others to engage in resistance where they might not have done so otherwise. But it does indeed seem to be the case that, as he notes here, Foucault still doesn’t “force or compel anyone to attack.” He may present particular issues in a way that changes our relationship to them, that promotes a new “political outlook” on them, but to do this is not to compel others to do anything about them. Recall from Chapter One that if Foucault (or any other intellectual) said specifically “what is wrong” and “what ought to be done,” his position as an “agent” of the regime of truth (and the relation of power set up between he and his audience thereby) might provide more of a forceful “push” than he wants the intellectual to exert. To avoid such compulsion, Foucault claims here, he says only “it seems to me that things have gone this way,” and beyond that remains silent. He claims, in other words, not to say directly what he thinks is wrong with certain relations of power and what others ought to do about them. Nevertheless, I think that Foucault’s insistence on his own silence, and his recommendation that other intellectuals do the same, mask a prescriptive force in his genealogies which he is not acknowledging in passages such as that quoted above. It may be that he doesn’t “force or compel anyone to attack,” but neither does he sit in silence while they decide whether or not to do so entirely on their own. The modifications he makes in his own thought and that of others through his genealogies are more than “invitations,” I think, though they fall short of compulsion. Foucault as genealogist operates in-between prophecy and silence, managing a subtle and complex prescription within histories that are presented as mainly descriptions. In other words, I think that Foucault’s “it seems to me that things have gone this way” is also, to some extent, “this is good and this is not,” though he also distances himself from this prescriptive claim. 14 In taking up this position in-between prophecy and silence, Foucault plays the role of an intellectual exile in an interesting way: he occupies a position of truth-provider, of someone who speaks a truth that others ought to follow, in order to undermine this very position and encourage others to think for themselves and make their own decisions. Foucault the genealogist therefore operates as a “prophet in exile,” someone who prophesies by offering universal truths, but who also distances himself from these and encourages others to do the same. A rhetoric of disruption^ s Recall that in his genealogies Foucault works to create an experience in himself and others through the use of an “historically verifiable truth.” I have argued that the “truth” he utilizes seems to be a contextualized one, a truth “for us” here and now, and that the transformation Foucault hopes to achieve in himself and others may have to do with a change in this truth “for us.” Accordingly, it is possible to read Foucault’s movements in his genealogical writing as employing truth (for us) for the purpose of transforming truth (for us). There is an intriguing dynamic exhibited here, one that has an “exile” character - Foucault both utilizes, and distances himself from, what appears to his audience to be true; and he seems to do so for the purpose of inducing in them their own movement of exile, encouraging them to distance themselves from their previous thoughts and actions and providing thereby room to change. Under the current regime of truth, what appears true to us often does so under the guise of a universal truth, so that in appealing to what seems true “for us,” Foucault may actually end up employing universal notions of truth. For example, Foucault writes his genealogical histories as if they are full of “facts” that could be “verified” by showing how they correspond to the way events “really” happened. He provides specific dates, events, and actors that one could check against the historical record to see if they “correspond” to “reality.” In so doing he seems to be appealing to a kind of universal truth, as if he were saying “here is the way things have occurred, objectively, absolutely, truly.” Foucault does not say this directly, of course, and in fact he insists quite the opposite in an interview he claims he is only presenting the way things seem, to him, to have occurred (Foucault 1996 b, 262). But in the genealogies themselves he does not give such explicit statements to qualify the way in which the “facts” presented therein are to be taken. Through what he himself acknowledges as his conformity to the “classic repertory” of philosophical tools to present the truth (demonstration, historical documentation, etc.), the history he tells can well appear to be one that claims an objective, universal truth for its correspondence to “reality.” I do not point this out to criticize Foucault for making it appear as if we readers should take his historical information as “fact” rather than the “fiction” he means it to be, to show a problematic disparity between what he does and what he says he does. I think that such a disparity does exist, but I do not think this must be considered a problem, as if Foucault does not practice what he preaches. It could be read instead as a rhetorical strategy performed by an intellectual exile who is, as I have suggested, highly concerned about the way in which his work is interpreted by his audience. As evidenced by his numerous statements in interviews about the role of the intellectual in general, and his explanations of his own work and what he is trying to do with it, it is clear that Foucault was quite conscious of and careful about the political ramifications of his work, the political role he played as an intellectual. He did not want to tell others what they ought to do, but at the same time he wanted to promote transformations in their (and his own) thinking. It may be that he devised a particular rhetorical strategy to allow him to induce such transformations, indicating to others to a limited degree what they ought to think while also working to undermine such a prophecy. I believe that in his genealogical texts, Foucault may have taken up the position of a universal truth-provider as a rhetorical strategy, presenting historical “facts” as if they were absolute correspondences with “reality.” In doing so, he may have hoped to bring his audience to lose faith in him as a prophet and in the universal truths he offers within this role. 16 David Shumway argues that Foucault deliberately employs a number of rhetorical strategies in order to affect his audience in particular ways. He asserts that though Foucault “is often experienced as a difficult writer,” it should not be assumed that this is “the result of his inattention to matters of style and rhetorical effect” (Shumway 1989, 27). For Shumway, Foucault employs certain strategies “because they are useful for [his] ends under the conditions that he faces” (1989, 14). Specifically, Shumway argues, Foucault works to upset usual ways of thinking, to “overthrow” common “habits of mind” (Shumway 1989, 26). This is in keeping with some of Foucault’s own statements about his work and what he believes to be “the work of an intellectual”: e.g., “to shake up habitual ways of working and thinking, to dissipate conventional familiarities” (Foucault 1996 c, 462). To illustrate one of the ways in which Foucault’s rhetoric seems meant to accomplish this goal, Shumway points to “the startling beginnings of so many of his books”: One characteristic ploy is to begin with an explicit reversal of some assumption or belief we take for granted. . . . The “Preface” [of Madness and Civilization] quotes Pascal: “Men are so necessarily mad, that not to be mad would amount to another form of madness.” This quotation immediately causes the reader to question any simple division of the sane and insane that he or she had been carrying about. (Shumway 1989, 27) This strategy is bound to be disorienting, Shumway goes on to say, but this is precisely the point, “for Foucault wants us to understand madness itself as an arbitrary classification created during the historical period he will discuss in the book” (1989, 27). In order for Foucault’s readers to understand madness in this way, they must first, Shumway points out, distance themselves from their habitual ways of thinking about it. Promoting disorientation through a strategy of reversing “some assumption or belief we take for granted” may be designed to bring about such a distancing. I think Shumway is correct to argue that Foucault may have deliberately employed particular rhetorical strategies in order to “shake up habitual ways of working and thinking,” and Shumway provides several other examples of how Foucault’s texts exhibit such strategies (Shumway 1989, 14-26). Given what we have seen so far of Foucault’s view of the intellectual’s political role, I believe that using rhetoric to bring his readers to change their usual ways of thinking may be the best option he has available for reaching the goals he sets for intellectual work. Foucault asserts that he hopes to modify the thought of himself and his audience; but it would seem that he cannot do so by simply telling us what we ought to think, because this would amount to playing the prophet, saying “this is good and this is not” and “here is what you must therefore think and do.” Because he rejects this intellectual role, he must find a way to induce the transformations in his audience that he hopes to accomplish without supporting the position of the intellectual as prophet. 17 As Shumway argues, perhaps Foucault used rhetoric to accomplish this goal - he may have tried to “disorient” his audience in the way described above in order to detach them from their usual ways of thinking and thereby open a space for the development of new ones. Such a strategy may be designed to try to coax Foucault’s audience into transforming their habitual modes of thought without being compelled to do so through the use of intellectual authority. Richard Bernstein provides a more in-depth explanation of how Foucault’s rhetoric might work to coax the reader into transformation. According to Bernstein, Foucault brings out “conflicting disruptive reactions in the reader,” thereby provoking the latter to question previously-held beliefs (Bernstein 1994, 224). He points to the structure of Discipline and Punish as an example, arguing that the opening description of the execution of Damiens allows the reader to be at first “seduced in taking comfort in the realization that ‘our’ methods of punishment. . . are much more humane” than the violent torture visited upon Damiens (1994, 224). But this comfort is later undermined as the reader realizes that what s/he considers to be more “humane,” modern punishments involve less physically violent, but no less restraining or coercive, methods. I may come to realize, after reading Discipline and Punish, that punishments can now be more “humane” because prisoners (and the rest of the population, to some extent) are more controlled and disciplined due to the proliferation of practices of surveillance, examination, etc. I may thereby begin to question my previously-held beliefs about the “humaneness” of modem punishment methods, as I come to see that these can be less violent because the violence has already been done through multiple practices of discipline and normalization. Physical constraint and coercion has been replaced by more subtle constraints, spread throughout the population. Bernstein concludes that “the rhetorical power of [Foucault’s] analysis depends upon skillfully eliciting and at the same time undermining the evaluative reactions of the reader,” which works to “[expose] fractures in ‘our’ most cherished convictions and comforting beliefs” (Bernstein 1994, 225). According to Bernstein, Foucault utilizes traditional, liberal concepts such as truth and freedom, rights and autonomy by provoking the reader to respond to his genealogical analyses with an evaluation based on them, but also writing so as to bring the reader to criticize such concepts. The latter task is accomplished by “showing us the dark ambiguities in the construction of these concepts and the role they have played in social practices” (1994, 224). Note that if I as a reader go through the process of questioning my previous beliefs about modern methods of punishment, to a certain degree this is accomplished by myself, without my being told by Foucault exactly what I ought to think. Rather than telling me precisely how I ought to view modern methods of punishment, in this text Foucault coaxes, encourages me to take a step back from them and look at them critically. Under Foucault’s rhetorical strategy, if it is successful, I will have been brought to question, more or less “on my own,” the very values and ideals that have been evoked in me by the text. To put the point somewhat differently, through his rhetorical strategies Foucault may be able to bring his readers to criticize their habitual ways of thinking, their usual values and ideals, through their own appeal to these very ideals themselves. In other words, if Bernstein is right, what Foucault’s readers may be doing is questioning their “most cherished convictions” in part through an invocation (by Foucault) of those very convictions themselves. To see how this might work, consider another of Bernstein’s examples explaining Foucault’s rhetorical strategy of “eliciting conflicting disruptive responses in the reader.” Bernstein argues that after reading Discipline and Punish, we would like to find some way out of the disciplinary society we now recognize around us; but Foucault then problematizes this desire for “liberation”: [A]s we react in horror against what strikes us as so constraining and repressive about the disciplinary society, we are tempted to think there is some good here that is being repressed and needs to be liberated, expressed, and affirmed. But. . . this elicits in us the expectation of some positive theory of liberation from domination and repression. Foucault has set us up for the critical analysis of The History of Sexuality, an analysis that. . . seeks to show us that standard understandings of the dynamics of liberation and repression are distortive and misleading. (Bernstein 1994, 225) Bernstein argues that The History of Sexuality makes us question our previous notions of “liberation” and “repression”: “we are compelled to rethink what these concepts mean” (1994, 225). One way we might do this (and, as I argue below, the way that seems to be encouraged in Foucault’s genealogies) is to evaluate such concepts according to their own standards, by recognizing that they don’t live up to their promises. In other words, we may be able to use notions such as “liberation” to criticize themselves. For example, when I think about liberation in its traditional meaning, I may have in mind something like a release from, or at least a reduction of, constraining limitations. I may have previously thought that it was possible to reach a state or realm free from the influence of power, to liberate certain aspects of myself or my life from power entirely. But after reading Foucault, I may realize instead that such an ideal may simply work to hide the ways in which I remain constrained by power. 18 If I choose then to criticize my previous conception of liberation in this case, it could be that I am doing so on the basis of what I think “liberation” means I may be criticizing the idea of trying to reach a state free from power because it does not actually result in “liberation” as a reduction or absence of constraint. Attempts at liberation, I may find, are not indeed “liberating” under their own definition of what this means. 19 Of course, this would mean that I am utilizing the notion of “liberation” as a freedom from constraint within my criticism of this very notion. If I find, after reading Foucault’s texts, that trying to escape from constraint through “liberation” doesn’t actually get me free of constraint, and this leads me to want to reject such an idea of escape, am I not rejecting it through appeal to this very idea itself and thereby, ultimately, not actually rejecting it at all? This would be a plausible objection if such a total rejection of one’s previous beliefs were the goal of Foucault’s rhetorical strategy, but I don’t think this is necessarily the case. Perhaps all Foucault is after in his readers is, as he puts it, a “shaking up,” (or, as Bernstein puts it) a “disruption,” a “questioning” of our usual habits of thought. I prefer to call this movement one of distancing", through Foucault’s genealogies, the reader may be brought to distance him/herself from previous ways of thinking. This means that old concepts, ideals, beliefs, etc. are not rejected entirely; they may be utilized, but only cautiously, with a recognition of their “dark ambiguities” and their dangers. We may invoke them in criticizing particular practices and relations of power, while at the same time maintaining a critical distance from them. This may be what is involved in the discussion of “liberation,” above: I may respond to Discipline and Punish, as Bernstein says, with a wish to eliminate certain constraints that I have come to find problematic on the basis of reading this text. I may wish to “liberate” myself and others from these limits. But then, upon reading The History of Sexuality, I may come to criticize this very notion of “liberation” in the way described here - I may recognize that it doesn’t live up to its promises, thereby appealing to the notion of “liberation” while also questioning it, retaining a critical distance from it. Foucault’s readers may have to question their previous modes of thought with something like this process of immanent critique, given the way he writes his genealogies. If I am to question the ideal of “liberation” and if Foucault wants me to do this more or less on my own, without him telling me exactly what to think about it then I will have to do so on the basis of ideals and values I already have, which may include this ideal of liberation itself. The only resource I may have for criticizing the notion of freedom as “liberation” could be this very notion itself; I may not yet have devised some other ideal of freedom, because I may have felt no particular need to do so. Jana Sawicki brings up this kind of immanent critique as a possibility that Foucault’s texts leave open, but that he himself did not often emphasize (Sawicki 1991, 101). According to Sawicki, we really have little choice but to appeal to our traditional concepts, values, and ideals when trying to criticize some of these, because they are all we have as a basis for criticism: find ourselves.... In other words, appeals to rights, liberties, and justice (and struggles over how to interpret these principles) are not denied to us. These are the only sorts of appeals that make sense to us right now. (1991, 100-101) If Foucault hopes to induce a transformation in his audience, without telling them directly what they ought to think or what alternative notions they should adopt to replace the ones they are brought to question, the readers themselves are left to invoke what they already think to criticize what they think. Given that he hopes his readers will come to criticize their previous ways of thinking without him telling them directly to do so, it would seem that Foucault has to allow them their own normative frameworks upon which to base their criticisms. If he provided an alternative set of norms for this purpose, he would be, in effect, prophesying in regard to “what is good/bad.” Nancy Fraser argues, and I agree, that Foucault does not provide such an alternative. Fraser claims that if Foucault did indeed mean to suggest to his readers a different normative framework to replace the Enlightenment norms he works to criticize, she “can find no clues in Foucault’s writings as to what his alternative norms might be” (Fraser 1989 a, 29). Instead, she contends, Foucault seems to be appealing in his genealogical texts to the very liberal, Enlightenment norms these texts appear to question: according to Fraser, “Foucault sometimes appears not to have suspended the liberal norms after all but, rather, to be presupposing them” (1989 a 19). Fraser considers this to be a problematic point in Foucault’s work, but I think it possible to interpret it in a more charitable way by considering his political role as an intellectual. Perhaps Foucault is “presupposing” traditional, liberal norms as a rhetorical strategy -- evoking them in we readers by presenting his histories so that we will react on the basis of these norms, for the purpose of bringing us to question them without being told explicitly to do so. If this is what is happening, we need something upon which to base our questions and criticisms, and it will likely be those (liberal) norms with which we are already familiar. We just don’t have much of a choice to do otherwise; and Foucault doesn’t seem to insist that we need to try to do so by offering an alternative normative apparatus for us to use. Under this interpretation, he would purposefully refrain from offering such an alternative framework, in order to avoid telling his readers what they ought to think and do and leaving them to question their previous modes of thought in their own ways. In sum, Foucault may be making appeal to traditional, liberal norms precisely for the purpose of coaxing his readers to question them. This is a complex process that I will attempt to make clearer in the next section of this chapter. According to Jana Sawicki, Foucault “attempted to free a space for the invention of new forms of rationality and experience” (Sawicki 1991, 101); and I believe this goal may be possible through the process described here. As David Shumway points out, the first step towards the “invention of new forms of rationality and experience” is a disruption in our usual ways of thinking, and even if we question the latter from within such a disruption may still take place. I can manage to question my previously-held ideals even when I do so on the basis of those very ideals themselves, insofar as I may have held them without much thought or question before reading Foucault’s genealogies. 20 If Foucault’s rhetorical strategy is successful, I will likely approach my previous ideals with a certain amount of questioning, even if I use them in this process of questioning themselves. I may use them, as described above, with a critical distance, recognizing their dangers while also recognizing that they can still be employed fruitfully at times. If I am thoughtful enough to get to the point of questioning previous ideals, I am liable to take this thought further and question the basis upon which I am questioning or so, it seems, Foucault would likely hope if I am describing his efforts adequately. This would then open a space for the creation of “new forms of rationality and experience”: perhaps in the process of questioning my former ideals, I will end up trying to formulate new concepts, new ways of thinking to replace the old ones that have been my only resource for criticism. Something like this may be the desired goal of the Foucauldian intellectual. Foucault need not therefore be characterized as hoping for a total rejection of previous modes of thought on the part of his readers, a goal which would be difficult to reach if they were to question those modes of thought from within in the way described above. Instead, we can say that Foucault may mean only to “shake up” our habitual ways of thinking a bit, to get us to take a step back, to distance ourselves from them without rejecting them entirely. Thomas Flynn agrees: [Foucault’s] is a skepticism more in line with Montaigne’s “Que sais-jeT" than with the obviously self-defeating form, “I can’t be certain of anything.” The subtle, questioning stance casts suspicion; it does not settle issues. But that is all Foucault intends. For in weakening our confidence in homogeneous reason and univocal truth, he has opened the door to new alternatives .... (Flynn 1987, 112) Foucault does not want to “settle issues,” as we have seen this would amount to prophesying, to saying “what is good/bad” and “what must be done.” According to Flynn, the goal of Foucault’s work as an intellectual genealogist lies in simply “weakening our confidence” in our previous modes of thought. If this disruption must take place through appeal to habitual modes of thought to ensure that the intellectual avoid prophesying, then, perhaps, this may be good enough. It is not Foucault’s intention, Flynn indicates here, to say (or to induce others to say to themselves) “I can’t be certain of anything,” to reject all of his previous beliefs (or to get others to do the same). 21 It is rather to “open the door to new alternatives,” and this can occur, I have argued, through the kind of immanent critique described here. Notice that the process of distancing oneself from previous modes of thought in response to Foucauldian genealogy could be described as one of “exile.” My use of this term involves a movement whereby one steps away from a particular practice, discourse, mode of thought, etc. without leaving it entirely one exiles oneself because one keeps certain ties to that from which one is also trying to maintain a distance. One might say, then, that if the reader of Foucauldian genealogy does distance him/herself from ideals such as “liberation,” through appeal to these ideals themselves, s/he could be said to engage in a kind of selfexile 22 Accordingly, the transformation Foucault hopes to induce in his readers could be described as one of self-exile, a drawing-away of oneself from habitual ways of thinking, where this occurs through more of a coaxing by the intellectual than a command or compulsion. Further, the self-exile of his readers may be accomplished through a movement of exile on Foucault’s part himself. I have already indicated in previous chapters various ways that such a movement is manifested in Foucault’s work e.g., he exiles himself from claims to universal truth by criticizing some truths by appeal to others and he seems to take a position of exile in regard to power as well when he argues that resistance does not take place from outside of power relations, but from a distanced position within. Foucault does not (at least in his genealogical work) attempt to exit the particular relations of power and the truths they produce that he criticizes; he instead engages in a critique of them from within. If this is the case, we might say that Foucault takes up an exile position in his genealogical texts for the purpose of drawing his readers into their own self-exile. It may be that he uses his position as an intellectual authority figure to get his audience to follow his movements of exile, thereby becoming exiles themselves. So far I have described in general terms the kind of exile movement Foucault may be said to undertake in the rhetorical structure of his genealogies, and what he may be able to accomplish thereby in terms of bringing about transformations in his readers. But the details of how this process might work are as yet unclear. I turn now to a more in-depth discussion of how Foucault may use rhetoric to draw the readers of his genealogies into a condition of exile from their previous ways of thinking. Writing in exile Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow argue that Foucault’s rhetorical strategy (in his genealogies) involves speaking and writing from a position of exile from currently dominant truths, knowledges and practices, in order to encourage selfexile on the part of his audience: Foucault’s interpretive approach consists in identifying what he takes to be our current problem, describing with detachment how this situation arose and, at the same time, using his rhetorical skills to reflect and increase shared uneasiness in the face of the übiquitous danger as he extrapolated it. (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1986, 115) In order to do this, they point out, Foucault must himself take seriously current norms and values rather than trying to stand outside of them all for otherwise, he could not claim to identify “our current problem” and its “übiquitous danger.” According to Dreyfus and Rabinow Foucault criticizes practices and ideals which he also shares to some extent, as he recognizes that he himself is a product of them (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, 124-125). He also distances himself these ideals and practices, but this doesn’t mean that he attempts to stand outside of them altogether: “The .. . step back that Foucault takes in order to see the strangeness of our society’s practices does not mean that he considers these practices meaningless” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1986, 115). Foucault works to criticize the current regime of truth from within as an exile, taking a critical step back from it while also retaining ties to it. But he does not just exile himself from these practices himself; he also uses language in such a way as to encourage such a distancing on the part of his readers as well: “[Foucault] uses language to shift what we see as our social environment” and “to articulate an understanding of our situation which moves us to action” (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1986, 114, 115). I have already described how this might take place, how Foucault seem to try to change how we view our present social ideals, values, practices, etc., so as to encourage us act, to modify what we now perceive as a “problem” and a “danger.” What I would like to emphasize here is that Foucault may be taking up a position of exile in his genealogical texts as a rhetorical strategy for inducing his readers to engage in their own process of selfexile. I will also discuss in detail how he may be read as using the language of his genealogies in order to accomplish this task. I take a cue from Bernstein’s description of Foucault’s “rhetoric of disruption,” but I explain Foucault’s rhetoric in more depth, and emphasize how Foucault acts as a “universal” intellectual in employing it while also distancing himself from this role. I focus on how by using rhetoric Foucault may incite his audience to engage in a movement of exile from previous habits of thought. Accordingly, I call the rhetorical strategy I find in Foucault’s genealogies that of “writing in exile.” To illustrate this strategy, it is helpful to summarize the main points of Foucault’s rhetoric as described by Bernstein, and to emphasize that Foucault seems to play the role of a “universal” intellectual in employing it while also working to undermine this role, to exile himself from it. We can describe the rhetorical strategy discussed by Bernstein as a kind of double movement: first, Foucault works to elicit responses from his readers that are based on their habitual modes of thought, and second, he then attempts to bring about the questioning, the unsettling of these modes of thought by the readers themselves. Throughout both of these movements, we can see Foucault acting as a kind of “universal” intellectual, as someone who has access to universal truths and who ought to be followed on account of this. He may be using this role as part of his rhetorical strategy, hoping to eventually bring his audience to question the “universal” intellectual role along with their habitual ways of thinking about the questions and issues at stake in particular genealogical histories. It appears, actually, that this may be one of the few strategies available to Foucault given what he seems to be trying to do with his rhetorical strategy. He claims that it is one his goals to bring his readers to a transformation in their thought through his texts, but he does not want to do so by telling them outright what they ought to think and do. How might he then elicit a change in his audience without forcing or compelling it? He would have to try to bring it about by relying on the movements of his readers themselves, by appealing to what will move them to question their own habitual modes of thought. In other words, rather than telling them to question or reject their usual beliefs, values, and ideals, Foucault may instead try to appeal to what is likely to provoke his audience to do this themselves. But this adds a problematic element to the process, because if Foucault’s texts are designed to elicit change in his readers, then before the latter go through this change they are likely to adhere strongly to the habitual beliefs targeted for change. This means that in order to provoke his readers to transform their own thought Foucault must comport himself in ways that they, in their habitual modes of thought, will listen to. In our current case, if we as readers are steeped in the present regime of truth with its emphasis on universal, absolute truths, values and ideals, then what is most likely to provoke us to change these (before they are changed) is an appeal to such notions themselves. If I am deeply enmeshed in the current regime of truth, and I read a text by Foucault or any other intellectual that does not make claims to the universal truths and ideals that I value, then I am not likely to pay much attention to it; and it will therefore not likely provoke me to change my thinking. Foucault’s task, then, seems to require that he play the part of a “universal” intellectual to some extent, making appeal to universal truths and values so that those who have not yet questioned these notions will listen to him and be moved to begin the process of questioning. He must use what appear to be universal truths to his audience because that is what they value previous to their transformation, that is what will move them to change. He must, therefore, use universal truths to induce others to question universal truths. Foucault may thus be said to play the role of a “universal” intellectual as a rhetorical device, for the purpose of eventually undermining it. Foucault may act like an “agent” of the regime of truth, but in so doing he also reveals himself to be working against this regime, as a “double agent.” To unravel Foucault’s status as an intellectual “double agent,” it is necessary first of all to trace how Foucault plays the role of a “universal” intellectual in the double movement of his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile,” before going on to show how he exiles himself from this role. Recall that Foucault’s genealogical texts provide a historical narrative that takes on the character of a presentation of “fact,” an accurate correspondence with events as they occurred “in reality.” This may be how many readers approach the texts at first steeped in traditional power relations between ourselves and intellectual writings, thinking that the latter provide us with the “truth,” we might expect Foucault’s genealogies to be “accurate” histories, and indeed they are presented as such. In this way, Foucault may be using his role as an “agent” of the regime of truth to present “historically verifiable truth” in his genealogies, which is necessary for their transformative capacity to be realized. We as readers must believe in these “facts” to enough of an extent that they manage to work the unsettling function for which they are designed, and in so doing we may be treating Foucault as an intellectual authority figure, as someone with access to the “facts.” In this sense, one might say that Foucault takes on the role of a “universal” intellectual who presents us with an objective view of the way events occurred “in reality.” Further, the historical “facts” in Foucault’s genealogies are presented in a highly normatively charged way (e.g., he shows the “dark ambiguities” in the construction of our current beliefs and values), seemingly for the purpose of eliciting in the audience a response based on their habitual values and ideals. For us as readers, this means that the way he tells his histories promotes (on the part of his readers) an appeal to liberal, Enlightenment ideals such as individual “rights,” “autonomy,” “liberation,” etc. In other words, Foucault seems to act as if he is utilizing our current, habitual normative framework to make value judgments regarding certain relations of power, practices, and discourses. Since the present normative framework (in the West) is centered around liberal, Enlightenment ideals that are thought to be universal and absolute, in appealing to these Foucault appears to take on the role of the “universal” intellectual. For example, Foucault seems to present a kind of traditional, liberal/Enlightenment criticism of the “disciplinary society” he reveals in Discipline and Punish, showing its dangers within an interpretive framework of rights, autonomy, liberation, etc. Nancy Fraser makes this point, arguing that “[i]f one asks what exactly is wrong with [the disciplinary] society, Kantian notions leap immediately to mind” (Fraser 1989 a, 30). I agree with Fraser that it seems the modem reader’s most immediate response to the “discipline” Foucault describes in this text is likely to involve appeal to notions such as “autonomy” to express what s/he feels is wrong with it. Reading about the ways in which modem societies in the West have and continue to “govern” individuals through methods of discipline and normalization, we may respond by appeal to the value of individual autonomy and how it is not being respected. But we might imagine that Foucault is writing deliberately so as to elicit responses based on such liberal ideals from his audience it is crucial that he bring out a response in his readers based on habitual ideals, so that these can then be disturbed. Foucault may therefore deliberately take on the role of an intellectual “agent” of the regime of truth to a certain extent in his genealogies, writing within the bounds of current normative structures so as to evoke current ideals in his readers and then coax their disturbance. We can see, then, how Foucault may be taking up the role of the “universal” intellectual in his genealogies to accomplish the first move of his rhetorical strategy, namely to provide a history with the character of “fact” and a normative tone that fits our habitual framework of values and ideals, in order to elicit in we readers a response based on these habitual modes of thought. He may be acting like the intellectual “spokesperson,” as if he knows “what is good/bad” and is passing this on to the rest of us in his genealogies. He may, therefore, take up the role of the “prophet” as a rhetorical device. It is possible that Foucault may have had to do this because it is what will get the attention of his “pre-transformation” audience, those who have not yet come to question their usual beliefs and ideals. By appealing to these, Foucault appears to such an audience as an intellectual worth listening to, as someone providing valuable, universal truth. He may also try to utilize this position in order to provoke his audience into changing their previous thoughts, to appeal to what seem to be universal truths because that is what they value and what might move them to change. Foucault might therefore be said to play the role of the “universal” intellectual in the second movement of his rhetorical strategy as well. The second movement of Foucault’s rhetorical strategy occurs when, having brought up habitual modes of thought in the reader, he then works to bring about their disturbance. For example, in Discipline and Punish Foucault both presents “historically verifiable facts” about the development of methods of punishment and discipline with a normative force that evokes liberal ideals, and he works to undermines these ideals as well. Our notion of an “autonomous” individual with “rights,” who can be “liberated” from repressive power, for instance, is unsettled when Foucault shows that this notion of the individual is a product of complex techniques of discipline and normalization. This means that the individual’s “rights” do not protect a realm of its life that is “liberated” from power, and that its actions and decisions are not, indeed, as “autonomous” as one might otherwise think. Foucault both invokes such liberal ideals in the readers of his genealogies, then, and works to bring about their disturbance. Looking at this second movement more closely, it seems that we readers may come to question our previous ideals because the historical narrative Foucault provides, to which we respond with appeals to liberal notions such as individual “autonomy,” is presented as the history of those ideals themselves. In other words, as we read about the disciplinary society whose history Foucault describes, we may criticize it because it doesn’t respect individual “autonomy” and “rights” individuals are too “governed” therein, we may think. But we may also come to realize that this history is presented by Foucault as the history of how those very ideals developed. Accordingly, we may be brought to question these ideals; though this would occur through appeal to these very ideals themselves. I might find, for example, the ideal of individual “autonomy” problematic because I have been presented with a history that shows it to have developed (and perhaps to be currently sustained) through processes that seem to violate “autonomy.” Summarizing the double movement in Foucault’s rhetoric, we can say that he first elicits habitual ideals and norms by presenting a historical narrative of “fact” that is also negatively charged in accordance with our habitual, normative framework; and he then works to bring about an unsettling of these common ideals and norms by revealing this narrative as a history of those very ideals themselves. The negative response the reader may have to the historical narrative based on his/her habitual norms and ideals is then turned upon the latter themselves. Notice that in the second movement of his rhetorical strategy, Foucault could still be read as playing the role of the “universal” intellectual. It appears that how he might bring his “pre-transformation” audience to question their habitual ideals is by convincing them that the history he has provided, the one he has presented as “accurate” and with a negative normative tone, is the “true” story of the development of those ideals themselves. In other words, to provoke his audience to want to change their usual beliefs, values and ideals, Foucault appeals to what might move them to do so in their “pre-transformation” state he acts as if he is giving them the truth about how their “most cherished” ideals developed and “what is good/bad” about them. 23 As a reader, I may come to question my previous ideals such as individual “autonomy” because I think I now have the real, true history of these ideals, and I perceive on the basis of this that these ideals are constructed and supported by practices of power that go against them. I may come to think that the notion of “autonomy” is possible only after “individuals” have been created and perpetuated through disciplinary power. But as a reader steeped in my habits of believing in universal truths and values, the only way I am likely to embark on this process of questioning is if I believe that Foucault has provided me with the objective, universal truth about the history of the ideals I am to question. If I thought this history was simply fabricated, I could dismiss it as a biased interpretation that I need not adhere to myself. But if I think it is the truth, I will be much more likely to take it to heart and question my previous ideals on the basis of it. In his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile,” then, Foucault could be said to take up the position of a “universal” intellectual in order to provoke his audience to question their habitual ways of thinking. In addition, Foucault’s rhetorical strategy may encourage his audience to question the role of the intellectual as prophet itself. In other words, we might say that Foucault plays the role of a “universal” intellectual prophet so that he can avoid taking up this role in a more fundamental and serious way. If this process works, he will have played the role of a prophet in order to encourage others to eliminate their (as quoted above) “call to prophetism.” Foucault will have used the position of a “universal” intellectual prophet in order to undermine it; and in this sense he could be said to play the prophet in order to avoid being a prophet. One might perhaps say, then, that Foucault operates in his genealogies as a “prophet in exile.” In order to understand how Foucault may be playing the prophet to avoid being one, consider how he may be distancing himself from the role of a “universal” intellectual while also occupying it in his genealogies. Through the double movement described above (if successful), he brings his readers to question the very ideals, values, and truths to which they appealed in response to his historical narrative, by presenting this narrative as the history of those ideals, values, and truths themselves. If the reader is thus brought to question concepts such as individual “autonomy” and “rights,” then, perhaps, s/he will become suspicious of Foucault’s own seeming appeal to such notions in his genealogical history. The thoughtful reader will likely suspect that there is something amiss, that Foucault himself can’t be in full support of the norms and values he seems to invoke in tracing the history of particular practices such as those of “discipline” and “normalization.” The reader may thus begin to question Foucault’s intellectual role: if he appeared to be a “universal” intellectual throughout the double movement of his rhetoric, then to the reader who has experienced this movement and thus come to question the beliefs and ideals to which he earlier made appeal, Foucault may seem to have provided truths that he also works to undermine (and that the reader him/herself is now questioning). As readers of Foucault’s genealogies, we may come to realize that he is not indeed acting as a full-fledged “universal” intellectual, that if he makes appeal to universal truth in his genealogies he also works to question and undermine these as well. If Foucault was thought to be an “agent” of the regime of truth before the reader undertakes the process of questioning their previous habits of thought, then afterwards he may seem to be a “double agent”: an agent who works against, rather than in support of, the universal truths that make up the current regime of truth. This may be enough, as Thomas Flynn puts it, to “cast suspicion” on Foucault’s role as a “universal” intellectual. The truths, norms and ideals Foucault invokes in his genealogies may be viewed by the “transformed” reader as historical constructions (and potentially dangerous ones), rather than being universal and timelessly valid. Accordingly, Foucault’s use of them in his genealogical history might then no longer put him in the position of a “universal” intellectual in the view of his readers. If the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” is successful, Foucault may manage to bring his readers to question not only their previous habits of thought but also the “universal” intellectual role that he employs as a means of inducing transformation in others. It seems clear that Foucault does play the role of a prophet to some extent, since he does indicate “what is good/bad” in the normative tone he takes in his historical narrative. The disciplinary society, as we have seen, is presented as “bad” in ways that seem to appeal to our current normative framework with its Enlightenment ideals. In that sense, Foucault may be said to act the prophet, since he appeals to universal ideals in order to tell us what to think about the disciplinary society. But if we as readers manage to go through the process of questioning such ideals by believing that they are the product of the methods of discipline thus revealed as “bad” by Foucault on the basis of those ideals, we may begin to suspect this prophecy that he offers. If Foucault indicates that the disciplinary society is “bad” on the basis of liberal ideals that he later seems to undermine and that we have been brought to question, then, we might ask, is he really offering us a universal prophecy about “what is good/bad”? Might he not then appear as a prophet, but one who is also an exile from the prophecies he presents a “prophet in exile”? According to this view of Foucault’s rhetorical strategy, we might say that he performs a movement of exile from the current regime of truth, thereby inducing his readers to do the same. I have argued that rather than trying to exit this regime, to move outside of current relations of power and the rules for truth they produce, Foucault occupies it while also questioning it, distancing himself from it. I have explained here that this may be at least in part a rhetorical strategy, that he may remain within the current regime of truth so as to be able to effectively induce its criticism in readers who are deeply enmeshed in it. He may distance himself from this regime by questioning it without leaving it, by questioning it within its own criteria for truth. His readers, if they are also engaged in the current regime, can perform this movement as well, without being told directly to do so because it does not require a different basis for questioning than that which they already possess. One might say, then, that as Foucault exiles himself from the regime of truth, his audience may do so as well. Since, as I have argued, he appears to play the role of a “universal” intellectual in this movement, it may be that his readers follow him in this exile movement as an authority, as one who they think ought to be followed. But once this is accomplished, they may be able to question Foucault’s prophecy in the way described above they may recognize that he is both utilizing and undermining universal truths, and is therefore not a purely “universal” intellectual prophet. They may then question the idea that he is someone to be followed due to his access to universal truths; they may see that the truths he invokes are constructed, and could be constructed differently. It may no longer appear as necessary to Foucault’s readers to follow him or other authority figures claiming universal truths, since these have come to be recognized as contingent and malleable rather than absolutes that ought to be respected. Once Foucault leads his readers to their exile, perhaps, they may be able to lead themselves. In summary, the intellectual as genealogist exiles him/herself from the current regime of truth with its emphasis on universal truths because s/he takes up a critical distance from it while yet remaining within it. The genealogist does not act purely as an “agent” of this regime, using such a position of power to spread and thereby perpetuate universal truths; but neither does s/he act against this regime from the outside, as if s/he has exited it entirely. If this intellectual exile did try to work from a position outside the regime of truth, s/he might simply end up perpetuating rather than undermining this regime. If, for example, Foucault tried to get his readers to question universal truths by refusing to speak any himself, as if he had effectively exited the regime of truth, might he not simply be interpreted as saying, in effect, that the truth about universal truths is that there are no such things, that they are all historical constructions? By trying to refuse entirely the role of a “universal” intellectual in this way, then, Foucault would simply reinstate it on the other side. Instead of telling us what to do from within the present regime of truth, he would be telling us what to do from a position of opposition to it “Be like me, refuse universal truths entirely because they are simply constructions, and dangerous ones at that.” By trying to exit the regime of truth and his/her role as “agent” of it, the Foucauldian intellectual, therefore, only manages to provide further support to both of these. Paradoxical as it may seem, it is by remaining within the current regime of truth, accepting his/her role as its “agent” and using its framework for truths and norms, that the Foucauldian intellectual has the best chance of encouraging others to undermine it. Foucault works within the current regime of truth by telling a story about the history of particular truth and value claims dominant therein. In so doing, he is actually trying to unsettle them from within by moving through and underneath them to present a story of their past from which he and his audience can emerge with a different view of them. Instead of standing outside of and in opposition to the concept of individual “autonomy,” for example, Foucault moves through it, from our present view of it into its past, thereby disturbing it from within. Recall that Foucauldian genealogy begins from the present, from what has meaning for us now; I would like to emphasize here that this means the Foucauldian genealogist moves through particular beliefs, values, and ideals to describe their past, rather than approaching their history from outside. S/he addresses their history from the perspective of the present, wherein they are already at work. I have argued that Foucault presents his historical narratives in a tone charged by our current normative framework, and that he may be doing this in order to incite his readers to respond to the narrative with their habitual beliefs and norms. But we can also see in this tactic that Foucault approaches the history of specific, current norms through the lens of those norms themselves. The narrative in Discipline and Punish of how the “individual” with its “rights” and “autonomy” were developed through disciplinary and normalizing practices is presented from the perspective of current norms, including these very ideals. Foucault does not try to bypass the current framework of norms and truths, the current regime of truth, but moves through particular aspects of it and gives a story of their history. He delves into them to reach beneath them to their past. In providing a narrative of this past, Foucault reveals the “fragility” of the particular truths or norms under discussion, how they developed in a specific context, through “accidents” and “failures.” This works to disturb what may have otherwise been considered timeless and absolute truths, by showing that they have instead been historically constructed in a highly contingent way. But notice that this process of disturbance is also dependent upon the current regime of truth -- it is only through the latter’s standards for truth that we might consider such an “accidental” history to be disturbing, to unsettle previous beliefs, values, ideals. Foucault admits in interviews that his genealogical histories are “fabrications,” that he tells his stories in particular ways in order to achieve a transformative effect. This effect, it seems, may be best achieved if he writes his histories from the perspective of the current regime of truth, which means that he writes as if they provide a “true” correspondence to the way events “really” occurred. This will allow him to move through our regime with its rules and standards for producing truth, adhering to these while also encouraging others to question them from within. By thus beginning from and remaining within (while also working to undermine) the present regime of truth, Foucault can potentially manage to provoke a disturbance of it in the thought of others. He shows that “what is” has not always been what it is, and by speaking of its past through the framework of “what is,” Foucault may be able to disturb it according to its own standards. This allows those among his audience who are still fully enmeshed in the current regime to question it by appeal to what they already know, without having to be provided with alternative standards by the intellectual. It allows them to stand back from their habitual mode of thinking and thereby create a space for new thoughts, new frameworks for rationality, truth, and value. We can therefore say that in his genealogies Foucault remains within the current regime of truth while also distancing himself from it - he moves through some of its particular claims to truth and value to tell the story of their past in a way that encourages others to question them from within. Diagnosing Foucault’s political intellectual I present Foucault’s “prophecy in exile” as a plausible interpretation of how he might have used a rhetorical strategy to play the role of a “universal” intellectual while also distancing himself from it. I do not wish to claim that he did, definitely, use this strategy consciously (since he does not mention it in interviews where he describes what he is trying to do). But I think there is evidence in his genealogies to support the claim that he does take on the “universal” intellectual role to some degree; and since he also criticizes this role, we might give this phenomenon a charitable, consistent interpretation by arguing that perhaps he takes it on as a rhetorical strategy while also “exiling” himself from it. This may seem a long way to go to be charitable to Foucault, and perhaps he himself did not view his intellectual maneuvers in this way. But I believe that this strategy fits the spirit of what Foucault does say he is trying to do, namely to induce others to change themselves without him telling them directly to do so, and to eliminate what he calls the “call to prophetism.” It seems that the above, admittedly complex, rhetorical strategy might be an intriguing and potentially fruitful way for a Foucauldian intellectual to accomplish such goals. S/he would then operate between prophecy and silence, acting the role of the “universal” intellectual prophet for the purpose of bringing others to question this role; encouraging others to think for themselves not by remaining silent, but by employing notions of universal truth strategically, to bring about their disturbance and his/her role as their “agent” as well. The way I have described this process, both Foucault and his audience end up as exiles who continue to inhabit the regime of truth even while questioning it. This is consistent with the idea that the Foucauldian intellectual can contribute to a “cure” for the regime of truth by encouraging others to engage in resistance: those who manage to become exiles after reading Foucault’s genealogies might then work to resist particular relations of power without exiting them. They might be able to resist them from a critical distance without trying to move outside of them entirely. Foucault’s readers may then become the resisting exiles discussed in Chapter Two. I argue in Chapter Four that for Foucault, the intellectual’s efforts can also contribute to a curative freedom in transforming others into resisting exiles: it can encourage them to practice freedom through resistance and thereby work to escape “poisonous” relations of power. But the exile position of Foucault’s readers may produce some problematic complications as well. As mentioned above, after becoming exiles they may no longer feel that they must follow intellectuals such as Foucault, since they would recognize that the universal truths such figures espouse are not the absolutes they appear to be. Noting that such claims are constructions, the reader as exile would likely feel less of a need to respect them and more of an ability to change them. But this need not mean that Foucault’s readers would eliminate their “call to prophetism” altogether, that they would quit looking to others entirely for answers as to what to think and to do. They might realize that they don’t have to do so, that others (such as Foucault) don’t necessarily have universal truths that must be followed; but they might still look to others for statements of contingent, constructed truths they might find helpful. Foucault’s rhetorical strategy seems meant to open a space for the creation of new modes of thought, newly-constructed views of truth, value, etc. Foucault’s readers might try to work to create these themselves, but why couldn’t they also elicit advice from others, such as intellectuals? If these readers have succeeded in becoming exiles, it seems, there would be little danger of them taking the intellectual’s suggestions as universal truths that must be followed - which may be a problem with intellectual advice given before exile. It seems that the Foucauldian intellectual as genealogist could offer helpful suggestions for newly-constructed modes of thought, as long as these were limited to specific circumstances and locales rather than “global” theories with the force of universal truth. Indeed, Foucault himself has at times seemed to offer alternative ways of thinking, such as when he suggests, at the end of The History of Sexuality Volume I, that we replace efforts to “liberate” sex in its truth with “the claims of bodies, pleasures, and knowledges, in their multiplicity and their possibility of resistance” (Foucault 1990 a, 157). 24 Critics have argued that in making this suggestion Foucault problematically appeals to notions of a “natural” or “prediscursive” body that is repressed by power, and that we can use as a source of resistance against it (Butler 1990, 93-106; Dews 1987, 161-170). Perhaps Foucault may have attempted to utilize such universal notions while also distancing himself from them, since this prescription appears within a genealogy that works precisely to question ideas such as a “natural” or “prediscursive” body. He may have tried to use his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” to tell others what to do while also maintaining a critical distance from this prescription and the universal notions of truth embedded within it. Still, the way that Foucault brings up the “multiplicity” of “bodies, pleasures, and knowledges” as a source of resistance in this text doesn’t seem to be efficacious in accomplishing this task, as the criticisms of some commentators suggest. Why Foucault seems to have failed to distance himself from his own appeal to a “natural” body in The History of Sexuality Volume lis not clear. In part, it may have to do with specific details regarding Foucault’s rhetorical strategy that I have not investigated here. It may also have to do with the general nature of this strategy -- its success or failure depends heavily on the particular responses of its audience. I have argued that in order to avoid telling others what they ought to think and do, Foucault acts as if he is doing so, acts like a “universal” intellectual while using this position to undermine his own prophecies and his role as a prophet. It seems that a number of things could go wrong with this process. First of all, it requires that the audience take Foucault (or the Foucauldian intellectual) seriously as a “universal” intellectual, as someone who has “the truth” and who ought to be followed. If this doesn’t occur, the audience is not likely to end up distancing themselves from their previous views on the basis of the genealogical history of them that Foucault presents. But of course, it need not necessarily be the case that Foucault’s readers do take him seriously as a “universal” intellectual with “the truth.” It could quite easily be that some of them view him as a “universal” intellectual who is attempting to provide “the truth,” but who has simply got it “wrong.” They might still consider him a prophet, then, but a “false” one a “false prophet” rather than a “prophet in exile,” an intellectual who attempts to provide universal truth but fails, rather than one who succeeds while also exiling himself from this truth and encouraging his audience to do the same. For them, the rhetorical strategy Foucault employs is not likely to work as I have described it. This problem speaks to one mentioned in Chapter One, namely that Foucault appears overly concerned with the modem intellectual’s status as an “agent” of the regime of truth, to the point of seeming to assume that most or all intellectuals will be treated as if they are presenting “the truth.” This may indeed be the case to the extent that many modem intellectuals are likely to be received as if they are at least attempting to provide claims to universal truth; but this is not the same as saying that intellectuals will be considered to have “the truth,” to have “got it right.” Indeed, it may often be the case that an intellectual’s audience treats them as a “false prophet.” If so, then Foucault’s worries about telling others what to think and to do may not be warranted in the strong sense in which he expresses them. It may not be so important that the intellectual refrain from saying “what must be done,” if it is not always extremely likely that others will take his/her commands seriously. There are other things that may go wrong with the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile.” It may be that some of the Foucauldian intellectual’s readers follow him to the point of questioning previous, habitual beliefs, but then get stuck in a kind of nihilistic despair due to a lack of alternatives. In other words, I may come to exile myself from some of my earlier beliefs and values, “casting suspicion” on them due to the history of them that Foucault presents in his genealogies. But I may then find myself lacking alternatives to replace these, and I may turn to Foucault himself and find little in the way of suggestions for different ways of thinking and acting. Clearly, Foucault’s hope is that I will find new ways of thinking on my own; but this may not be something I can immediately do, given my history as a product of the modem regime of truth with its “agents” (such as intellectuals) whose job is purportedly to provide me with such solutions and alternatives. I may manage, in other words, to exile myself from previous habits of thought, but may not get so far as to view Foucault’s role as a “universal” intellectual prophet with a critical eye. I may still treat him as if he has “the truth,” and look to him to provide it for me. It is likely in order to try to reduce such a “call to prophetism” that Foucault refuses to offer alternatives and solutions, leaving his audience with silence on this issue. But this strategy, I think, can easily backfire. What might happen if a “call to prophetism” is made to an intellectual like Foucault who remains silent in the face of it? It seems quite possible that, if others follow the intellectual to the point of questioning their previous beliefs and looking to him/her for alternatives, they might follow him/her in the refusal to proffer alternatives. In other words, if the intellectual remains entirely silent on the issue of “what must be done,” might it not be the case that some part of his/her audience, thinking the intellectual to have “the truth” on this issue, could think that the answer is, simply, nothing? Rather than leaving them “free” to decide solutions for themselves, the intellectual might therefore lead others into the silence upon which s/he insists. If the intellectual suggests nothing when others turn to him/her for solutions as a figure of authority and knowledge, it may well appear to them that, in “truth,” there’s nothing to be done. 25 It may seem that, according to the intellectual, things are “dangerous” and nothing can be done to make them any better. As lan Hacking points out, it may appear that Foucault would respond to the Kantian question, “For what may we hope?” with a simple reply of “Nothing,” thereby expressing a nihilist position (Hacking 1986 a, 39). Though Hacking himself rejects the idea that Foucault is a nihilist, not all commentators agree Michael Walzer (1986, 61), for example, asserts explicitly that Foucault puts forth a nihilist view by giving us no reason to hope that things can ever improve. Hacking argues that to accuse Foucault of nihilism is to misunderstand his views (Hacking 1986 a, 39-40), and I agree. But perhaps Foucault himself invites this interpretation through his own comportment as an intellectual. In refusing to say what must be done, he may give the impression that there is, indeed, nothing to be done. It may be that critics like Walzer are looking to Foucault as an intellectual with something to say about resolving the problems he points out in regard to power relations, and when Foucault remains silent on this issue, it may seem that this is because he thinks there is no good solution. It is significant that Walzer insists we still need “universal intellectuals,” intellectuals who suggest to us what we ought to do, despite Foucault’s claims that we do not (Walzer 1986, 66-67). Looking to Foucault as such an intellectual for an answer, then, perhaps Walzer interprets the latter’s silence as an expression of nihilism. Walzer, himself an intellectual, does not “follow” Foucault as an intellectual in this perceived nihilism but is instead critical of it. It is certainly possible for other readers to take this perceived nihilism seriously, however, and follow Foucault as an intellectual by taking it up for themselves. There are no doubt numerous ways that the strategy of “writing in exile” could fail; I have mentioned only two. First, the intellectual’s audience may not take him/her seriously as a “universal” intellectual with “the truth” but rather as a “false prophet,” and they therefore may not be brought to question their habitual modes of thought on the basis of the genealogical history the intellectual presents. Second, the intellectual’s audience may come to the point of questioning their previous ways of thinking but may not manage to take a critical view of the intellectual’s role as a prophet, may not consider him/her as a “prophet in exile” but rather as a “prophet” simpliciter who has “the truth” about what must be done. If this occurs, and the intellectual remains silent on the issue of “what to do,” his/her audience may think that “the truth” is that there is nothing to be done. In regard to both of these possible failures we can say something about Foucault’s refusal to give any indication of alternative ways of thinking or solutions as to what others ought to do. We can say first that this refusal is unnecessary, that it is not necessarily the case that intellectual prophecy will always or even for the most part be taken to be “the truth.” It does not seem crucial, then, that the intellectual maintain an utter refusal to provide alternatives or solutions in order to avoid telling others what they must do. They will not necessarily listen anyway. In addition, we can say that refusing to give such prophecy might actually be dangerous in itself. This refusal seems based on the worry that others will take the intellectual’s pronouncements as “the truth” and follow him/her as a prophet rather than coming up with new ways of thinking and acting on their own. But for those inclined to view the intellectual as a prophet who has “the truth” (rather than a “false prophet”) such silence need not lead to self-reliance in the creation of new alternatives and solutions. Indeed, for those who look to the intellectual for solutions and find only silence, it seems likely that they might interpret this response as “the truth” about what must be done they may think that the answer is “nothing,” and refuse to try to do anything as a result. Such an audience is not likely to engage in resistance as a “cure” for relations of power they find “poisonous.” We can see why Foucault’s refusal to prophesy might backfire in this way if we think of it as a negation or opposition of the intellectual role of “prophet” rather than an exile from it. In expressing an utter refusal, in saying “no” to intellectual prophecy, Foucault merely takes up a position on the “other side” of the prophet, as a “non-prophet.” I have argued that such oppositions manage mainly to support that which is opposed, by providing the negative “outside” needed for the “inside” to define and consolidate itself. Foucault himself recognizes that moving to the “other side” is not the most effective means of resistance in that it does little to change the general structure of that which is being resisted. One merely negates what one resists, leaving it intact by simply adding a “no” to it. Such a phenomenon is manifested in the way Foucault’s refusal to prophecy may simply be taken as more prophecy: he may be viewed as the prophet who simply says “no.” What would be more efficacious, it seems, would be for him to continue to be a “prophet in exile,” to act as a “universal” intellectual by presenting universal truths while also undermining them, exiling himself from them. Further, as I have indicated, it is not even clearly the case that Foucault lived up to his own claim that he provides no alternatives or solutions. Commentators such as Judith Butler, Peter Dews, and Nancy Fraser point out that Foucault’s “body language” seems to be offered at times as a kind of alternative mode of thought, one that can be used in efforts of resistance. 26 In addition, I have argued that Foucault acts the role of a prophet in his genealogies as a rhetorical strategy, playing at prophecy in order to undermine the truths he thus presents and his role as prophet in the process. It is not entirely clear why Foucault is so adamant about refusing to prophecy given that this refusal seems unnecessary, that it might backfire, and that it may not even describe his own work adequately. This utter refusal, this negation and opposition of the role of the prophet seems out of keeping with the movements of exile he otherwise exhibits in his genealogical texts. Foucault seems to tie his refusal to the issue of freedom in that he often accompanies his statements of opposition to prophecy with claims as to how others must be left free to decide what to do on their own (Foucault 1996 b, 262; 1991 b, 157, 172). This also brings in the question of intellectual authority and power, as it appears that Foucault does not want to coerce others through his relation of power with them as an intellectual. But the danger of coercion is not always there, since the intellectual’s audience might simply treat him/her as a “false prophet.” The relation of power between intellectual and audience under these particular circumstances doesn’t seem especially dangerous. Further, even if the intellectual does have a more “dangerous” relationship of power with his/her audience in that they do consider him/her to be a prophet with “the truth,” this situation is not necessarily so “bad” that the intellectual must always refuse to offer prophecies in the form of alternative ways of thinking and solutions as to what must be done. That this relation of power, like others, is dangerous does not mean it is necessarily bad, as Foucault himself insists. Indeed, I have argued that the danger involved in intellectual prophecy may be made worse by the refusal to prophecy instead of thereby eliminating the “call to prophetism,” the intellectual may simply reinforce it with his/her oppositional silence, making it appear as if s/he is the prophet who simply says “no.” The question of freedom is not well-addressed by intellectual silence either. For Foucault, freedom does not come about when one is completely “free” from limitations, from constraints. Rather, freedom is something one practices through efforts at resistance, by resisting limitations experienced within relations of power. 27 In order to allow his readers the freedom to decide what to think and to do, then, it is not necessary (given his own view of freedom) for Foucault to try to avoid placing any limits on this decision by offering suggestions that may be backed up by intellectual authority, that may involve a relation of power. Foucault admits that what is crucial in political struggle is to try to operate “with as little domination as possible” (Foucault 1996 e, 447); but to say this is not to say that one must work with as little power as possible, since a relation of power is not the same as a relation of domination. If the intellectual prescribes solutions or alternatives, s/he may perpetuate a certain relation of power, but this need not necessarily be oppressively constraining or coercive to the point of domination. The point is not to eliminate limits on others through relations of power, but to leave open the possibility of their resisting such limits. It is possible that Foucault insisted on his refusal to play the prophet in order to counter misinterpretations of his work. We have already seen in Chapter One how he argues that some of his readers treat him as a prophet, how Madness and Civilization was interpreted as presenting an “anti-psychiatry” position and how Foucault attributes this to a “call to prophetism” on the part of his audience (Foucault 1996 f, 380). There are a number of other places where Foucault complains about the ways his work has been misread, several of which could be described as misinterpretations that may be the result of a “call to prophetism”: There is hardly any relationship between what I have actually said and the things [some communists] attribute to me. . . . For example, a naturalistic conception of desire was attributed to me: enough to make you split your sides with laughter. (Foucault 1996 b, 257) [The communists] have reduced everything I said to the simple form of the Panopticon, which was only one element of my analysis. . . . [They have also reduced] the analyses of the technologies of power to a kind of metaphysics of Power with a capital P, by which technology is led back to a dualism in which the things confronted are this Power and the silent, deaf resistance to it... . (Foucault 1996 b, 258-259) [Y]ou know all too well, that they’ve made me into the melancholy historian of prohibitions and repressive power, someone who recounts history according to two categories: insanity and its incarceration, anomaly and its exclusion, delinquence and its imprisonment. (Foucault 1996 d, 215) In these quotes there is the sense that Foucault feels he has been misinterpreted by having his ideas forced into conceptions of power, repression, desire, etc. that he works to criticize. In the case of the first two quotes, Foucault is focusing on a particular audience (some members of Communist parties, in France and elsewhere) who may have specific reasons for interpreting his work in the way they do. 28 In the last quote, Foucault doesn’t identify the “they” to which he refers it seems to be a catch-all for something like the group of readers who misinterpret him in this way. I think it is important to note that the way in which they read him tends to put him into a kind of “universal” intellectual category: they interpret his work as focusing on “prohibitions” and “repressive power,” and as championing that which is opposed to and repressed by this kind of power (e.g., “insanity,” “anomaly,” “delinquence”). The “communists” to which Foucault refers in the first two quotes also put him into a “universal” intellectual position, as someone who holds a “naturalistic conception of desire,” who provides a “metaphysics of Power with a capital P.” It is the “universal” intellectual, the producer of ahistorical and universal truths who would tend to think of power as repressive, as opposed to some realm of “nature” that lies entirely outside of it. It is this intellectual who would theorize a metaphysics of what power “really is,” universally and absolutely. It is possible that part of the reason why Foucault’s work is misinterpreted in this way is because his audience expects him, as an intellectual, to provide universal truths as an “agent” of our modern regime of truth. It may be that Foucault sensed this possibility, and chose to insist so strongly that he does not act as a prophet in order to try to counter such misreadings. He may have thought he was being treated by his readers as a serious prophet rather than a “prophet in exile,” thus perhaps leading him to claim, at the other extreme, that he was not prophesying at all. If this is the case, of course, it means that he ended up telling his audience even more strongly what they ought to do “Don’t treat me as a prophet!” Once again, by taking up a position of utter negation in regard to prophecy, Foucault may have simply dug himself even deeper into the role of an intellectual prophet. Foucault laments in an interview that he is in a double-bind in regard to misinterpretations of his work. He admits that to try to counter distortions means telling his readers what to think; but that he also does not want to simply let the distortions stand: Here we have a real problem: should one enter the fray and respond to each of these distortions, and, consequently, give the law to readers, which I am loath to do, or allow the book to be distorted into a caricature of itself, which I am equally loath to do? (Foucault 1996 a, 454) This is an important dilemma, and it does seem problematic for Foucault to “give the law to readers” by telling them how to read his books, especially when he insists that there is no “law of the book”: “The only law is that there are all manner of possible readings. I don’t see any major inconvenience if a book, being read, is read in different ways” (1996 a 453). Yet there clearly is at least one such inconvenience for Foucault, since it is only a few lines later that he says he is “loath” to let a book of his “be distorted into a caricature of itself.” To respond to the inconvenience of misinterpretation by telling readers not to treat him as a prophet is for Foucault to simply uphold and perpetuate his status as a prophet. By refusing to say what others must think and do, he continues to give such commands trying to get “outside” of prophecy only ensures that one remains within it. Indeed, we can see that Foucault’s refusal to say what others should think may be in part due to his efforts to ensure that his audience think a certain way about his own work. In other words, he may refuse to tell his audience what to think out of a desire to tell them what to think. There is manifested here one way in which the attempt to exit prophecy through negation does not work to take one beyond it. There is also the issue of Foucault telling other intellectuals what they ought to do this might seem to be a questionable practice, if Foucault continues to insist that he does not tell others what to think and do. The relationship between intellectuals is of course importantly different than that between intellectuals and “the masses,” the power relations in the two cases cannot be treated as exactly the same. But, to the extent that Foucault, as a prominent intellectual, is telling other (perhaps less prominent) intellectuals what to do, this puts him in a position that may be “dangerous” enough to warrant worries similar to those Foucault seems to express in regard to the relation between intellectuals and their (non-intellectual) audiences. Wouldn’t it seem that he ought to problematize his own prophecies to other intellectuals, as well as to “the masses,” given his refusal of intellectual prophecy? I believe that Foucault’s practice of prescribing a political role for himself and other intellectuals is not necessarily problematic, for reasons similar to why I have argued that his prescriptions to non-intellectuals need not be considered problematic. I do not think it was necessary for Foucault to engage in an utter refusal of prophecy and prescription; indeed, this strategy may even be dangerous as it can manage to simply dig him deeper into the prophecy he tries to refuse. It would have been better for Foucault to continue in his role as a “prophet in exile” rather than attempting to be a “non-prophet,” since the latter does not help him escape prophecy but lodges him further into it. Whereas the “prophet in exile” provides prescriptions that s/he also works to undermine, presenting them with a critical distance that encourages others to question them, the “non-prophet” does not manage such a movement of exile, either for him/herself or for others. By saying “no” to prescribing solutions and alternatives, Foucault (and the Foucauldian intellectual) end up giving prescriptions without a critical movement of distancing, of exile. Foucault’s claims that he does not act like a prophet are given as simple statements of “the truth,” as prescriptions for how others ought to think of his work which he does not himself then work to criticize or undermine. He may, indeed, see such statements as providing a “law to readers,” and he may think of this as a “real problem”; but he continues to repeat them in many interviews without engaging in the process of questioning them. The Foucauldian intellectual as a “prophet in exile” is in a precarious position. I argued in Chapter One that the figure of the exile may exhibit a tendency to try to move completely “outside” that from which s/he is exiled, that s/he may want to try to exit entirely that from which s/he maintains a critical distance. Edward Said argues that the intellectual exile experiences a perpetual state of “restlessness,” since s/he is neither “at home” in the discourse, practice, or society from which s/he is exiled, nor has s/he entirely left it to establish a “home” someplace new (Said 1994, 53). Such restlessness may result in a desire to find stability in one place or the other, and the intellectual may therefore attempt to either give up his/her exile and revert back to being a full inhabitant of that from which s/he had earlier taken distance, or s/he may try to find a home in a stable “outside” of negation and refusal. Both of these attempts end up in approximately the same place, however, as the dream of a pure “outside” cannot be attained, and those who endeavor to do so manage to merely uphold and support the “inside” they refuse. We can therefore interpret Foucault’s refusal of prophecy as a symptom of his status as an intellectual exile, as an attempt to find stability in the “restlessness” of his position between prophecy and silence. He may have hoped to achieve stability at least in the way his readers interpret his works, by telling them he is not, and must not be read as, a prophet. Though such a yearning for and effort to reach an impossible “outside” may be a symptom of intellectual exile, however, it is likely not to produce the kind of results for which Foucault appeared to hope. He clearly did not think it was the role of the intellectual to tell others what to think and to do, yet by refusing to do so he manages to do so all the same. I have argued that it is by playing the prophet that the Foucauldian intellectual can best avoid being a prophet; and Foucault did not always manage to fulfill this role. It is through the role of a “prophet in exile” that the Foucauldian intellectual can best contribute to the “cure” for the “poison” of the regime of truth. In order to show most clearly why this is the case, it is necessary to consider in some detail what this “cure” involves. I have suggested that it has to do with efforts at resisting relations of power deemed “poisonous” by those living within them, but I have not yet explained carefully how the intellectual as genealogist and “prophet in exile” can contribute to such efforts. For Foucault, the political role of the intellectual has much to do with promoting freedom, and examining the kind of freedom to which he refers will help elucidate how the intellectual can contribute to a “cure.” 14 This last quote comes from Foucault’s own description in an interview of precisely what he does not say in his books (Foucault 1996 b, 262). I argue, however, that in some sense he does actually say something like this in his genealogies, though he also undermines such a prescription in a way that seems designed to get his readers to question it as well. 15 This is the label given by Richard Bernstein to the rhetorical strategy he finds in Foucault’s genealogies (Bernstein 1994, 222-226). I cannot, of course, claim to know precisely what Foucault was trying to do with his texts; my claim here is rather that it is possible to interpret Foucault’s genealogies as if he were taking up this kind of intellectual position. Whether or not Foucault himself meant to utilize the rhetorical strategies discussed below, one can tease them out of his texts. Further, the intellectual who did deliberately use these strategies would, I think, be following the spirit of Foucault’s claims regarding the intellectual’s political role. It is by acting as a “prophet in exile,” I will argue, that Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual can best work to modify the thought of themselves and others, without telling them explicitly that they ought to do so and how. 17 As I argue below, I think that Foucault may actually utilize the role of a “universal” intellectual prophet rhetorically, that he may take it up as a ruse designed to encourage his audience to question this very role. 1 argues that efforts at “liberation” from power are not the most effective means of resistance, as they tend to work to uphold the power relations one hopes to be “liberated” from. I explain why this is the case in Chapter Four. 19 It is important to note that, as I will argue, the result of such a questioning of my previous beliefs (such as a belief in the liberatory potential of projects of liberation) need not be thought of as a rejection of those beliefs. Rather, the efforts of the intellectual exile can be seen as resulting in an exile from previous habits of thought on the part of the intellectual’s audience. In other words, I may end up questioning my previous beliefs, looking at them with a critical eye; but this is not the same as rejecting them entirely. Thus, for example, if I come to question the liberatory potential of efforts at liberation, this need not mean I am trying to reject liberation entirely, thereby “liberating” myself from it. If I tried to do so, I may find myself in a problematic spiral I may recognize that my efforts to “liberate” myself from liberation are not, themselves, liberating either. I will argue that the intellectual exile can be read as leading others into an exile from their own habits of thought, bringing them to question these without trying to negate or exit them entirely. In the absence of alternatives to present principles and values governing political struggle, we must continue to appeal to the standards of rationality and justice that are available to us within the specific contexts in which we Of course, I may not even end up questioning my ideals in the way described above as a result of reading Foucault’s genealogies. The process of disruption discussed here is presented as a possible reaction to Foucauldian genealogy only, one that Foucault seemed to hope would occur, but that is not guaranteed. It is quite certainly possible that I will read Foucault’s genealogies with my previous ideals remaining intact throughout. As a reader of Foucault’s genealogies, however, I may indeed land in what Flynn calls the “selfdefeating” position of such a radical rejection: realizing that the basis upon which I criticize ideals such as “liberation” crucially involves these ideals themselves, I may want to undergo a “second order” criticism of this basis. I may then find, however, that I have nothing to which to appeal to do so if I don’t want to use ideals I feel I ought to be criticizing. I may feel defeated, lost, and try to simply reject my previous ideals altogether in a gesture of utter nihilism, for lack of perceived alternatives. This, I think, is a real danger; and the fact that Foucault himself has been read as a nihilist might be considered testimony to it. 22 I have yet to address carefully the question of the efficacy of such a movement of exile i.e., what can it accomplish? In Chapter Four I argue that it might facilitate a practice of resistance, thereby allowing for the possibility of an escape from current relations of power that cannot be accomplished by trying to exit them directly. 23 While I have already noted that Foucault seems to present “facts” that correspond to events in their “reality,” I am here emphasizing that he also presents the historical narrative as a similarly “accurate” and valid way to string these events together, to provide a history that “corresponds” to the past development of particular ideals, specifically. 24 1 consider this suggestion in detail in Chapter Four. I argue that looking at this prescription within the context of Foucault’s role as an intellectual exile helps to resolve some of the problems commentators have raised in regard to it. 25 I would like to thank my colleague Matthew Evans for suggesting this point. 26 Butler (1990, 93-106); Dews (1987, 161-170); Fraser (1989 c In Chapter Four I discuss Foucault’s “body language” and the problems Butler, Dews and Fraser cite in regard to it. 27 For Foucault, freedom is something one does rather than something one attains —it consists in a practice of resistance against relations of power one finds too constraining. Freedom does not reside in being “free” from limits or constraints, but in working to try to change them and thereby effect an escape from being governed “that way.” I discuss Foucauldian freedom in detail in Chapter Four. 28 Foucault claims it is because they are so focused on finding an enemy to condemn so as to bolster their own position (see the entire interview entitled “Clarifications on the Question of Power” (Foucault 1996 b)). But there may be other reasons for their interpretations as well, including what I describe below as an expectation of universality on the part of the intellectual. Chapter Four Curative Freedom I Real Freedom: The Dangers of Liberation The Foucauldian intellectual may be able to contribute to the “cure” for the “poison” of the regime of truth through something like the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile,” by playing the role of a “prophet in exile.” This strategy may not always be successful, as there are a number of things that could go wrong. But if it is successful, what kind of “cure” might be likely to result? Foucault indicates that the intellectual can contribute to the freedom of his/her audience, though the kind of freedom to which he refers is a somewhat complex one that warrants an in-depth discussion. Foucault claims that since we are always able to struggle and resist power relations, leading to their transformation, “we are always free” (Foucault 1996 n, 386). The freedom to which he refers here seems to involve at least a perpetual possibility for resistance. This is the kind of freedom he attributes to subjects enmeshed in power relations, for “[p]ower is exercised only over free subjects,” subjects who are free in the sense that they are “faced with a field of possibilities” for action (Foucault 1983 b, 221). This is not a freedom from power relations or the oppression involved in domination, but is instead a kind of freedom to do something that might change these. This is a “freedom of choice” of a sort, since it involves the freedom to choose to acquiesce or to resist, and to do either in a variety of ways. But it couldn’t be said that one’s choice is “completely free” in the sense of being undetermined, since the alternatives are made possible by the particular power relation in which one is enmeshed. Also, one’s freedom of choice may be constrained in the sense that one may not be aware of, or may not see the need for, the possibility of resisting. It is not the idea of a “freedom of choice” that is most significant here, however rather, for Foucault it is the freedom to make changes that is crucial. It is this freedom which ensures that we are not “trapped” within a particular relation of power. But there is more to freedom than simply the possibility for resistance: to be free, for Foucault, it seems we must also practice resistance. It is not enough that the potential for resisting exists, our freedom requires also that we take up this possibility and engage in active resistance. Foucault describes freedom as a “practice,” explaining that it is an ongoing process: I do not think that there is anything that is functionally by its very nature absolutely liberating. Liberty is a practice. So there may, in fact, always be, a number of projects whose aim is to modify some constraints, to loosen, or even to break them, but none of these projects can, simply by its nature, assure that people will have liberty automatically: that it will be established by the project itself. The liberty of men is never assured by the institutions and laws that are intended to guarantee them. . . . because “liberty” is what must be exercised. (Foucault 19960, 339; italics mine) Liberty for Foucault is not something that is established by one “project” or another, by one revolution or another; it is a “practice” that continues in various areas within various relations of power modifying, loosening, or even breaking oppressive constraints. Such resistance will bring forth new power relations, however (in the “agonism” of power and resistance, as discussed in Chapter Two), and new resistances as practices of freedom may be required in turn. The activity of resistance is a practice of freedom or liberty in Foucault’s sense, as “that which must be exercised.” I begin this chapter by discussing in depth the practice of freedom that the intellectual may be able to promote as an antidote to the “poisonous traces” within the present regime of truth, contrasting this freedom with projects of “liberation” that Foucault criticizes as less effective. I then explain, by reference to some of Foucault’s writings on Kant, how it is that the intellectual as a “prophet in exile” may be able to promote freedom as a practice of resistance. I conclude by considering a number of objections that critics have brought against Foucault’s conception of freedom, and I work to resolve them by reference to his political role as an intellectual exile. The practice of freedom In an essay entitled “What is Enlightenment?” Foucault refers to what he calls the “work of freedom,” linking it to “the possibility of no longer being, doing, or thinking what we are, do, or think” (Foucault 1997 d, 125-126). John Rajchman calls this kind of freedom our “real freedom,” and argues that it is central to Foucault’s work: [O]ur real freedom does not consist either in telling our true stories and finding our place within some tradition or ethical code, in completely determining our actions in accordance with universal principles .... We are, on the contrary, “really” free because we can identify and change those procedures or forms through which our stories become true, because we can question and modify those systems which make (only) particular kinds of action possible, and because there is no “authentic” self-relation we must conform to. (Rajchman 1985, 122) This “real freedom” is one where constraints and limits in relations of power are capable of being questioned and modified, where we are free because we can choose to resist these limits and attempt to change them. But freedom requires not just the potential for resistance, it also requires its practice: according to Rajchman, our “real freedom” lies in “rebelling against those ways in which we are already defined, categorized, and classified” (1985, 62). We live within various relations of power that work to define us in multiple ways, and we practice our freedom when we resist these definitions and the limits they place on us. But this is not to say that the practice of freedom is aimed at getting rid of all limits, at reaching a state of total absence of constraint in which one will finally be “free.” For Foucault liberty is “what must be exercised” the point is not to resist in order to realize later a state of freedom, but rather to exercise continually the freedom we already have now. This exercise of freedom occurs variously in a multiplicity of times and places, it is a practice of rebelling against classifications and limits that is, in Rajchman’s words, “extremely concrete” and therefore cannot be made into some kind of revolutionary goal: Such noncompliance in concrete situations of power is not something we can abstract and institute in a new form of life. It is specific and unpredictable, not universal and grounded. Foucault thinks freedom should not be analyzed as an ideal form of life .... Thus his critique is designed to sharpen revolt but not to institute a new society. (Rajchman 1985, 93) In other words, according to Rajchman Foucault is not driving towards a “new form of life” where there are no limits and we are all finally free. Instead, we have the potential for an exercise of freedom already in that the power relations that work to limit us multiple, concrete, and specific ways can be resisted and changed. For Rajchman, then, Foucault’s work provides a “philosophy of endless revolt” (Rajchman 1985, 93): It is a critique which does not attempt to fix the foundations for knowledge, to provide theory with a justification, or to defend Reason, but to occasion new ways of thinking. .. . It. . . sees freedom not as the end of domination or as our removal from history, but rather as the revolt through which history may constantly be changed. Foucault’s philosophy is ... . occasion, spark, challenge. ... it always remains without an end. (1985, 123) Foucault emphasizes freedom as a practice of revolt through which change can occur, a “challenge” of existing power relations and their truth-effects; but Foucault does not argue that through such a revolt we can reach some sort of ideal end state. Instead, Rajchman argues, the point is to engage in a continual process of questioning and reworking the truth: “[Foucault’s] is not a programmatic philosophy, but instead makes a virtue of change, endless rethinking, fundamental questioning” (1985, 98). Foucault himself supports this view when he expresses reservation about describing freedom in terms of “liberation.” In an interview from 1984 Foucault explains why he finds projects of “liberation” problematic: It is easy to see already one reason why this idea of liberation as a release from “repression” and a return to an original “nature” should, according to Foucault, be scrutinized. For Foucault the individual and his or her “true nature” are not something simply repressed by power, but also produced by it. Foucault makes It is easy to see already one reason why this idea of liberation as a release from “repression” and a return to an original “nature” should, according to Foucault, be scrutinized. For Foucault the individual and his or her “true nature” are not something simply repressed by power, but also produced by it. Foucault makes this clear: “[t]he individual is not to be conceived as a sort of elementary nucleus, a primitive atom . . . upon which power comes to fasten or against which it happens to strike, and in so doing subdues or crushes individuals”; instead, the individual is one of the “prime effects” of power (Foucault 1980 h, 98). Thus it is easy to see why he would be wary of projects of liberation which tend towards a goal of releasing some kind of human “nature” from power as a repressive force, without considering the implication of power in the production of this “nature.” But there is another, related reason for Foucault’s reservation, one that is somewhat subtly stated in the 1984 interview cited above. After acknowledging that liberation can indeed occur as when “a colonized people attempts to liberate itself from its colonizers,” which, he says, “is indeed a practice of liberation in the strict sense” - Foucault provides another reason for caution: But we know very well, and moreover in this specific case [of the colonized people], that this practice of liberation is not in itself sufficient to define the practices of freedom that will still be needed if this people, this society and these individuals are to be able to define admissible and acceptable forms of existence or political society. 1 (Foucault 1996 e, 433) Part of the problem expressed here is that liberation from constraint is not enough. Foucault explains later in the interview that liberation may be an important first step, especially when one is living within “states of domination” that provide little room for resistance. In such cases, he explains, liberation can be necessary as the “political or historical condition for a practice of freedom” (1996 e 434). But it is not enough: Foucault claims it is mistaken to think that by “getting rid 0f... prohibitions, in other words, by liberating oneself... the problem gets resolved,” because “this completely misses the ethical problem of the practice of freedom: how can one practice freedom?” (1996 e 434). In other words, liberation from constraint can pave the way, so to speak, for a “practice of freedom,” but the latter is something different than this notion of lifting prohibitions. There is something to the practice of freedom that projects of liberation, by themselves, don’t reach. A “practice of freedom” seems to involve the kind of resisting of limits described by Rajchman, the revolt against and transformation of the ways in which we are categorized and defined. Foucault offers another example of how “liberation” is not enough, and his explanation of why this is the case suggests that the practice of freedom has to do with the ability to resist and redefine the way we are “governed”: [D]oes it make any sense to say, “Let’s liberate our sexuality”? Isn’t the problem rather that of defining the practices of freedom by which one could define what is sexual pleasure and erotic, amorous and passionate relationships with others? (Foucault 1996 e, 433) This indicates that the real issue in regard to freedom is not simply liberating something called “our sexuality,” but rather considering how we might “define what is sexual pleasure and erotic . . . relationships with others.” The “sexuality” we work to liberate may be implicated in problematic practices of power, something that power creates rather than simply represses. This also means that there is a deeper way in which we could exercise our freedom not just to liberate a sexuality already conceived as something “repressed,” but also to choose to redefine, reform, transform our views of sexual pleasure and sexual relationships. Something similar could be said in the example of the liberation of the colonized population from their colonizers Foucault asserts that in this case liberation is not enough, that further practices of freedom are necessary in order that, as quoted above, this newly-freed population be able to “define admissible and acceptable forms of existence or political society.” In other words, the formerly colonized must not only liberate themselves from previous constraints, but also practice their freedom in re-defining themselves and their society in ways that they find more acceptable. If they do not exercise freedom in this way but stop at simple liberation, it is implied here, they might actually repeat certain problematic aspects of the previous power relations which worked to produce the selves that they are attempting to liberate. To use Rajchman’s terminology, our “real freedom” for Foucault is not simply a matter of liberation from constraints and prohibitions. If we stop there, we may simply liberate products of power that could conceivably work to repeat some of its dangerous aspects. The picture of freedom presented by Foucault is one where we are perpetually vigilant, knowing that “everything is dangerous,” and working to resist relations of power we find poisonous. Jon Simons characterizes Foucault’s view of power, resistance, and freedom as an “ethic of permanent resistance.” Referring to the vigilance required by the knowledge that “everything is dangerous,” Simons argues that Foucault calls for an endless resistance: The incessant activism that such vigilance calls for is the engagement of agonal subjects who seek not the end of struggle, but the liberty of participating in it. They forego the hope and comfort that there is some safe haven external to power relations, as this vision is no more than a mirage. . . . Our fight is our freedom .... (Simons 1995, 87) Simons here presents a view of Foucauldian “real freedom” as a participation in struggles of resistance, as a “fight” against relations of power. I agree that Foucault’s view of freedom involves a kind of endless resistance to relations of power that we find problematic, but it must be remembered that for Foucault not all relations of power are “bad,” and thus we will not be resisting everything, all of the time. Some power relations may not call for resistance at all. But to the extent that “everything is dangerous,” it does make sense to speak of an endless questioning and resistance, a permanent readiness to rethink and reform relations of power if and when they are determined to be poisonous. Foucault’s notion of freedom is a dynamic one it is not something that awaits us after all constraints, all domination and oppression have ended; it is rather something that we practice, it is something exercised, something that we do. For Foucault, we practice freedom when we find ways to resist problematic relations of power, when we exercise our ability to fight and thereby transform them. Foucault also speaks of freedom inhering in the exercise of “thought,” where thought is defined in a particular way: quite different from the domain of attitudes that can determine this behavior. Thought is not what inhabits a certain conduct and gives it meaning; rather, it is what allows one to step back from this way of acting or reacting, to present it to oneself as an object of thought and to question it as to its meaning, its conditions and its goals. Thought is freedom in relation to what one does, the motion by which one detaches oneself from it, establishes it as an object, and reflects on it as a problem. (Foucault 19961, 421) Thought, in this context, is a specific kind of mental process whereby one takes a step back from one’s actions and mode of behavior in order to isolate them as objects of contemplation. In so doing, one is able to question these actions and their meaning, to think about the beliefs and attitudes that underlie them, to consider them “as a problem” rather than simply performing them without reflection. For Foucault, this process of detachment is a practice of freedom, a “freedom in relation to what one does” because with thought and reflection one can exercise one’s ability to choose to continue with the action or behavior or to change it. Through thought, “what one does” becomes a problem, a question rather than an unthinking activity. This is a practice of freedom because it allows one to become aware of alternative courses of action, to recognize why the present one might be problematic (if it is), and to choose to change it if necessary. Thought would appear to be necessary for the practice of resistance, an integral part of exercising one’s capacity for transgressing limits and transforming relations of power. Freedom, then, could be said to begin with thought and develop into resistance if necessary: upon reflection one might find that some of the power relations to which one is subject call for resistance, and that “what one does” does not do enough to resist. In some cases, perhaps, the exercise of freedom may end with thought alone, as one may find that resistance is not necessary at the time. Freedom can be practiced not only by acting to resist, but also by thinking about the possibility that one could do so, asking oneself whether, when and how it might be necessary. This view of freedom as thought displays the quality of the exile. In exercising one’s freedom of thought in relation to “what one does,” one takes a step back from one’s own actions, beliefs, attitudes and values in order to reflect upon them. One is detaching oneself from oneself, exiling oneself from one’s own mental processes and outward activities. It is not possible to fully step outside oneself, of course, and one may not even be able to completely separate from a certain set of beliefs and attitudes - since these may be connected to and supported by others that one does not isolate for reflection. This practice of freedom, then, could be considered one of self-exile. One does not escape from oneself entirely, and thus one does not escape from all of the ways in which one has been produced as an “individual” through relations of power. This is not a freedom whereby one becomes free from all effects of power. One may not even escape the effects of the particular relations of power one decides to resist while making this decision some of the beliefs and values that one uses to reflect upon others that one has isolated may themselves be products of the very relations of power that one decides, through this process of thought, to resist. In a way similar to the practice of resistance, thought may be exiled from particular relations of power and the truths they produce without fully escaping them, but this does not mean that it is “trapped.” Through thought one can distance oneself from certain relations of power, from the beliefs and values they produce as “true,” without fully exiting these; and through the means of this exile one can work to effect their transformation. We can already see how the Foucauldian intellectual might contribute to practices of freedom through thought and resistance, since s/he works to encourage a self-exile on the part of his/her audience through a strategy of “writing in exile.” If this strategy is successful, the intellectual can manage to bring his/her audience to take a critical view of their habitual ways of thinking about particular issues a movement similar to that described here as “thought.” The intellectual “prophet in exile,” then, can encourage others to engage in the process of thought that forms part of the practice of freedom. The exiles thereby produced can then decide if they find the relations of power that support their previous beliefs and knowledges “poisonous” enough to be resisted, and can attempt to engage in resistance in their own ways if they deem it necessary. Before carefully addressing the contribution of the Foucauldian intellectual to the practice of freedom, however, it is helpful to consider Foucault’s view of freedom in more detail in order to reveal the goal which the intellectual can help to reach. For this purpose I turn to a discussion of the first volume of The History of Sexuality, where Foucault explains in depth the problems associated with “projects of liberation” by considering the example of sexual liberation. He describes how it is that attempts to achieve freedom through the liberation of sexuality manage to work in support of, rather than against, relations of power that are productive instead of simply repressive. He also offers a brief and contentious suggestion of how resistance to the power that governs sexuality might be better achieved. I discuss both of these points in order to further elucidate why, for Foucault, our “real freedom” does not involve a “project of liberation,” and what it might entail instead. Sexual Liberation The first volume of Foucault’s History of Sexuality presents an overview of a-proposed series of studies that will form a genealogy of “sexuality.” Sexuality, Foucault argues, is something produced, a “historical construct”: Sexuality must not be thought of as a kind of natural given which power tries to hold in check, or as an obscure domain which knowledge tries gradually to uncover. It is the name that can be given to a historical construct: ... a great surface network in which the stimulation of bodies, the intensification of pleasures, the incitement to discourse, the formation of special knowledges, the strengthening of controls and resistances, are linked together, in accordance with a few major strategies of knowledge and power. (Foucault 1990 a, 105-106) According to Foucault the genealogy of sexuality will be a historical study of the development of “the regime of power-knowledge-pleasure that sustains the discourse on human sexuality in our part of the world” (1990 a 11). Sexuality, as it is currently understood in the West, is for Foucault a complex field of discourses, knowledges, pleasures, and power relations that encompass not just sexual acts but also the pleasures and desires that surround and incite them, the fantasies and dreams that can accompany them or substitute for them, the effects on the individual body and social relations that can result from them, and various other aspects of individual and collective life that contribute to the production of true discourses about sex. Foucault argues that these different elements contribute to a “scientific” discourse about sex, a scientia sexualis (1990 a 67-68). In the first volume of The History of Sexuality, Foucault states that his research for the series of volumes will focus on the development of this science of sexuality beginning with the Christian ritual of confession from which its techniques for producing the truth of sex seem to have their roots through the deployment of new techniques in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, to the present manifestations of “mechanisms of knowledge and power centering on sex” (1990 a 103). One of the most striking features of Volume I of The History of Sexuality is Foucault’s criticisms of what he calls the “repressive hypothesis.” This hypothesis is exhibited in what is by now a familiar story about the history of sexuality in the West over the past three centuries. We have been accustomed, Foucault argues, to thinking of sexuality as something that underwent a significant repression in the Victorian era, having been relatively free, frank, and open at the beginning of the seventeenth century. This repression forced sexuality into a kind of straight jacket, keeping it within the well-ordered boundaries of the married couple who used it only for the purposes of procreation. Any sexual practice outside of this restricted arena was not only deemed illegitimate, it was banished, “driven out, denied, reduced to silence. Not only did it not exist, it had no right to exist and would be made to disappear upon its least manifestation whether in acts or words” (Foucault 1990 a, 4). The working model of the relationship between power and sex here is one that is essentially negative: “rejection, exclusion, refusal, blockage, concealment, or mask. Where sex and pleasure are concerned, power can ‘do’ nothing but say no to them . . .” (Foucault 1990 a, 83). Under this “repressive hypothesis,” power is thought to prohibit, to censor sex, to make it disappear through its refusals, its laws, and its threats of punishment for noncompliance. But during the twentieth century, as the story goes, movements to “liberate” sex began to develop. There arrived on the scene a “sexual cause the demand for sexual freedom, but also for the knowledge to be gained from sex and the right to speak about it” (1990 a 6). 2 People began to realize the deleterious effects of repression, and began to speak about sex to each other, to their psychoanalysts, and to the public. A call came forth (and continues today) to transgress the laws of power in relation to sex, to lift prohibitions, to be subversive and to tell the truth of sex that the negating forces of power would wish to remain suppressed. This project of the “liberation” of sex seems to hold out a promise of freedom against the domination of power due to an association between freedom and the “truth,” many think that eliminating the forces of repression and speaking the truth of sex that is being held down is the key to our “real freedom.” Given his views on freedom, liberation, power and truth, it should not be surprising that Foucault is critical of this story and the “repressive hypothesis” that informs it. First of all, he questions whether sexual repression is as much of an historical fact over the past three centuries as it is often purported to be. He argues that, to the contrary, “around and apropos of sex, one sees a veritable discursive explosion”: “There was a steady proliferation of discourses concerned with sex . . . a discursive ferment that gathered momentum from the eighteenth century onward” (Foucault 1990 a, 17, 18). Rather than being more and more silenced, Foucault claims, sex became an increasingly more prevalent topic of various discourses and practices of power, including medicine, psychiatry, pedagogy, and criminal justice. But along with this observation comes the very significant point that the increase in discourses concerning sex did not take place outside of the field of power, as if power were something that simply repressed sex; the “speaking of sex” occurred (at least partly) within the field of power itself: there was an “institutional incitement to speak about it [sex] ... a determination on the part of the agencies of power to hear it spoken about, and to cause it to speak through explicit articulation and endlessly accumulated detail” (1990 a 18). Thus the relationship of power to sex on the model of repression alone is inadequate it doesn’t capture the role of power in the production of discourses about sex, the ways power works to make sex speak rather than keeping it quiet. Of course, Foucault argues that the “negative” view of power is too limited to capture its complex workings, that power is a significantly productive as well as a prohibiting force. Here he emphasizes the role of power relations in the production of “true” discourses about sex, in the production of what he calls a scientia sexualis, a science of sex and sexuality. Foucault argues in the first volume of The History of Sexuality that this science has its beginnings in the ritual of Christian confession. 3 After the sixteenth century, he argues, confessional practices began to require more and more from penitents in their speech about sex. It was demanded that they speak in more and more detail (if in the most careful and prudish of words) about much more than just their sexual acts: [The confession] attributed more and more importance in penance ... to all the insinuations of the flesh: thoughts, desires, voluptuous imaginings, delectations .... [S]ex must not be named imprudently, but its aspects, its correlations, and its effects must be pursued down to their slenderest ramifications: a shadow in a daydream, an image too slowly dispelled . . . everything had to be told. (Foucault 1990 a, 19) [The confession] attributed more and more importance in penance ... to all the insinuations of the flesh: thoughts, desires, voluptuous imaginings, delectations .... [S]ex must not be named imprudently, but its aspects, its correlations, and its effects must be pursued down to their slenderest ramifications: a shadow in a daydream, an image too slowly dispelled . . . everything had to be told. (Foucault 1990 a, 19) [The confession] attributed more and more importance in penance ... to all the insinuations of the flesh: thoughts, desires, voluptuous imaginings, delectations .... [S]ex must not be named imprudently, but its aspects, its correlations, and its effects must be pursued down to their slenderest ramifications: a shadow in a daydream, an image too slowly dispelled . . . everything had to be told. (Foucault 1990 a, 19) The mechanism of the confession takes place within a power relationship; it is something demanded through the use of authority, an imperative wherein one is judged, punished, or consoled (Foucault 1990 a, 61). Foucault therefore notes that the confession provides an imperative, a constraint to put sex into discourse. This imperative began with religious practice but did not remain tied to it, as the confession extended into other social practices from about the beginning of the eighteenth century. Foucault argues that in pedagogy, medicine, criminal justice, and political concerns about population and demography (as well as other areas) there was a proliferation of discourses regarding sex, a need to tell all about sex and to record this information into various bodies of knowledge and incorporate these into social practices. This multiplication of discourses involved practices of power similar to the Christian confession (1990 a 23-32); and Foucault argues that by now “[w]e have .. . become a singularly confessing society. The confession has spread its effects far and wide” (1990 a 59). Given that the confession is a practice that takes place within a relationship of power, providing an imperative to put one’s sex into discourse, Foucault insists that the discourses on sex that proliferated over the last three hundred years in the West “did not multiply apart from or against power, but in the very space and as the means of its exercise” (1990 a 32). Out of this proliferation of discourses (and also, therefore, as part of the exercise of power) emerged a scientia sexualis, a science of sex. This label, as used by Foucault, seems to refer not so much to a single science as to a “scientificity” in regard to sex - an approach to sex that follows the general conditions of scientific inquiry, and thereby is able to produce “true” discourses about sex. 4 Given the various social practices and institutions in which these discourses have been produced, we can imagine that for Foucault the scientia sexualis could also refer to a kind of complex of knowledges, practices, methods and discourses that developed piecemeal in various, specific areas (and that could possibly be linked up strategically into larger wholes after they developed). In any case it is clear that for Foucault over the course of the last three hundred years Western societies have developed “true” discourses about sex through mechanisms of power such as the confession, producing a “truth” of sex. According to Foucault, the scientia sexualis “kept as its nucleus the singular ritual of obligatory and exhaustive confession which in the Christian West was the first technique for producing the truth of sex” (Foucault 1990 a, 68). Foucault uses the term “deployment of sexuality” to describe the multiple mechanisms and practices of power whereby sex is made to speak in “true” discourses, whereby a “truth of sex” is produced through a scientific approach, and whereby “sexuality” is created as an area of scientific knowledge (made up of a complex of subjects including desires, pleasures, fantasies, and other issues surrounding the question of sex) (Foucault 1990 a, 106-107). The mechanisms involved in the “deployment of sexuality” include those that are necessary for scientific research into sex and sexuality, for combining these into a coherent body of knowledge, for disseminating this knowledge, and for implementing it into social institutions and practices. Thus psychological, medical, and sociological research projects devoted to developing a science of sexuality would be part of this deployment (e.g., psychoanalytic research into sexual desires and fantasies, medical research into the functions and dysfunctions of sexual organs, sociological research into sexual behavior patterns in society, etc.). In addition, the “deployment of sexuality” would include efforts to incorporate the scientific conclusions made from such research into social and governmental programs, such as efforts to control population growth or decline, to curb sexual deviance and encourage heterosexual monogamy, etc. 5 As a result of this “deployment of sexuality” and the development of the scientia sexualis, sex eventually came to be regarded as something involving natural and irreducible forces, desires and pleasures that are grounded in biological mechanisms and whose truth can be and often is concealed by a repressive exercise of power. Under this view, sex is thought to be a natural, instinctual, irreducible element of ourselves from which desires and pleasures emerge of their own accord unless repressed by power: many believe sex is “rooted in a specific and irreducible urgency which power tries as best it can to dominate . ..” (Foucault 1990 a, 155). But Foucault argues that this conception of “sex,” rather than being some kind of natural “anchorage point that supports the manifestations of sexuality” and upon which power launches its oppressive attacks, is instead “a complex idea that was formed inside the deployment of sexuality” (1990 a 152). We can see how this could have come about by considering the mechanism of confession that Foucault argues is at the heart of the deployment of sexuality by power. The confession is something extracted from the hidden depths of the soul, a truth concealed inside that is made public by internal or external compulsion. It is a solemn ritual, bringing weighty, secret truths to light. This was especially the case in regard to the confession of sex as a religious practice, the confession of one’s inner desires, fantasies, and pleasures. Foucault quotes a text designed to give instructions to penitents during confessions in the seventeenth century to show that the confession of sex was considered so important and grave that every detail about it had to be examined and spoken: Examine diligently, therefore, all the faculties of your soul: memory, understanding, and will. Examine with precision all your senses as well. . . Examine, moreover, all your thoughts, every word you speak, and all your actions. Examine even unto your dreams .... And finally, do not think that in so sensitive and perilous a matter as this, there is anything trivial or insignificant. (Foucault 1990 a, 20) 6 One’s sexual desires and pleasures had to be rooted out, no longer kept secret; and this was a perilous matter indeed, for no less than the very salvation of one’s soul was at stake. Sex was treated as a kind of hidden, destructive force within, a dark and devious threat that might be neutralized if brought into the open, but which could be deadly if it remained secret and unknown (especially if it is unknown even to oneself). If one was not aware of the sexual desires, thoughts, and dreams within oneself, they could work their destructive force insidiously; thus the injunction to examine, in every detail, and to confess. The need to examine and purify oneself, to discover one’s secret sexual desires tended to make of sex something mysterious, disquieting, and fearsome. Over the course of the last three centuries, Foucault claims, sex gradually became an object of great suspicion; the general and disquieting meaning that pervades our conduct and our existence, in spite of ourselves; the point of weakness where evil portents reach through to us; the fragment of darkness that we each carry within us: a general signification, a universal secret, an omnipresent cause, a fear that never ends. (1990 a 69) Sex came to seem more and more like a dark element within, potentially dangerous if unknown, a “universal secret” contained within each one of us. Further, the speaking of sex came to be connected to the Christian injunction to discover and reveal the truth about oneself, to find out who one is deep down inside and work to purify this self Such a purification requires that we be aware of the dark secrets of our own sexuality, so that we can be sure to eliminate any aspects of it that might be unclean. In a lecture given in 1980, Foucault argues that all Christians have a duty to find the truth of their sexuality within and to confess it to others: Everyone, every Christian, has the duty to know who he is, what is happening in him. He has to know the faults he may have committed: he has to know the temptations to which he is exposed. And, moreover, everyone in Christianity is obliged to say these things to other people (Foucault 1997 a, 202) Part of the reason for this is that through this process, one can discover what is going on in the hidden depths of oneself and eliminate dangerous, impure elements if necessary. 7 According to Foucault, this process of purification is essential to achieving access to the “truth of the faith,” to the “light of God” (1997 a 202). Self-purification is required in order to receive God’s truth, and this purification can be achieved in part through confession and the speaking of sex that occurs there. The injunction to examine oneself in detail, as diligently as possible, implies that there are aspects of the self, sexual desires and pleasures, that are not available to immediate consciousness. There could be feelings and stirrings and dreams and desires of which even the conscious self is not aware, buried in the “darkness within”; and the confession gives an imperative to find these secrets out, to reveal these hidden truths. There thus has developed a split within the self between what is available to immediate consciousness, and what remains buried within, hidden from our conscious awareness of ourselves. What is hidden constitutes an unconscious truth, a truth we hold but cannot easily access, and it is deeply connected to sex through the mechanism of confession. It is because we are constrained to confess our sexuality that it comes to appear as a secret, hidden “truth” within, and thus the innermost “truth” of ourselves, according to Foucault, comes to be intimately tied to sex: our sexual thoughts, pleasures, actions, dreams, desires, etc. hold the key to the truth of ourselves that hides in unconscious secrecy. Sex was eventually thought to hold the “fundamental secret,” the truth of ourselves; and Foucault claims that this is how it is still treated: “we demand that sex speak the truth ... and we demand that it tell us our truth, or rather, the deeply buried truth of that truth about ourselves which we think we possess in our immediate consciousness” (Foucault 1990 a, 69). Somewhere deep inside lies “our truth,” the truth of ourselves that is even more fundamental than what we know about ourselves consciously; and this truth is available through the practice of putting sex into discourse. In early Christian experience, Foucault points out, the revelation of this hidden truth of the self is intimately connected to self-renunciation: “this verbalization [confession] is also a way of renouncing one’s self and no longer wishing to be the subject of the will” (Foucault 1997 a, 226). What is being sacrificed is the self that was previously not under the rule of God, and the will that hoped to go its own way as opposed to God’s way: “Since the human being was attached to himself under the reign of Satan, verbalization as a movement toward God is a renunciation to Satan, and a renunciation to oneself. Verbalization is a self-sacrifice” (1997 a 225). In confessing, and thus bringing to light the hidden truth of the self, one can move closer to God and further from the self. Becoming more aware of one’s deep desires and pleasures, one can be more wary of their insidious influence, and thereby renounce their reign in favor of the rule of God. In addition, it is only when one renounces one’s earthly life as a sinner that one can hope to attain the truth of the light of God: “you will become the subject of the manifestation of truth when and only when you disappear or you destroy yourself as a real body or as a real existence” (Foucault 1997 a, 227). In other words, you will be able to reach the real, ultimate truth of the self, the true way humans ought to be and to live, only when you sacrifice the body and its sexual desires and pleasures. Foucault argues that in early Christianity, therefore, “[w]e have to sacrifice the self in order to discover the truth about ourselves, and we have to discover the truth about ourselves in order to sacrifice ourself’ (1997 a 226). The “truth about ourselves” is used ambiguously in this statement: we can discover the “real, ultimate truth” about ourselves by sacrificing ourselves as bodies with material existence, and we can sacrifice ourselves in this way by discovering the “truth” about sex that is hidden within us, the secret “truth” about ourselves. But the connection between discovering the truth of the self and selfsacrifice has been broken, Foucault argues, to the point where in modern Western culture, it has been the aim of “judicial institutions,. .. medical and psychiatric practices . . . political and philosophical theory ... to constitute the ground of subjectivity as the root of a positive self’ (Foucault 1997 a, 229). Foucault characterizes this phenomenon as “the permanent anthropologism of Western thought,” and argues that it is linked to “the deep desire to substitute the positive figure of man for the sacrifice [in Christianity]” (1997 a 229, 230). In other words, the self-sacrifice that went along with the Christian confession in its early days has been replaced by an attempt to find a positive ground for the self in the hidden truth of its sexual desires. The revelation of the truth of the self is put in service of gathering knowledge about “the positive figure of man,” of discovering “what [the self] is in its positivity,” of discovering “a positive self or the positive foundation for the self’ (1997 a 230). The confession developed into a way to discover and catalogue our positive truth in order to build a knowledge of the human being, rather than to find that which must be renounced. The confession as a means of producing the “truth” of the self through a revelation of sexual desire and pleasure was further developed through the amplification of confessional practices over the course of the last three centuries. Recall that according to Foucault, while the confession began as a religious ritual, it has by now “spread its effects far and wide,” into the areas of “justice, medicine, education, family relationships, and love relations,” even in “the most ordinary affairs of everyday life”: [O]ne confesses one’s crimes, one’s sins, one’s thoughts and desires, one’s illnesses and troubles .... One confesses in public and private, to one’s parents, one’s educators, one’s doctor, to those one loves; one admits to oneself. . . things that it would be impossible to tell anyone else .... (Foucault 1990 a, 59) Foucault sees the mechanism of the confession at work wherever we feel compelled, by internal or external forces, to tell the truth (to others and/or to ourselves) about our innermost thoughts, feelings, desires, dreams, etc. We do this continually, he notes, telling our parents, our lovers, our friends, doctors and teachers things that we extract from our depths, wrenching them from their “hiding place[s] in the soul” (1990 a 59). The spread of the confession into more and more aspects of life had an important impact on the way the truth thus extracted came to be viewed in its relationship to power. After the mechanisms of confession multiplied throughout social practices, sex came to appear also as something whose truth tended to emerge on its own unless held back by power. Confession draws the truth of sex out through a practice of power, as we are made to speak of our sexual desires and fantasies in a relation of power with an authority who extracts this from us. But if this power relationship is forgotten or ignored, it may appear that the truth of sex emerges of its own accord. This is precisely what Foucault claims has happened: Confession has now become so common that we think of sexuality as harboring some “truth” inside that is trying to force its way out unless a constraining power holds it down. Rather than recognizing how power has and continues to work to produce and extract this “truth” of sex, we consider it to be a kind of “natural” force inside that moves itself outward if not halted by power. Thus we can see how for Foucault, sex as we now understand it is something constituted by the exercise of power involved in the “deployment of sexuality”: as mechanisms of power modeled on the confession multiplied, as discourses on sex multiplied, sex came to be seen as harboring a “secret” truth that was at first constrained to emerge, and then (once the confession became so übiquitous that the role of power in it was no longer recognized) thought to emerge “naturally,” on its own. Sex came to be seen as involving an “irreducible urgency,” a force that “demands” to surface, and that brings with it the truth which will set us free. We are now in a position to see why, for Foucault, modern criticisms of sexual repression don’t really constitute a fundamental break with the way power has been exercised in relation to sex over the last three centuries. The “antirepressive” projects of the “sexual revolution” (Foucault 1990 a, 131) call for the “liberation” of sex through transgressing the prohibitions of power that are thought to repress it. But a crucial element of this project is the belief that power is mainly exercised as a negative force in relation to sex, a prohibiting force that works to silence the truth of sex. Under this view of power relations it can indeed seem as if liberating the truth of sex from repression will manage to lift it free of power relations in general, will “liberate” it. But as we have seen, this view of power is problematic for Foucault: Foucault argues that relations of power are positive and productive in addition to being negative and repressive. In this case, power works to produce the truth of sex and sexual pleasures, and to build up scientific knowledges in regard to them. Foucault admits that power does at times manage to silence or prohibit, but that this is not the only way it has worked in relation to sex since the seventeenth century: “I do not claim that sex has not been prohibited or barred or masked or misapprehended since the classical age .... I do not maintain that the prohibition of sex is a ruse; but it is a ruse to make prohibition into the basic and constitutive element from which one would be able to write the history of what has been said concerning sex starting from the modern epoch” (Foucault 1990 a, 12). But this “ruse” of thinking that prohibition is the “basic and constitutive” way power acts towards sex is precisely what the “repressive hypothesis” accepts; and in adhering to this hypothesis, projects to liberate sex from repressive, prohibiting power relations have a distorted view of how power works. One important consequence of this is that for Foucault, modern projects of sexual liberation, by calling for the speaking of sex against the silencing prohibitions of power, do not ultimately ask for something different from what the exercise of power in relation to sex has already been doing for the last three hundred years. The “sexual revolution” asks us to reveal the truth of our sexual desires and pleasures, to lift the repression put on us by power and bring our secret truths to light. We are told, in the manner of “preaching,” of a promise of freedom and a “new day to come” through transgression of the old laws of sexuality; and this “sexual sermon” purports to “reveal the truth about sex, modify its economy within reality, subvert the law that governs it, and change its future” (Foucault 1990 a, 7,8). But this promise of liberation is to be achieved through the putting of sex into discourse, through speaking its truth practices that do not work against the exercise of power in relation to sex, once one recognizes its productive aspects. In other words, confessing the truth of sex in order to “liberate” it may seem to work against a power which is considered to be only repressive, but it works right alongside and along with power relations that are productive of such discourses in the first place. Foucault doubts that the project of liberating sex really acts as many believe as a counter force to a power that is mainly repressive. He asks instead whether “it is not in fact part of the same historical network as the thing it denounces (and doubtless misrepresents) by calling it ‘repression’? Was there really a historical rupture between the age of repression and the critical analysis of repression?” (Foucault 1990 a, 10). Foucault answers this question in the negative, noting that while the critique of repression has had certain important and valuable effects, it does not ultimately work against the exercise of power in regard to sex: The importance of this critique and its impact on reality were substantial. But the very possibility of its success was tied to the fact that it always unfolded within the deployment of sexuality, and not outside or against it. . . . [TJhis whole “antirepressive” struggle, represented nothing more, but nothing less and its importance is undeniable than a tactical shift and reversal in the great deployment of sexuality. (1990 a 131) The “antirepressive” cries for the liberation of sex, then, work within the power relations involved in the “deployment of sexuality,” in the multiplication of discourses about sex, the production of truth and knowledge about desires and pleasures that function together as “sexuality.” Speaking the truth of sex does not free us from the power relations that enjoin us to do so anyway. What the “antirepressive” movements amount to, according to the above quote, is a “tactical shift and reversal” in the “deployment of sexuality.” In other words, they still function as mechanisms for producing true discourses and knowledges about sex, albeit in a somewhat different way than has been done in the past. Whereas previous to the onset of such movements power relations worked to produce the truth of sex through practices of confession that yet somehow manage to function as if they were “prohibiting” and “silencing” sex, the “antirepressive” movements produce the truth of sex through practices of confession that function as if they were “liberating” sex from its former constraints. It is indeed the case that a shift has taken place between the one and the other, as Foucault emphasizes; but the main point is that the basic structure of the relationship of power to sex has not much changed power is still putting sex into discourse, into discourses deemed to be “true” and knowledges deemed to be “scientific.” Foucault doesn’t carefully address the reasons for this “tactical shift,” perhaps because this seems to form part of the purpose he gives for his proposed later volumes of The History of Sexuality 8 But he does give a few preliminary hints, noting that this question is bound up with the question of why power is often considered (by “antirepressive” movements and by many other discourses) to be mainly a negative, repressive force. Foucault suggests that “in this society that has been more imaginative, probably, than any other in creating devious and supple mechanisms of power,” the reason why we tend only to recognize the workings of power in their negative forms could be because “power is tolerable only on condition that it mask a substantial part of itself’ (Foucault 1990 a, 86). He argues that in order for power relations to function at all in Western societies, it may be necessary for them to hide certain aspects of themselves. Power is more likely to be accepted by the general populace, according to Foucault, if people see it as “a mere limit placed on their desire, leaving a measure of freedom however slight - intact” (1990 a 86). 9 In other words, power (in relation to sex, but also as it functions in other aspects of life) may be more easily tolerated, less likely to be resisted, if it comes to be viewed as something that mainly represses, limits, silences. The reason for this could be because under this model, power is seen as a negative, external force that attempts to limit our freedom - a freedom conceived of as a lack of constraints. Since power rarely if ever dominates and constrains us completely, we seem still to be left with a certain measure of freedom that this repressive force cannot conquer. This may be tolerable because we then have at least a glimmer of hope; and also, we have an clear recipe for resistance, namely lifting the most repressive aspects of current power relations. Foucault argues, then, that perhaps relations of power, in order to work at all, must not reveal all aspects of their mechanisms. Power may therefore work best if it appears as a negative, hindering force when it instead has also a positive, productive aspect; and thinking of power as mainly repressive may thus facilitate its functioning. This could explain the “tactical shift” in the deployment of sexuality by power: as power relations put sex into discourse and produce its truth, they are able to function best if masked to some degree, if thought to be mostly negative and prohibiting. Thus while sex is being talked about more and more, and true discourses about it are being multiplied, it can appear that it is being silenced nonetheless. 10 At some point, Foucault notes, in order to further the production of the truth of sex a certain promise of liberation was perhaps needed to induce individuals to talk about it. 11 After asking why the pursuit of the truth of sex eventually turned into a project for its liberation, Foucault speculates: Was the labor then so arduous that it had to be enchanted by this promise? Or had this knowledge become so costly in political, economic, and ethical terms that in order to subject everyone to its rule, it was necessary to assure them, paradoxically, that their liberation was at stake? (Foucault 1990 a, 80) It may have been the case that the work of speaking true discourses about sex, of confessing one’s sex, was so difficult that it required the promise of liberation in order to be carried out. 12 Or worse -it may have been that the multiplication of true discourses of sex was producing such costly moral or political consequences (Foucault doesn’t elaborate on what these might be, specifically) that it had to be made to seem worth the cost through the promise of a better future. In any case the idea is that the continuing production of true discourses about sex came to require some kind of inducement; and the claim that our “liberation” is at stake seems to have worked quite well. But this means, of course, that the “liberation” of sex from “repression” is merely a different way in which power continues to produce the truth of sex. It is, for this time and place, one of the more tolerable ways that this production can continue. It is clear that at least one problem with such “liberatory” efforts is that they are often deluded. The hope of the “antirepressive” movements seems to be that sex will be at least partially or fully freed from power, that it will be “liberated” from power’s constraining effects. But appealing to sex as a natural and irreducible element within that needs to be “liberated” by speaking its truth is yet another way that the “deployment of sexuality” is continued by power. We can therefore see why, for Foucault, “[w]e must not think that by saying yes to sex, one says no to power; on the contrary, one tracks along the course laid out by the general deployment of sexuality” (Foucault 1990 a, 157). Believing that “the truth will set us free,” we willingly speak the truth of sex as if this were an act of transgression against power itself, while ultimately working alongside it. But it is not just this naive, deluded aspect of the “sexual revolution” that is revealed as troubling in The History of Sexuality Volume I; there is also its complicity with the “government of individualization.” The project to “liberate” sex works to tie individuals to their identity by exhorting them to find their “truth” through the speaking of sex. In that sense, it furthers the “subjection” of individuals, the creation of “subjects” in the sense of being subjected to one’s own truth. Recall that for Foucault, the truth of sex is bound up with the truth of the self, the subject: in our “confessing” society we not only require sex to speak its truth, we require it to speak our truth, the truth of ourselves that is hidden beneath the surface of consciousness. This truth of the self, too, appears as something that demands to emerge if not held back by psychic repression, by the “censor” within the psyche. Escaping the repression of power is thought not only to liberate the truth of sex, but (as sex is also thought to harbor the “fundamental secret” of the self) the truth of ourselves as well. Thus the truth of sex and the truth of the self come to be intertwined in that they are both products of practices of power in the deployment of sexuality: the injunction to confess the truth of sex eventually came to make of sex a fundamental truth of the self that can emerge through the lifting of repression. Projects calling for the “liberation of sex,” therefore, quite often involve or imply the “liberation of the true self’ as well, as if the lifting of sexual repression were the key to freeing our innermost, authentic, selves. But by producing this truth through a confessional mechanism, the “sexual revolution” works to perpetuate the subjection of individuals to their identity, to further the “government of individualization.” In an essay published in 1983, Foucault provides a concise discussion of how we live under an “individualizing” form of power that emerged out of Christian practices such as the confession. This individualizing power developed from the type of power exercised by the Christian “pastor,” a power Foucault therefore calls “pastoral.” Some of the most important features of pastoral power are: (1) it has as its ultimate aim the salvation of individuals in the next world; (2) it “does not look after just the whole community, but each individual in particular, during his entire life”; and (3) it “cannot be exercised without knowing the inside of people’s minds ... without making them reveal their innermost secrets” (Foucault 1983 b, 214). The power exercised by the pastor within practices such as the confession operated through a promise of salvation in return for a revelation of one’s most secret truths (which were usually connected with sex). Thus Foucault argues that pastoral power “is linked with a production of truth the truth of the individual himself’ (1983 b 214). This point is significant, because according to Foucault pastoral power has spread throughout Western societies along with the confession we currently live under the exercise of a new form of pastoral power, a “modern matrix of individualization” (Foucault 1983 b, 215). This new pastoral power has a slightly different aim than its earlier manifestation: rather than working towards the salvation of individuals in the next world, it focuses on saving them in this one. This new “salvation” concerns “worldly aims” like “health, well-being (that is, sufficient wealth, standard of living), security, protection against accidents” (1983 b 215). Different authority figures have taken up the cause of this project of salvation, replacing the pastor: the state, the police, philanthropists, the family, doctors, teachers, employers, etc. Individuals are still required to confess their “truth,” though in this new form of pastoral power they are enjoined to do so for the purpose of their salvation in this world rather than in the next. Along these lines, Foucault notes in The History of Sexuality Volume I that the call to “liberate” sex functions as a kind of “preaching,” a “sexual sermon” that “combines the fervor of knowledge, the determination to change the laws, and the longing for the garden of earthly delights” (Foucault 1990 a, 7). But this “sexual sermon” also takes place within a form of power that “subjects” individuals to the truth of their identity. We are told to look inside, to examine ourselves and find the secret truths about our sex and about our selves that are only in hiding because they are repressed by a negative, prohibiting power. We are promised health, happiness, and well-being if we can only find the courage to transgress the laws of repression and express our “true selves.” But whatever truth we might find there is itself drawn out and produced by a form of power, one that requires us to speak what is thought to be the “most true” aspects of ourselves because they are so deeply hidden behind the veil of repression. Once these are spoken and pronounced “true” by pastoral power, individuals are “subjected” to them, required to remember and live up to what has now been revealed as their truth. One could say that just as Foucault claims we must not think that “by saying yes to sex we say no to power,” we must also recognize that by saying yes to the “true self’ we do not say no to power either. We do not liberate ourselves from power by claiming to find the truth of ourselves and lifting the repressive power that is supposed to hold it down. The truth of the self is yet another product of the exercise of power that works to put sex into discourse through mechanisms such as the confession, yet another incarnation of pastoral power. As James Bernauer notes, “the legacy of the Christian technology of the self is to have linked ‘sexuality, subjectivity and truth’ together as the terrain for self-discovery” (Bernauer 1990, 166). 13 This triad continues to work even in modern Western societies, according to Foucault, with the result that sex becomes the site of the truth of ourselves that we are exhorted to “liberate.” The call to liberate sex is only one of the multiple “projects of liberation” that follow this kind of model. According to Foucault, psychoanalysis (in some manifestations of its practice at least) is another of such “projects of liberation,” since in seeking to liberate the truth of the self from repression it actually works in service of the form of power that extracts this truth from us through the speaking of sex. In The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault ties psychoanalysis to the “deployment of sexuality,” claiming that “the history of the deployment of sexuality, as it has evolved since the classical age, can serve as an archaeology of psychoanalysis” (Foucault 1990 a, 130). Bernauer discusses several ways in which Foucault’s concern with the triad of “sexuality, subjectivity and truth” link up to a concern with Freudian psychoanalysis. Among other things, he notes that psychoanalysis ties sexuality to the truth of the individual’s identity: Psychoanalysis is in alliance with the modern period’s threefold sexual production: the creation of sexuality as a reality, especially the sexualization of children’s experience; the constitution of a scientia sexualis based on global study of the population and analytic study of the individual; and the privileging of sexuality as the access to the truth of human identity. (Bernauer 1990, 169) Bernauer concludes that for Foucault, Freudian psychoanalysis emphasizes “a special relationship that the self takes up with itself, namely, that sexuality is the index of one’s subjectivity, of one’s true self’ (Bernauer 1990, 170). In this way psychoanalysis takes up and perpetuates the production of the truth of the self through the confession of sex. According to Foucault, Freudian psychoanalysis, the “talking cure,” is one of the many mechanisms by which sex has been put into discourse a part of the general deployment of sexuality. Psychoanalytic practice can certainly be considered a type of “confession,” especially given some of the main attributes of the confession presented by Foucault: the confession takes place within a relationship of power with an authority figure who “prescribes” it and who “judges,” “consoles” the confessing subject; it is “a ritual in which the expression alone . . . produces intrinsic modifications in the person who articulates it: ... it liberates him, and promises him salvation”; it is a practice wherein “the agency of domination does not reside in the one who speaks . . . , but in the one who listens and says nothing; not in the one who knows and answers, but in the one who questions and is not supposed to know” (Foucault 1990 a, 61-62). The psychoanalyst is not far removed from the silent “father” on the other side of the confessional, both of them prescribing the putting of sex into discourse for the purpose of liberation and salvation. It is mainly the forms of salvation that differ: for the Christian father, the speaking of sex allows for our liberation from its otherwise dark and secret agency, directing our thoughts and actions without our conscious control; he promises salvation through his close connection to God, who can forgive us our sexual impulses and impurities and save us in the next world. For the psychoanalyst, the speaking of sex allows its truth to be liberated from the repression that had come to be seen, around the nineteenth century, as a dangerous threat to psychic health; the analyst offers salvation due to his close connection to the power of the scientific knowledge of sex and the psyche, which can save us from the debilitating effects of repression and thereby promote our psychic health in this world. Foucault claims, therefore, that “[a]round it [psychoanalysis] the great requirement of confession that had taken form so long ago assumed the new meaning of an injunction to lift psychical repression” (Foucault 1990 a, 130). In other words, analysands are required to confess the truth of sex, according to Foucault, for the purpose of their own psychic salvation. They are constrained to liberate unconscious elements from the psychic censor within, to find the truth behind consciousness the deepest, most “true” truth of the self. And this truth has much to do with the truth of sex -- our secret, incestuous desires, pleasures, and fantasies. Of course, there is no completely uniform and unified body of knowledges and practices that can be covered by the term “psychoanalysis,” as many different theories and techniques have emerged over the last century as heirs of Freud. Foucault’s characterization of psychoanalysis, then, may not legitimately apply to all psychoanalytic theorists or practitioners. Indeed, some modern psychoanalytic theorists and practitioners would criticize attempts to find a “truth” of sex and the self and “liberate” it from power as repression. l4 Still, insofar as any psychoanalysts do operate in this way, Foucault’s criticisms here would apply to them. Foucault argues that psychoanalysis (if it purports to reveal the truth of the self) can contribute to what he calls the “California cult of the self,” where the point is to find one’s “true” self within: In the California cult of the self, one is supposed to discover one’s true self, to separate it from that which might obscure or alienate it, to decipher its truth thanks to psychological or psychoanalytic science, which is supposed to be able to tell you what your true self is. (Foucault 1983 a, 245) While this may not be the way all or even most psychoanalysts view their purpose in relation to the truth of the subject, it is at least one way that psychoanalysis can be considered, whether by those that undergo it, those that practice it, or by the general public. And if this is the case, psychoanalysis would not seem to form much of a resistance to the type of power that produces the truth of sex and of the self, since it would itself involve the exercise of such a power. James Bemauer points out that for Foucault, “psychoanalysis operates within the modern regime of sexuality, and even intensifies it”; “psychoanalysis provides one of the most striking examples in the modern transformation of pastoral power” (Bernauer 1990, 170). I have been focusing on an illustration of the problems involved with “projects of liberation” in regard to sexuality and the “true self’; but this discussion could be extended to support the more general claim that our “real freedom” does not consist in a resistance grounded in efforts to “liberate” some “true” aspect of ourselves. Freedom is not something to be attained after liberation of this sort has been accomplished; rather, it is a practice to be endlessly repeated. Once we have been successful in resisting a particular relation of power, we must recognize that everything is still “dangerous,” and we must remain open to the need to resist again if necessary. If we are focused on projects of liberation, we may ignore the ways in which what has been liberated still perpetuates pernicious power relations because we may think that now we are finally “free” and no longer need to resist. Recognizing that even that in the name of which we resist is still a product of power, and thus could be potentially dangerous in some way, we will be less likely to fall prey to this kind of mistake. Near the end of The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault gives an indication of how we might go about enacting an effective resistance to the relations of power that produce the “truth” of sex and the self; but this suggestion is itself problematic, as it seems to involve a project of “liberation” itself. Looking at this prescription in more detail, and in the context of Foucault’s role as an intellectual exile, will help elucidate the kind of resistance involved in our “real freedom” and how the intellectual as a “prophet in exile” can help to promote it. Strategic reversal Foucault argues that the (pastoral) power whose exercise individualizes, the “government of individualization,” is currently undergoing resistance. There are those who have already decided that they no longer want to be governed “quite so much,” who resist the pastoral power that “categorizes the individual, marks him by his own individuality, attaches him to his own identity .. .” (Foucault 1983 b, 212). In The History of Sexuality Volume I, Foucault asserts that if such resistance is to be effective, it must work through appeal to some kind of multiplicity rather than to a single truth of sex and the self. This is because, as we have seen, appealing to one’s “true self’ works in support of, rather than against, the pastoral power that focuses on the production of this “true self.” Rather than trying to find and liberate a “true self’ through the speaking of the “truth” of sex, therefore, Foucault indicates that a better strategy for resisting and for promoting real change in relations of power would involve appeal to a multiplicity and heterogeneity within the self. 15 Foucault asserts that we must appeal not to sex as a source of resistance, but to a plurality of differing bodies and pleasures: It is the agency of sex that we must break away from, if we aim through a tactical reversal of the various mechanisms of sexuality to counter the grips of power with the claims of bodies, pleasures, and knowledges, in their multiplicity and their possibility of resistance. (Foucault 1990 a, 157) Rather than attempting to resist the relations of power that produce sex in the deployment of sexuality through a liberation of sex as a singular, irreducible and natural truth, Foucault suggests a resistance grounded in the multiplicity of varied pleasures. This suggestion is problematic, however. Several commentators argue that when Foucault makes tacit or overt appeal to bodies and pleasures in this way he implies the existence of a “natural” or “prediscursive” body that is not constructed by power, a claim that conflicts with his rejection of such notions. The conception of sex, of pleasures and desires, and even of the body as existing in a “prediscursive” realm of nature is itself a product of certain practices of power for Foucault. Judith Butler explains this point in some depth in Gender Trouble, where echoes of Foucault are quite prominent, and where she argues, among other things, that the seemingly “natural” category of sex is as constructed as that of gender: Are the ostensibly natural facts of sex discursively produced by various scientific discourses in the service of other political and social interests? If the immutable character of sex is contested, perhaps this construct called “sex” is as culturally constructed as gender. [Conventionally,] the body is figured as a mere instrument or medium for which a set of cultural meanings are only externally related. But “the body” [is] itself a construction .... (Butler 1990, 7,8) In consequence, the resistance we undertake to particular relations of power should not, Butler argues, be grounded in something like a “true body” that is said to exist beyond power. If we do so, we run the risk of attempting a “liberation” from the “law” of power in a way that “[poses] as subversive but [operates] in the service of that law’s self-amplification and proliferation”: “In order to avoid the emancipation of the oppressor in the name of the oppressed, it is necessary to take into account the full complexity and subtlety of the law and to cure ourselves of the illusion of a true body beyond the law” (Butler 1990, 93). 16 Butler argues that Foucault makes or implies claims to such a “true body” in The History of Sexuality Volume I and elsewhere, thereby implicating himself in an “unresolved tension”: On the one hand, Foucault wants to argue that there is no ‘sex’ in itself which is not produced by complex interactions of discourse and power, and yet there does seem to be a ‘multiplicity of pleasures’ in itself which is not the effect of any specific discourse/power exchange. (Butler 1990, 97) According to Butler, Foucault seems to argue both in The History of Sexuality Volume I and, more explicitly, in Herculine Barbin that “the overthrow of ‘sex’ results in the release of a primary sexual multiplicity” one that was otherwise repressed by power (1990, 96). 17 On this reading, Foucault appears to be offering a recipe for resistance through a “natural” multiplicity of pleasures -- that is in tension with his views on the productive capacities of power. Peter Dews agrees, arguing that Foucault “is obliged to cling to an elusive, residual naturalism” while at the same time realizing that it is “philosophically untenable” (Dews 1987, 169). Dews points to various places in Foucault’s work where this tension is exhibited, including his discussions of sex, repression, and the possibility for resistance through appeal to bodies and pleasures: Foucault cannot avoid invoking his own ‘unbearable, too hazardous truth’ which sexuality itself occludes: the ‘repressive hypothesis’, therefore, is not abolished, but simply displaced. This is made clear by Foucault’s persistent though unfocused references, throughout The History of Sexuality, to ‘the body and its pleasures’ .... (1987, 168) Dews attributes this tension in Foucault’s work to a more general one (which, according to Dews, plagues other poststructuralists as well): in criticizing the oppressive effects of power, Foucault makes normative judgments while at the same time wanting to avoid taking a normative stance (1987, 169-170). As a consequence, Foucault ends up appealing to some of the very concepts he also wants to reject, such as the body and its pleasures as a “natural,” unconstructed site of resistance. Commentators such as Butler and Dews bring up an important and problematic aspect of Foucault’s work -- there do, indeed, seem to be places where Foucault makes appeal to notions such as a “natural” body that are in tension with his rejection of such notions in other parts of his work. There are, of course, various ways to try to deal with this difficulty, including finding ways to defend Foucault and/or going beyond his own work to resolve the problem. Butler engages in the Foucauldian strategy of developing a genealogy of the “natural” body as it appears in Foucault’s work, arguing that the notion of a body that is naturally sexed is a construct of gender norms that are themselves products of “a regulatory practice that can be identified as a compulsory heterosexuality” (Butler 1990, 18). After showing that what appears as a “natural” body is actually constructed by power relations, Butler then offers her own strategy for resisting the power that enforces “a compulsory heterosexuality” without making appeal to the “natural” body or its pleasures. 18 Nancy Fraser defends Foucault to some extent by arguing that when Foucault speaks in “body language,” he makes reference only to bodies as they are constructed, not as they are “in themselves”: “In fact, Foucault does not identify any positive characteristics of bodies ‘as they really are in themselves’ apart from the ways in which they are historically invested” (Fraser 1989 b, 60). But Fraser does acknowledge that Foucault sometimes continues to speak anyway of “the body simpliciter” (1989 b 61). She suggests that when he does so, it may be pragmatics, rather than ontology, that is behind it rather than speaking of bodies as sites of resistance because, ontologically, they are outside of (and prior to) power, perhaps Foucault could be using “body language” because it is, pragmatically, “the most efficacious discourse for thematizing the problematic of emancipation in modem societies” (1989 b 61). In other words, perhaps making appeal to bodies in the way Foucault does may be an attempt to present a discourse of resistance that makes sense to many of us, here and now (even if it is not the only possible basis for resistance). 19 The appearance of what seems to be an “alternative” way of thinking or a “solution” that tells others what they ought to do in The History of Sexuality Volume I and elsewhere understandably poses problems for Foucault, given his insistence that this is not the role of the intellectual (and further, that he does not himself offer “alternatives”). I believe this difficulty can be best addressed by thinking of Foucault’s work, with its tensions intact, in the context of his view of the political role of the intellectual. I think that Nancy Fraser is on the right track when she argues that perhaps Foucault is motivated by pragmatic concerns when he speaks of things such as “the body simpliciter” Foucault may have used notions familiar to his audience in a strategic way. In other words, he may indeed have thought that “body language” could form an important resource for resistance on the part of others, given its familiarity and sense of opposition to a “disciplinary” power. Although Foucault also criticizes such discourses, this doesn’t mean he thinks they can never be used for the purpose of resistance. His appeal to concepts such as the “natural” body - that he also works to question need not be considered evidence of incoherence, but may instead be evidence of his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile.” In other words, perhaps Foucault is playing the prophet in The History of Sexuality Volume I, offering a discourse that appeals to universal truth while yet exiling himself from this discourse and hoping to encourage others to do the same. After all, this text provides a brief outline of a genealogical history of notions such as the “true body,” the “natural” category of sex, etc.; and this means that Foucault’s recommendation of resistance through a multiplicity of pleasures appears within a genealogical discussion that works to question the very notion of a “natural” body with such a multiplicity. Perhaps Foucault recognized that such a discourse of resistance might be effective to a certain extent, as long as those who used it also distanced themselves from it, maintained a critical distance and realized that it harbors dangers as well as utility. He may have tried to present his own appeals to such a “true body” through the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile”: making such appeals in order to bring his audience to question them, to exile themselves from the idea of a “true” or “natural” body. This would mean that his readers would not reject or refuse such notions outright in their strategies of resistance, but would use them with a critical distance, aware of their dangers as well as their potential benefits. With his contentious statement about the body and its multiple pleasures, Foucault seems to be offering an alternative way of thinking about sex and sexuality, a way to replace notions of the “truth” of sex and the self as a unity with an appeal to the multiplicity of sexual desires and pleasures. This would be a kind of movement to the “other side,” a replacement of unity with multiplicity; and while such an oscillation from one side to its opposite is not ultimately the most effective means of undertaking resistance, it can still have provisionally beneficial effects. For example, even if we emphasize a multiplicity and heterogeneity of desires and pleasures as “natural” rather than a single, “real and true” kind of desire and pleasure as “natural,” we are still working to disturb the usual “truth” of sex as produced by power. This may help to open out new ways of thinking about sex and sexuality. Certainly, the truth of sex as a multiplicity can become reified itself, but we can then work to resist that truth as well. Recall that the practice of freedom for Foucault is an ongoing process, a continual effort to resist limits that we find “poisonous.” If we pass to the “other side” of the truth of sex as a unity to speak of it as a multiplicity, then, we must not think that by doing so we have reached a state of freedom from power where resistance will no longer be necessary. But this is not to say that such reversals are only futile and dangerous. We may appeal to the “other side” of a dominant discourse in order to unsettle its dominance, but we must not simply remain in this space of opposition. Resistance through negation is not ultimately effective, I have argued. If we are to engage in it, it must be as a preliminary means to open out a space for strategies that do not simply say “no.” Foucault seems aware of the dangers involved in suggesting that we counter the “truth” of sex as a unity with a discourse of multiplicity. Note that he calls this alternative way of resisting the “truth” of sex “a tactical reversal of the various mechanisms of sexuality,” which indicates that he is well aware that what he is doing is simply reversing the relations of power involved in the “deployment of sexuality.” Recall that for Foucault the movements of “sexual liberation” also amounted to “a tactical shift and reversal in the great deployment of sexuality” (Foucault 1990 a, 131). This would seem to indicate that Foucault shouldn’t be offering a prescription for resistance that is merely a similar kind of “tactical shift,” since he works to criticize efforts at “sexual liberation” as mainly supportive of relations of power they mean to resist. Wouldn’t the same be true of the resistance based on the “natural body” through appeal to its “multiplicity” of desires and pleasures? I think that ultimately, the answer is yes - we wouldn’t want to stick to this kind of resistance through negation and reversal of the power that produces the “truth” of sex. But Foucault insists that such reversals can have beneficial effects. Even the movements of “sexual liberation,” he argues, had a “substantial” impact that ought not to be ignored (1990 a 131). Perhaps his suggested alternative for resistance might also have important benefits, as long as the move to the “other side” didn’t result in efforts to resist that are permanently negative. Jana Sawicki argues that Foucault himself utilized discourses that appeal to the “nature” of sexuality and to liberal notions such as “civil rights” in his own efforts at resistance, while at the same time working to question and unsettle such discourses: He believed that liberation struggles rooted in demands for a right to one’s sexuality [such as those taken up by some gay right movements] are limited insofar as they accept the fixing of sexual identity .... He hoped to stimulate other avenues of resistance to the disciplinary technologies of sex in addition to those premised on embracing homosexuality as a natural fact to open up possibilities for other ways of experiencing ourselves as sexual subjects. Thus he resisted the idea of a fixed sexual identity at the same time that he believed, of course, that homosexuals should have civil liberties as homosexuals. (Sawicki 1991, 100) This is the resistance of an exile, of someone who attempts to change the regime of truth while yet remaining within it as it stands and working to better the conditions that still exist therein. Rather than utterly avoiding all appeals to universal concepts and truths such as a “natural” sexuality and the objective justice of respect for individual “rights,” Foucault as an intellectual exile makes use of these because they can work to promote change that improve conditions for those living within the regime of truth as it exists here and now. But he uses such appeals with caution, with a critical distance, as he hopes also to change in a more fundamental way the regime they support. He would not therefore want to use notions of universal truths as if they were a permanent solution. They can still, nevertheless, have importantly beneficial effects. Foucault may be able to encourage the provisional use of such a “tactical reversal” by those who want to engage in resistance to the power that produces the “truth” of sex, through his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile.” In other words, he may be able to indicate that an appeal to the multiplicity of sexual pleasures and desires in a seemingly “natural” body is both useful to a certain extent and dangerous something that can be taken up as part of a strategy of resistance, but only with caution. In reading The History of Sexuality Volume I, we may choose follow Foucault in his prophecy of what must be done by agreeing that appeal to a “natural,” multiple body is a good source of resistance; but through his movement of “prophecy in exile” Foucault may be also move away from this prescription, since the genealogical discussion in which it appears works to question the basis upon which the prescription is built. We may recognize that Foucault is not a loyal “agent” of the regime of truth, that if he puts forth a discourse that appeals to universal truths such as the “natural” body and its multiplicity of pleasures, he also works to unsettle and undermine these and reveals himself thereby as a “double agent.” If the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” is successful, Foucault’s readers may come to recognize that his “body language” must be treated with caution, from a critical distance that we as readers can accomplish by exiling ourselves from the regime of truth. If we accomplish this self-exile, we will not thereby give up entirely on discourses that appeal to universal truths (such as those which speak of the “multiplicity” of “bodies, pleasures, and knowledges”). Rather, we will continue to use these, but cautiously and critically, aware of their complicity with power. As Jana Sawicki argues, such universal notions may be all that make sense to us right now we may have to continue to appeal to concepts such as the “natural” body before developing other alternatives (Sawicki 1991, 100-101). In sum, perhaps we can look at Foucault’s suggestion that we “counter the grips of power with the claims of bodies, pleasures, and knowledges, in their multiplicity” in the context of his role as an intellectual exile, and thereby resolve some of the problems that seem inherent in it. Though this alternative way of thinking about sex and sexuality, this prescription for resistance, makes appeal to a universal notion of a “natural” body, it may be a tactical, strategic move on Foucault’s part that is both useful and dangerous. It may help to make conditions better under the current regime of truth, in that it allows for a multiplicity of desires and pleasures, a multiplicity of sexualities rather than simply saying that the dominant, heterosexual model is the only “true” sexuality. This may work to unsettle the dominance of what was previously thought to be the “one truth” about sex and sexuality, thereby opening up a space to develop new ways of thinking about it. But Foucault offers this alternative means of resistance within a genealogy that also works to question the “nature” of the body it seems to assume; and readers who would take him as a prophet in offering this alternative may also note that he thereby also exiles himself from his prescription. If so, they may recognize that while this kind of resistance can have helpful effects, it also harbors a danger and must be used with caution. We must not think that by appealing to the “multiplicity” of desires and pleasures in a “natural” body we have reached an end state of freedom from the relations of power that produce the truth of sex. We must realize that we are only, after all, engaging in a “tactical reversal of the various mechanisms of sexuality,” and that this kind of negative resistance will ultimately work only to support the relations of power we mean to resist. Yet as a temporary measure, such a reversal can be useful in important ways. This discussion provides a further dimension to the role of the Foucauldian intellectual as a “prophet in exile,” and what s/he may hope to accomplish. This intellectual may at times encourage the kind of resistance as negation that may tend in the long run to support, rather than undermine, relations of power being resisted. S/he may suggest a “project of liberation” as a temporary measure, such as the effort to counter the “truth” of sex with claims to the “multiplicity” of bodies, desires, pleasures, etc. (as if one were thereby “liberating” such a “multiplicity”). This might be successful if the intellectual makes such a suggestion while also working to question the universal notions upon which it is based, through, e.g., a strategy of “writing in exile” in genealogical texts. In this way, the intellectual’s readers may be able to recognize that if they are going to take up the intellectual’s prescription for resistance through negation and reversal, they must do so with a critical distance, with caution. For such resistance to be successful, those engaging in it would have to realize that their negations do not bring about their exit from power, but instead their exile from it. I have argued that the most effective resistance is not one that works through negation, as if were operating from a position outside of and opposed to power resistance as negation may manage to unsettle power relations a bit, but since such resistance repeats the basic structure of power relations from the opposite side, it does not work to effect much transformation. But it may be that effective resistance can take place through negation and refusal, as long as one is, in effect, playing at being outside of power while yet realizing that one is still operating within it. One might act as if one were operating outside of power, as if one were liberating the multiplicity of a “natural” body, for example; but in the process one could also realize that in so doing one has not, indeed, exited power relations entirely. If one engaged in this kind of resistance through exile, one might play at reversal for awhile in order to achieve its beneficial effects, but recognize that such reversals are themselves dangerous. There may therefore be at least two kinds of effective resistance through a movement of exile: one might resist relations of power from within by finding ways to alter them without saying “no,” or one might take up a strategy of negation as a provisional tactic while recognizing that it, too, must be resisted. Both of these might be considered as “practices of freedom,” since in neither of these kinds of resistance do those engaging in them operate as if they have escaped relations of power entirely, as if once they achieve success in their efforts to resist they can stop and enjoy their end state of pure freedom. In both kinds of resistance one operates as an exile from the relations of power one works to change, recognizing that the changes one may accomplish will result in new relations of power that might themselves become “poisonous,” thereby calling for new efforts at resistance. Those engaged in both types of resistance, then, might be said to be practicing a “real freedom.” I have suggested that the Foucauldian intellectual as a “prophet in exile” can contribute to a “cure” for the regime of truth by encouraging others to practice freedom. We can perhaps already see how this is the case, given the intellectual’s efforts to “make things more fragile” through genealogical analysis. Once the fragility of particular discourses, practices, and knowledges is revealed through genealogy, it may be easier for others to practice their freedom by engaging in resistance against the relations of power that produce these. In some of his later writings, Foucault focuses on the importance of practicing freedom and provides some more in-depth and intriguing suggestions as to how it is that the intellectual can help promote it. In this context, Foucault speaks of the intellectual genealogist as one who is able to “diagnose the present” and thereby contribute to its “cure.” 1 Foucault’s reference here to “admissible and acceptable forms of existence or political society” is somewhat problematic. According to his own view of the political role of intellectuals, Foucault himself should not be dictating what is to count as “admissible and “acceptable.” Perhaps he means to indicate that these terms are to be defined by those practicing freedom through resistance themselves which would be much more in keeping with his concern to leave others free to decide what is good/bad and what must be done. But if this is the case, he doesn’t made it as clear in the interview as he ought. What distinguishes thought is that it is something quite different from the set of representations that underlies a certain behavior; it is also something does not say, in the passage from which this quote is taken, what kind of “knowledge” might be said to be gained from sex, according to those who work to release it from repression. We can imagine that one thing they might mention is an increase in knowledge about one’s own psychological and emotional workings, and how to cure oneself of the damaging effects of repressing one’s sexuality. In other words, if one could lift the cloak of silence surrounding questions of sex and sexuality, one might be better able to understand sexual desires, fantasies, fetishes, etc.; and one might thereby be better able to address psychological problems posed by hiding, ignoring, or failing to fully comprehend such aspects of one’s sexual life. 3 ln later volumes of The History of Sexuality and later essays and interviews, however, Foucault traces the history of the Christian confession itself and finds elements of its practice as far back as ancient Greece. For a concise discussion of the development of the confession, see the lectures titled “Subjectivity and Truth” and “Christianity and Confession” (Foucault 1997 b; 1997 a). explains the scientia sexualis in terms of an attempt to adapt norms of scientific discourse to the speaking of sex in confessional practices: “[O]ur society has equipped itself with a scientia sexualis. To be more precise, it has pursued the task of producing true discourses concerning sex, and this by adapting not without difficulty the ancient procedure of confession to the rules of scientific discourse” (Foucault 1990 a, 67-68). s This is a very general overview of the “deployment of sexuality,” providing only an outline of what Foucault himself describes in more detail in Volume I of The History of Sexuality (1990 a 10e-114). cites the source of this quote as Paolo Segneri, L’lnstruction du penitent (French trans. 1695), p. 301 (Foucault 1990 a, 19). 7 The question of what constitutes “pure” or “impure” thoughts is one that would require a lengthy digression into Christian beliefs to answer. In a later part of the lecture cited here Foucault provides a brief discussion of one aspect of “purity” reflecting beliefs of the first few centuries of the Christian era. In part, discovering the purity of one’s thoughts involves asking if they allow one to contemplate God, if they are of good origin (from God or from the devil), and whether or not they have been “whittled away and rusted by evil sentiments” (Foucault 1997 a, 217). Some of these “evil sentiments” may very well be sexual desires, which can keep us from contemplating God and may have their origins in devilish temptations. The obligation to confess is now relayed through so many different points, is so deeply ingrained in us, that we no longer perceive it as the effect of a power that constrains us; on the contrary, it seems to us that truth, lodged in our most secret nature, “demands” only to surface; that if it fails to do so, this is because a constraint holds it in place, the violence of a power weighs it down, and it can finally be articulated only at the price of a kind of liberation. (Foucault 1990 a, 60) B Foucault explains his purposes in future volumes at several points in this one (though these purposes are somewhat different than the studies that actually emerged in the second and third volumes of The History of Sexuality), where he indicates that part of what he hopes to investigate is why we ended up claiming that we are repressed, blaming our past and present for it, and deciding that we must be “liberated”: “The question I would like to pose is not, Why are we repressed? but rather, Why do we say, with so much passion and so much resentment against our most recent past, against our present, and against ourselves, that we are repressed? By what spiral did we come to affirm that sex is negated?” (Foucault 1990 a, 8-9); “We must write the history of this will to truth [in regard to sex] . . . What is this patience or eagerness to constitute it [sex] as the secret, the omnipotent cause, the hidden meaning, the unremitting fear? And why was the task of discovering this difficult truth finally turned into an invitation to eliminate taboos and break free of what binds us?” (1990 a 80). 9 Note that this point is placed in historical context by Foucault, however —he emphasizes that the above seems true of the way power works “at least in our society” (Foucault 1990 a, 86), and goes on to give a historical account of why this might be so. 10 Clearly, a fuller discussion of how power “masks” itself as merely repressive is called for before one could claim to have fully explained how the proliferation of discourses regarding sex could yet appear as the silencing of sex. Foucault does not provide such an explanation in the first volume of The History of Sexuality, and while it might be an interesting topic to pursue here, it is not ultimately necessary to my purposes and could take the present study too far afield. 11 It is important to remember that for Foucault, power does not originate from a central point and then emanate outwards, because this means that it would not be accurate to interpret his claims here as indicating some conscious decision on the part of a central authority to induce people to speak of sex through offering a promise of liberation. Power relations are spread throughout the social body, and the way Foucault sometimes describes them it seems they can be directed in their more local arenas by conscious decisions of individuals (Foucault 1980 h, 97-102; 1980 b, 200- 208). But the larger, more general tactics of power that can be discerned are a result of strategic connection and annexation of more local relations; and while the former may have a certain decipherable rationality, according to Foucault they are often not grounded in some central authority that directs their actions. While all power relations have certain objectives, these are not always the result of specific choices made by individuals: “Power relations are both intentional and nonsubjective. If in fact they are intelligible, this is . . . because they are imbued, through and through, with calculation: there is no power that is exercised without a series of aims and objectives. But this does not mean that it results from the choice or decision of an individual subject; let us not look for the headquarters that presides over its rationality . . .” (Foucault 1990 a, 94-95). This seems to indicate that no relation of power is consciously directed according to Foucault. I don’t think this is necessarily the case. I consider this issue under the question of agency that I take up in Chapter Five. The main point for the present purpose is that Foucault is not saying that one or even a few individuals decided that if the telling of the truth of sex were to continue, a false promise of liberation would have to be made. Instead, this development could have occurred gradually, as various decisions at more local levels of power caused changes in power relations that were annexed further up the line, and the liberatory aspects of the Christian confession evolved into the liberatory promise of the “sexual revolution.” Much more discussion would be needed here in order to explain how a strategy of power such as the promise of liberation could be developed without any conscious development, how in strategies of power it could be the case that “the logic is perfectly clear, the aims decipherable, and yet it is often the case that no one is there to have invented them” (Foucault 1990 a, 95). A more lengthy discussion of this issue can be found in “The Confession of the Flesh” (Foucault 1980 b, 202-209), where Foucault argues (among other things) that it is the development of larger “rationalities” of power out of highly dispersed relations that shows how it is possible to have “a coherent, rational strategy, but one for which it is no longer possible to identify a person who conceived it” (1980 b 203). As this question also involves Foucault’s notion of “strategies” of power and/or resistance, it would be helpful to recall what Foucault means by “strategy,” which I have discussed in Chapter Three. Colin Gordon (Foucault 1980 b), Jeff Minson (Minson 1986), and Gary Wickham (Wickham 1986) also discuss this notion in some detail, as well as explaining how power can be both “intentional and nonsubjective.” 12 We have already seen how in its early incarnations, the confession held out a promise of salvation and perhaps even one of liberation liberation from the hidden sexual desires and dreams that could affect one secretly if they weren’t brought out into the open and thereby set under conscious control. So it is possible to see how the notion of confession, the speaking of sex, as a process of liberation could have developed in its modern form out of the liberatory aspects of confessions of the past. l3 ln this statement Bernauer quotes Foucault (Foucault 1982, 16). 14 For example, Julia Kristeva is a psychoanalyst who strongly criticizes this view of psychoanalysis (though she does admit that some of its practitioners do think of themselves as helping others to find their “true” selves”). See especially Chapter Two of New Maladies of the Soul for Kristeva’s view of psychoanalytic practice and her emphasis on how it need not be thought to “normalize” patients or encourage them to find an absolute “truth” within to which they must subject themselves (Kristeva 1995, 27-44). 15 Foucault seems to be appealing here to a contrast between a resistance that is grounded in a unitary, coherent “true self’ and one that rejects such a notion in favor of a self that contains a multiplicity of heterogeneous elements within. By focusing on the latter, it seems, one could at least avoid the problem associated with resistance grounded in the former, namely that such resistance works to perpetuate the pastoral power targeted for resistance. But Foucault’s suggested appeal to a multiple, rather than a unitary self is still problematic in a number of ways, as I discuss in what follows. quotes are taken from a section of Gender Trouble where Butler addresses the “subversive” potential of the work of Julia Kristeva. The “law” to which she refers here is the “paternal law” Kristeva discusses in her version of psychoanalytic theory. I agree with Butler’s interpretation of Foucault here, but disagree with her analysis and evaluation of Kristeva’s views. See Hendricks (1997) for an interpretation of Kristeva’s work that shows it need not fall prey to Butler’s criticisms as presented in Gender Trouble. ' 7 Butler explains how the multiple and heterogeneous sexual pleasures of the hermaphrodite Herculine Barbin (as described in his/her journals, published by Foucault) seem to be presented by Foucault as if they were unregulated and unconstructed by power: “Foucault appears to think that the journals provide insight into precisely that unregulated field of pleasures prior to the imposition of the law of univocal sex. His reading, however, constitutes a radical misreading of the way in which those pleasures are . . . generated by the very law they are said to deny” (Butler 1990, 98). 18 Once we recognize the constructedness of sex and gender, Butler argues, we may be able to perform these constructs in such a way as to reveal their constructedness: “If ‘identifications’ . . . can be exposed as phantasmatic, then it must be possible to enact an identification that displays its phantasmatic structure” (Butler 1990, 30-31). She suggests “gender parody” as a means of resistance to power that would place individuals in rigid categories of sex and gender. One type of such parody can be found in the practice of drag, or cross-dressing: “In imitating gender, drag implicitly reveals the imitative structure of gender itself as well as its contingency” (1990, 137); it is therefore “a parodic repetition that exposes the phantasmatic effect of abiding identity as a politically tenuous construction” (1990, 141). See especially Butler (1990, 128-141) for a discussion of the subversive potential of the practice of drag. 19 Fraser then goes on to question this pragmatic use of Foucault’s “body language,” arguing that the humanist language of rights and freedom will likely serve better as a discourse of emancipation (Fraser 1989 b, 63-64). I have argued, however, that Foucault does seem to make appeal to such humanist language in his genealogies, and that he does so in order to bring his audience to question ideals such as “rights” and “freedom” from a critical distance. II Diagnosing the Present: How the Intellectual can Promote “Real Freedom” It is in some of Foucault’s later writings on Kant, especially, that he emphasizes the notion of freedom and how the intellectual can contribute to it. In three different essays, all focused on Kant’s article from 1784 entitled “What is Enlightenment?,” Foucault compares some aspects of his own intellectual project favorably with Kant’s arguments in this article. Foucault gives the label “ontology of the present” or “ontology of ourselves” to the kind of work that he claims both he and Kant undertake. Considering what Foucault means by such an “ontology” will help elucidate the ways in which the Foucauldian intellectual as exile can help encourage others to practice their “real freedom.” In the first lecture of his course at the College de France in 1983, Foucault argues that Kant “founded the two great critical traditions which divide modern philosophy” (Foucault 1997 e, 99). The first tradition Foucault calls the “analytic of truth,” an intellectual inquiry into “the conditions under which true knowledge is possible” (1997 e 99). This type of critical work, Foucault states, was initiated by Kant’s monumental Critiques, his investigations into the legitimate uses and the limits of pure reason, practical reason and judgment. The other “great critical tradition” founded by Kant stems mainly from his text on the Enlightenment, according to Foucault, and it concerns an “ontology of the present.” This tradition, within which Foucault locates his own work, investigates the present and our place within it: The question which, I believe, for the first time appears in this text by Kant [“What is Enlightenment?”] is the question of today, the question about the present, about what is our actuality: what is happening today? What is happening right now? And what is this right now we are all in which defines the moment at which I am writing? (1997 e 84) It is this kind of critique, with these sorts of questions, that Foucault himself chooses to perform: rather than opting for “a critical philosophy which will present itself as an analytic philosophy of truth in general,” Foucault claims that “the form of reflection within which [he has] attempted to work” is the critique he calls an “ontology of ourselves” (1997 e 100). Foucault specifies that this kind of critique, this “ontology of the present” involves a particular way of interrogating the present, whereby the present appears as a “philosophical event to which the philosopher who speaks about it belongs”: [l]t is a matter of showing specifically and in what ways the one who speaks as a thinker, a scientist, and a philosopher is himself a part of [a process concerning thought, bodies of knowledge and philosophy] and (more than that) how he has a certain role to play in this process where he will therefore find himself as both element and actor. (Foucault 1997 e, 85) In other words, the thinker who performs an “ontology of the present” does not just ask about “what is happening right now,” but also inquires into his/her role therein. More precisely, this critique involves asking both how one’s thought and speech fit into and are grounded in the present reality, as well as what kinds of effects one can have on this reality through thinking and speaking: Discourse has to reappropriate its present, on one hand, in order to again find in it its proper place, on the other, in order to express its meaning and finally, in order to specify the mode of action that it is capable of exerting in the present. (1997 e 87) I will argue that in examining the present reality and one’s role in it, the “ontologist of the present” also considers the way in which the present can be changed through his/her critical discourse. Thus the “mode of action” that the ontologist’s discourse “is capable of exerting in the present” is one of change, of transformation. According to Foucault, Kant performs this kind of critique in “What is Enlightenment?”. Foucault points out that the Enlightenment (in German, Aufklarung) was labeled as such by those living within it, and that this shows they were concerned with their own present: [T]he Aufkldrung named itself Aufkldrung ... it is a very unique cultural process which became aware of itself by naming itself, by situating itself in terms of its past and its future, and by indicating how it had to operate within its own present. (Foucault 1997 e, 88) It was perhaps in that spirit that the German periodical Berlinische Monatschrift asked of its readers in 1784, “Was Ist Aufkldrung?” Kant was among several intellectual figures who replied. His by-now familiar response was that “Enlightenment is man’s release from his self-incurred tutelage” (Kant 1997, 7). Foucault emphasizes the negative aspect of this response, claiming that for Kant enlightenment is an “exit,” a “way out”: “a process that releases us from the status of ‘immaturity’ ... [the latter being] a certain state of our will that makes us accept someone else’s authority to lead us in areas where the use of reason is called for” (Foucault 1997 d, 105). Kant’s view of enlightenment, then, describes a process whereby rational beings find a “way out” from the “tutelage” of others’ authority by using their own reason in areas where such independence is called for. It is not called for in all sectors of one’s life, as Kant is quick to point out. It is only in the “public use of reason,” where one expresses one’s opinions in writing before the public “as a scholar,” that one ought to escape the tutelage of others and use one’s own reason (Kant 1997, 10). The “private use of reason,” on the other hand, is involved when one fulfills the duties of one’s particular place in society, where the “interests of the community” require an “artificial unanimity” in order to get things done. Here, according to Kant, reason must not debate but only obey (Kant 1997, 11). Kant provides an example to help illustrate this point: a citizen should be allowed to express his opinion publicly on the issue of taxation, advocating change should he be so inclined. But he cannot then, on the basis of these opinions, refuse to pay his taxes as a private citizen, as a member of a community which requires a certain level of obedience in order to function (Kant 1997, 11-12). Foucault explains that Kant does not mean we must practice a “blind obedience” in the private use of reason, but rather that in this area of life, where we have a particular role to play in the community, our reason must be directed towards the specific ends involved in that role: Man, Kant says, makes a private use of reason when he is a “cog in a machine”; that is, when he has a role to play in society and jobs to do . . . he finds himself thereby placed in a circumscribed position, where he has to apply particular rules and pursue particular ends. Kant does not ask that people practice a blind and foolish obedience, but that they adapt the use they make of their reason to these determined circumstances; and reason must then be subjected to the particular ends in view. (Foucault 1997 d, 109) Reason is not, then, as free in its private use as it is in its public use the former requires that reason be directed towards specific ends and restricted by the particular rules involved with one’s post in society, while the latter allows for a more open and free use of reason since there, as Foucault puts it, “one is reasoning only in order to use one’s reason” (Foucault 1997 d, 109). Thus, while the private use of reason can be limited, according to Kant, rational beings must be granted the liberty to exercise the public use of their reason without constraint. According to Kant, enlightenment is a release from our incapacity to use our own (public) reason in an autonomous fashion, a release from a certain kind of “tutelage” whereby others think for us and we simply follow their directions. This tutelage is self-incurred because “its cause lies not in lack of reason but in lack of resolution and courage to use it without direction from another” it is due mainly to “laziness and cowardice” (Kant 1997, 7). We have become used to our “immaturity,” comfortable with it to the point that the prospect of leaving it seems a frightening, if not impossible, task. But the blame is not to be put only on our cowardice, for those who guide and direct us are partly responsible for creating such immature subjects: That the step to competence is held to be very dangerous by the far greater portion of mankind (and by the entire fair sex) quite apart from its being arduous is seen to by those guardians who have so kindly assumed superintendence over them. After the guardians have first made their domestic cattle dumb and have made sure that these placid creatures will not dare take a single step without the harness of the cart to which they are tethered, the guardians then show them the danger which threatens if they try to go alone. (Kant 1997, 8) Foucault emphasizes that for Kant, enlightenment is a release from a “minority condition in which humanity was maintained and maintained in an authoritative way,” but which is due to both an “excess of authority” and to a kind of “lack of decision and courage” on the part of the subjects of this authority (Foucault 1997 c, 33). Accomplishing the “way out” of enlightenment, then, requires both a political and a personal effort. Kant claims that what is required for enlightenment is freedom: “the freedom to make public use of one’s reason at every point” (Kant 1997, 10). This, as Foucault points out, is a political question, since it prescribes an obligation on the part of the state to guarantee citizens the freedom to engage in the public use of reason (Foucault 1997 d, 110). But once such liberty has been granted to individuals by political leaders, individuals themselves must finally begin to practice the use of reason within this space of freedom. Kant indicates that this will more or less follow naturally from the freedom granted, that once people are allowed to exercise the public use of their reason without constraint, and a few begin to do so, “enlightenment is almost sure to follow” for the public at large (Kant 1997, 9). Nevertheless, his remarks about humanity’s “cowardice” are recalled in the “motto” of Enlightenment, which Foucault likens to a kind of “sermon,” a “call to courage” (Foucault 1997 c, 33): “Have the courage to use your own reason!” (Kant 1997, 7). This “motto” seems more a command, requiring that individuals take on part of the burden of enlightenment themselves, by summoning up the courage to release themselves from the cattle-cart and “go alone.” Thus personal courage and effort must accompany the political freedom required for enlightenment. Notice that in his answer to the question “What is Enlightenment?” Kant not only describes the process of escaping from one’s self-imposed tutelage, he also prescribes it as a task to be undertaken. Enlightenment as a “way out,” therefore, is both a process that Kant describes as happening “right now,” and one that calls for political and personal change the political structure must be made such that individuals have the freedom to practice an autonomous use of public reason, and the latter need to muster the courage to exercise this freedom. Foucault points out that enlightenment is presented by Kant in an ambiguous way: “He characterizes it as a phenomenon, an ongoing process; but he also presents it as a task and an obligation” (Foucault 1996 b, 106). In so doing, Kant exhibits what Foucault calls an “attitude of modernity,” whereby one interrogates one’s present in a particular way: focusing on one or more particularly meaningful aspects of it, one imagines the present differently from a position within it. Foucault explains this “modern attitude” by reference to Charles Baudelaire’s description of modernity in art. According to Foucault, Baudelaire characterizes modernity as a particular kind of attitude towards the present. This attitude consists partly in being sensitive to the present as fleeting, in allowing oneself to experience “a feeling of novelty, of vertigo in the face of the passing moment”; but also, and more importantly, the attitude of modernity “consists in recapturing something eternal that is not beyond the present instant, nor behind it, but within it” (Foucault 1997 d, 114). To adopt a modern attitude is to try to grasp “the mysterious element of beauty” that the present moment may contain, to “extract from fashion whatever element it may contain of poetry within history” (Baudelaire 1964, 13, 12). The modern individual recognizes the contingency, the ephemerality of the present, but also seeks to locate and emphasize within it aspects of beauty, value, and meaning that can extend beyond the fleeting moment. Those with the modern attitude do not simply watch the present pass by, content to sit as idle spectators; they take aspects of the ephemeral present and bring out in them a lasting value that nevertheless respects and upholds their contingency. Baudelaire offers as an example artists who reveal how particular fashions of dress exemplify important aspects of the present. As Foucault explains, citing Baudelaire: “The modern painter is the one who can show the dark frock-coat as ‘the necessary costume of our time,’ the one who knows how to make manifest, in the fashion of the day, the essential, permanent, obsessive relation that our age entertains with death” (Foucault 1997 d, 115). 20 Such a painter finds and emphasizes a particular aspect of the present in its beauty and meaning, revealing the “obsessive relation .. . with death” that is part of the present. At the same time, however, the modem artist does not uphold this aspect as something universal and timeless, “beyond” or “behind” the present moment, as Foucault notes; rather, s/he expresses its meaning as something contingent, rooted in the present age. Foucault points out that in this process of “heroizing” the present (Foucault 1997 d, 114), those with the modern attitude also work to change it. By focusing on particular aspects of the present and revealing them in their beauty and meaning, the modern individual imagines and expresses a present that is transformed. But this transformation does not occur, Foucault points out, by rejecting or destroying the present in an attempt to go beyond it entirely. Rather, the modem individual imagines the present transformed through focusing on “what it is”: “For the attitude of modernity, the high value of the present is indissociable from a desperate eagerness to imagine it, to imagine it otherwise than it is, and to transform it not by destroying it but by grasping it in what it is” (Foucault 1997 d, 117). The modern attitude consists in emphasizing parts of the present as it currently exists, deemphasizing others in the process and thereby imagining a present that is different. In so doing it accomplishes “a difficult interplay between the truth of what is real and the exercise of freedom” it takes what is given as the present in its reality and practices a freedom by also, and through this emphasis on what is real, expressing how it might be different (1997 d 117). Foucault argues, therefore, that “Baudelairean modernity is an exercise in which extreme attention to what is real is confronted with the practice of a liberty that simultaneously respects this reality and violates it” (1997 d 117). By referring back to the “ambiguous” manner in which Kant speaks of enlightenment, we can see how Kant investigated the present in order to move through it towards its transformation. Recall that for Foucault, Kant presents enlightenment as both an “ongoing process” and as a “task” and “obligation.” Rereading this statement as an expression of the “attitude of modernity,” we could say that Kant investigates the “ongoing process” of enlightenment during his present, for the purpose of advising a change of some sort in this case, a change in quantity. In other words, Kant answered the question “What is Enlightenment?” by saying that it is both something which is happening “here and now” and something which should happen more. Kant notes that enlightenment has begun by 1784, but has yet far to go: If we are asked, “Do we now live in an enlightened ageT' the answer is, “No,” but we do live in an age of enlightenment. As things now stand, much is lacking which prevents men from being, or easily becoming, capable of correctly using their own reason .... But on the other hand, we have clear indications that the field has now been opened . . . that the obstacles to general enlightenment or the release from self-imposed tutelage are gradually being reduced. (Kant 1997, 16) Thus Kant’s text could be said to exhibit the “attitude of modernity” that Foucault describes, an attitude that investigates the present in order to transform it, “not by destroying it but by grasping it in what it is.” James Schmidt and Thomas Wartenberg agree that for Foucault, what is most important about Kant’s “What is Enlightenment?” is the “modern attitude” expressed therein. They argue that just as the modern artist, as described by Baudelaire, “sought to discover the eternal in ‘the ephemeral, the fugitive, the contingent,’ so Kant as Foucault reads him -- attempted to find a philosophical significance in the controversies of his own age” (Schmidt and Wartenberg 1994, 302). In other words, in his article on enlightenment Kant focused on the present in a particular way, seeking to find in it “a philosophical significance,” some element of meaning through which he could imagine the present differently not by rejecting it, but by grasping it in “what it is.” Kant considered the “way out” of enlightenment an especially significant aspect of his present reality and brought it into focus. In so doing he also expressed concern for his own role in the present, connecting “the significance of his work with respect to knowledge, a reflection on history and a particular analysis of the specific moment at which he is writing and because of which he is writing” (Foucault 1997 d, 112). In “What is Enlightenment?” Kant explains that public enlightenment is likely to follow the granting of political freedom to use one’s (public) reason independently: For there will always be some independent thinkers, even among the established guardians of the great masses, who, after throwing off the yoke of tutelage from their own shoulders, will disseminate the spirit of the rational appreciation of both their own worth and every man’s vocation for thinking for himself. (Kant 1997, 9) Kant himself may not be one of the “established guardians of the great masses,” but he certainly qualifies as one of the “independent thinkers” he describes here, and it could well be that he considers his own work as contributing to public enlightenment. One might say, then, that he expresses concern both for the present reality (and the element of philosophical meaning he finds therein) and for the role he plays in it as a philosopher and a writer. He imagines the present differently and considers the potential for his own work to exhibit transformative action within the present the “motto” he provides for enlightenment, expressed in the form of a command, seems testament to this. In this way, Kant’s text seems to express the “modem attitude” as described by Foucault. In claiming to also write within the context of an “ontology of the present,” Foucault sometimes describes his own work as exhibiting a “modern attitude.” In an interview first published in 1983, Foucault refers to Kant’s text on enlightenment to argue that “it is the task of philosophy to explain what today is and what we are today,” to offer a “diagnosis of today” that could promote its transformation: I want to say about the task of a diagnosis of today that it does not consist only of a description of who we are, rather a line of fragility of today to follow and understand, if and how what is, can no longer be what it is. In this sense, the description must be formulated in a kind of virtual break, which opens room understood as a room of concrete freedom, that is possible transformation. (Foucault 1996 h, 359) In this densely-packed passage we can recognize the task of the intellectual as genealogist to “make things more fragile,” to exhibit “if and how what is, can no longer be what it is.” But what is especially interesting for the present purpose is that Foucault describes this task here as something that can be accomplished through a description of the present. In other words, rather than trying to encourage a transformation in the present by pointing to something beyond or outside of it, Foucault suggests that this may be done through a description of the present itself, through diagnosing the present reality in “what it is.” Specifically, he suggests a diagnosis of the present that describes it so as to emphasize “a line of fragility,” where “what is” can appear as something that need not be. The intellectual who undertakes such a “diagnosis of today” would exhibit the “modern attitude,” imagining the present differently through a focus on certain elements of it that hold an important philosophical significance, namely their capacity to induce transformation in others and in the present reality itself. Could we say that Foucault provides a “diagnosis of today” in his genealogies, a description of the present that imagines it otherwise without going beyond it? I think so, despite the fact that his genealogical analyses are focused on the past. Foucault insists that genealogy begins with questions and issues that are important within the present moment: “The question I start off with is: what are we and what are we today? . . . Therefore, if you like, it is a history that starts off from this present day actuality” (Foucault 1997 f, 158). His genealogical histories do not just start from present concerns, however; Foucault also asserts that each one also “always refers to an actuality” (1997 f 159). In order to see at least one way in which this is the case, recall that in his genealogies Foucault encourages an unsettling of current modes of thought without exiting them entirely, by questioning them in the context of how they are presently viewed. He works to question particular discourses, practices, etc. through the lens of present normative concerns and evaluations. Foucault therefore does not leave the present, but moves through it towards its past. We can discern here the evidence of a “modem attitude.” First, one could say that Foucault begins by locating aspects of the present that have a certain significance today he focuses on issues and questions that are already somehow meaningful in the present, that are “particularly fragile or sensitive at the present time” (Foucault 1997 f, 158). He then provides a historical narrative that intensifies this fragility through the lens of the present itself. In this way he might be said to imagine the present differently by focusing on “what it is,” and on what is already happening within it he intensifies certain aspects of the present reality, thereby working to promote a change in it without going beyond or outside of it. This “diagnosis of today” does seem to open “a room of concrete freedom, that is possible transformation,” as Foucault suggests such a diagnosis ought to do. It both “makes things more fragile” by showing how “what is” need not be so, and accomplishes this in a way that would seem to allow the reader to distance him/herself from Foucault as an intellectual truth-provider by making him appear as a “prophet in exile.” This leaves open a space for the reader to question his/her “call to prophetism” and, perhaps, to turn to him/herself for guidance instead. Foucault himself seems to consider his genealogies capable of accomplishing such a goal, as evidenced by statements in his own essay entitled “What is Enlightenment?” Near the end of this essay he claims that the “modem attitude” informing an “ontology of ourselves” could be thought of as a “limit attitude,” an approach to limits that enables the questioning and possible transgression of them. Here Foucault expresses the divergence of his own project from Kant’s “ontology of the present.” Kant’s work did contain a certain focus on limits, Foucault notes, but “the Kantian question was that of knowing what limits knowledge has to renounce transgressing” (Foucault 1997 d, 124). Foucault argues that Kant’s three Critiques “[define] the conditions under which the use of reason is legitimate in order to determine what can be known, what must be done, and what may be hoped” (1997 d 111). In other words, according to Foucault Kant set out certain limits to the legitimate use of reason in his Critiques, offering them as “handbooks” for the person trying to achieve enlightenment by using reason on their own (1997 d 111). These were presented, then, as limits that “knowledge has to renounce transgressing.” The “modern attitude” Foucault himself encourages, and the kind of “ontology of the present” that he seems to undertake, takes on a more “positive” character, he claims, since it encourages us to ask which limits we might be able to transgress rather than telling us which we must not cross: [l]n what is given to us as universal, necessary, obligatory, what place is occupied by whatever is singular, contingent, and the product of arbitrary constraints? The point, in brief, is to transform the critique conducted in the form of necessary limitation into a practical critique that takes the form of a possible transgression. (Foucault 1997 d, 124-125) Foucault goes on to explain, in what seems a clear reference to Kant, that in this kind of endeavor one no longer searches for “formal structures with universal value” (1997 d 125). Whereas Kant claimed to locate the, universal limits of the legitimate uses of reason, Foucault here argues that the ontologist of the present ought rather to ask about the “contingent” and “arbitrary” elements of what is thus presented as “universal, necessary, obligatory.” Jon Simons explains this point clearly in elucidating Foucault’s proximity to, as well as his departure from Kant: Foucault’s stress on the historical and contingent nature of conditions of possibility for human sciences distinguishes his critique of limits from Kant’s. . . . Kant failed to recognize that his own thought must also be limited and conditioned by his historical and cultural circumstances. In Foucault’s version, limits are historical and contingent rather than universal and necessary, and thus are open to change. (Simons 1995, 15, 17) For Foucault, the “ontology of the present” should reveal the contingency of limits, their “fragility,” in order to make what might appear to be a “necessary limitation” into a “possible transgression.” This, Foucault indicates, is what genealogy is able to do it encourages us to transgress the limits that have made us who and what we are. Foucault argues that his version of an “ontology of ourselves” “will be genealogical” (Foucault 1997 d, 125). Genealogy accomplishes a “critique of what we are” that is “at one and the same time the historical analysis of the limits that are imposed upon us, and an experiment with the possibility of going beyond them” (1997 d 132). It manages a “diagnosis of today” that describes the present in “what it is” while also imagining it differently, analyzing our limits in such a way that reveals “the possibility of going beyond them.” Genealogy, therefore, makes possible and encourages a practice of freedom on the part of others, an effort to resist and transgress limits that may have appeared necessary in the past but are revealed by the genealogist as contingent. It reveals, as Foucault argues, that we can change the boundaries of who we are, how we think, and what we do. To summarize, Foucault provides an “ontology of the present” in his genealogies that exhibits a “modem attitude” similar to Kant’s (in his text on enlightenment) in certain respects: he, like Kant, undertakes a “diagnosis of today” that seeks to find within the present moment elements of particular significance, and focuses on them in order to imagine the present differently than it is. Kant emphasizes the enlightenment that he finds already at work in the present; while Foucault locates particular issues, discourses, practices, ideals, etc. that are already “sensitive” and “fragile” in the present, and emphasizes this fragility by delving into their past. But in so doing, Foucault (like Kant) simultaneously “respects [his] reality and violates it” (Foucault 1997 d, 117) -he imagines the present differently not by rejecting it, but by looking more closely at “what it is,” at certain elements already there within it. In addition, the goal of Foucault’s “ontology of the present” is similar to Kant’s notion of enlightenment in that it encourages others to turn to themselves for guidance. Foucault claims that his “diagnosis of today” seeks “to give new impetus, as far and wide as possible, to the undefined work of freedom” (Foucault 1997 d, 126). In other words, in his genealogies Foucault works to induce, to encourage a transformation in his audience that will impel them to practice freedom. He seems to want to coax his readers to question their habitual modes of thought so that they have reason to change them. But he also appears to hope that, in the process, they will begin to turn to themselves for this change rather than continuing under the “tutelage” of others. Foucault’s goal of “enlightenment” as a “way out” extends further than Kant’s, however, in that while the latter insists there are certain limits one must respect in using one’s reason autonomously, the former does not. Foucault encourages the questioning of all limits rather than promoting the transgression of some while respecting others. He cannot accept, therefore, that the intellectual would tell others to escape from the bonds of their “tutelage” by “tutoring” them him/herself on which limits they must respect. This brings up another similarity between Foucault and Kant, in that both address the present with a particular concern for their own role therein and their ability to help bring about the transformation that they envision, even if they differ in what role they chose to play. Kant seemed to consider himself able to encourage others to undertake the difficult task of enlightenment, as he issued what Foucault terms a “call to courage” to his readers to use their own reason. Foucault is also concerned with his ability as an intellectual to bring about change, but he doesn’t offer a direct “sermon” to others in as serious a fashion as Kant. Instead, as I have argued, Foucault may have acted the prophet in a way that also encourages others to undermine this position; he may have played the role of the “universal” intellectual who tells others what is good/bad, but only in order to bring them to question this role and his own performance of it. This divergence of Foucault from Kant seems traceable to Foucault’s wish to encourage a transgression of limits rather than “sermonizing” about which limits ought to be respected, and to Kant’s role as a “universal” intellectual who prophesies without critical distance. Kant sought to locate “formal structures with universal value” (Foucault 1997 d, 125), and considered the limits to the legitimate uses of reason as such. Further, once having accessed such “universal” structures, Kant would likely feel justified in giving a “sermon” as to what others ought to do: “Have the courage to use your own reason!” (but only within the limits of its legitimate use). Foucault, on the other hand, seems to utilize the “universal” intellectual position as a ploy: he acts as if he is “sermonizing” about what must be done and what is universally true, but then backs away from this by showing, as Richard Bernstein puts it, the “dark ambiguities” in the history of such universal truths and values. He therefore distances himself from the role of a “universal” intellectual, using it while also undermining it. In this way Foucault may be able to open a space of freedom for his audience to decide what to think and do rather than looking for prophecies. He may also encourage them to do so without directly commanding them as Kant seems to do. As a genealogist, then, Foucault attempts to “diagnose” the present: from a position within the present, he locates particular issues, practices, values, etc. that are already showing signs of fragility, that are already being felt as problematic. He reveals this problem, this danger as if he were a “universal” intellectual giving an objective, universally valid diagnosis of it, seeming to move outside of his contextualized position in the present as a rhetorical device. Foucault writes as if he were telling others what is good or bad about the present with a “view from nowhere,” as it were. But he does not, thereby, leave his position in the present, his position within the current regime of truth, because speaking universal truths is precisely what this regime requires. He takes up this role as a “universal” intellectual within the current regime of truth (thereby appearing to be outside of all contexts) in order to draw others into exile from it. By acting as if he is expressing universal truths, Foucault has a better chance of ensuring that those among his readers who are still deeply enmeshed in the current regime of truth will take him seriously. But he may manage, through the rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile,” to encourage them to question their previous modes of thought and thereby exile themselves from this regime as well. Though he appears to move beyond the present into a “view from nowhere,” Foucault remains yet within it, moves through it to tell a story of its past, and in the process imagines it differently. He seems, thereby, to encourage others to distance themselves from their habitual ways of thinking and practice a “real freedom” by transgressing limits. I have so far considered what Foucauldian “real freedom” looks like, and how the intellectual as a “prophet in exile” can contribute to this freedom. For Foucault, our “real freedom” is a practice of resisting limits, of asking which limits we find “poisonous” and working to transgress them. I have argued that the most effective resistance occurs from a position of exile within the relations of power being resisted, that those who wish to resist can best do so if they avoid trying to stand outside of the power relations they attack unless, that is, they take up such an “outside” only as a provisional, temporary measure, in order to reap its benefits and avoid its dangers. I have also argued that the Foucauldian intellectual can help encourage such a practice of freedom through resistance by providing a diagnosis of the present through a genealogical history and acting as a “prophet in exile” therein. The genealogist diagnoses the present by focusing on certain discourses, practices, knowledges, truth claims, etc., that are already experiencing some fragility, and by making them even more fragile through a presentation of their history. The intellectual as genealogist thereby reveals the malleability of particular limits placed on us by relations of power, and encourages resistance on the part of those who no longer want to be governed “like that.” It is clear that Foucault hopes the genealogist can also encourage a kind of perpetual questioning of limits on the part of others, rather than simply a resistance against the particular limits s/he examines in his/her genealogical analyses. By comparing his “ontology of the present” to Kant’s discussion of enlightenment, Foucault reveals that one goal of the intellectual genealogist is to encourage others to use their own reason rather than looking to others for “tutelage.” Part of exercising such autonomy is being willing to constantly question the limits put on one by others, limits as to “what we are, do, or think.” How can the Foucauldian intellectual as exile work to bring about such autonomy? I have argued that by refusing to prophecy, to say to others what they must do, the intellectual manages only give a negative prophecy: there is nothing to be done. It is by giving prescriptions while also distancing him/herself from them that the intellectual may be able to encourage others to turn more to themselves than to the intellectual for answers as to what to do. If s/he suggests that resistance take place through appeal to the “multiplicity” of “bodies, pleasures, and knowledges,” for example, the intellectual as genealogist can also distance him/herself from this prescription by unsettling it in his/her genealogical analysis (by revealing the “dark ambiguities” in its historical development and how these continue to be perpetuated). The intellectual’s audience may then be able to understand that the prescription must be adopted with caution. Further, by revealing him/herself to be a “double agent” in regard to the regime of truth, by showing that s/he both uses and questions the concepts, values discourses, and knowledges that are currently dominant in this regime, the intellectual distances him/herself from the role of a “universal” intellectual who ought to be followed as a prophet. Readers may then realize that the intellectual need not be viewed as the voice of authority, as their “representative”; and they may be more likely, perhaps, to turn to themselves instead. There are still problems to be resolved here, however. For example, might it not be the case that if the intellectual reveals him/herself to be a “double agent,” his/her audience could respond by simply turning to someone else as a “prophet” rather than looking to themselves to decide what to think and to do? Unless all “agents” of the regime of truth acted as “prophets in exile,” this would seem to be not only possible, but perhaps even likely. It may be for this reason that Foucault began to focus, in his later work, on the notion of creating oneself as a work of art. In the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality, Foucault emphasized how it may be possible for us to create ourselves aesthetically; and if we can manage to do this, it seems, we are likely to engage in the continual process of questioning that makes up our “real freedom”. The “aesthetics of the self’ that Foucault discusses in his later work can be considered as part of the practice of freedom that comprises a “cure” for the regime of truth. I explain this notion of an “aesthetics of the self’ in Chapter Five, discussing its liberatory potential and how the intellectual as genealogist can encourage others to practice freedom in this way. Other problems not yet resolved have to do with the notion of our “real freedom” as a practice of continual questioning and resistance of limits, to which I turn next. 20 Foucault cites a phrase from Baudelaire in this passage; see Baudelaire (1955, 127). III Real Freedom? Objections and Replies There are a number of objections that could be and have been brought against Foucault’s view of freedom. First, it seems all we can ever succeed in doing through a practice of freedom, according to Foucault, is to change somewhat the relations of power under which we live. This may appear problematic, since even if we succeed these altered power relations will be “dangerous” like their predecessors. Recall that for Foucault this does not mean resistance is always “recuperated” by power in the sense that power always “wins.” But it is also the case that resistance doesn’t “win” either - the struggle, even if it is not called for in regard to all relations of power, all of the time, does at least seem to be called for in regard to some of them in perpetuity. As Alessandro Pizzorno points out, for Foucault freedom as a practice is something that is only temporary, and that seems therefore doomed to defeat: Freedom, in fact, comes out merely as a temporary possibility, the forces struggling in its name either doomed to be defeated or, should they finally succeed, bound to abolish freedom in the name of what was meant to be a new free order. And indeed, a free social order cannot in this view be easily conceived, since by definition order will be achieved only as an effect of the working of power. (Pizzorno 1992, 208) What Pizzorno means by the last statement here can be explained by reference to my previous discussion of power and resistance. Relations of power are in force when “stable mechanisms . . . direct, in a fairly constant manner and with reasonable certainty, the conduct of others” (Foucault 1983 b, 225). This means that, as Pizzorno claims, order occurs only through “the working of power.” One can then legitimately ask whether temporary, fleeting acts of resistance constitute much of a “real freedom,” when these brief manifestations of what Pizzorno calls “contestation, unruliness, indocility, intractability” (Pizzorno 1992, 207) will inevitably be supplanted by an “order” that is the product of relations of power. Pizzorno himself does not present this point in criticism of Foucault; but other critics, such as Charles Taylor, have done so. 21 There is also another important objection that needs to be considered: given that Foucault thinks some relations of power are “better” or “worse” than others, and that practices of freedom seem to produce “better” results than projects of liberation, how, exactly, might such normative evaluations be grounded in Foucault’s work? This question is not easily answered, though I argue that it can be best resolved by paying close attention to Foucault’s professed political role as an intellectual. No escape into freedom According to Charles Taylor, Foucault’s genealogical analyses “seem to offer an insight into what has happened . . . which at the same time offers a critique, and hence some notion of a good unrealized or repressed in history, which we therefore understand better how to rescue” (Taylor 1986, 69). The problem, Taylor argues, is that Foucault rejects the notion of some “good” that may be “rescued” as a result of his analyses. Foucault’s position thus seems “paradoxical” to Taylor: “Foucault’s analyses seem to bring evils to light; and yet he wants to distance himself from the suggestion which would seem inescapably to follow, that the negation or overcoming of these evils promotes a good” (1986, 69). There are two “goods” in particular that Taylor seems to want to see “rescued,” and that he thinks Foucault’s work does attempt to rescue despite its author’s claims to the contrary: freedom and truth. Taylor claims that Foucault contends in much of his work that freedom and truth cannot be rescued: The idea of liberating truth is a profound illusion. There is no truth which can be espoused, defended, rescued against systems of power. On the contrary, each such system defines its own variant of truth. And there is no escape from power into freedom, for such systems of power are coextensive with human society. We can only step from one to another. (1986, 70) For Taylor, “there is no escape from power into freedom” in Foucault’s work, since we are always involved in relations of power and all we can do is “step from one to another.” This doesn’t seem to amount to much of a “real freedom” at all, Taylor implies. Taylor goes on to make the further claim that Foucault’s position is incoherent, as his analysis of power requires the very notions of truth and freedom that he explicitly rejects. Focusing on the latter (since it is freedom with which I am mainly concerned here), Taylor claims that Foucault “wants to discredit as somehow based on a misunderstanding the very idea of liberation from power” (Taylor 1986, 92). But according to Taylor, this doesn’t make sense on Foucault’s own view. Taylor argues that the notion of “power” (even in Foucault’s sense of the term) cannot be separated from the idea of freedom as liberation: “power, in his sense, does not make sense without at least the idea of liberation” (1986, 92). This is because power implies “some notion of constraint” as an “imposition,” which requires “a background of desires, interests, purposes” that power “frustrates,” and this in turn implies the correlative notion of a lifting of constraint (1986, 90, 91): “Because [power] is linked with the notion of the imposition on our significant desires/purposes, it cannot be separated from the notion of some relative lifting of this restraint, from an unimpeded fulfillment of these desires/purposes” (1986, 91). It is the lifting of restraint that Taylor is calling “liberation,” allowing him to conclude that Foucault is simply speaking “incoherently” when he speaks of power without the possibility of liberation from it (1986, 93). There seem to be at least two, related criticisms of Foucault presented by Taylor: (1) Foucault puts forth a critique of power while also dooming us to remain within its grips; and (2) he cannot even coherently hold this view. To some degree the first criticism seems to rely on the second i.e., it may be that the reason why it is a problem for Taylor that Foucault offers a critique without a corresponding “good” is mainly because doing so is incoherent. 22 But there seems also to be more for Taylor to the first criticism than this, given the rhetorical force of his claim that for Foucault “there can be no escape from power into freedom.” That we are stuck forever in relations of power seems connected by Taylor to a perpetual state of unfreedom. I will address both of these criticisms in turn. The responses that follow, though they are guided by Taylor’s criticisms, could be formulated in ways that would provide appropriate responses to similar criticisms by others. One fairly simple response a Foucauldian could give to the first of Taylor’s criticisms would be to point out that it seems to rely on an assumption that power is “all bad” a view Foucault explicitly rejects. Indeed, it is clear that Taylor interprets Foucauldian power relations as mainly or wholly constraining (he likens power to an “imposition” that “restrains” interests and purposes). More generally, to say that his notion of freedom isn’t much of a “real freedom” because we still end up governed by power seems to imply, in part, that this is an undesirable state of affairs. Yet it is important to recall that Foucault does not take a negative view of all power relations. Certainly the force of genealogical texts such as Discipline and Punish tends to suggest a negative evaluation of “disciplinary,” “normalizing,” and “pastoral” power it seems clear that Foucault’s work is not ethically or politically neutral. But it is possible to argue that though such relations of power (and indeed, seemingly all relations of power for Foucault) involve limitations and constraints, it is not this that he finds problematic about them. Foucault does indicate that all relations of power involve constraint, when he makes statements such as the following: The exercise of power consists in guiding the possibility of conduct and putting in order the possible outcome.. . . [Power is] a question of government. . . . [where this term designates] the way in which the conduct of individuals or of groups might be directed .... To govern, in this sense, is to structure the possible field of action of others. (Foucault 1983 b, 221) Under this view of power, we can see how it establishes limits —it limits the range of one’s actions by directing them, governing them in the sense of structuring “the possible field of action.” There are of course obvious examples of how this works in practices of power, such as when particular actions are expressly forbidden by the law, by moral standards, etc. There are also limits to action produced by the notion of “truth,” which for Foucault is a function of relations of power. The “truth” of individuals, for example, is produced through practices of disciplinary power such as the examination and the confession. Once one has been defined in one’s “truth,” this can be used “as a means of control and a method of domination” (Foucault 1995, 191). One’s actions can be directed, limited based on the truth of one’s sanity, one’s criminality, etc. Truth works to limit actions in other ways as well, such as when scholars are constrained by the injunction to write what is “true,” or when one’s activities in everyday social and political life are limited by what one believes to be “true.” In these and countless other ways, relations of power can be described as limiting one’s actions, as limits. But that relations of power work to constrain need not, in and of itself, be regarded as wholly negative. If this is the case, then even though we do not “exit” power entirely when practicing freedom for Foucault, this is not an utterly lamentable situation. Several commentators make this point in describing Foucault’s views. Jon Simons, for example, argues that Foucault recognizes the positive character of limits as “enabling”: [R]esentment of limitations can be overcome by recognizing that we are indebted to our constraints. Lives, works of art, and political communities have shape because of constraints. Limitations are . . . conditions of possibility. (Simons 1995, 3) In other words, not all constraints are “bad,” since they give shape to ourselves and our surroundings. To put it another way, we could think of relations of power and the limitations they place on us as enabling conceptual schemas that allow us to define, categorize, and give meaning to ourselves and to our relationships with others and the world. If this is the case, then it would likely be an impossible goal (and probably not even a desirable one) to achieve freedom from power and its limits entirely, as this would mean thrusting ourselves into a reality devoid of the means by which we establish meaning and value. Nancy Fraser agrees, stating that for Foucault “one cannot object to a form of life simply on the ground that it is power-laden” (Fraser 1989 a, 31). Fraser argues that Foucault’s view of power and the limits it places on us is “a familiar one in twentieth-century philosophy,” one that can be boiled down to three statements: (1) social practices are necessarily norm-governed, (2) practice-governing norms are simultaneously constraining and enabling, and (3) such norms enable only insofar as they constrain. Together, these three statements imply that one cannot have social practices without constraints and that, hence, the mere fact that it constrains cannot be held against any particular practice. (1989 a 31) In other words, social practices such as medicine, education, punishment, etc. function by establishing certain norms that give shape and meaning to their operations; and though these norms are constraining limitations in some sense, they also enable the practices to exist and to function at all. For example, education clearly involves constraints for teachers and students alike in their behavior, in what is taught/leamed, etc. But the practice of education would be impossible without some kind of norms that will necessarily involve some kind of limiting constraints. Fraser explains by reference to Jurgen Habermas’s view of how language works. According to Fraser, Habermas’s account shows that the successful performance of any speech act presupposes norms of truth, comprehensibility, truthfulness, and appropriateness. Such norms make communication possible, but only by devaluing and ruling out some possible and actual utterances: they enable us to speak precisely insofar as they constrain us. (1989 a 31) Her claim is that for Foucault, social practices work similarly: they enable us to function together in society in various ways just because they also constrain us. 23 Veronica Vasterling explains Fraser’s arguments in terms of the distinction between intelligibility and unintelligibility: 24 To speak and act intelligibly, I have to comply, to some extent, with the conventions that regulate the use, that is, the meaning, of words and that constitute the particular practices in which I participate.... As such, conventions are both constraining and enabling: they enable us to speak and act intelligibly exactly in so far as they constrain us. (Vasterling 1999, 30) In order for our speech and behavior to be intelligible, to carry meaning, there must be certain conventions and rules that rule out what is not intelligible, and that therefore constrain our words and actions to some extent. This occurs not just in the use of language, but in particular social practices as well. Vasterling provides the example of education: “I cannot, for instance, act intelligibly as a teacher without, to some degree, following the conventions that constitute the practice of teaching” (1999, 30). All social institutions and practices are defined in terms of limits that exclude what is to count as unintelligible in the context of those institutions and practices. Reiterating Fraser’s claims, Vasterling argues that “[c]onstraint and enablement, exclusion and production are two sides of the same coin. . . . Unless the distinction between the intelligible and the unintelligible is given up altogether, both sides belong together” (1999, 31). In other words, that practices of power are constraining is not enough to criticize them, for this allows them also to be enabling. Vasterling also points out that the particular constraints imposed by specific practices of power are contingent and malleable, and can be criticized and changed: [E]ven though the distinction between the intelligible and the unintelligible is itself irreducible, every specific instance of it is contingent and, hence, contestable. ... It is always possible, in principle, to conceive of an alternative to any specific convention, and consequently to contest its constraints and exclusions and to reinterpret its demarcation of the intelligible and the unintelligible. (Vasterling 1999, 31) Why, exactly, one would choose to contest the limits of any particular practice of power is, Vasterling notes, not entirely clear; though it has something to do with the degree to which the constraints are “compelling,” how much room they leave for choice (1999, 32). Foucault does not hold it against relations of power that they constrain, since constraints are also enabling. He argues that it is not the fact that power constrains that is problematic, but rather that some constraints may be worse than others. It is the tendency towards domination that is problematic, that is “poisonous,” not the existence of power relations as constraining. The more relations of power become dominating that is, the less room they leave for choosing courses of action alternative to those specifically encouraged the more they become good candidates for resistance. 25 One could therefore respond to Taylor’s first criticism by saying that if Foucault offers a critique of power without the hope of “liberation” from power, this does not mean we are doomed to a perpetual, oppressive constraint. Taylor mentions that “Foucault’s analyses are terribly one-sided,” as they focus on the dominating and controlling aspects of disciplinary power (Taylor 1986, 81). That this is Foucault’s focus I don’t dispute; however, I think it is perhaps Taylor’s interpretation of Foucault’s work that is itself “one-sided” when he explains the latter’s conception of power in mainly negative, repressive terms. 26 This comes out even more clearly in what lam calling Taylor’s second criticism, namely that Foucault’s position is incoherent because his view of power requires a notion of freedom that he at the same time denies. Recall that for Taylor, the idea of power as an imposition on the desires and purposes of one or more individuals, as a kind of restraint, “cannot be separated from the notion of some relative lifting of this restraint” (Taylor 1986, 91). He then goes on to argue that such a relaxing of constraint “is just what is involved in a notion of freedom,” a notion he also calls “liberation.” According to Taylor, Foucault is not expressing a coherent view because he “wants to discredit... the very idea of liberation from power” (1986, 91), an idea that is inseparable from his own conception of power. A Foucauldian could agree that power may be inseparable from the notion of a lessening of restraint, as nothing in Foucault’s view suggests that the limits imposed by particular practices of power can’t be lifted. Indeed, Foucault emphasizes the continual possibility for resistance to power and change in its relations and practices. Also, he clearly accepts the possibility of “liberation” from power in the sense Taylor seems to be describing here (e.g., Foucault describes in depth not only the possibility, but the actual occurrence of movements of sexual liberation). The problem that Foucault brings out, and that Taylor doesn’t carefully address, is that such a call for liberation is “dangerous” it can work to support and perpetuate relations of power that one hopes instead to resist. One could argue, therefore, that Taylor is right to a degree: Foucault’s work does both require and criticize the notion of freedom as liberation from power. It is not that such liberation is impossible, in Foucault’s view (at least in terms of liberation from specific practices of power it is true that for Foucault there is no liberation from power as such); it is rather that it is not the kind of “real freedom” he hopes for. That Taylor seems to ignore this aspect of Foucault’s work could be due to multiple factors, one of which might be too heavy of a focus on the negative aspects of Foucault’s view of power. 27 If power is thought to be mainly or wholly constraining, then freedom would appear to lie in its removal. This would lead to a notion of freedom as liberation from power, masking the ways in which power is still operative in this liberation. One could therefore respond to the criticism that Foucault’s view of freedom isn’t much of a “real freedom” by turning it back around upon itself. A Foucauldian could say that the complaint seems to rest on a conception of freedom that is itself not a “real freedom.” The claim that Foucauldian freedom as a practice is not much of a freedom appears to rest on an assumption that freedom must be some kind of absence of (or at least significant diminution of) constraining or oppressive power relations. A Foucauldian might respond by saying that striving for this goal may itself fail to reduce the potential for oppression because it involves a “project of liberation” that supports and perpetuates the constraining relations of power one hopes to attack. In other words, the kind of freedom underlying the complaint seems to be that of a liberation from constraint; but this kind of project often ignores how that which is thus “liberated” can uphold the very constraints that seemed to keep it down. In hoping for some kind of future state of liberation from limits, we must still ask: what is it that we are liberating, and how are potentially oppressive relations of power still implicated therein? Alessandro Pizzorno makes this kind of claim when he argues that part of what Foucault’s work on freedom and power does for us is to reveal the inadequacies of the traditional, “liberal” conception of these two notions: We know that in liberal-democratic regimes power as defined by the liberals is, by and large, checked; that freedom according to the liberal is, by and large, secured. But when we unexpectedly discover some source of powerlessness of the individual within contemporary institutions or some voice, like Foucault’s, spells it out for us we find ourselves with a deficiency of shared concepts and intellectual tools to illuminate our condition. (Pizzorno 1992, 209-210) Much work has been done to achieve freedom as conceived under the liberal view as liberation from various constraints, as checks and balances to power, etc. and, arguably, we have reached a rather high level of achievement in this area in at least a few democratic regimes. But, as Pizzorno points out, when those of us living within liberal democratic regimes still find a certain lack of freedom, a certain powerlessness on the part of individuals nonetheless, we should recognize that perhaps our notion of freedom is not adequate. Pizzorno gives several examples of how individuals, even in the “freest” democratic regimes, are still not free in important respects. One of these has to do with the notion of “free access to representation of interests”: even where this is established within the regime, “the paths of everyone’s freedom are tightly defined by the dutiful accomplishments of those administrative, fiscal, financial, consumption requirements whose observance allows the big social machine of cooperation ... to run smoothly . . .” (Pizzorno 1992, 209). We may be “liberated” enough from the constraints of power to enjoy the “free representation of interests,” but we are already so tightly directed by power that these interests so freely represented manage to be of only a narrow scope, and work in the service of dominant relations of power. Pizzorno makes a similar point in regard to freedom of expression: “the very terms and categories in which the free expression of opinions takes shape are patterned according to the needs of some pre-existing powerful social requirements” (1992, 209). Attaining freedom from power as constraint, liberating the interests, acts and expressions of individuals from repressive control, can work in support of power in the name of freedom. Foucault explains that this phenomenon is due to the predominance of a “theory of right,” a “theory of sovereignty” in our conception of political and legal power we focus on limiting the power of the sovereign, on legitimating it through the notion of “right” and “just” rule. The theory of right and sovereignty emphasizes “the necessity of imposing limits upon [the] sovereign power, of submitting it to certain rules of right, within whose confines it [has] to be exercised in order for it to remain legitimate” (Foucault 1980 h, 95). But this view can have the problematic effect that while we think we are limiting and legitimating sovereign power and therefore becoming more “free,” we are still bound by power in ways that are simply now more hidden. According to Foucault, the theory of sovereignty has the effect of masking the ways in which the “rights” and “freedoms” we enjoy are still working to uphold coercive practices of power: [T]he theory of sovereignty, and the organisation of a legal code centered upon it, have allowed a system of right to be superimposed upon the mechanisms of discipline in such a way as to conceal its actual procedures, the element of domination inherent in its techniques .... Modern society . . . has been characterised on the one hand, by a legislation, a discourse, an organisation based on public right. ..; and on the other hand, by a closely linked grid of disciplinary coercions whose purpose is in fact to assure the cohesion of this same social body. (Foucault 1980 h, 105, 106) Like Pizzorno, Foucault indicates here that “public right” may provide us with freedom from obvious constraint in things like the free expression of speech, etc.; but this does not mean we are free from the coercive effects of power. Having been “disciplined” well, the speech we express, the interests we pursue, may still work to “assure the cohesion of.. . [the] social body.” 28 That we can speak and live “freely,” in this sense, does not mean that we are likely to resist the ways in which we are still governed by relations of power, to practice a “real freedom.” A Foucauldian might say that those who would complain that Foucault’s conception of freedom outlined is not much of a “real freedom” because one does not escape power entirely, are not themselves going far enough to promote freedom by hoping for liberation. If we think that freedom is something attained, once and for all, through something like the notion of right and legitimate government, we run the risk of losing sight of (or lacking the concepts to articulate) the ways in which we still find ourselves powerless, unfree. This kind of response might be made to Taylor when he expresses a desire to “rescue” the “goods” of “truth and freedom” from the power in which Foucault appears to have encased them. If for Foucault we do not “escape from power into freedom,” as Taylor laments, this is partly because such an escape would not itself provide for a “real” freedom as Foucault envisions it. For Foucault, freedom is something continually practiced by those who remain vigilant to the perpetual dangers of power, rather than a state to be reached through attempts at liberation from power - attempts which are likely to ignore the ways in which we are still unfree even if “liberated.” Finally, another kind of response may be made to the complaint that Foucault’s view of freedom doesn’t seem to provide us with much of a “real freedom” because all we can ever manage to do is change relations of power somewhat. It is possible to argue that the agonism between power and resistance need not go on forever. Indeed, Foucault himself admits this when he states in an interview that the struggle between power and resistance is in some sense indefinite, but not necessarily infinite: “[o]ne has to recognise the indefiniteness of the struggle though this is not to say it won’t someday have an end . . .” (Foucault 1980 a, 57). In other words, even if at present resistance continually struggles against power relations in a relationship of reciprocal incitement, this need not always be the case. Foucault does not go on to explain how the situation might be altered and what might develop in its place, but it is at least clear that with this statement he indicates that things can change. This is not surprising, actually, because for Foucault to speak otherwise would amount to claiming that there is an absolute, unchangeable “essence” to the relationship between power and resistance, and, by extension, an “essence” to the notion of freedom. Given the genealogist’s task of historicizing and destabilizing such notions of absolute certainty, it would be surprising if Foucault were to make such a claim. Further, Foucault claims to be most concerned with the ability of his writings to promote a transformation in his readers, rather than with their “truth” in the sense of a correspondence to the facts of the world. Thus one could argue that Foucault’s view of power, resistance and freedom need not even be meant to provide a currently “true” picture of the world, much less one that is absolutely, timelessly true. Perhaps Foucault’s claims regarding freedom are mainly meant to provoke, to promote thought in a way that can lead to change, rather than to present an “accurate” picture of the “way things are.” Even if one doesn’t want to go that far, however, it seems clear at least that Foucault’s view of freedom as a continual practice of resistance and transgression need not be taken to be an absolute “truth” about the world, that this freedom may change. Thus the above complaint could be answered by saying that for now, this is the best kind of freedom available, and something else may be possible later. Our “real freedom” for Foucault is not a state we reach after escaping from an entirely oppressive power. That power relations constrain makes them potentially dangerous, since such constraints can become intolerable, “poisonous.” Taylor is correct to say that the conception of power as constraining requires the notion that we could possibly lift the constraint, that we could achieve freedom as liberation. And indeed, Foucault does allow that such a liberation can and does take place. The point is that freedom cannot end there, that if one thinks one has reached a state of pure freedom from power through liberation one can too easily ignore the ways in which one remains constrained. We might say that we are always exiled from the promise of a pure liberation, that while we may yearn for it, attempting to reach it (or worse, thinking that we have already done so) will tend only to perpetuate restraining and oppressive relations of power. “Real freedom” requires that we be open to continually question the limits placed on us by the many relations of power in which we live, and to be ready to resist them if necessary. In so doing, we act as exiles from power relations, working to change them without attempting to exit them entirely. We take a step back from particular relations of power and resist them from within, well aware that if we try to “escape into freedom” through liberation we will not manage the escape for which we hope. To practice a “real freedom” we must operate in a state in-between being “inside” and “outside” of the power relations we resist: we must resist from a distanced position within. Only then can we work towards an effective change in relations of power, towards escaping them without exiting them entirely. The practice of freedom Foucault describes is the practice of the exile who avoids the (related) extremes of thinking of power as entirely constraining and therefore calling for complete liberation from it, and thinking that we can indeed bring about such a liberation. The exile who practices freedom recognizes that the limits we experience due to relations of power can be enabling precisely because of their constraints, and that eliminating them entirely is not necessary nor advisable (though at times, particular power relations may become too constraining and may therefore call for resistance). By practicing freedom we reveal our exile from the current regime of truth, remaining tied to it in many ways by accepting certain relations of power and their limits, while also distancing ourselves from it by finding ways to resist those power relations we find oppressive and “poisonous.” These can be resisted from within, transformed and therefore “escaped” without an attempt to exit them entirely. We do not escape into freedom, as Taylor seems to hope we can; rather, we escape particular power relations through the freedom of practicing resistance to them from within. As long as we exile ourselves from those power relations we find “poisonous,” rather than trying to exit them, we can engage in the freedom of continually questioning and changing who we are, what we do, and what we think. Normative confusions 19 Still, one could ask about the results of the practice of freedom as described by Foucault: specifically, if effective resistance as a practice of freedom results in changed relations of power, why does Foucault seem to think that this must be better than the changes that result from a “project of liberation”? Certainly the movements to liberate sexuality, for example, produced changes in relations of power, as individuals refused to submit to certain constraints they had previously accepted and lived by. Why should the changes produced by practices of freedom be “better” in some way, when they, too, simply result in transformed relations of power? Foucault himself claims in an interview that “[l]iberation paves the way for new power relationships, which must be controlled by practices of freedom” (Foucault 1996 e, 434). But of course, practices of freedom themselves “pave the way for new power relationships” as well; and it has not yet been made clear why the latter do so in ways preferable to those of projects of liberation. This question ultimately brings up a difficult and complex issue regarding the grounding of Foucault’s normative claims. Many of the problems brought up by Foucault’s critics in this regard can be resolved through a closer look at the role of the intellectual exile that, I have argued, we can read Foucault as playing. Why does Foucault seem to think that the results of practices of resistance will be better than those of projects of liberation? The main problem with projects of liberation is that if they provoke changes in relations of power, these changes are somehow relatively less radical than those that can be produced by practices of freedom. Recall from the discussion of sexual liberation that the attempt to liberate our sexuality, according to Foucault, resulted in only a “tactical shift” in the relations of power under resistance (Foucault 1990 a, 131). In other words, the relations of power that compelled the practice of putting sex into discourse (what Foucault terms the “deployment of sexuality”) were not undermined by this project of liberation; they were rather perpetuated, albeit in somewhat different ways. The problem was, as Foucault puts it, that attempts to liberate sexuality “unfolded within the deployment of sexuality, and not outside or against it” (1990 a 131). But this claim is more complex than it seems at first, because the point is that sexual liberation “unfolded within the deployment of sexuality” precisely because it was an attempt to operate outside of relations of power that were thought to be merely repressive. The “deployment of sexuality” as Foucault describes it is a relation of power that is both repressive and productive it produces the “true sexuality” that it also represses in various ways. But, as Foucault argues, this productive aspect is masked (perhaps so as to make the practice of power itself more tolerable), and as a result the power relation is viewed as merely negative or repressive. A project aimed at liberating our “true sexuality” can then appear to focus on, operate from, and aim to rescue something outside of this purely negative power. Such a flight to the outside, however, does not produce an escape from a relation of power that produces this very outside. One has only moved to the other side of the relation of power, to that which it defines as “outside” of itself but which actually works in its service. 3o In this way, moving to the “outside” only ensures that one remains “inside” power relations that produce and occupy both of these “sides.” This means that the results of such efforts will be relations of power that may be changed, but only in small, non-radical ways. The basic movements and structures of the original relations -- such as the requirement to put sex into discourse will remain. But if it would have been better to engage in a practice of resisting the “deployment of sexuality” through efforts that work “outside or against it,” as Foucault suggests, what could this mean in a situation as complex as this one? Clearly, the attempt to move “outside” a relation of power in the above way will not work as we might hope. If we think we can resist through appeal to some realm or aspect of ourselves that is utterly free from power, “outside” of it, we are probably making appeal to a product of the very power relation we are intending to resist. For Foucault, there is no “outside” of power in the larger sense, no escape to a place wholly free from relations of power; there is only an “outside” that is itself created by power and works in its service. If this is the case, though, how might we manage a resistance that could operate “outside or against” a relation of power such as the “deployment of sexuality”? Recall that, as I have argued, effective resistance works best if it operates from within the relation of power rather than trying to “exit” it. Neither thinking it can operate from outside of power nor aiming for such an outside as a goal, those who undertake an effective practice of resistance seek courses of action created by the relation of power under resistance, but which are neither encouraged by it nor work directly in its service. Like liberation, this kind of resistance functions through taking up actions produced or defined by the relation of power being resisted; but the two efforts differ in that in its attempt to move “outside” the power relation, liberation roots itself only deeper within, perpetuating this relation rather than upsetting it. An effective practice of resistance, on the other hand, operates by taking up possible actions that are, indeed, products of the relation of power under resistance, but that are distanced from this relation. They are possibilities which do not support the relation outright, but neither do they provide for a resistance through simple negation and refusal. This kind of resistance operates within a relation of power while at the same time taking a step back from it in order to provoke change. For example, it may be possible to resist the “deployment of sexuality” through practices that promote the active development of multiple kinds of sexual practices and identities that are considered to be constructed rather than “natural.” 31 The point at issue here is that the change possible through practices of resistance is, Foucault seems to indicate, more radical than that available through projects of liberation. We are able, through effective resistance, to force enough of a change in relations of power to escape from being governed in particular ways and to set up relations of power whereby we are governed differently. The same doesn’t appear to be the case for projects of liberation, in Foucault’s view. There, what one manages to do is to largely perpetuate the ways in which one has previously been governed with only minor “tactical shifts.” So to a certain extent, the results of practices of resistance are “better” (at least for those resisting) than the results of projects of liberation. One might even want to describe the transformed relations of power that result from practices of resistance as “more free” to some extent than their predecessors and the transformed relations of power that result from projects of liberation. But there is a danger in doing so, since if one thinks that one has achieved a state of “freedom” from power thereby, one may fail to recognize that what one has done instead is to produce new and different relations of power. They may be less constraining or oppressive than the ones previously resisted, but they are still “dangerous.” One must still be vigilant in case they develop new “poisonous” aspects. Perhaps a Foucauldian could say that the changed relations of power resulting from practices of resistance are “better” than those resulting from projects of liberation because the former are likely to exhibit more change in comparison to their predecessors than the latter. This may be enough to placate some of the critics who, like Charles Taylor, seem to complain that Foucault provides us with little to no reason to hope for or believe in the possibility of a “better” future. Foucault does indicate that things can get better; what he rejects is the idea that they can be made better once and for all. He denies that we can, in Taylor’s words, “escape from power into freedom,” because the freedom into which we would thereby escape works to uphold and perpetuate the power we hope to leave. But by not attempting to escape in this way, we can, according to Foucault, manage to produce a change in relations of power that can be described in some way as “better.” Still, there is a deeper problem here that needs to be addressed. It seems difficult for Foucault to justify any normative claim that the transformed relations of power that result from practices of resistance are “better” than those resulting from projects of liberation (and/or than those from which the transformation took place). Taylor points this out when he describes Foucault’s view of the “regime-relativity of truth”: “There can be no such thing as a truth independent of its regime, unless it be that of another” (Taylor 1986, 94). Here Taylor is referring to Foucault’s arguments regarding how truth is produced by practices of power, to the effect that truth is dependent upon the rules and procedures that define it at any given time and that are set up by particular power structures. Calling this the “general relativity thesis,” Taylor points out that it precludes normative judgments regarding the transformation of relations of power, if they make claims to truth: “Because of relativity, transformation from one regime to another cannot be a gain in truth or freedom, because each is redefined in the new context. They are incomparable” (1986, 94). In other words, under Foucault’s view one cannot judge one set of power relations to be “better” than another, because the grounds upon which such a normative claim might be made are relative to each particular set. According to Foucault there are no “objective” criteria, independent of any set of power relations, through which value judgments can be made in comparing different sets. Taylor argues, therefore, that “the move from one context to another cannot be seen as a liberation because there is no common measure between the impositions of the one and those of the other” (1986, 92). Nor can the move from one set of power relations to another be seen as normatively “better” in other ways, on this view. Taylor concludes that in order to be able to compare one regime of power to another, Foucault must inhabit what Jon Simons calls a “shared horizon of significance” (Simons 1995, 66). In other words, Foucault must accept a certain set of values and truths if normative judgments on his part are to be made possible. But, Taylor argues, Foucault refuses to do this: he attempts to take “the outsider’s perspective,” tries to “stand nowhere, identifying with none of the . . . structures of power whose coming and going he impartially surveys” (Taylor 1986, 98). Michael Walzer makes a similar point in “The Politics of Michel Foucault,” arguing that Foucault’s relativism is incompatible with the normative overtones in his genealogical work: “one can’t... be downcast, angry, grim, indignant, sullen, or embittered with reason unless one inhabits some social setting and adopts, however tentatively and critically, its codes and categories” (Walzer 1986, 67). On Walzer’s reading, Foucault is a relativist in regard to truth and knowledge “Foucault believes that truth is relative to its sanctions and knowledge to the constraints that produce it” (Walzer 1986, 64) and he therefore neither takes a normative standpoint of his own grounded in some notion of truth, nor asks that others do so: “he makes no demands on us that we adopt this or that critical principle or replace these disciplinary norms with some other set of norms. He is not an advocate” (Walzer 1986, 65). This means, then, that if resistance produces transformed relations of power, “Foucault gives us no reason to expect that these will be any better than the ones we now live with,” because he doesn’t provide “any way of knowing what ‘better’ might mean” (Walzer 1986, 61). The point that critics like Taylor and Walzer are making is that even if for Foucault some relations of power are “better” or “worse” than others, that power is therefore not all “evil,” and that this means we do not require a total “liberation” from power in order to be free, he still does not explain clearly how we are to make the distinction between “better” and “worse” relations of power. There do seem to be normative evaluations in his work, places where the “danger” of particular kinds of power relations is at least implied if not stated outright. For example, his descriptions of disciplinary power in Discipline and Punish and elsewhere are given in terms with distinctly negative overtones, as Nancy Fraser points out: Foucault’s writings abound with such phrases as ‘the age of bio-power,’ ‘the disciplinary society,’ ‘the carceral archipelago’ -- phrases rife, that is, with ominous overtones. I must also note that Foucault does not shrink from frequent use of such terms as ‘domination,’ ‘subjugation,’ and ‘subjection’ in describing the modem power/knowledge regime. (Fraser 1989 a, 28) Taylor and Walzer argue that any value judgments on Foucault’s part are incoherent, given what they term his “relativism.” If he does not inhabit any particular power/knowledge regime and therefore take seriously its truth and value claims, on what does he base his negative (or positive) evaluations of particular practices of power? Nancy Fraser is a bit more circumspect in her evaluation of Foucault’s work that Taylor and Walzer, as she considers the possibility that perhaps Foucault does not mean to suspend all normative frameworks, but only that of “modern liberal political theory, whose central categories are those of right, limit, sovereignty, contract, and oppression” (Fraser 1989 a, 21). But even if this is the case, Fraser argues, there are still deep difficulties in regard to normativity in Foucault’s work. She points out first that if Foucault means only to reject liberal norms, then he needs an alternative normative framework within which to ground his own value judgments; and such an alternative is not to be found in his work (1989 a 29-30). Further, Fraser argues, instead of offering an alternative set of norms as a basis for criticizing modem practices of power, Foucault appears to be using the liberal norms he also rejects, as the basis for rejecting them. The normative force of Foucault’s genealogical studies sometimes appears, according to Fraser, “to depend on tacit appeal to the notions of rights, limits, and the like”: When confronted with the treatment of persons solely as means that are causally manipulated by various institutions, one cannot help but appeal to such concepts as the violation of dignity and autonomy. But. . . these Kantian notions are clearly related to the liberal norms of legitimacy and illegitimacy defined in terms of limits and rights. (1989 a 30) Fraser concludes that if “the liberal framework has not been fully suspended” in Foucault’s work, then “Foucault is caught in an outright contradiction, for he . . . tends to treat that framework as simply an instrument of domination” (1989 a 30). Fraser is referring to Foucault’s argument that liberal notions such as “rights” can and have worked to hide the ways in which we may still be oppressed and dominated by relations of power. Thus for Fraser, if Foucault appeals to liberal notions in his normative evaluation of power structures, this is in tension with his own claims that such notions are themselves normatively suspect. I believe that the problems Taylor, Walzer and Fraser raise can be resolved by paying close attention to the ways in which Foucault is playing the intellectual role of a “prophet in exile.” By considering how Foucault exiles himself from pronouncements of universal truth without completely rejecting them, and from his own role as an authoritative “prophet,” we can ease some of the tensions these critics bring out. In regard to the charge of relativism brought by Taylor and Walzer, consider Foucault’s position of exile from universal truth. I have argued that Foucault need not be considered a “total skeptic” in regard to truth, that it is not necessarily the case that he attempts to stand outside of all claims to truth. Instead, he can be read as taking up an “exile” position in regard to truth claims, accepting some provisionally for the purpose of criticizing others, while recognizing all the while that those he accepts are not universal and ahistorical. Recall that Foucault inhabits the truth claims of his own time to some degree, yet he distances himself from them to the extent that he thinks they are contingent and open to question and change. He presents his genealogical histories from the perspective of the present, with its truth and value claims intact. Fraser is right to point out that Foucault’s genealogical study of the disciplinary society elicits normative responses based on Enlightenment ideals. Foucault does not reject all claims to universal truth and value, as he makes appeal in his genealogies to those truths and values that are currently dominant. But he does so as part of a rhetorical strategy designed to encourage others to question those very claims and ideals once they have been brought up by reading Foucault’s genealogies. Even though Foucault seems thereby to encourage us to distance ourselves from current truths and norms, this is not to say that he insists we reject these entirely. I have argued that Foucault exiles himself from particular claims to truth and normative value, using them while also distancing himself from them; and I have explained that the goal of his intellectual exile seems to be to encourage others to exile themselves from such claims as well. Notions such as freedom as “liberation,” individual “rights,” and other traditional, Western ideals can still be used and appealed to, I have claimed, as long as we recognize their dangers and use them with caution. Contra Taylor and Walzer, then, I think that describing Foucault as a “relativist” because he attempts to stand outside of all truth claims and value judgments in order to neutrally describe their development and workings does not provide an adequate picture of his work (nor does it seem accurate to imply that Foucault hopes we will all adopt this relativist, nihilist stance). 32 I believe that Fraser’s criticisms are more on the mark than those of Taylor and Walzer, especially when she argues that perhaps Foucault is using the “liberal” norms that he also attacks. The difference between my view and hers is that I don’t think that this is a problem. Fraser claims that Foucault is caught in a contradiction if he makes appeal to liberal norms, since he tends to condemn them as being merely screens for domination. But this is not an entirely accurate rendition of Foucault’s view of liberal norms in their connection to power. That notions such as “rights” and “autonomy” are dangerous for Foucault is indisputable; but this is not the same as saying that they are entirely bad. They can be dangerous if we think that by establishing them we are escaping from power entirely, because we can then easily ignore the ways in which we may still be caught up in problematic power structures. For example, if we think that we can create a space for ourselves that is free from power by establishing individual rights and a zone of privacy, then we do run the risk of simply setting up a screen for domination we will ignore the ways in which relations of power are still operating within our “rights,” and may become oppressive and dominating if we don’t watch out. But for Foucault such notions also have positive aspects that can be emphasized and expanded if we recognize the ways in which they are themselves products of power. Even the projects of sexual liberation have had positive benefits, according to Foucault. Thus it need not be the case that if Foucault both uses liberal notions and criticizes them at the same time he must be caught in a contradiction. Instead, he may be trying to negotiate a way to reap the benefits of using such norms with caution, employing them with a critical distance. Indeed, in a later paper Fraser herself suggests this possibility, arguing that there may be “some emancipatory potential surviving in humanism”: there may be possible “the sort of immanent critique that consists in condemning the institutions of a culture for their failure to realize its own widely accepted ideals” (Fraser 1989 b, 64). But Fraser does not think that Foucault’s work offers us the possibility of such an immanent critique, as he argues on the contrary that “our attempts to critique discipline in terms of humanism testify only to our immersion in the disciplinary matrix and in fact are moves deployed to articulate and strengthen that matrix” (1989 b 64). I believe on the contrary that Foucault can indeed be read as encouraging us to “critique discipline in terms of humanism,” and I have argued that his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” promotes precisely this kind of critique. Foucault uses rhetoric so as to elicit in readers a response based on their usual ways of thinking, their habitual beliefs and values. He then works to undermine these by delving into their history; but he does so through the perspective of the present, through the lens of the very kinds of truths and values he questions. Things such as Enlightenment ideals can thereby be unsettled, but through a critique that relies upon those very ideals themselves. This allows the reader to take a step back from such ideals, questioning them without giving them up altogether. The reader can, I have argued, exile him/herself from habitual ways of thinking through the efforts of the intellectual who “writes in exile.” Such a process of distancing oneself from one’s usual modes of thought can open up a space for the development of new ways of thinking and acting, and for the initiation of practices of resistance if one deems it necessary. An immanent critique is precisely what Foucault’s position of intellectual exile encourages. Fraser argues that this cannot be the case, since according to Foucault engaging in an immanent critique of humanism only works to show “our immersion in the disciplinary matrix” and to “articulate and strengthen that matrix.” That this need not be the case can be shown by considering the difference between working as a loyal inhabitant of the current regime of truth and its “disciplinary matrix,” and working from a position of exile within it. The loyalist will appeal to liberal norms as if they are truly the universal, absolute and timeless ideals they have been considered to be. S/he will not recognize the way in which they are products of disciplinary power, and continue to work in its service. Blind to this connection to power, the loyalist may think, for example, that by establishing certain “individual rights” we can attain a “liberation” from coercive and constraining power relations. S/he would not realize the ways in which such “rights” still work to constrain and discipline us by dictating and establishing as absolute a human “nature” that is supposed to be the source of our “rights.” The exile, on the other hand, may use liberal norms as part of an immanent critique without thereby taking them as seriously as the loyalist would. Recall that the exile may have to appeal to such norms even when criticizing them, since s/he may not yet have developed an alternative normative framework within which to conduct his/her critique. Still, recognizing the dangers of such norms after having considered their genealogical history, the exile is not likely to treat them as universal absolutes. Rather, s/he may use them with a critical distance, recognizing their historical contingency and malleability, but appealing to them provisionally for lack of an alternative. I have also argued that such a provisional appeal to universal notions can have beneficial effects in regard to living conditions for many still enmeshed in the current regime of truth. While the exile may hope to eventually change this regime, in the meantime s/he recognizes that its Enlightenment notions can achieve positive, as well as negative results. S/he will therefore continue to work within the traditional, liberal framework in order to secure the benefits of “equal rights,” “equal protection,” “equal opportunity,” etc. But the exile will also use these tactics with caution, realizing at the same time that they can work to uphold the disciplinary relations of power that may become “poisonous.” The criticisms raised by Taylor, Walzer and Fraser can be best approached by considering Foucault’s political role as an intellectual. The tensions such critics point out are eased by noting that Foucault neither attempts to exit power relations entirely, nor tries to stand outside of all claims to truth and normative value, nor thinks that all appeals to liberal norms must be avoided as they have only ill effects. He instead takes up a position of exile within the current regime of truth, working within its disciplinary and normalizing relations of power and the truths and knowledges they produce, while also maintaining a critical distance from these. He does so, I have argued, in order to encourage others to engage in a similar kind of exile, questioning their usual ways of thinking and engaging in resistance to particular relations of power if they themselves deem it necessary. I think that paying close attention to Foucault’s statements about the intellectual’s political role and applying these to his own comportment as an intellectual can be very fruitful for anyone attempting to understand and/or criticize his work. Foucault exhibited much concern about his own role as an intellectual, speaking out often on what he was attempting to do with his writings, why, and how. It is important, therefore, to consider not just what Foucault says and does, but how he goes about it and why he says he does it that way. In other words, I think it is helpful to think about his work in the context of his views of the political role of the intellectual. By not doing so, we miss considering that he may have said or done certain things in his texts strategically, for the purpose of affecting his readers in a particular way. We may miss the rhetorical strategies in which he engages, strategies that can help explain why he says some of the things he does. For example, considering Foucault’s rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” helps us to understand why he both appeals to and criticizes universal truths and liberal norms. I have argued that by doing so Foucault may be able to bring his readers to engage in their own critique of such truths and norms, to question them while still using them provisionally. Without considering Foucault’s strategies in his political role as an intellectual, the tensions in his work seem more glaring and irreconcilable. If, on the contrary, we do think about what Foucault may have been trying to do with his genealogical texts, we may come to recognize such tensions as the product of an attempt to encourage others to begin to rely more on themselves for deciding what they ought to think and do than on the intellectual. I have explained that in order to avoid telling others precisely what they should think about particular relations of power, Foucault may have written his genealogies in a way that allows his readers to respond on their own with their habitual beliefs and values, and that then brings these readers to criticize these very beliefs and values themselves on the basis of the genealogical history presented. Foucault may thereby be able to encourage others to engage in a self-critique and a self-exile without telling them directly that they ought to do so, and dictating what they ought to think instead. He can thus leave them room to develop new modes of thought themselves and to decide to resist in their own ways if they so choose. In order to do this, however, Foucault ends up writing his genealogies within the context of the present regime of truth and its normative framework by doing so, he can bring out the normative responses in his readers that they are to then question. He also writes as if he is a “universal” intellectual prophet, since it is only in this way that those who have not yet exiled themselves from the current regime of truth will take him seriously enough to question their usual ways of thinking on the basis of his genealogical analyses. If we don’t consider these goals that Foucault may be trying to accomplish as an intellectual, then his behavior as a “universal” intellectual can seem only mysterious or contradictory. We may miss how he is playing a prophet in order to avoid being one. There are a number of other problems brought up by critics of Foucault’s work that can be similarly resolved by considering them in the context of his political role as an intellectual exile, and in the following chapter I discuss those problems having particularly to do with Foucault’s later writings on the “aesthetics of the self.” This notion was only partially developed by Foucault before his death, and consequently there are a number of difficulties with it that Foucault did not have a chance to address. The idea of creating the self aesthetically can be considered as another aspect of the “real freedom” that the Foucauldian intellectual can promote as a “cure” for the “poison” of the regime of truth. I have argued that in order to practice our “real freedom”, we must work to continually question and evaluate the limits that both constrain and enable us; and I have noted that while the Foucauldian intellectual can be understood to promote particular efforts at resistance by making some things “more fragile,” it is not yet clear how s/he can encourage others to maintain the continued, critical stance of endless questioning that “real freedom” seems to require. Foucault’s emphasis on creating oneself as a work of art can be considered as an attempt to promote such a continual critique of limits. The “aesthetics of the self’ seems an important part of practicing freedom, and, therefore, part of the Foucauldian intellectual’s political goals. Investigating how and why we might fruitfully attempt to create ourselves aesthetically will help illuminate further aspects of the Foucauldian intellectual’s political role. 2 1 Pizzorno brings up this point about Foucault’s view of freedom in order to show how Foucault’s work can be used to reveal the inadequacy of “liberal” notions of power and freedom, as discussed below. 22 This is how Richard Bernstein describes Taylor’s view (Bernstein 1994, 218-220). 23 Fraser goes on to argue, however, that Foucault’s view of power does not only include these types of enabling constraints. Power for Foucault can also involve relations of coercion that are much more oppressive and problematic. These, she argues, can’t be considered as innocuous and “normatively neutral” as the enabling constraints described above (Fraser 1989 a, 32). In consequence, she argues that Foucault needs to be able to distinguish between “better and worse sets of practices and forms of constraint,” and that he does not establish enough of a normative framework in his writings to allow him to do so legitimately (1989 a 32). In what follows I will argue on the contrary that Foucault’s normative claims are more clear and grounded than Fraser seems to allow. 24 The article from which the following quotes are taken concerns some of Judith Butler’s work; but it relies heavily on the Foucauldian aspects of Butler’s claims as well as Nancy Fraser’s arguments regarding the enabling/constraining character of limits. The points recited below are therefore not aimed by Vasterling directly at Foucault’s work, but can be applied to it indirectly and, I think, legitimately. 25 It is still an open question here as to which kinds of limits are to be resisted and which are not. This is because the decision as to what, when, and how to resist is left by Foucault to those who will be doing the resisting. Still, I have argued that he can and does nevertheless give some prescriptions as to what must be done, and that he also distances himself from these so as to leave more room for others to guide themselves. 26 Jon Simons agrees —he claims that Taylor ‘conflates power and domination whereas Foucault does not . . and Taylor constantly refers to power as an imposition” (Simons 1995, 66). 27 Jon Simons provides a further reason why Taylor might have ignored Foucault’s warnings concerning “projects of liberation,” namely that “he has already accepted the narrative of progressive humanization that Foucault challenges” (Simons 1995, 61). In other words, Taylor may be so focused on what he himself admits to be the “old enlightenment-inspired combination” of freedom and truth as goods to be liberated from power that he fails to carefully address the ways in which Foucault shows they may not be purely “good” after all. To his credit, Taylor does imply that sometimes these ideals can be put to use in oppressive ways. He argues that some of the enlightenment-inspired notions “that helped to found the societies based on contract and responsible government in earlier times, which represented a great leap forward in egalitarian politics, are now serving bureaucratic modes of irresponsible power which are sapping our democracy (Taylor 1986, 82). But he then claims that Foucault’s analysis of power does not allow us to understand this kind of “slide” from freedom to abuse of power. This is because, according to Taylor, Foucault views power as already being a kind of control, rather than something that becomes controlling: “you incapacitate yourself to understand this becoming of you conceive it from the beginning as essentially being control” (1986, 83). Taylor’s emphasis on the negative character of Foucauldian power is clearly evident here. That Foucault does not view power as “essentially being control” ought to be clear from the analysis here one could say at least that for Foucault, the limits placed on us by power are not simply “controlling,” but are also “enabling” in the way described above. One could also point to Foucault’s insistence that power always leaves open the possibility for resistance. In response to Taylor, we can say that Foucault does not automatically equate power and oppression; nor, therefore, does he equate ideals such as truth and freedom with oppression when he points out their links to power. Rather than ignoring how enlightenment ideals and societal structures patterned after them can “slide” into oppression, as Taylor claims, I believe Foucault addresses precisely this process in much of his work. He does not argue that modern, democratic institutions are entirely constraining, oppressive, and evil - only that they are “dangerous.” Ideals such as truth and freedom as liberation may be enabling in certain ways (including the ways Taylor mentions), but it is important to recognize that they may be linked to practices of power that can also end up becoming too heavy-handed in their “governing.” A closer look at Foucault’s work than Taylor provides reveals an in-depth analysis of the kind of “slide” from freedom to oppression to which Taylor refers. 28 This “cohesion,” along with the smooth functioning of the “big social machine of cooperation” mentioned by Pizzorno, are arguably desirable outcomes. In other words, that the constraints imposed on us by power (even when we have achieved the wide freedoms and rights many in liberal, democratic regimes currently enjoy) are still a function of power that ensures the cohesion of the social body does not seem, in and of itself, to be problematic. To some degree at least, social cooperation and unity are beneficial, even if describable as a “big social machine.” Still, the relations of power that underlie and make possible this cohesion are “dangerous,” even if they are not wholly “bad”: we ought to be aware, Pizzorno and Foucault may be saying, that the rights and freedoms we enjoy do not eliminate the workings of power in support of particular social relations, practices, and institutions; and while we are exercising our freedoms we must recognize that we may be contributing to the reification of such relations and practices into a “big social machine” that may eventually become more and more dominating. Unity, cohesion and cooperation are desirable, certainly, but we must not think that by achieving liberal rights and freedoms we have eliminated the danger that they can also pose. 29 This title is taken from an essay by Nancy Fraser, entitled “Foucault on Power: Empirical Insights and Normative Confusions” (Fraser 1989 a). 30 The details of how this works in relation to projects of sexual liberation have been discussed earlier in this chapter. Problems along similar lines could be expected to occur within other kinds of liberatory efforts. 31 Note that many possibilities for effective resistance against the “deployment of sexuality” could exist. If such resistance functions within a relation of power while also being distanced from it in the way here described, then there are a few requirements we would have to follow to practice it; but these still leave open a quite a few possibilities. We would want to find a course of action that neither upholds the “deployment of sexuality” outright (in either its repressive or productive forms) nor resists through a simple negation or refusal. We would not, then, want to: (a) engage in actions that promote the repression of sex and sexuality; (b) engage in actions that would uphold the “true sexuality” that is a product of this relation of power; (c) resist the constraints placed on sex and sexuality through a simple refusal. There are numerous options left over for promoting conceptions of sex that are fluid, that are recognized as constructed. One option is outlined in Chapter Five, where I describe the possibility of creating oneself as a work of art. We might construe our sexuality as something constructed by the relations of power in which we are enmeshed, and as something that we might work to construct differently through practicing resistance. How such a construction of the self may be possible, and why it should be considered an aesthetic practice, are addressed in detail in the following chapter. 32 To be fair, however, it may be the case that Foucault attempted such a neutral stance in his earlier work. Indeed, this is what Dreyfus and Rabinow claim in the first part of their book, Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983). They argue that Foucault abandoned his early attempts to stand outside of history because this makes ethical evaluation problematic (1983, 85-103). In his later, genealogical work, they contend, Foucault recognized and revealed that “he himself [was] produced by what he [was] studying” (1983, 124). Chapter Five Cure: Aesthetic Subjectivity More can be said about our “real freedom” by investigating some of Foucault’s later writings on what might be termed the “aesthetic creation of the self.” John Rajchman argues that one of the things that our “real freedom” allows us to do is to question the limits put on our selves, our identity and individuality, by specific relations of power. These relations of power work to define us, to tell us the “truth” about ourselves. According to Rajchman, “Foucault invents a philosophy which would ‘free’ our experience of ourselves or our subjectivity” (Rajchman 1985, 122). Foucault works to show that the “truths” we may come to accept about ourselves as part of our “nature” are the function of contingent practices of power, thereby allowing for the possibility of resistance through a practice of freedom. In his later work Foucault connects this freedom to the notion of creating oneself as a work of art if the “truth” of the self is contingent upon relations of power that can be resisted, then rather than replacing this truth with another perhaps we can create ourselves aesthetically. In this chapter I turn to a discussion of this “aesthetics of the self’ in order to further elaborate the “cure” for the regime of truth and the role of the Foucauldian intellectual therein. This will also bring up the third general area in which Foucault criticized the Marxist intellectuals of his day, namely subjectivity. In relation to subjectivity, as to truth and power, Foucault’s work exhibits movements of exile that are highly significant to his view of the political role of the intellectual. I begin by elaborating Foucault’s view of the ancient Greek “arts of existence” as he describes them in The Use of Pleasure, contrasting the kind of subject who practiced them (the “aesthetic subject”) with the kind of subject that, according to Foucault, developed during and after the advent of the Christian era (the “desiring subject”). I then explain how and why the aesthetic subject, updated from the Greek model into a more modern one, can be said to be more “free” than the desiring subject. I conclude by considering the problem of agency in Foucault’s view of subjectivity, and I offer a way to resolve it by reference to the notion of subjects acting as exiles. I The Arts of Existence There is a fairly substantial shift in direction between the first and second volumes of The History of Sexuality. The first volume announces a forthcoming genealogy of sexuality, providing the outlines of its subject matter and a statement of its goals and methods. The second volume, rather than following this outline, sets up and investigates new questions and issues, moving Foucault’s genealogy of sexuality in a different direction than that indicated by the introductory volume. It is with this later text that Foucault begins to focus on what he calls the “arts of existence,” or the “aesthetics of the self’ - a practice of freedom in regard to oneself that Foucault (following Nietzsche) likens to creating oneself as a work of art. In The Use of Pleasure, the second volume of The History of Sexuality, Foucault explains how an “aesthetics of the self’ was practiced in ancient Greece, within the context of a particular kind of ethical domain having to do with issues of sex and sexuality. In the third volume, The Care of the Self, he describes how such artistic practice on the self began to wane in the first centuries A.D., being gradually replaced by a view of subjectivity that emphasizes the discovery of one’s “true self,” rather than the creation of the self aesthetically. In interviews, Foucault suggests that a modem version of the ancient “arts of existence” might be developed as part of the practice of our “real freedom.” Foucault contrasts the notion of creating the self as a work of art to the project of finding one’s “true self’ that he criticizes in the first volume of The History of Sexuality. Recall that according to the “repressive hypothesis,” the self is thought to possess a “natural” truth, intimately linked to sexual desire, that is held down by repressive power. The key to freedom, under this view, is thought to be the lifting of repression and the speaking of the truth of sex and the self. But Foucault argues that the model of power relations employed in such antirepressive struggles is inadequate, that it focuses only on the negative, repressive aspects of power and ignores how power is productive of the very kinds of efforts such struggles consider to be liberatory. We do not often recognize how power enjoins us to speak the truth of sex through confessional mechanisms, and how this continues to occur even when the fight against repression calls for speaking the truth of sex (including confessions to one’s psychoanalyst). Resistance to the power involved in the deployment of sexuality, in the putting of sex into discourse, does not come through appeal to the truth of sex or the self. Rather than trying to discover our “truth,” Foucault suggests, perhaps we could work create ourselves, to shape ourselves aesthetically. Explaining what such an aesthetic process might mean requires a somewhat detailed investigation into The Use of Pleasure, where Foucault gives the most indepth description of how one might go about creating oneself as a work of art. I argue that Foucault does seem to suggest the “arts of existence” as an alternative model of subjectivity to the one focused on the “truth” of the subject, and that it can be updated from the Greek version to provide important emancipatory potential in the present day. A “history of ethics” In his Introduction to The Use of Pleasure, Foucault tries to explain why this second volume of The History of Sexuality does not follow the outline of the first, and where it is headed instead. The main project of this series, Foucault argues, was to produce a genealogy of “sexuality,” to investigate its historical development, which he dates to roughly the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries. What he had planned, Foucault claims here, was “a history of the experience of sexuality, where experience is understood as the correlation between fields of knowledge, types of normativity, and forms of subjectivity in a particular culture” (Foucault 1990 b, 4). The genealogy of sexuality thus takes place along (what he calls a few lines later) “three axes” knowledge, power and subjectivity. It requires an analysis of “the peculiar characteristics and interrelations of the three axes that constitute it [sexuality]”: (1) the formation of sciences (savoirs) that refer to it, (2) the systems of power that regulate its practice, (3) the forms within which individuals are able, are obliged, to recognize themselves as subjects of this sexuality. (1990 b 4) For Foucault, then, writing a genealogy of sexuality requires analyzing it along these three different axes and noting the complex web of interrelationships between them. He argues that his earlier work on truth/knowledge and power (in his studies of medicine, psychiatry, disciplinary and penal practices) had provided him with the tools necessary to analyze the knowledge and power axes of sexuality; but when he approached the subjectivity axis, he found that a preliminary task was required before he could continue. This is because the “subject of sexuality” under consideration is of a form that had, at that point, simply been taken as a given it had been “withdrawn from the historical field” (1990 b 4), and needed to be put back into historical context. The kind of subject to which he refers here is the “subject of desire,” or the “desiring subject.” This subject emerged when “individuals were led to focus their attention on themselves .. . bringing into play between themselves and themselves a certain relationship that allows them to discover, in desire, the truth of their being” (1990 b 5). As James Bernauer points out, for Foucault the “pastoral power” that emerged mainly through early Christian practices of confession produced “a unique form of subjectivity”: One is related to oneself as an obscure text demanding permanent interpretation through ever more sophisticated practices of attentiveness, concern, decipherment and verbalisation. The soul is a house of truth, and true discourses are able to be articulated concerning it. (Bernauer 1992, 267) “Pastoral power” resulted in a particular kind of subjectivity, the “subject of desire.” Though the notion of the desiring subject had often been considered a constant (“at least a generally accepted historical theme” (Foucault 1990 b, 5)), Foucault was able to trace it back to an early Christian tradition, thereby rehistoricizing it. Foucault argues that before continuing on with the project of his genealogy of sexuality, it was necessary to perform a genealogy of the subject of desire: [l] t seemed to me that one could not very well analyze the formation and development of the experience of sexuality from the eighteenth century onward, without doing a historical and critical study dealing with desire and the desiring subject. In other words, without undertaking a “genealogy.” (Foucault 1990 b, 5) This genealogy begins, like the others Foucault undertakes, with the present: the subject of desire is something that (in the early 1980’ s) Foucault claims is still with us, guiding our understanding of ourselves and our social and political practices. This subject is the one that projects of sexual liberation hope to free, one whose truth is thought to be bound up with sex and desire, where the latter struggle to emerge from a crushing repression by power. It is the subject of Freudian psychoanalysis, according to Foucault, the subject whose truth is thought able to set one free if one’s desire can be liberated from repression. It is this subject, Foucault claims, that we still take to be a “constant”; and it is the history of this view of subjectivity that he undertakes in the second and third volumes of The History of Sexuality, The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self Foucault argues that this genealogy of the desiring subject was accompanied by a “theoretical shift” on his part; but this seems more or less mainly a shift in focus within the methods and subjects of his earlier work. It is not as if, in turning to a genealogy of the modern subject as a subject of desire, Foucault abandons his earlier concerns with truth and power, since these “axes” are closely connected to the “axis” of subjectivity. Rather, he refocuses questions about truth and power onto the issue of subjectivity: After first studying the games of truth (jeux de v erite) in their interplay with one another, as exemplified by certain empirical sciences in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and then studying their interaction with power relations, as exemplified by punitive practices I felt obliged to study the games of truth in the relationship of self with self and the forming of oneself as a subject, taking as my domain of reference and field of investigation what might be called “the history of desiring man.” (Foucault 1990 b, 6) In the revised version of the genealogy of sexuality as it appears in The Use of Pleasure, Foucault investigates how the “desiring subject” developed historically through the “games of truth” involved in the “relationship of self with self.” While he had focused on “games of truth” in the areas of knowledge and power in the past, here he shifts to considering how they operate in the “forming of oneself as a subject.” Foucault explains these “games” more precisely in an interview: [W]hen I say “game,” I mean a set of rules by which truth is produced. It is not a game in the sense of an amusement; it is a set of procedures that lead to a certain result, which, on the basis of its principles and rules of procedure, may be considered valid or invalid, winning or losing. (Foucault 1996 e, 445) Foucault undertakes to investigate, therefore, how the formation of the subject of desire is achieved through various rules and procedures that determine what is “valid or invalid,” true or false about the subject. Recall that the “truth” of the self is intimately connected to one’s sexual desires, pleasures, etc., as drawn out through practices of confession. The games of truth that work to form the “subject of desire,” then, have much to do with issues of sex and sexuality. But the project is even more complex than this, as Foucault characterizes his concern in the second and third volumes of The History of Sexuality as “ethical.” Partly this is because sexuality has come to be an area of great moral concern, and thus moral issues come into play when investigating the history of the “desiring subject,” whose truth centers on the confession of sex. Foucault states, therefore, that another question taken up within this altered project of a genealogy of sexuality is: “how, why, and in what forms was sexuality constituted as a moral domain?” (Foucault 1990 b, 10). In asking this question, Foucault was brought to consider how the form under which sexuality is considered a moral domain for the “desiring subject” came to develop out of earlier forms. Specifically, in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self he focuses on the moral dimension of sexuality in Greek classical antiquity and beyond, starting from about the fourth century B.C.E. and going through the first two centuries A.D. The ways that sexuality was “constituted as a moral domain” in pre-Christian antiquity differed significantly from the way this occurred for the “desiring subject” who developed under Christian morality; but the most important differences have less to do with the moral “rules” followed in regard to sexuality than with relationship to self that individuals cultivated in regard to moral concerns about sexuality. To explain this point, Foucault argues that the moral domain has multiple aspects, including but not limited to the “moral code”: “a set of values and rules of action that are recommended to individuals through the intermediary of various prescriptive agencies . . .” (Foucault 1990 b, 25). This domain also covers something else that we don’t often consider carefully, which Foucault describes as “the manner in which one ought to ‘conduct oneself’ that is, the manner in which one ought to form oneself as an ethical subject acting in reference to the prescriptive elements that make up the code” (1990 b 26). This other aspect of “morality” refers to one’s “relationship to self’: it concerns how one views oneself and governs oneself in relation to the moral code. Foucault calls this one’s “self-formation as an ‘ethical subject’”: [A] process in which the individual delimits that part of himself that will form the object of his moral practice, defines his position relative to the precept he will follow, and decides on a certain mode of being that will serve as his moral goal. And this requires him to act upon himself, to monitor, test, improve, and transform himself. (1990 b 28) What Foucault seems to be saying is that acting morally involves more than simply conforming one’s behavior and activities to certain rules. The rules can be followed in different ways, and it is the way one “conducts oneself’ in reference to the rules that is partly at issue in one’s relationship to self: “Given a code of actions, and with regard to a specific type of actions ... there are different ways to ‘conduct oneself’ morally, different ways for the acting individual to operate, not just as an agent, but as an ethical subject of this action” (1990 b 26). It is not just that the individual has a choice as to whether or not to follow the rules; Foucault’s emphasis here is on the larger issue of the various ways one governs oneself, views oneself, works on oneself to develop a particular mode of being in relation to moral precepts. To illustrate, Foucault gives an example concerning the moral injunction to practice conjugal fidelity, “always with a view to procreation”: he argues that “there will be many ways, even within such a rigid frame, to practice that austerity, many ways to ‘be faithful’” (Foucault 1990 b, 26). Without delving into Foucault’s detailed discussion of the specific themes governing these multiple ways to form oneself as an ethical subject, I will mention here just a couple of examples to illustrate his point in regard to conjugal fidelity: 1 (a) one can view the “crucial aspects” of fidelity as “the strict observance of interdictions and obligations,” or as “the mastery of desires, ... the fervent combat one directs against them,” or as “the intensity, continuity, and reciprocity of feelings that are experienced vis-a-vis the partner”; (b) one can practice fidelity “through a long effort of learning, memorization, and assimilation of a systematic ensemble of precepts,” or “in the form of a sudden, all-embracing, and definitive renunciation of pleasures” or “in the form of a relentless combat whose vicissitudes including momentary setbacks can have meaning and value in themselves” (1990 b 26, 27). In other words, far from just “following the rules,” acting morally involves a whole host of ways of being in relation to the rules, to one’s actions, and to oneself ways of “conducting oneself’ and thereby forming oneself as an “ethical subject.” This dimension of morality becomes an important part of Foucault’s genealogy of the “desiring subject” because this subject operates under a particular model of the relationship to self in the formation of oneself as an ethical subject, a model whose historical development must itself be traced within the genealogy of sexuality. Foucault describes his endeavor in volumes two and three of The History of Sexuality as a “history of ‘ethics’”: “a history of the way in which individuals are urged to constitute themselves as subjects of moral conduct. . . the models proposed for setting up and developing relationships with the self’ (Foucault 1990 b, 29). The “ethics” to which he refers here, then, covers that aspect of morality whereby individuals form themselves as ethical subjects in the way described above; and in providing a “history of ‘ethics,’” Foucault undertakes a genealogy of the “ethics” of the “desiring subject.” This subject, he argues, cultivates a particular relationship to itself in regard to sex as a moral domain. Specifically, the self-governance of the “desiring subject” that developed with “the Christian morality of sexual behavior” includes the following characteristics: it focuses on “a domain of desires that lie hidden among the mysteries of the heart” and on “a set of [sexual] acts that are carefully specified as to their form and their condition”; it considers these sexual desires and acts under “a recognition of the law and an obedience to pastoral authority”; and it advocates practices of “selfdecipherment” and “self-renunciation” (1990 b 92). Foucault endeavors to show how this way of forming oneself as an ethical subject emerged out of earlier models those of classical Greek antiquity. The latter, he argues, focus not on “being in conformity with a code of behavior” or on “an effort of purification” in making oneself into an ethical subject, but on what he calls an “aesthetics of existence”: “a way of life whose moral value . . . [depends] on certain formal principles in the use of pleasures .... [and that] took on the brilliance of a beauty that was revealed to those able to behold it or keep its memory present in mind” (Foucault 1990 b, 89). This mode of self-governance in relation to the moral dimensions of sexual pleasures was less concerned with strict obedience to specific rules and particular forms of sexual acts than it was with forming one’s life with style, as something of beauty and one’s behavior in regard to sexual pleasures was a critical part of such an endeavor. In The Care of the Self Foucault shows how this mode of self-formation as an ethical subject changed and developed through the first two centuries A.D., giving rise to the beginnings of the subject of desire. With this preliminary outline of Foucault’s project in the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality, we can perhaps get a glimpse of how Foucault ties together the themes of sexuality, subjectivity, and ethics. Foucault argues in The Use of Pleasure that his revised project revolves around a genealogy of the “desiring subject,” considering its historical development and the role of certain “games of truth” therein. This is because he found that he could not adequately investigate the “three axes” of knowledge, power and subjectivity involved in his genealogy of “sexuality” without taking a closer look at the subject of this sexuality the “desiring subject.” In addition, this project has an important ethical dimension that emerges partly because the desiring subject finds its truth in sex, which is a subject of great moral concern. But ethics also plays a part in this revised project because Foucault focuses on the specific kind of relationship to self that the “desiring subject” exhibits in the way it forms the self as an ethical subject (especially in regard to the issue of sex and sexual pleasure), and he performs a genealogy of this “ethical” dimension of the “desiring subject” as well. He therefore provides a “history of ‘ethics,’ understood as the elaboration of a form of relation to self that enables an individual to fashion himself into a subject of ethical conduct” (Foucault 1990 b, 251). The ethical dimension of the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality, therefore, emerges through a focus on the various modes of self-governance that are possible in relation to moral precepts, rather than a focus on the precepts and rules themselves. This is at least one way in which the themes of sexuality, subjectivity, and ethics can be said to come together in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self, there are, perhaps, other interconnections as well. Still, even with this brief overview of the project that gave rise to Foucault’s focus on the “aesthetics of the self,” it remains to consider the importance of this project and these texts for the present purpose of discussing freedom as a “cure” to the poisonous regime of truth. The “pastoral power” under which Foucault claims we are still living (or rather, we were in the mid-80s at least) is one that produces subjects who can find their “truth” in sex through mechanisms of confession. It is a power that produces a subject of desire, one that discovers its “true self’ in its hidden sexual desires. It forms a “government of individualization” that ties individuals to a “truthful” identity. Foucault argues that this type of “governmentality,” this type of power is already being resisted by individuals who are refusing to be “individualized” in this way. They are asking the crucial question who are we? without claiming that the answer can be found in some hidden truth that an authority can reveal and verify. They are refusing to be told by institutions of power and knowledge what our truth is, “who we are”: [T]hese present struggles revolve around the question: Who are we? They are a refusal of these abstractions, of economic and ideological state violence which ignore who we are individually, and also a refusal of a scientific or administrative inquisition which determines who one is. (Foucault 1983 b, 212) This question - Who are we? - provides a preliminary glimpse of what Foucault claims the resistance to “governmentality” looks like. It is, at least, a question which can imply a suspension of knowledge, a suspension of the “truth” of who we are that we may have earlier accepted. For Foucault, it seems also to imply a refusal of a certain sort, a refusal of the notion that we can “discover” a “truth” to ourselves, that there is a stable referent for “who we are”: “Maybe the target nowadays is not to discover what we are, but to refuse what we are. We have to imagine and to build up what we could be . . .” (Foucault 1983 b, 216). In other words, by refusing to say (with any sense of universal “truth”) who we are, this leaves us room to “imagine” who we might be, who we could be. Foucault appears to view this refusal of “the government of individualization” as an opportunity to create new modes of being, new subjects: “We have to promote new forms of subjectivity through the refusal of this kind of individuality which has been imposed on us for several centuries” (1983 b 216). This is precisely where the “genealogy of the desiring subject” and the “history of ‘ethics’” that Foucault provides in The Use of Pleasure and The Care of the Self\xccccx\c important. This genealogy shows that the “desiring subject,” the subject whose truth is discovered in sex and desire (and who is tied to this truth through various institutions of knowledge and power), is not a universal, timelessly true conception of “who we are.” This form of subjectivity has a history, and tracing its development exhibits, among other things, alternative ways of conceiving of ourselves. Specifically, Foucault’s “history of ‘ethics’” shows alternative ways of forming oneself as an ethical subject most significantly, it describes an “aesthetics of existence” practiced in antiquity that could provide some fruitful suggestions for resistance to pastoral power through the refusal of “who we are” and the development of “who we could be.” Along these lines, James Bernauer argues that Foucault’s later work reflects “an effort to get at a form of becoming a subject that would furnish the source of an effective resistance to a specific and widespread type of power” (Bernauer 1990, 166). Following this insight, I approach the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality as providing a possible model of resistance, one that focuses on the individual subject and its relationship to self as a crucial element in the hope for political resistance to oppressive forms of power. Foucault’s discussion and elaboration of the “aesthetic creation of self’ in these two volumes can be viewed as suggestive of a different kind of subject than the “desiring subject,” one that has, in the place of “liberatory” potential, the potential for practicing the “real freedom” of ceaseless questioning and resistance of limits. A beautiful life Foucault defines the “arts of existence,” the “techniques of the self,” early on in The Use of Pleasure as those intentional and voluntary actions by which men not only set themselves rules of conduct, but also seek to transform themselves, to change themselves in their singular being, and to make their life into an oeuvre that carries certain aesthetic values and meets certain stylistic criteria. (Foucault 1990 b, 10-11) These techniques of “fashioning oneself,” as it were, are further elaborated by Foucault throughout his discussion of Greek and Roman antiquity (the latter in The Care of the Self (Foucault 1988 a)). In their self-formation as ethical subjects, individuals in classical antiquity practiced various ways of creating themselves that could be described as a kind of aesthetic stylization. Focusing on the ethical concerns surrounding sex and sexual pleasures, Foucault shows how Greeks in the fourth century B.C.E. developed a form of relationship to self that did not emphasize compliance with a universal set of rules and/or the discovery of a “truth” within the self, but focused on the creation of oneself and one’s life as objects of a certain kind of aesthetic appreciation. According to Foucault, such an effort to stylize oneself, to live a beautiful life, is something that began to wane in the first few centuries A.D., eventually (and gradually) being displaced by a greater emphasis on the practices and mechanisms that inform and sustain the “subject of desire.” But the “aesthetic” relation to self did not disappear entirely, and Foucault seems to suggest that it can be revived and updated for the present. Some of Foucault’s later texts, lectures and interviews suggest that efforts to create the self aesthetically play a crucial role in resistance to power. In order to better explain how the “aesthetics of existence” might help facilitate resistance, and thus form part of the “cure” for the “poison” of the regime of truth, I begin with Foucault’s discussion of the Greek “arts of existence” as they existed in the fourth century B.C.E. Foucault argues that the ethical concern surrounding sex in Greek antiquity took, for some individuals, the form of a demand for sexual austerity that yet left much room for creativity in compliance. In other words, the Greeks expressed strong moral concerns about sex and sexual pleasure, and their attitudes in regard to these tended toward a certain emphasis on austerity; but within this moral domain it was possible to practice this austerity in a variety of ways. In fact, Foucault argues, there existed in Greek antiquity a type of “ethics” (used both in the sense of a moral code and as naming a relationship to oneself in the formation of oneself as an ethical subject) whose demands in regard to sexual austerity “were not organized into a unified, coherent, authoritarian moral system that was imposed on everyone in the same manner” (Foucault 1990 b, 21). Instead, this ethics left open much room for variation in the ways one could live up to its demands, resulting in an emphasis on “styling” oneself in relation to general ideals that needed to be adjusted to one’s own particular situation and status. It must be stated at the outset that this type of ethics was not universally practiced by the Greeks. Foucault notes first of all that this was an “ethics for men”: [T]his ethics was not addressed to women; it was not their duties, or obligations, that were recalled, justified, or spelled out. It was an ethics for men: an ethics thought, written, and taught by men and addressed to men to free men, obviously. A male ethics, consequently, in which women figured only as objects or, at most, as partners that one had best train, educate, and watch over when one had them under one’s power .... (Foucault 1990 b, 22) The “techniques of the self’ involved in the ethics Foucault investigates here, were primarily practiced by men; and they were considered part of a “masculine” endeavor even when undertaken by women. 2 But these practices were also restricted to free men (not slaves), and mainly to men with some status and power over others (1990 b 61). This could still include a large group, however, for many free, male, Athenian citizens had power over at least the inhabitants of their households. The ethical issues surrounding sexual behaviors and pleasures, as they were directed to this segment of the population, concerned “those conducts in which they were called upon to exercise their rights, their power, their authority, and their liberty” - i.e., rather than expressing “deep and essential prohibitions” that applied to all, this ethics focused on “the elaboration and stylization of an activity in the exercise of its power and the practice of its liberty” (Foucault 1990 b, 23). Part of what Foucault means here is that a certain segment of the population was free to choose to follow this particular type of “creative” ethical practice if they so desired, but it was not something in which everyone was expected to or even could participate. It was, as Foucault explains in an interview, a “personal choice for a small elite”: “it was reserved for a few people in the population; it was not a question of giving a pattern of behavior for everybody” (Foucault 1983 a, 230). A certain elite segment of the population could choose to follow a particular kind of ethical practice in regard to sex and sexuality, and they would do so mainly for the purpose of having “a beautiful existence, ... a good reputation”; in other words, those who chose this ethics accepted its obligations “in a conscious way for the beauty or glory of existence” (1983 a 240). The Greek ethics of sexual austerity, where one “stylizes” oneself in the adherence to general ethical demands, was an ethics only for those with power and authority, and functioned as an expression of the liberty connected with this status. It was not a set of rules or prohibitions that were applied to everyone, equally. Further, even for those to whom this particular ethics applied, it was not the case that the sexual austerity required was demanded through the use of rigid, specific rules imposed on all “free men.” There were general expectations, general boundaries within which one’s conduct ought to remain, but within these boundaries there was much room for adjustment on the basis of various factors, including one’s particular circumstances and status. This point can perhaps best be illustrated by reference to what Foucault calls the “use of pleasures”: “the manner in which an individual managed his sexual activity, his way of conducting himself in such matters, the regimen he allowed himself. . .” (Foucault 1990 b, 53). Within this moral domain, Foucault points out, there was no rigid code set out for all how sexual pleasures ought to be “used,” it was acknowledged, could vary somewhat amongst different men based on their particular situation (though there were still certain universal boundaries that ought not to be transgressed): In the use of pleasures, while it was necessary to respect the laws and customs of the land, to keep from offending the gods, and to heed the will of nature, the moral rules to which one conformed were far removed from anything that might form a clearly defined code. It was much more a question of a variable adjustment in which one had to take different factors into account: the element of want and natural necessity; that of opportuneness, which was temporal and circumstantial; that of the status of the individual himself. (1990 b 54) Foucault elaborates in some detail on the considerations of “natural necessity,” “opportuneness” and “status,” showing how they allowed individual men room to maneuver in their use of pleasures, thereby providing a freedom to tailor, or “stylize” their activities in accordance with their personal circumstances. As an example, Foucault cites a text entitled the Erotic Essay (attributed to Demosthenes), which shows that the appropriateness of enjoying sexual pleasures with boys varied with one’s status: “every sensible person knows very well that love relations with boys are not ‘absolutely either honorable or shameful but for the most part vary according to the persons concerned,’ so that it would be ‘unreasonable to adopt the same attitude’ in every case” (Foucault 1990 b, 59). 3 Thus the ethical demands in regard to this aspect of the use of pleasures varied with the agent’s status. But further, it was left up to the individual himself to decide precisely how to regulate his conduct within this space left open for adjustment. It is not as if the multiple, varied possibilities were determined in advance and a specific code of conduct set out for each. The textual record shows, Foucault argues, that in this area of the use of pleasures (as well as in other aspects of the Greek ethics of sexual austerity), no one said “exactly what ought or ought not to be done in the way of sexual acts or practices” (1990 b 93). There were certain general recommendations given, but much was left up to the determination of the individual himself, in reference to his particular status and circumstances. 4 There was an emphasis, therefore, not on a code of rules, but on a savoir faire that each individual ought to try to develop: The few great common laws of the city, religion, nature - remained present, but it was as if they traced a very wide circle in the distance, inside of which practical thought had to define what could rightfully be done. And for this there was no need of anything resembling a text that would have the force of law, but rather of a techne or “practice,” a savoir-faire that by taking general principles into account would guide action in its time, according to its context, and in view of its ends. (Foucault 1990 b, 62) One who possesses the requisite savoir-faire is able to conduct himself within the space left open by the general principles and recommendations, taking into account variables such as one’s status, one’s physical needs, the particular time and circumstances of the considered behavior, etc. Another of the many examples Foucault gives to illustrate this point involves what he calls “dietetics”: the Greeks’ concern with the relationship between sexual pleasures and the health of the body. According to Foucault, part of the moral concern surrounding sexual behavior for the ancient Greeks was focused on the need to “define the use of pleasures which conditions were favorable, which practice was recommended, which rarefaction was necessary in terms of a certain way of caring for one’s body” (Foucault 1990 b, 97). Foucault explains various ways in which the Greeks considered sexual pleasures and activities to be potentially beneficial or harmful to one’s health, the details of which are not crucial here. What is most important to note in this regard is that the means of regulating one’s own health (whether having to do with sexual pleasures or things such as diet and illness) did not involve following a list of universal rules and guidelines or even an “unquestioning obedience to the authority of another” such as a doctor: “If it was to be reasonable, properly adjusting itself to time and circumstances, the diet of the body had also to be a matter of thought, deliberation, and prudence” (1990 b 107). In other words, individuals were to “take care of their health” not by conforming themselves to universal rules of what is good and bad for the body, but by tailoring the “care of themselves” to their own particular bodies and circumstances. Foucault cites a passage from Xenophon’s Memorabilia to illustrate, where Socrates tells his disciples to care for their health through a “vigilant attentiveness to themselves” accompanied by note-taking, for the purpose of learning how best to “stylize” the care of their own bodies: Everyone should watch himself throughout his life, and notice what sort of meat and drink and what form of exercise suit his constitution, and how he should regulate them in order to enjoy good health. . . . For by such attention to yourselves you can discover better than any doctor what suits your constitution. (Foucault 1990 b, 108) 5 Taking care of one’s health in fourth century Greece, according to Foucault, was characterized by a “circumstantial strategy involving the body and the elements that surrounded it” (1990 b 108); and this was true in the case of the regulation of sexual pleasures just as in the control of diet and exercise. The potential dangers in the use of sexual pleasures indicated a need for control and careful measure but here too, the point was to control them according to one’s own constitution, combined with factors such as one’s status and circumstances. The anxiety surrounding the sexual pleasures in their effects on the health of the body “took shape within a reflection that did not aim at a codification of acts . . rather, its objective was to develop a technique of existence” (Foucault 1990 b, 138). In other words, the aim was to develop a particular kind of technique or practice tailored to oneself, a savoir-faire that gave one “the possibility of making oneself like the doctor treating sickness ... a skillful and prudent guide of himself, one who had a sense of the right time and the right measure” (1990 b 138-139). This technique was something that had to be developed and refined by oneself; it was not determined by a rigid code of rules applied to all: “One always remained within the compass of a general assessment.... it was not possible to determine in advance and for everyone, the rhythm of an activity that engaged an interplay of qualities . . . between the body and its milieu” (1990 b 114-115). This was a very different way of conducting oneself ethically than that which was to develop later, as the latter involves the requirement to conform to an absolute and universal code of behavior in regard to sexual pleasures and behaviors. Instead, the free, male Greeks of the fourth century 8.C.E., Foucault argues, created and developed their own “practice,” their own “style” of acting ethically, tailored to their own lives. The development of this “practice,” or “savoir-faire,” required a certain attitude, a particular kind of “relationship with oneself. . . which was necessary to the ethics of pleasures and which was manifested through the proper use one made of them” (Foucault 1990 b, 63). Foucault locates this attitude in the ancient Greek term, enkrateia, which he characterizes as “an active form of self-mastery, which enables one to resist or struggle, and to achieve domination in the area of desires and pleasures”; “it is self-control, tension, ‘continence’” (1990 b 64, 65). Translated into English as “self-mastery,” enkrateia, according to Foucault, marks a particular relationship to oneself one of self-control, of domination of one’s desires and pleasures by the self, and therefore rule of the self by the self. As part of the practice of the “ethics for men” in regard to sexual pleasures and their use, then, a certain type of self-relation was required, a certain attitude towards shaping the self: “to form oneself as a virtuous and moderate subject in the use he makes of pleasures, the individual has to construct a relationship with the self that is of the “domination-submission,” “command-obedience,” “mastery-docility” type ... (1990 b 70). This attitude was achieved through training (according to Foucault, askesis in ancient Greek) and practice, a part of “attending to oneself’ or “caring for oneself’ for the purpose of self-transformation (Foucault 1990 b, 73). One had to be morally trained in the correct manner in order to develop the proper attitude of self-mastery, and thus to manage the proper use of pleasures. This moral training, or “ascesis,” it is important to note, was considered the same as the training required to prepare men to exercise authority over others. This is because, as Foucault notes, “self-mastery and mastery of others were regarded as having the same form . . . one was expected to govern oneself in the same manner as one governed one’s household and played one’s role in the city . . .” (1990 b 75). This brings up an interesting connection between one’s relationship to and treatment of others and one’s attitude towards oneself, a connection that is significant for the discussion of the aesthetic creation of self as a practice of freedom (I discuss this point further below). The result of developing the right relationship with oneself in this “ethics for men,” was the virtue of “moderation”: “a very general state that ensures that one will do ‘what is fitting as regards both gods and men’ - that is, one will be not only moderate but righteous and just, and courageous as well” (Foucault 1990 b, 64). 6 One of the differences between moderation and self-mastery, according to Foucault, is that the latter is focused more on an active effort, a struggle or combat with one’s desires, while the former characterizes someone who has achieved a measure of victory in his efforts at self-mastery. Foucault argues, therefore, that “enkrateia [self-mastery] can be regarded as the prerequisite of sophrosyne [moderation], as the form of effort and control that the individual must apply to himself in order to become moderate . . .” (1990 b 65). What is most significant about the virtue of moderation for the present purpose is that, according to Foucault, “it was characterized as a freedom” (Foucault 1990 b, 78). Moderate men were “free,” not in the modern sense of possessing a “free will,” but (in part) in the sense of not being enslaved by the self and its desires: “[t]o be free in relation to pleasures was to be free of their authority; it was not to be their slave” (1990 b 79). But, Foucault points out, there was even more to this freedom that was cherished in moderation than an “emancipation” from “any exterior or interior constraint”: “in its full, positive form, it was a power that one brought to bear on oneself in the power that one exercised over others” (1990 b 80). Freedom as nonenslavement to the self was achieved through a power over, a mastery of, oneself; and the form of this mastery was not considered to be different from that of the power exercised in one’s rule over others. Foucault emphasizes this connection between power over oneself and power over others when he notes that it was for those in positions of authority that moderation was most critical: “In order not to be excessive, not to do violence, in order to avoid the trap of tyrannical authority (over others)... the exercise of political power required, as its own principle of internal regulation, power over oneself’ (1990 b 80-81). This implies that the individual freedom achieved in the moderation of one in authority (the freedom of nonenslavement by one’s own desires) is intimately linked to the freedom of those under his rule (the freedom of nonenslavement by him, by a tyrannical and oppressive rule). 7 Indeed, Foucault argues in an interview that lacking the proper “care of the self’ that is, lacking the proper relationship to oneself as self-mastery, the proper use of pleasures, the achievement of the virtue of moderation was, to the Greeks, what led to tyrannical rule: “the risk of dominating others and exercising a tyrannical power over them arises precisely only when one has not taken care of the self and has become a slave of one’s desires” (Foucault 1996 e, 438). For the Greeks of the fourth century 8.C.E., then, attending to the “care of oneself’ helped to secure the freedom of the self and would contribute to the freedom of others under one’s power as well. Part of achieving moderation for the Greeks, according to Foucault, involved bringing the self into a particular relation to truth and knowledge. In part, this is because the moderate person was one in which reason, the rational principle within the soul, rules: “To rule one’s pleasures and to bring them under the authority of the logos formed one and the same enterprise: moderation, says Aristotle, desires only what the rational principle [orthos logos] directs” (Foucault 1990 b, 86). 8 Though ancient Greek philosophers differed in their characterization of the soul and its parts, Foucault argues, they agreed that “it is reason that commands and prescribes,” that rules over desires and appetites in the moderate soul (1990 b 87). The irrational aspects of the soul needed to be reined in, controlled by the rational ones, which could direct them according to its relationship to truth and knowledge. This hierarchical structure of the moderate soul allows it to engage in instrumental, practical reason as well: such a person can determine what he ought to do at any given time in regard to the use of the pleasures, taking into account his particular status and circumstances and working out thereby “‘the things he ought, as he ought, and when he ought’” (1990 b 87). 9 Finally, the self’s relation to truth and knowledge in regard to the ancient Greek view of moderation was expressed as “the ontological recognition of the self by the self’ (Foucault 1990 b, 88). The moderate soul is one that “knows itself,” as a Socratic theme one that knows the real and true nature of the human soul. The nature of the soul according to the ancient Greeks, Foucault explains (using Plato’s Phaedrus as a guide), involves a tremendous struggle within the self, where the various elements such as desires, appetites, and reason pull and push each other in different directions. The soul is consequently thrown into states of tension and anxiety as well as peace and pleasure, “the suffering and pleasure that alternate and intermix ... the lapses, the wounds, the pains, the reward and the final appeasement” (1990 b 88). This struggle has as its end goal the triumph of reason over the passions for the purpose of reaching an eventual union of the soul with the truth, its “final appeasement.” The moderate soul, recognizing this as its own nature, seems thereby better equipped to attain its goal than a soul that lacks this knowledge it knows where it is going and how to get there (even if the struggle may yet be long and difficult). Foucault concludes, summarizing the above points, that, “be it in the form of a hierarchical structure of the human being, in the form of a practice of prudence or of the soul’s recognition of its own being, the relation to truth constituted an essential element of moderation” (1990 b 88-89). What is significant for the present purpose in regard to the moderate soul’s relation to truth is that it has a different structure than that of the later “subject of desire.” The “subject of desire” is one that studies itself and its desires (primarily sexual) in order to find its truth therein (Foucault 1990 b, 5). This type of subject is brought, by practices of pastoral power such as the confession, to speak its desire and have this its truth ratified by a figure of authority; and through such a procedure it becomes subject to its identity, individualized by the putting of sex and desire into discourse as the expression of its “true self.” But the subject of moderation in ancient Greece had a relation to truth that was, Foucault argues, of a significantly different type: “it was not equivalent to an obligation for the subject to speak truthfully concerning himself; it never opened up the soul as a domain of potential knowledge where barely discernible traces of desire needed to be read and interpreted” (1990 b 89). The moderate subject was not one whose truth could be deciphered in its hidden desires, in its repressed sexual appetites. Therefore, unlike the “subject of desire,” it was not the case that “traces of desire needed to be read and interpreted” in the Greek subject of moderation. The latter’s relation to truth did not involve discovering its truth by putting its desire into discourse, but required instead an ordering of the soul so that reason could rule over the desires through its ability to grasp and implement the knowledge of the proper use of sexual pleasures. Even the “soul’s recognition of its own being” the requirement that the moderate soul come to an ontological understanding of its true nature —was not the same as the “decipherment of the self by the self’ that was to come later, where the individual comes to “recognize himself in his singularity as a desiring subject” (Foucault 1990 b, 89). The subject of moderation does not come to “know” itself through deciphering its truth in its desire, does not become subjected to that truth, tied to that individuality through a practice of power. It recognizes its “true nature” in struggle as part of an ontological order wherein the goal of a union with truth may be reached through control over desires and appetites. But this knowledge, as well as the knowledge of the proper use of sexual pleasures, is used by the moderate subject to create a life that follows these general prescriptions in its own, particular way according to its own status and circumstances. In other words, the moderate subject, unlike the “subject of desire,” is not bound to an individual truth found in its desire. Rather, it can create itself, fashion itself within general guidelines of which it must have knowledge, but within which it can develop its own “style” befitting its own particular situation. 10 Foucault argues, therefore, that the subject of moderation enjoyed a relation to truth that allowed for an “aesthetics of existence”: Now, while this relation to truth, constitutive of the moderate subject, did not lead to a hermeneutics of desire, it did on the other hand open onto an aesthetics of existence. And what I mean by this is a way of life whose moral value did not depend either on one’s being in conformity with a code of behavior, or on an effort of purification, but on certain formal principles in the use of pleasures, in the way one distributed them, in the limits one observed, in the hierarchy one respected. (Foucault 1990 b, 89) Recall that the Greek ethics of sexual austerity did not set out a strict code of rules to be followed by everyone. Not only was this an “ethics for [free] men,” rather than one that applied universally, but even for those to whom it was particularly directed it was not a matter of conforming one’s behavior to a rigid code of what must and must not be done. An important aspect of this ethics was that behavior was regulated not by a “universal legislation determining permitted and forbidden acts; but rather by a savoir-faire, an art that prescribed the modalities of a use that depended on different variables” (1990 b 91). One was to govern oneself, not by simply making one’s behavior conform to precise rules regarding sexual pleasures, but instead by developing a flexible knowledge, a savoir-faire that would allow one to direct oneself according to varying factors such as one’s status, one’s physical needs, the particular context and circumstances of any given act, etc. Foucault describes this activity as a kind of “stylization” of oneself and one’s behavior in the formation of oneself as an ethical subject: Putting it schematically, we could say that classical antiquity’s moral reflection concerning the pleasures was not directed toward a codification of acts, nor toward a hermeneutics of the subject, but toward a stylization of attitudes and an aesthetics of existence. A stylization, because the rarefaction of sexual activity presented itself as a sort of open-ended requirement. (Foucault 1990 b, 92) Within the wide boundaries of general principles and rules, each individual had a generous amount of latitude to create their own “style” of living ethically, and this “stylization” had an aesthetic, as well as a moral value: [T]he requirement of austerity . . . was not presented in the form of a universal law, which each and every individual would have to obey, but rather as a principle of stylization of conduct for those who wished to give their existence the most graceful and accomplished form possible. (1990 b 250-251) Foucault points out that the moderate soul was also considered a beautiful soul, one that “took on the brilliance of a beauty that was revealed to those able to behold it or keep its memory present in mind” (1990 b 89). 11 Further, this beauty one strove to achieve for one’s soul was a goal, not just during one’s life, but for long after the hope was that one would make a great enough aesthetic impression to be kept in memory for many generations. The Greeks, at least those who were free and male, could work to develop a style of living that was “good, beautiful, honorable, estimable, memorable and exemplary” (Foucault 1996 e, 436); one worked “to give to one’s own life a certain form in which one could recognize oneself, be recognized by others, and in which even posterity could find an example” (Foucault 1996 a, 451). Still, this was not a moral requirement even for free males; it was something that one could choose to do, if one wanted to create for oneself a beautiful life. Foucault makes much of this Greek notion of an “aesthetics of existence” in his later essays and interviews, this “elaboration of one’s own life as a personal work of art” (Foucault 1996 a, 451). Its significance for the present purpose is that it appears to provide a different kind of model of being an ethical subject than that of the “subject of desire” under which (according to Foucault) we have been living in the West since the rise of Christian ethics. This alternative model seems to promise for Foucault the possibility of a practice of “real freedom,” of a resistance to “poisonous” power relations. Though power is not all evil, it can still be dangerous in that it has the potential for an oppressive “governmentality” or can even be hardened into a “state of domination” where resistance is cut off completely. One of the more dangerous forms of power for Foucault, it seems, is “disciplinary” and “normalizing” power. It is this type of power relation that governs the development of the “subject of desire,” that “subjects” individuals to their identity, individualizing them according to the “true self’ that is said to be found in (sexual) desire. The subject becomes bound to a truth designated as its own by one in authority. Further, in the moral domain, the “subject of desire” is bound by a strict code of rules, universally applied, that works to “normalize” individuals. The individual, then, is not only tied to his or her own “truth,” s/he is also bound by the imperative to conform that “true self’ to a norm of ethical behavior, through the following of universal rules. It is such exercises of power that can call for resistance by those who no longer want to be governed “like that” - ’’not like that, not for that, not by them” (Foucault 1997 c, 28) and the “aesthetics of existence” that Foucault finds in classical Antiquity seems to offer, in some of its aspects at least, a promising model to be reworked and developed for our own practices of freedom. If the Greek ethics of sexual austerity can provide a creative model of subjectivity with emancipatory potential for us, here and now, it is important to consider just how it is different from the later, Christian ethics that produces the “subject of desire” and its relation to self as focused on “truth.” One of the most important differences between the Greek and Christian ethics, as explained by Foucault, has to do with the degree of universality and specificity in the moral code. Foucault notes in The Use of Pleasure that many of the same “themes, anxieties, and exigencies that. . . marked the Christian ethic and the morality of modern European societies” were “already present at the core of Greek and Greco-Roman thought” (Foucault 1990 b, 15). In other words, the moral code (“what is forbidden and what is not”) didn’t change dramatically between the Greek ethics and the Christian ethics: “I think you can say that the codes in themselves didn’t change a great deal. . . . [S]ome of the prohibitions are much stricter and much more rigorous in Christianity than in the Greek period. But the themes are the same” (Foucault 1983 a, 240). Still, though the codes may have been similar, there was a significant change in the quality and scope of their application. For Christian ethics, the code is an expression of a universal set of values, an absolute notion of what is right and true for all human beings; and it is something that all must therefore follow or suffer condemnation and possibly punishment if they do not. Foucault notes that of course even there “the rules of sexual conduct vary according to age, sex, and the condition of individuals” so that “obligations and prohibitions are not imposed on everyone in the same manner” (Foucault 1990 b, 60). But he argues that this is a “moderated universality” in that the point is to vary the rules so as to bring everyone (in their different circumstances) in line with general principles valid for all: [T]his specification [variations in the rules according to age, sex, etc.] occurs within the framework of an overall system that defines the value of the sexual act in terms of general principles, indicates the conditions in which it may be legitimate or not, according to whether one is married or not, bound by vows or not, etc. (1990 b 60). In other words, the Christian ethics emphasizes certain universal standards of behavior, and any variability in the rules as regards different types of people is a result of applying those universal standards in different particular circumstances. In contrast, Foucault argues, the Greek view of ethics acknowledged “a legitimate difference ... among moral criteria” (Foucault 1990 b, 60). This meant at least that there could be different standards for different types of people (usually dependent upon things like gender and status), and that therefore certain people would not be reproached for behavior that would be considered immoral for others. Variation in the rules applied to different types of people, then, reflected genuinely different standards rather than being the result of applying universal standards to differing circumstances. In the Greek “aesthetics of existence” it was not a matter of conforming one’s behavior to general principles that were grounded in absolute values and a universal notion of what is good for all humanity. Foucault explains this difference as he locates the change from the Greek ethics to the Christian, beginning with “late Stoicism.” He argues that before the Stoics, the Greek ethics as an “aesthetics of existence” was a matter of personal choice for those who wanted to create a beautiful life. But things soon begin to change: You can see, for instance, in the Stoics how they move slowly from an idea of an aesthetics of existence to the idea that we have to do such and such things because we are rational beings as members of the human community we have to do them. In late Stoicism, when they start saying “Well, you are obliged to do that because you are a human being” something changes. It’s not a problem of choice; you have to do it because you are a rational being. (Foucault 1983 a, 239, 241) With the Stoics, Foucault argues, begins the emphasis on universality that comes to characterize the Christian ethics. In The Care of the Self Foucault traces this transition through various texts from the first few centuries A.D. He notes there an increasing emphasis on conforming one’s sexual desires and behaviors “to a universal form by which one is bound, a form grounded in both nature and reason, and valid for all human beings” (Foucault 1988 a, 238). Eventually, the Christian ethics would develop into a form wherein one was obliged to conduct “work on oneself that implies a decipherment of the soul and a purificatory hermeneutics of the desires,” and to subject oneself to “obedience to a general law” valid for all individuals (1988 a 239). 12 There is, therefore, an important “normalizing” element in the Christian ethics centered on the “subject of desire,” in that it emphasizes the universality of standards that are supposed to bind all human beings equally. One is to conform one’s behavior to these, to “normalize” one’s actions and oneself according to the universal code. This aspect of normalization is, for the most part, lacking in the Greek ethics of sexual austerity. Some aspects of the code may be similar between the Christian and Greek ethics, but for the latter, following it was a matter of personal choice for a few, because they wanted to add an aesthetic value to their lives. It was thus a matter of personal choice and even, to some degree, aesthetic taste rather than a requirement. For the Christian ethics, however, the code provided obligations for all under the rubric of a universal view of the nature of “rational humanity” and stated what one must do, morally, to be true to this nature. To fail to live up to the code under this view is to fail to be fully rational and therefore human, according to the standards of normalcy established by the code. Foucault points out in an interview that the element of “normalization” found in the Christian ethics was not present in the ethics of Greek antiquity (even in Stoic ethics, where the transition to “normalization” began): I don’t think one can find any normalization in, for instance, the Stoic ethics. The reason is, I think, that the principal aim, the principal target of this kind of ethics was an aesthetic one. ... It was a personal choice for a small elite. The reason for making this choice was the will to live a beautiful life, and to leave to others memories of a beautiful existence. I don’t think that we can say that this kind of ethics was an attempt to normalize the population. (Foucault 1983 a, 230) Living up to the code of sexual austerity in ancient Greece was a matter of “personal choice” for a few, rather than an obligation for all due to a universal standard of what it means to be a rational human being. Another important difference between the Greek and Christian ethics, according to Foucault, has to do with the nature of the relationship one has with oneself under each and the end goal or purpose of taking on this relationship. In the Greek ethics of sexual austerity, one’s relationship to oneself was one of selfmastery, self-control, for the purpose of becoming a moderate soul. One had to struggle with oneself in that one’s desires, passions and appetites continually threatened to escape the control of reason, their “natural” leader. The moderate soul was one who had achieved at least a certain degree of control over its irrational parts so that it no longer needed to struggle so much to maintain the relation to itself of self-control. This moderation, which could be achieved through self-mastery, “was characterized as a freedom” according to Foucault (1990 b 78) a freedom from the threat of tyrannical rule by irrational elements and/or an individual who is himself thus ruled. The Christian “subject of desire,” on the other hand, experiences a relationship to self that is one of self-decipherment for the purpose of denying, renouncing the self and achieving purity thereby: “the ethical subject was to be characterized not so much by the perfect rule of the self by the self in the exercise of a virile type of activity, as by self-renunciation and a purity whose model was to be sought in virginity” (Foucault 1990 b, 92). This subject attempts to find the truth within, by a deciphering of his or her (sexual) desires; and once this truth is revealed one can then take the necessary steps towards renouncing what is required to purify the self. In the Christian ethics, self-decipherment and purification means finding and renouncing any desires or passions that go against the universal ethical standards. The purity thus achieved is itself required for a further goal, namely the lasting peace and happiness of an immortal existence in the kingdom of heaven. In certain respects, the relationship to the self as expressed in the Greek and Christian ethics appears similar. For example, in both one finds a movement of self-denial in regard to passions, desires, and appetites. In the Greek ethics the soul practices a self-mastery that involves the control of these irrational elements by reason, but this differs in important ways from the Christian self-decipherment and self-renunciation. The Greek male who chose to practice the ethics of sexual austerity did not look inside to find the truth of himself in his desires, nor did he then attempt to renounce these desires, to purify himself of them. Foucault notes that for the Greeks, sexual pleasure and sexual activity were viewed as valuable aspects of life, as natural and important parts of the self, but also as things that tended to excess and thus needed to be carefully controlled. In other words, one had to control the sexual appetites and desires not because they are bad in themselves (and it would be better to renounce them), but because they can easily be enjoyed too much: [T]he reason [sexual activity had to be controlled] was not that [it] was a vice, nor that it might deviate from a canonical model; it was because sexual activity was associated with a force, an energeia, that was itself liable to be excessive. . . . For classical Greek thought, this force was potentially excessive by nature, and the moral question was how to confront this force, how to control it and regulate its economy in a suitable way. (Foucault 1990 b, 50) The point in the Greek ethics was to learn to master one’s desires and pleasures so that they could be used appropriately, according to one’s own circumstances, status, etc. This was not so much a self-renunciation and purification as it was a self-creation, a self-styling for the purpose of making a beautiful life. In the Christian ethics, on the other hand, “the reason why you have to take control of yourself is to keep yourself pure” (Foucault 1983 a, 247) you have to look for any impure thoughts or desires so as to root them out, renounce them. This notion of purity didn’t play into the Greek ethics in the same way. There, it was not a matter of some desires and pleasures being good or bad according to a universal standard that all are obligated to follow; rather, the point was to keep one’s desires under control until they could be used in the proper time and place. But even this was not an obligation applied to everyone, universally it was a choice you could make to live your life in a particular way. Thus one was not “purifying” oneself of desires that, according to the established standards, should not be part of the normal, rational, human being. One was, instead, creating a self that could have lasting aesthetic value. Foucault emphasizes that after the transition occurred in the West from the Greek style of ethics to the Christian, this notion of self-creation was largely covered over in favor of self-decipherment and purification: “From that moment on, the self was no longer something to be made but something to be renounced and deciphered” (1983 a 248). With this disparity between “making” the self and “deciphering” the self, we can begin to see how the approach to ethics and ethical conduct practiced in ancient Greece can serve as an alternative to that which developed later. It offers a different kind of relationship to oneself than that exhibited by the “subject of desire” rather than a decipherment of the self by the self, a search for one’s own “truth” through the speaking of desire, the relationship with oneself that can be found in the Greek ethical practice as described above is more focused on the creation of oneself and one’s life for the purpose of giving it an aesthetically beautiful form. This resonates with Foucault’s exhortation regarding a possible way to resist normalizing and individualizing relations of power: “Maybe the target nowadays is not to discover what we are, but.... to imagine and to build up what we could be . . .” (Foucault 1983 b, 216). If, as Foucault argues, “[w]e have to promote new forms of subjectivity through the refusal of this kind of individuality which has been imposed on us for several centuries” (1983 b 216), then it is possible that the aesthetic creation of the self as practiced by the Greeks could serve as a model for these new ways of “being subject.” Foucault does indeed seem to suggest the creation of new forms of subjectivity, new kinds of relationships to oneself, in ways that seem at least derived from the model he finds in the ancient Greek “ethics for men.” Though he does not advocate a simple and straightforward “return to the Greeks,” Foucault does use the notion of an “aesthetics of existence” to locate the possibility of imagining “what we could be.” Further, he characterizes this possibility as carrying significant potential for developing a practice of “real freedom.” 1 Foucault argues that the different ways one can form oneself as an ethical subject can be organized around four broad themes: (1) “the determination of the ethical substance, that is, the way in which the individual has to constitute this or that part of himself as the prime material of his moral conduct”; (2) “the mode of subjection (mode d’assujettissementf that is, . . . the way in which the individual establishes his relation to the rule and recognizes himself as obliged to put it into practice”; (3) “the forms of elaboration, of ethical work (travail ethique) that one performs on oneself, not only in order to bring one’s conduct into compliance with a given rule, but to attempt to transform oneself into the ethical subject of one’s behavior”; (4) “the telos of the ethical subject... a pattern of conduct.... a certain mode of being, a mode of being characteristic of the ethical subject” (Foucault 1990 b, 26, 27, 28). For a concise summary of each of these four themes and how they play into Foucault’s genealogy of sexuality in The Use of Pleasure and beyond, see Michael Mahon (1992, 164-175). 2 Foucault admits that the kind of practices involved in this ethics could be and were also undertaken by women to some extent, though their ethical self-formation was partly a function of their dependent relationship to men (Foucault 1990 b, 83, 181-184). This “ethics for men” mainly concerned the conduct of men in relation to their sexual activities and pleasures, and women’s conduct was highly regulated by their relationships to men. Still, though women did practice the “techniques of the self’ in fourth century Greece to a certain extent, Foucault argues that this was still considered a “masculine” activity: it was a way of “being a man with respect to oneself’ (1990 b 82). also points to Plato’s Symposium (180c-18la, 183 d) in support of his point here. provides a lengthy discussion of the use of pleasures in regard to boys in the fourth section of The Use of Pleasure (Foucault 1990 b, 187-225). One of the main themes therein relates to the issue of adjusting one’s pleasures with boys according to one’s status: Foucault explains that in this domain of sexual ethics, as in others, many of the demands of austerity were informed by an analogy between “positions in the social field (with the difference between ‘the first ones’ and the others, the great who rule and those who obey, the masters and servants) and the form of sexual relations (with dominant and subordinate positions, active and passive roles . . .)” (1990 b 210). The issue of status comes in not only through one’s choice of partners, but through one’s “activity” or “passivity” in the activities practiced in the relationship, and how these related to one’s particular status. passage Foucault cites here is from Xenophon, Memorabilia, IV, 7. cites Plato’s Gorgias here, 507 a-b. 7 There is also, however, a connection here between the moderation of the individual in power and the moderation of those ruled - since the latter become moderate not through the process of selfmastery described above, the development of an attitude of self-domination, but rather by following the orders of those in power. As Foucault explains: “the person who, owing to his status, was under the authority of others was not expected to find the principle of his moderation within himself; it would be enough for him to obey the orders and instructions he was given” (Foucault 1990 b, 80). Foucault cites Plato’s Republic in support of this point, as Plato insists that the city will exhibit moderation if the rulers are self-controlled, and if they, through their rule, control the others (especially the craftsmen, who are expected to have little to no self-control) (see Plato’s Republic, 590 c). cites Aristotle here, from the Nichomachean Ethics 111, 12, 1119 b. cites Aristotle here once again, from the same passage as in note eight. 1 °Thomas Flynn argues that while truth played an important role in the practices of the Greek ethical subject in the three ways described above, none of these present an epistemological relation to truth. According to Flynn, this represents one of the main differences between the Greek aesthetic subject and the subject of desire: “To the extent that truth figures into the constitution of the moral subject in classical Greece, it does so in three ways: structurally, insofar as logos is superior to desire and must rule it; instrumentally, as the practical reason that enables the subject to act appropriately in concrete circumstances; and ontologically, according to the thesis of the soul’s recognizing its true being and pursuing it (the theme of the Phaedrus). But, Foucault insists, there is no epistemological relationship to the truth operative here; no soul-searching or examination of conscience in order to purify motives or interpret desires .... The truth-practices that constitute the subject in this context are not nomothetic but aesthetic, creative of fitting moments in an admirable life” (Flynn 1985, 536). Flynn also points out, however, that Plato plays an ambiguous role in Foucault’s history of the aesthetics of existence and the subject of desire, since it is in Plato (especially the Symposium and the Phaedrus) that Foucault locates the beginnings of the structures that were later to develop into the subject of desire (1985, 535). See Part Five of The Use of Pleasure (“True Love”) for Foucault’s discussion of this point (Foucault 1990 b, 229-246). 11 Among other things, Foucault cites Plato’s Republic (402d-403b) as an example to illustrate the aesthetic value of the soul, especially when harmonized with the beauty of a body that is well cared-for: “When a man’s soul has a beautiful character . . . and his body matches it in beauty and is thus in harmony with it, that harmonizing combination ... is the most beautiful spectacle for anyone who has eyes to see” (Foucault 1990 b, 90). 1 See Bernauer (1987, 59-62) and Flynn (1985, 535-536) for brief, clear overviews of the way Foucault describes the gradual development of the subject of desire out of the earlier, “aesthetic” subject. II The Care of the Self as a Practice of Freedom Foucault explains in an interview that among the Greeks and Romans especially the Greeks concern with the self and care of the self were required for right conduct and the proper practice of freedom, in order to know oneself... as well as to form oneself, to surpass oneself, to master the appetites that threaten to overwhelm one. . . . [l]n Antiquity, ethics as the conscious practice of freedom has revolved around this fundamental imperative: “Take care of yourself.” (Foucault 1996 e, 435) The aesthetic creation of oneself is an expression of care for oneself, of concern for one’s health, one’s virtue, one’s status and power, and for the beauty one hopes to exhibit in one’s present life and future memory. What is not yet clear here is why and how Foucault connects this “care of the self’ to freedom. The issue of freedom is discussed by Foucault only briefly in his explanation of the Greek “aesthetics of existence.” More needs to be said to show not only how this ethical practice involved freedom for the Greeks, but also if and how something like it might serve as a promising means to practice freedom for us, over two millennia later. I will focus here only on the second of these two issues, leaving aside, for the most part, the question of how freedom played into the aesthetic creation of self in Greek Antiquity. It is the question of our own potential to practice freedom that is of most concern for the issue of the political role of the intellectual in promoting resistance to oppressive power relations. For Foucault, the notion of an “aesthetics of existence” appears to provide a model for a practice of freedom that we, here and now, might fruitfully consider. As Foucault describes it, the role of the intellectual in promoting this freedom has the character of exile between prophecy and silence. “Fishing around” with the Greeks Foucault emphasizes that, for the Greeks, “stylizing” oneself through a process of self-mastery could result in a soul that is moderate and also “free.” Recall that according to Foucault the moderate soul in fourth century Greece was free in the sense that it was not enslaved to its own passions and desires. This selfcontrol as nonenslavement was also intimately connected to the exercise of one’s power over others the moderate soul, in control of his passions and thus free in relation to them, was not likely to enslave others in his rule over them (thus granting them a certain amount of freedom in relation to him). One might also want to say that the Greek ethics of sexual austerity as described above allowed for a freedom to “stylize” oneself and one’s behavior within the wide boundaries of general ethical guidelines. The free, Greek male who chose to create himself aesthetically could fashion his behavior in his own way, according to his own personal circumstances, for the purpose of producing a beautiful life. But this freedom of creativity, as it might be called, is not entirely separate from the freedom of nonenslavement, since if one does not have freedom in the latter sense one’s freedom to create oneself will be limited by the desires and passions to which one is subjected. Both the freedom of nonenslavement and of creativity can be favorably compared to our present situation in the following sense. One could argue that, according to Foucault, we too face the possibility of enslavement, though not of exactly the same kind as that which the Greeks wanted to avoid; and emancipation from our own enslavement might open out a space in which we, too could practice a freedom to create ourselves aesthetically. Living under modern forms of pastoral power and the “subject of desire” it tends to produce, we run the risk of being enslaved by our passions and desires in a different way than that which was a concern for the Greeks. With the rise of pastoral power came techniques (such as the confession) for drawing out and deciphering the “true self,” located in (sexual) desire. As such techniques became more widespread and the power involved in bringing desire to discourse became so common as to be ignored, it began to seem as if our passions and desires would well up and spill out on their own if it were not for the force of repression holding them back. These hidden desires seem to emanate from a mysterious, deep, and natural force - a manifestation of one’s “true” self hindered by a repressive power. One could say that under this view (which is arguably still prevalent to this day), we are “enslaved” to a certain degree by our desires. At the very least, if they are considered an expression of the “true self’ through the emergence of “natural” forces, they have the potential to control us in a way similar to that which characterized Greek immoderation. But it is not this kind of enslavement that seems of most concern for Foucault; it is rather that this “subject of desire” is enslaved by the “truth” that is said to be found in these hidden desires one’s own, true, self. Considered through the eyes of the Foucauldian genealogist, one becomes tied to one’s “truth” as a natural and irreducible aspect of oneself through the exercise of a pastoral power that works to create the notion of a “true self,” locating it in desire. One is thus enslaved by pastoral power relations in that these create the truth of one’s identity and bind one to it by making of it a “natural” aspect of oneself. The “subject of desire” is also enslaved, one could argue, in that it is required not only to find the truth of its “natural” desires within, but to conduct itself in particular ways with regard to them, in accordance with universal norms of ethical behavior. Not only is one subject to one’s own natural, irreducible truth-indesire; one is also subject to relations of power that tell one what must be done with it. Under the Christian ethics there are obligations in regard to sexual pleasures, desires and passions that center on self-decipherment, self-renunciation and purity. Significantly, similar obligations can be found in the ethics of the movement for “sexual liberation” (which retains much of the general structure of the “repressive” (Christian) ethics against which it means to revolt): one must look within to find one’s “truth” in the form of one’s “natural” desires as well as one’s repressive tendencies, for the purpose of renouncing the latter and thereby purifying oneself of the dangers of repression. The ultimate goal of Christian selfrenunciation and purity is the reward of immortality in the kingdom of heaven; while the purity of the sexual revolution is aimed at health and well-being in this life. Though the trajectories of these two types of pastoral power seem to move in different directions, they share a crucial common trait: in both, a relation of power is used in ways that attempt to normalize what is seen as aberrant and dangerous. The “subject of desire” thus faces the potential for enslavement of a sort, since it is obliged to follow a prescriptive program that is considered “true” for all; and deviation from this is not viewed as “creative,” but pathological, in error as regards the universal form under which all ought to shape themselves. One could say the “subject of desire” is enslaved, then, even if in a different way than the kind of enslavement to passions about which the Greeks were concerned. We can also argue that freedom from this enslavement might allow for the possibility of developing a more creative freedom in the creation of the self. As with the Greeks, if we can at least free ourselves from the confines of rule by an involuntary power (in the case of the Greek ethics, our own passions and desires; in the case of later ethics, the pastoral power that produces our notion of desire as a source of truth of the self) we may be able to more freely create ourselves in new, multiple ways if we so choose. In Greek Antiquity, there was available to a few (free males) the choice of “stylizing” themselves in their ethical conduct, the choice of creating a beautiful life that fits their own circumstances as well as the more general ethical guidelines of the community. There were outside limits one had to avoid transgressing, of course, but within these there was not a detailed code of prescriptions and prohibitions those who could choose to and did follow this ethics were expected to use their own reason to determine what is best/or them, with the goal of fashioning a life of brilliant beauty for others to emulate. 14 Something similar may be possible for us, Foucault’s work on this topic suggests. Foucault argues in an interview that we may now be moving away from the Christian model of ethics that has been dominant for so long, and that perhaps the Greek model is something we should begin to examine more closely: From Antiquity to Christianity one passes from a morality that was essentially a search for a personal ethics to a morality as obedience to a system of rules. And if I have taken an interest in Antiquity, it is because, for a whole series of reasons, the idea of a morality as obedience to a code of rules is now disappearing, has already disappeared. To this absence of a morality, one responds, or must respond, with an investigation which is that of an aesthetics of existence. 15 (Foucault 1996 a, 451) This does not necessarily mean that “one must respond” to a movement away from a code-oriented ethics by offering an “aesthetics of existence” as an alternative that must be taken up. Instead, Foucault need only be saying here that what is required in response is a consideration of, an investigation into, this aesthetically-oriented view of ethics. Part of the reason for this is that our changing attitudes towards morality leave us with a problem that puts us in a similar situation as the ancient Greeks. For the latter, ethics was not closely connected to either a religious or social/legal system; and our situation today is starting to look similar, according to Foucault: [M]ost of us no longer believe that ethics is founded in religion, nor do we want a legal system to intervene in our moral, personal, private life. Recent liberation movements suffer from the fact that they cannot find any principle on which to base the elaboration of a new ethics. They need an ethics, but they cannot find any other ethics than an ethics founded on so-called scientific knowledge of what the self is, what desire is, what the unconscious is, and so on. (Foucault 1983 a, 231) If this is the case, then we are in a position that parallels that of the Greeks of the fourth century, who also needed (and had) an ethics that did not center on religion, law, or scientific truth about “rational humanity.” Thus an investigation into the ancient Greek view of ethics seems called for, given that we are in a relatively similar situation. But we must be careful not to make too much of this similarity, Foucault warns. It could easily seem that he is suggesting the Greek model as a good alternative to our own view of ethics; but when asked if this is the case by an interviewer Foucault replies emphatically that it is not: Q: Do you think that the Greeks offer an attractive and plausible alternative? A: No! I am not looking for an alternative; you can’t find the solution of a problem in the solution of another problem raised at another moment by other people. (Foucault 1983 a, 231) Foucault does not want to say, in other words, that we should just take up the Greek view of ethics whole cloth, as is, uncritically. Even if our problem is similar to one they faced, the solutions cannot be exactly the same given the vast differences between us. Foucault rejects the notion of a timeless, universal truth about problems such that a timeless, universal solution could be found to them. Problems and their solutions develop historically, according to contingent factors that cannot simply be transferred from one place and time to another, and there are many historically-contingent variables that make the Greek solution unworkable for us. 16 Thus Foucault insists that “there is no exemplary value in a period which is not our period ... it is not anything to get back to” (1983 a 234). It is clear that Foucault is not suggesting that we recreate the “aesthetics of existence” precisely as it was practiced by the Greeks of the fourth century B.C.E. Our problem is not their problem, precisely, and it would be a mistake to think that we can simply pull their ethical practice out of its historical context and have it work for us. Still, Foucault claims that to our current ethical crisis “one must respond” with an investigation into ethics as an aesthetics of existence. 17 For him, it appears that considering the Greek ethical experience will go some way in helping us to respond well to our own. It seems we can learn something from investigating this ancient practice, even if borrowing it in its entirety will not be successful. Foucault indicates in several interviews that we may be able to fruitfully update the aesthetic ethical practice of the Greeks for our own purposes. For example, in response to an interviewer’s question as to whether or not the modern “practices of the self’ and those of the Greeks “have anything to do with each other,” Foucault explains that they do: Anything? Yes and no. From a strictly philosophical point of view, the morality of Greek antiquity and contemporary morality have nothing in common. On the other hand, if you take them for what they prescribe, intimate and advise, they are extraordinarily close. It’s the proximity and the differences that we must bring to light and, through their interplay, we must show how the same advice given by the ancient morality can work differently in the style of contemporary morality. (Foucault 1996 m, 468) It seems clear here that Foucault means to introduce the Greek view of ethics as something we can learn from to some degree not by simply adopting it as is, but by considering it as a different approach that we might be able to modify to fit our circumstances. Another part of Foucault’s purpose in bringing up the Greeks has to do with his view of what genealogical analysis can accomplish: in undertaking a genealogy of sex as a moral domain and of the subject of this ethical concern, Foucault is working to show that our conception of ethics is historically constituted. One result of such a genealogical analysis, Foucault indicates, is that our notion of what has been thus “historicized” can be questioned it is not some timeless, absolute truth but has developed according to a certain set of contingencies and accidents. If our notion of ethics has been historically developed through contingent circumstances, then it seems easier to see that it can be historically changed. Further, finding an alternative in the past to our conception of ethics shows that our view is not the only possible one, not the only one that can make sense and be effective. Foucault expresses in an interview that his investigation into the ancient Greek ethics is a genealogical one, which means that he “conductfs] the analysis beginning with a current question”: For a long time some people have thought that the rigor of sexual codes, in the form that we have experienced them, was indispensable to so-called “capitalist” societies. Yet, the lifting of the codes and the dislocation of the prohibitions have no doubt occurred more easily than one would have thought possible (which seems to indicate that their reason for being was not what one believed). ... In short, we were mistaken when we believed that all morality was in prohibitions and that the lifting of the latter alone would resolve the question of ethics. (Foucault 1996 c, 460-461) The “current question” that drives this genealogy, it seems, may have to do with the movements of sexual liberation. Within the attempt to liberate sex it was thought (according to Foucault) that the lifting of prohibitions would resolve the ethical problems associated with sex. But Foucault argues that such efforts did not manage to provide a response that is significantly different from what they opposed attempts to “liberate” sex from repression tended to extend the effects of power that were supposed to be the target of resistance. The problem is in part that such “liberatory” movements did not think beyond the “repressive” model of power, indicating also that their view of sexual ethics was limited to “prohibitions” based on a rigorous code. As Foucault notes, this model appears to many as “indispensable” to our kind of society, as the only view of ethics available to us. If this is the case, then it makes sense to think that the best alternative to dangerous “repressions” and “prohibitions” involves antirepressive efforts to lift them. But given the inadequacy of this response, we are still left with a need for an effective resistance; and by showing that our usual view of ethics may not be indispensable, Foucault can reveal the possibility of a different kind of response. Offering a history of how our view of ethics developed at least indicates that it need not be the only effective one. Combining this with the above claim regarding how the Greek experience might be updated to fit modern conditions, it seems fair to conclude that Foucault’s investigation into the Greek “aesthetics of existence” is offered in some sense as a tool that could be taken up to change current conditions. Foucault does not go much further than this in explaining how this might be the case, how the Greek experience of ethics might be modified so as to be useful today. But this is not surprising, given his insistence that he does not and will not tell others “what to do.” Foucault does not give a complete program as to what must be done with the Greek view of ethics so as to solve our current problems. He insists that he will not say exactly what must be taken and what must be left behind from the Greeks: I believe that in this “fishing around” that one undertakes with the Greeks it is absolutely necessary not to fix the limits nor to establish in advance a sort of program that would permit one to say: this part of the Greeks I accept, that other part I reject. The whole Greek experience can be taken up again in nearly the same way by taking into account each time the differences of context and by indicating the part of this experience that one can perhaps save and the part that one can on the contrary abandon. (Foucault 1996 m, 470) Rather than creating a specific program for how, exactly, the Greek experience can be useful, Foucault expresses here that he thinks we can take up the general idea of an “aesthetics of existence” and update various parts of this along the way, as we deem it necessary. If he is suggesting such a move, he is perhaps suggesting it as something that others can attempt on their own i.e., others can undertake modifications of the Greek view as they, in their particular circumstances, see fit. But Foucault does, nevertheless, offer a more positive, specific suggestion as to what we might gain from this “fishing around with the Greeks.” He suggests in an interview that we might adopt the notion of an aesthetic creation of the self: Q: So, what kind of ethics can we build now . . .? A: What strikes me is the fact that in our society, art has become something which is related only to objects and not to individuals, or to life. That art is something which is specialized or which is done by experts who are artists. But couldn’t everyone’s life become a work of art? (Foucault 1983 a, 236) By phrasing it as a question, Foucault already takes away some of the force of what might otherwise be a statement as to “what must be done.” Instead, he is perhaps offering the notion of making one’s life into a “work of art” as a possible suggestion only, as a different way of viewing ethics and the ethical relationship one has to oneself. He claims elsewhere that taking on the aesthetic view of the self is an “interesting” idea: The idea of the bios as a material for an aesthetic piece of art is something which fascinates me. The idea also that ethics can be a very strong structure of existence, without any relation with the juridical per se, with an authoritarian system, with a disciplinary structure. All that is very interesting. (1983 a 235) But that it “fascinates” Foucault to think of an aesthetic creation of the self is not to say that he is offering it as the solution to what he sees as a problem in our view of ethics, our lack of faith in our usual conception of it and our need for a new approach. It is, at the least and perhaps at the most, an “interesting” suggestion that may or may not be as useful for all as it seems to be to Foucault. James Bernauer makes a similar point, arguing that the aesthetic creation of the self as suggested by Foucault reflects the latter’s own personal history, values, and commitments: The task of self-formation which Foucault puts forward has a specificity which reflects his own commitments as an intellectual. He is not seeking a form of morality generalizable for all, but rather developing a particular style which emerges from the history of his own freedom and thought. (Bernauer 1987, 66) In other words, Foucault’s notion of the “arts of existence,” or creating oneself aesthetically, may have specific elements that reflect Foucault’s own “style,” his aesthetic creation of himself. The return to the Greeks that is exhibited in his latest work may be referred to in this way perhaps this specific choice of subjects had to do with the history of Foucault’s own concerns and thought as an intellectual. Some of the particular aspects that emerge from this “fishing around with the Greeks,” then, could be accepted or not by others, depending on whether they find them useful or not in their own, specific circumstances. Foucault seems to find the “arts of existence” interesting and useful as a possible way of resisting the kind of subjectivity that is today dominant, namely the “subject of desire.” Bernauer hints at this point when he focuses on the notion of the aesthetics of existence as a contrast to the truth-telling required of the subject of desire: An ‘aesthetics of existence’ is in contrast and resistance to a ‘science of life’. To speak of human existence as a work of art is to take it out of the domain of the scientifically knowable and to free us from the obligation of deciphering ourselves as a system of timeless functions which are subjected to corresponding norms. (Bernauer 1992, 262) Bemauer indicates that it is mainly the contrast that the aesthetic creation of the self provides against the “subject of desire” that is important for Foucault. In other words, what is crucial is that the desiring subject is resisted; the conception of an “alternative” is not it can be multiple and various, depending on who is undertaking the resistance. Foucault himself may be suggesting the notion of creating oneself as a work of art because for him, with his particular historical, intellectual development, the realm of the aesthetic provides a contrast with the realm of the scientifically truthful. This makes sense to him as a way to resist the subjectivity modeled on desire; but it may or may not do so for others. Bernauer argues that “Foucault insisted on the necessity for developing new forms of relating to the self and he exhibited one” (Bernauer 1987, 70). Perhaps there are others available as well. But to the extent that modem readers of Foucault share his cultural and intellectual history, we too might find some benefit in the idea of “stylizing” the self aesthetically as a contrast to deciphering the self in its truth. We need not take up this aesthetic model of the self in its exact detail from the Greeks, and we may even reject much of what Foucault himself has to say specifically about it while still retaining the basic idea of creating the self as a work of art. In the next section I consider what it might mean to take up the idea of an aesthetic subjectivity instead of a desiring one, and how this might contribute to the “cure” for the regime of truth through a practice of freedom. I retain there some aspects of the ancient Greek approach to ethics and the “arts of existence” that I think might be fruitfully updated for a modern context. It should be understood in what follows, however, that this need only be considered one possible model for resistance through developing, as quoted above from Bernauer, “new forms of relating to the self.” Aesthetic freedom It is crucial to understand at the outset that, for Foucault, subjectivity does not have a universal, fixed character; there are different kinds of subjects created, at least in part, through different relations of power. Foucault explains in an interview that subjectivity is something constituted by practices of power, and constituted differently by different power relations: What I wanted to try to show was how the subject constituted itself, in one specific form or another . . . through certain practices that were also games of truth, practices of power, etc. I had to reject a priori theories of the subject in order to analyze the relationships that may exist between the constitution of the subject or different forms of the subject and games of truth, practices of power, etc. (Foucault 1996 e, 440) This means at least that subjectivity may be constituted differently at different times and places (varying, for example, with geographical location and historical era) due to the different power relations and “games of truth” being practiced. This supports the notion that the “subject of desire” may be substantially different from the subject involved in the Greek ethics as aesthetics of existence (hereinafter, the “aesthetic subject”), since the two exist within different practices of power. But Foucault goes even further than this, arguing that the same individual can experience multiple forms of subjectivity, due to the different relations of power in which s/he is involved: You do not have the same relationship to yourself when you constitute yourself as a political subject who goes to vote or speaks at a meeting and when you are seeking to fulfill your desires in a sexual relationship. Undoubtedly there are relationships and interferences between these different forms of the subject; but we are not dealing with the same type of subject. In each case, one plays, one establishes a different type of relationship to oneself. (Foucault 1996 e, 440) Each of us, then, experiences different forms of subjectivity in relation to the different relations of power and “games of truth” in which we participate. Not only is there no “a priori” definition of subjectivity that holds universally across all times and places, there isn’t even one that holds for a single individual throughout their life. Foucault claims that subjects are constituted “as a result of the effects of power” (Foucault 1980 h, 98). Alessandro Pizzorno elaborates: “the individual must be conceived of as a construction power makes up out of a series of acts and events that would not necessarily possess any unity of meaning were it not for the meaning power introduces into them” (Pizzorno 1992, 206). What it means to be an individual, how we are conceived as such in social and political contexts, and how we conceive of ourselves, is shaped by the relations of power under which we live. These give form and meaning to the otherwise disparate “series of acts and events” that make up our day-to-day existence. How I conceive of myself as an individual subject, whether I expect to find a “true self’ hidden deep within or whether I attempt to create myself aesthetically, these are determined by the relations of power in which I find myself. As power relations become organized and practiced differently, then, different kinds of subjectivities may arise. It is therefore at least possible that Foucault may be suggesting we take on a different form of subjectivity as part of the “cure” for the regime of truth it is not as if he thinks there is only one, “true” type of subject to which we must hold fast, regardless of whether or not it contributes to efforts to resist oppressive power relations. Indeed, Foucault expresses hostility toward this unitary view of the subject: “I don’t think there is actually a sovereign, founding subject, a universal form of subject that one could find everywhere. I am very skeptical and very hostile toward this conception of the subject” (Foucault 1996 a, 452). But not only is it possible that Foucault is suggesting the adoption of a different kind of subjectivity in response to “poisonous” relations of power; his statements regarding the creation of one’s life as a work of art indicate that it is highly probable he means to make this kind of prescription. The point appears even stronger when one considers Foucault’s claims in regard to Sartre’s view of subjectivity, given in an interview: I think that from the theoretical point of view, Sartre avoids the idea of the self as something which is given to us, but through the moral notion of authenticity, he turns back to the idea that we have to be ourselves - to be truly our true self. I think that the only acceptable practical consequence of what Sartre has said is to link his theoretical insight to the practice of creativity .... From the idea that the self is not given to us, I think that there is only one practical consequence: we have to create ourselves as a work of art. (Foucault 1983 a, 237) 18 For Foucault if we find, theoretically, that the self is not something given, that there is not a “true” self to which we must adhere, then the best ethical, practical response to this theoretical point is to approach the self creatively. Since Foucault himself also criticizes the idea of a “true self,” the “practical consequence” of his view should be, on his own claims here, similar: “we should relate the kind of relation one has to oneself to a creative activity” (1983 a 237). Note that the “should” here provides prescriptive force. It is plausible to argue that Foucault is suggesting we might approach a “cure” for the regime of truth through changing our view of subjectivity. 19 I have argued that despite his claims to the contrary, Foucault does at times offer prescriptive statements as to what ought to be done, and that if these are presented as a “prophecy in exile” they do not run afoul of his criticisms of the “universal” prophet. The latter would give directions as to what must be done as if they are universally valid and applicable for all. The “prophet in exile,” on the other hand, may offer prescriptions as long as s/he also distances him/herself from them, encouraging his/her audience to question these prophecies. I have argued that Foucault can be said to offer such prescriptions in his genealogies, through his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile.” Does he do something similar with the suggestion that we ought to create ourselves as works of art? I do not find a good case for this claim in the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality, where Foucault performs a genealogy of the desiring subject and describes the aesthetic subject out of which it emerged. The prescriptive force of this genealogy leans in the direction of encouraging others to resist the subject of desire, and there is an alternative form of subjectivity offered that seems to avoid some of the desiring subject’s more problematic constraints. But there is not in evidence a stepping-back on Foucault’s part from the notion of the aesthetic subject as an “alternative” in these two volumes. This genealogy does not exhibit the same rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” that I have described. Through this strategy, the genealogist elicits responses in his/her reader that bring up habitual ways of thinking, traditional concepts and categories; and s/he then brings the reader to question these habits of thought through the genealogical analysis, which provides a history of precisely these ways of thinking. This not what occurs in the second and third volumes of The History of Sexuality. There, the reader may be brought to question the “subject of desire,” but is also offered what seems to be an alternative that is not, itself, subjected to critical questioning through a genealogical analysis. To be sure, Foucault does work to emphasize in interviews that he does not mean for the Greek “aesthetics of existence” to be taken on uncritically as an “alternative,” a solution for our present problems. This is not, however, as effective from the point of view of his own concerns about intellectual prophecy. His statements in interviews take on a “universal” force that is not as carefully undermined as it might be in genealogical texts. In interviews Foucault acts as an authority with “the truth,” especially when speaking about his own texts -- his word about what he says and why has an authoritative force due to intimate acquaintance, and he does not distance himself from such prophecies of truth. Even if he attempts to do so by claiming, as he occasionally does, that he doesn’t “try to universalize what [he] say[s],” the form of such statements itself seems to be backed by the force of a universal truth. In that case, Foucault continues to appear as a prophet a prophet who says “no,” who provides negations that are themselves universal. Therefore, when Foucault states in interviews how the Greek “aesthetics of existence” is not meant as an “alternative,” a solution that we ought to take up uncritically, he is doing so within the context of a prophecy from which he does not carefully work to distance himself. Granted, he does not say exactly how the creating oneself as a work of art might be fruitfully employed by us, updated from the Greek model; and in this sense he does not tell us directly, precisely what ought to be done. But the general notion of taking on an aesthetic subjectivity is still offered without the kind of critical distance Foucault manages in his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile.” In interviews he either presents it in the form of a positive, direct prescription (we should create ourselves aesthetically) or as a kind of negative, no less direct one (no, I don’t mean we should take on the Greek model of aesthetic subjectivity). Such prescriptions would have been better made given Foucault’s own criticisms of the “universal” intellectual prophet that would present them with a critical distance such as that described in Chapter Three. It seems clear, however, that Foucault did mean to suggest we try creating ourselves aesthetically, that this can have some beneficial effects within the current regime of truth. I argue that the aesthetic subject is presented by Foucault as more free than the desiring subject, and as one with more of a potential to engage in practices of “real freedom” as a “cure” for the regime of truth. In order to support this claim, it is necessary to investigate further the nature of the aesthetic subject and to elaborate the liberatory potential of this subject over the “subject of desire.” One might think it would be helpful to begin with a discussion of Foucault’s view of subjectivity “in general”: what this term means, how the subject can take on different forms corresponding to various practices of power, etc. But this seems misguided, since Foucault insists there is no “universal” form of subjectivity. He focuses instead on the differing subjects that are constituted at different times through different relations of power, criticizing the idea of a subject “which is either transcendental in relation to the field of events or runs in its empty sameness throughout the course of history” (Foucault 1980 g, 117). Still, Foucault does take up the topic of subjectivity in a more “general” fashion in the last two volumes of The History of Sexuality. There, the subject is described primarily in terms of the relationship to the self. This is echoed in a passage quoted above, where Foucault describes the various forms of the subject in terms of varying relationships to the self (Foucault 1996 e, 440). To a certain degree, this notion of subjectivity as a relationship to oneself seems a general one for Foucault, since he describes both the “subject of desire” and the “aesthetic subject” in terms of the different relationship to the self manifested in each. 20 It therefore seems legitimate to discuss these two forms of subjectivity under this general notion of a relationship to self. This does not appear to run afoul of Foucault’s claim that there is no universal form of subjectivity, that its form varies with different relations of power - since the relationship to the self can also vary in this way, as Foucault himself admits. To what extent, then, could the aesthetic subject be said to have a creative relationship to self, to “create itself as a work of art,” as Foucault suggests we might do? And to what extent does this differ from the relationship to self in the “subject of desire”? Foucault explains that with the advent of Christian ethics, the subject was no longer something to be made, but something to be deciphered. In the desiring subject, the truth of the self lies hidden in desire, brought to light through practices of confession that have proliferated to such a degree that this truth appears to emerge from the depths on its own unless held back by repression. There is a kind of obligation to decipher this truth, to speak it to others for the purpose of achieving salvation through purification purifying the self either through self-sacrifice or the elimination of repression so as to allow one’s “natural” self to be expressed. The crucial point here is that under this kind of subjectivity, there is assumed to be a “truth of the self,” a “true self’ to be found somehow within. As discussed above, Foucault’s genealogy of this subject shows that this truth is a product of particular practices of (pastoral) power, especially the confession. The “true self,” rather than being hindered by relations of power through a mechanism of repression, is rather produced by it. By contrast, the aesthetic subject of the ancient Greek ethics of sexual austerity is one where the self is something to be made rather than discovered in its truth. Ethical activity within this Greek ethics did not involve deciphering the truth about oneself through practices of confession; rather, one worked to create the self not for the sake of truth, but for the sake of beauty. One wanted to make a beautiful life, a brilliant life that would be the object of admiration for generations into the future. Achieving this end was a matter of adapting vague guidelines and rules to one’s own circumstances in one’s own way, creating what one wanted to become rather than finding out the “truth” about what one is. The later, Christian ethics (according to Foucault) required decipherment and purification of the self according to specific rules that were to apply universally one had to find one’s truth in order to determine if one was complying with the rules down to the level of one’s deepest thoughts and desires. But for the Greeks practicing the ethics of sexual austerity, it was not a matter of conforming oneself in one’s truth to universal moral laws. Instead, one could choose to practice this ethics for aesthetic purposes (to “leave behind ... an exalted reputation,” to “give the maximum possible brilliance” to one’s life (Foucault 1983 a, 245)); and the rules of this ethics were themselves open-ended enough that it was much more a matter of conforming them to one’s own situation than of conforming oneself to the rules. Instead of searching for one’s truth, the aesthetic subject is concerned with creating a self with significant aesthetic value. To a certain degree, it seems that the aesthetic subject is more “free” than the subject of desire: whereas the latter is bent on finding a truth supposedly already formed within and either conforming it to strict rules or allowing this “true nature” to express itself and thus having to conform oneself to it, the former is concerned with creating a self that is not tied down to a truth it views as its “natural,” irreducible identity. It was located for the Greeks within an ethics that focused less on the institution of a strict code of rules than on the “practices of the self,” the way one governs oneself so as to “constitute oneself as the worker of the beauty of one’s own life” (Foucault 1996 c, 458). The aesthetic subject seems relatively free to make its own identity in comparison to the subject of desire, as artists are free to create their personal vision of aesthetic value in comparison to scientists searching for the truth. This seems to be what Foucault has in mind when he appeals to the notion of “the bios as a material for an aesthetic piece of art” (Foucault 1983 a, 235) Creating oneself as a work of art does seem more free than trying to discover and decipher a “natural” truth within oneself and bend it to rules already set out. It is important to consider what kind of freedom might be involved in this aesthetic creation of the self i.e., in what way is the aesthetic subject more “free” than the subject of desire? What Foucault is not saying is that the aesthetic subject has a freedom in the sense of an absence of limits, in the sense of a freedom from the constraints of power. In his discussion of the Greek aesthetics of existence, Foucault makes it clear that the aesthetic subject did not create itself in a field without limits, did not fashion itself out of nothing, with no rules or constraints to follow whatsoever. In making an appeal to aesthetic creation, then, Foucault is not treating art as an endeavor of pure creativity, without the constraints of particular relations of power. Jon Simons notes that Foucault’s work on the aesthetics of existence can leave the impression that he makes a “familiar appeal to art as a privileged realm of freedom in Western culture,” treating it as a site of unlimited, autonomous creativity: According to this line of reasoning, when in the modem West art lost its previous religious function, it became a purposive activity that had no visible purpose. The attainment of beauty serves no social function, being pursued for its own sake. Art is not constrained by the demands of technological functionality, scientific veracity, or moral validity. Art can thus be defined as autonomous or autotelic, in that it gives itself its own laws and ends. (Simons 1995, 78) Simons points out, however, that even if Foucault sometimes tends to speak as if art is an autonomous realm free from limits imposed on it from outside (and that as aesthetic subjects we can experience this kind of freedom), a closer look at Foucault’s discussion of aesthetic self-creation amongst the Greeks shows that it was very much enmeshed in social, political, and cultural determinations and limitations. In other words, it as not as if those who engaged in the “arts of the self’ were not subject to scientific or moral constraints, as if they could create themselves any way they pleased, giving themselves “[their] own laws and ends.” Simons remarks that for the Greek conception of ethics and the aesthetic creation of the self, “there are social and political constraints on members of the elite who supposedly make free, personal choices” (1995, 79-80). Foucault explains in an interview that the aesthetic subject does not practice a kind of unrestricted self-invention: [Though] the subject constitutes itself in an active fashion through practices of the self, these practices are nevertheless not something invented by the individual himself. They are models that he finds in his culture and that are proposed, suggested, imposed upon him by his culture, his society and his social group. (Foucault 1996 e, 441) The free, Greek male who chose to adopt the ethics of sexual austerity and to create for himself a beautiful life did not invent for himself the practices by which he created himself as an aesthetic object. Both the practices and the end goal of a life of brilliance must conform to certain criteria for aesthetic and moral value that are supplied by the culture (even if these are quite broad and variously applicable in different circumstances). There were certain standards and models for virtue, honor, and beauty that could be instantiated in various ways, but were not left open to be created entirely differently. One might take a model from an already-admired individual and adapt it to one’s own circumstances, giving it a different twist here and there; but the beautiful object one made of oneself was not created through practices that were utterly original, invented wholly out of oneself. Still, it seems one could say that the aesthetic subject is free to choose which models and practices to instantiate in his life and how, even if the models themselves are not “up to” him. But even these choices seem restricted in at least a couple of senses. First, the aesthetic subject must adapt practices of the self to his own circumstances, which are of course not entirely under his control. Examples of this abound throughout The Use of Pleasure, though I will appeal here to only two, both of which are found in the section of this text on love relationships between men and boys. Foucault explains that the practices in which one chose to engage within such relationships had to match one’s circumstances as to at least the factors of age and social status. The privileged type of love relation between males was one that occurred between “an older male who had finished his education and who was expected to play the socially, morally, and sexually active role and a younger one, who . . . was in need of assistance, advice, and support” (Foucault 1990 b, 195). Foucault is careful to point out that this does not mean other types of love relations between males was absolutely forbidden, they simply weren’t as privileged and openly praised (though, Foucault admits, they were “more apt to be [objects] of criticism and irony” (1990 b 194)). Thus there was at least a certain pressure for men to adapt their sexual practices with other males to criteria of age and education playing the beloved when one is too old do so, or loving overage boys could easily subject one to criticism (1990 b 199). Similarly, one had to pay attention to one’s status when engaging in love relations with other men. This was especially the case, Foucault notes, because the Greeks perceived the sexual relation in terms of an “active” and a “passive” element, and it was shameful for males to behave too passively. Relations between men and women or between free men and slaves were not problematic in this regard, since it was clear that the free male would play the active role. But in a relationship between two men, someone has to play the passive role, and this was the cause of much concern. One had to be very careful, if one was a free male, to keep this status in mind when choosing how and with whom to engage in homosexual relations: [Everything in the way of sexual behavior that might cause a free man to say nothing of someone who, by birth, fortune, and prestige, held or should hold one of the first ranks among men to bear the marks of inferiority, submission to domination, and acceptance of servitude, could only be considered as shameful: a shame that was even greater if he offered himself as the obliging object of another’s pleasure. (Foucault 1990 b, 216) Foucault explains the kind of behavior that would be considered shameful by citing Aeschines’ criticisms of Timarchus as “a man who in the course of his youth placed himself and showed himself to everyone, in the inferior and humiliating position of a pleasure object for others; he wanted this role . . . took pleasure in it. . .” (1990 b 219). Such behavior, Foucault recounts, was not to be undertaken by a man whose status gave him civic and political responsibilities. These examples are meant to show that the aesthetic subject one finds in Foucault’s study of the Greek ethics of sexual austerity is one who is able to create himself, but not in an entirely free and unrestricted way. The practices he chooses to undertake, the models he emulates in creating a life of beauty, and the ways he adapts these to his own circumstances are dictated to a certain extent by his social surroundings. These are not rigid rules, for certainly it was possible for love relationships to exist (without shame) between two grown men or two young boys; and perhaps a certain degree of passivity would be tolerated in a man of prominent status under particular types of circumstances. Still, it is likely that even these “exceptions,” if they are considered acceptable or even good contributions to a beautiful life, would be so due to social and cultural factors that are not under the subject’s control. In other words, even in the way he adapts open-ended models to his own life, the aesthetic subject does not have an unrestricted freedom of choice. This means that if Foucault is making an appeal to art as a realm of freedom, this freedom is not a “pure” one in the sense of having no limits or constraints, or only ones that the aesthetic subject sets for himself. The aesthetic self-creation to which Foucault refers, if it is free, is nevertheless also constrained in various ways. In what sense, then, might the aesthetic subject be “more free” than the desiring subject? I have argued that the desiring subject is less than fully free since it is obliged to search for its own truth as a product of relations of power and therefore is not encouraged to create its own truth, and that the aesthetic subject is able to create itself but only by choosing amongst alternatives laid out for it by the relations of power within which it exists. Both end up with a “self’ that is in some sense a product of power. What is the main difference between them that makes the aesthetic subject more “interesting” for Foucault? What might support the claim that the aesthetic subject is more free than the desiring subject? An adequate answer to this question will take the discussion of the aesthetic subject beyond the Greek model discussed in The Use of Pleasure. Recall that Foucault insists he is not offering the Greek “arts of existence” as a solution to modern dilemmas, since so much history has elapsed since then their problems are not our problems, and thus their solutions can’t be taken on by us in their exact form. But Foucault does seem to indicate that this ancient Greek practice could be updated in a way that it might be useful (or at least “interesting”) for us now. So while we can find some of the ways in which the aesthetic subject is free by looking at the Greeks, we need not restrict ourselves to this model. An updated version of the aesthetic subject could present it as one that recognizes the construction of truth by relations of power. 21 Recall that for Foucault, creating the self as a work of art is the “one practical consequence” of “the idea that the self is not given to us” (Foucault 1983 a, 237). Perhaps, then, the aesthetic subject is one who creates him/herself as a work of art as a “practical consequence” of realizing that the self is not a given, but a constructed, entity. This description may seem far removed from the Greek model of the aesthetic subject, as their self-creation took place in a context of rules and constraints that were already open-ended and that allowed for self-creation without an emphasis on discovering and living up to one’s “true” self. But the modern aesthetic subject would have to be developed after and out of the dominance of the subject of desire and its emphasis on the truth to be found within. The modern aesthetic subject, in order to create itself in a context where the push to find one’s truth is still strong, would have to recognize the construction of this truth by power it would have to be aware that there is no singular, “true” self it must discover so that it can choose instead to create itself. 22 If this is the case, the differences between the aesthetic subject and the subject of desire as regards their respective freedom seems to be that the subject of desire is bent on finding its one, “true” self, believing that there is an absolute truth to be discovered within, while the aesthetic subject, realizing that the truth of the self is constructed, accepts that s/he can create a truth for him/herself that is contingent and malleable. In other words, the desiring subject feels as though it must discover and bind itself to a singular, “true” self, while the aesthetic subject knows it can create itself and do so in multiple ways at various times. Another important point is that the subject of desire thinks that its “true” self resides in a “natural” realm of freedom from power it conceives of this self as a free agent upon which power fastens for the purpose of repression and constraint. The aesthetic subject, on the other hand, recognizes that the self it creates is, itself, still a product of power. This self may have been made through the subject’s choice between alternatives, but these alternatives are all provided for it by the power relations under which it lives. It is not free to create itself in any way whatsoever, without constraint. Both the desiring subject and the aesthetic subject end up with a self that is a product of power, but the latter is aware of this while the former is not. This has an important consequence: the desiring subject does not realize that the “true” self it has “discovered” is contingent and therefore can be changed, while the aesthetic subject does and can take on the task of changing it. On this interpretation, the aesthetic subject is more free than the desiring subject, not because it exists without constraints, or produces a self that is entirely free from power. Rather, it is more free in the sense that it is more likely to recognize and resist dangerous relations of power. The desiring subject, believing that its “true self’ resides in a realm free from power, would be less likely than the aesthetic subject to recognize the ways in which this self is implicated in relations of power and can work to support them. Adhering to notions of freedom as opposed to power, of Enlightenment ideals such as individual rights and autonomy, the subject of desire would not tend to be on the lookout for the dangers lurking within these. While the desiring subject might resist some relations of power in the name of the values and ideals produced for it by power, it furthers others by its very efforts without realizing it. It may try to resist by appeal to a “true” self and its rights that it thinks are free from power, while through this process it is further entrenching the power relations that produced these ideals. The aesthetic subject, however, would tend to be more resistant and therefore more “free” in the sense discussed above understanding that whatever grounds its resistance is itself a product of power and is therefore “dangerous,” this subject is likely to be more vigilant and ready to resist even that which grounded its resistance efforts in the past, if need be. One might say, then, that the aesthetic subject is “more free” than the desiring subject because it is likely to practice more resistance to power relations. The aesthetic subject has the character of an exile. S/he works to create him/herself from a distanced position within particular power relations. Whereas the desiring subject supports and perpetuates the relations of disciplinary and normalizing power that produced it through efforts to discover and adhere to its own “truth,” the aesthetic subject maintains a critical distance from such power relations by recognizing that the notion of a “true self’ is their product rather than a means of exiting them entirely. As I have described it, the aesthetic subject may be able to emerge out of the disciplinary power that produces the desiring subject, by recognizing that any attempt at a pure “exit” from power will not succeed, that if one thinks one has found a pure realm of freedom in one’s “truth” one works mainly to uphold the relations of power one hopes to have left. The aesthetic subject does not attempt such an exit from disciplinary power relations, but rather distances him/herself from them by recognizing how they operate to produce notions of universal truth and the very idea of a pure freedom supposedly residing “outside” of them. By recognizing these productive aspects of power relations, the aesthetic subject is less likely to work in their service than the desiring subject who blindly supports them while believing him/herself to have moved beyond them. The aesthetic subject continues to operate within relations of power, realizing that the subjectivities it creates are themselves constrained by power the aesthetic subject uses models already found within the culture around him/her, and s/he adapts these to him/herself according to constraints of custom, ethics, and criteria of beauty. But this subject retains a critical distance from the power relations that produce these constraints in that s/he sees them as contingent and malleable rather than necessary and permanent. The aesthetic subject exiles him/herself from the relations of disciplinary power within which it exists, working to create him/herself within them while also taking a step back from them by recognizing their contingent nature. Accordingly, I have argued, the aesthetic subject is more likely to practice a “real freedom” through efforts at resistance than the subject of desire s/he continues to consciously operate within power relations rather than thinking s/he has exited them, and will likely realize that continued vigilance, questioning, and resistance may be called for since s/he does not believe him/herself to have reached an end state of pure freedom. In this sense, the aesthetic subject exhibits the exile of those who engage in an unending practice of “real freedom”: the resisting exiles struggle against particular relations of power without attempting to leave them entirely, transforming these relations into new ones that, they recognize, are themselves “dangerous” and may require resistance in the future. Exile from agency There are a number of questions still remaining regarding the freedom of the aesthetic subject. One of the most pressing ones has to do with the issue of agency. The problem can be stated in the form of a question: if for Foucault, subjectivity (including that of the aesthetic subject) is a product of relations of power, then in what sense is the aesthetic subject “free” to choose to engage in resistance as a practice of freedom? For Foucault, there is no essential freedom at the heart of subjectivity through which the aesthetic subject could exercise a self-directed freedom of choice, since the notion of such a core freedom is itself a product of power. The aesthetic subject is not only constrained in the sense of having to create itself out of the materials provided for it by power; its own creative choices would appear to be determined by the ways in which it has been constructed by power. This would also mean that whether, and how, the aesthetic subject chooses to resist particular relations of power would not be due to its “free choice” either, but would be determined by the power relations that have produced it. In what sense, then, could we speak of the aesthetic subject as an “agent” that chooses to create itself as a work of art, to resist particular relations of power, etc.? Similarly, since Foucault does seem to speak in this way, is he not making appeal to a notion of a “free” and autonomous self constrained by power that he elsewhere rejects? It is not difficult to find places in Foucault’s work where agency seems to be ruled out by the insistence that there is no free, “brute” self existing outside and before relations of power. Recall that for Foucault the subject is “not a substance,” but a “form” that can be constituted variously according to contingent, historical “games of truth” and practices of power (Foucault 1996 e, 440). It is not as if there are subjects first, and then these are shaped or warped or repressed by relations of power; rather, subjectivity arises as a product of power itself (and is constituted differently by different practices of power). Thus it would not make sense to speak of a subject for Foucault as having a kind of essential kernel of individual freedom from which it can analyze and choose between the various options given to it by relations of power. There is, of course, a kind of subject that views itself in this way, that imagines itself to have a focal point of individuality through which it makes its choices freely. This subject could be described along the lines of what is commonly termed the “liberal view” of the individual. Alessandro Pizzorno gives a succinct account of the liberal view: ‘lndividual’, in the liberal view, is a primitive term. . . . Individuals are there all the time, each identical to himself in time, with their wills and their decisions. Power can be applied to constrain their decisions. When such a constraint is not applied, the individual is socially free. He can then choose according to the judgment he gives of what the outcome of his action will be. (Pizzorno 1992, 204) But this subject too, Foucault would say, is constituted through particular relations of power: “the individual as such, as a durable identifiable reality with his own interests and values, is merely a product of the power relations that happen to be dominant in a certain society, in a certain period” (Pizzorno 1992, 208). 23 This means, Pizzorno points out, that liberal notions of freedom no longer apply we cannot say that for Foucault, the individual as a “primitive term,” with his interests, values, and will, is free unless constrained from the outside by power. As John Rajchman puts it: “We are not born free; we are always already thrown into some configuration of power” (Rajchman 1985, 62). This view of subjectivity may seem to indicate a more or less complete loss of agency, since the subject is always “governed” in its actions by the relations of power in which it is enmeshed. What it chooses to do or not do, how it chooses to create itself, are therefore not “up to” the subject itself (including the aesthetic subject, whether ancient Greek or modern). Foucault tends to reinforce this kind of conclusion when he emphasizes the notion of a “subject” as “being subject to”: There are two meanings of the word subject', subject to someone else by control and dependence, and tied to his own identity by a conscience or selfknowledge. Both meanings suggest a form of power which subjugates and makes subject to. (Foucault 1983 a, 212) Any form of subjectivity is, according to this passage, a kind of subjugation to relations of power. But does this mean there must be a radical loss of agency in Foucault’s view of subjectivity? Linda Alcoff argues that it does. According to Alcoff, Foucault (along with post-structuralists such as Jacques Lacan and Jacques Derrida) offers a view of subjectivity that harbors “an interesting sort of neodeterminism”: he rejects biological determinism, but this rejection “is not grounded in the belief that human subjects are underdetermined but, rather, in the belief that we are overdetermined (i.e., constructed) by a social discourse and/or cultural practice” (Alcoff 1988, 416). As subjects, for Foucault, we are constructed by discourses and relations of power that are, Alcoff points out, “beyond (way beyond) individual control” (1988, 416). She concludes, therefore, that this form of “neodeterminism” results in a lack of subject agency, due to the denial of “the ontological autonomy and even the existence of intentionality” (1988, 416). If we are formed by social forces beyond our control, in what sense can we be said to have autonomy, to be able to act with an intentionality of our own? Is it not rather the case that we are passive subjects, being acted upon and blown about by the relations of power that produce us as subjects? Alcoff parts ways with Foucault (and other post-structuralists) on what appears to be a total loss of subject agency: My disagreement [with post-structuralists] occurs . . .when they seem totally to erase any maneuver by the individual within a social discourse or set of institutions. It is that totalization of history’s imprint that I reject. In their defense of a total construction of the subject, post-structuralists deny the subject’s ability to reflect on the social discourse and challenge its determinations. (1988, 416-417) Perceiving a “totalization of history’s imprint” on the subject for Foucault (along with Lacan and Derrida), Alcoff argues that this leaves no room for an intentionality directed at challenging this determination. Focusing on Foucault’s view of subjectivity in particular, Alcoff argues that [g]iven the enormous productive efficacy Foucault accords to power/knowledge or the dominant discourse, there could be agency only if human beings were given the causal ability to create, effect, and transform power/knowledge or discourses, but Foucault does not concede to us this capacity. (Alcoff 1990, 75) Alcoff points to Foucault’s argument that subjectivity is constructed by relations of power and games of truth in order to support her claim that he does not “concede to us [the] capacity” for agency. Alcoff explains that for Foucault, subjectivity is historically constituted rather than “elementary,” and this means that “the subject can no longer serve as an absolute ground of knowledge, as a transcendental historical figure, or as an ultimate justification for moral theories” (1990, 70). Further, Alcoff argues, Foucault does not simply reject thereby the notion of a subject that is “trans-historical and universal,” he also opposes “the notion of a subject as a being with a kind of primordial interiority that is autonomous or spontaneous in some ontological sense” (1990, 71). For Foucault, according to Alcoff, “we must dispense with the constituent subject altogether, that is, a subject that founds knowledges, grounds morality, and causes events” (1990, 71). Alcoff points to an important problem regarding agency in Foucault’s work on power, resistance, and subjectivity, but it is not ultimately as damning as she makes it out to be. Alcoff too negatively construes Foucault’s view of subjective agency as advocating its complete rejection. She quotes a passage from an interview in which Foucault claims we must “dispense” with the subject as support for her view that Foucault opposes and rejects any notion of subjectivity that speaks of its interiority or agency. But in this passage Foucault says we must “dispense” with the subject in a particular context, in order to undertake a particular kind of analysis: One has to dispense with the constituent subject, to get rid of the subject itself, that’s to say, to arrive at an analysis which can account for the constitution of the subject within a historical framework. And this is what I would call genealogy, that is, a form of history which can account for the constitution of knowledges, discourses, domains of objects, etc. without having to make reference to a subject which is either transcendental in relation to the field of events or runs in its empty sameness throughout the course of history. (Foucault 1980 g, 117; italics mine) In order to explain how subjectivity is developed, produced by power, “one has to dispense with the constituent subject. In order to perform a genealogy of the subject, one must not begin from and work through the notion of a subject that is “transcendental in relation to the field of events or runs in its empty sameness throughout the course of history.” It is precisely this subject that Foucault attempts to historicize; and, he indicates here, one must do so without invoking this subject itself. This need not mean, however, that Foucault rejects any appeal to the “constituent subject” under any conditions whatsoever. Foucault himself admits as much in another interview when an interviewer indicates that Foucault seems to want to avoid discussing “the subject in general,” Foucault responds by saying that this is only because he wants to perform the genealogy of the subject: Q: But you have always “forbidden” people to talk to you about the subject in general? MF: No, I have not “forbidden” them. Perhaps I did not explain myself adequately. What I rejected was the idea of starting out with a theory of the subject as is done, for example, in phenomenology or existentialism and, on the basis of this theory, asking how a given form of knowledge was possible. What I wanted to try to show was how the subject constituted itself, in one specific form or another . . . through certain practices that were also games of truth, practices of power, etc. I had to reject a priori theories of the subject in order to analyze the relationships that may exist between the constitution of the subject or different forms of the subject and games of truth, practices of power, etc. (Foucault 1996 e, 440; italics mine) Foucault says explicitly that he rejects “a priori” theories of the subject such as the theory of a constituent subject that, as Alcoff explains, “founds knowledges, grounds morality, and causes events” in order to show how such a subject came to be developed through practices of power. This does not necessarily mean, however, that Foucault “forbids” the invocation of a “constituent” subject in all other contexts. Actually, I’m not convinced that Foucault needed to or even did avoid invoking the “constituent subject” in his genealogies, that he dispensed with it in order to trace its historical development. It is indeed the case that in his genealogies Foucault often emphasizes discourses and practices that are not under the conscious control of any particular subjects, that move and change without anyone intentionally directing them. Yet there are still, clearly, conscious acts being described in these histories; it is simply that what one tries, consciously, to do with relations of power is not always what ends up happening. Recall Foucault’s notion of a “strategy,” and how it is different from a “program.” Whereas the latter refers to an institution’s goal or end, “that is to say the objectives that it proposes and the means it has of reaching these objectives,” a “strategy” exists where the means fail to reach their objectives, and through which “one can construct new rational behaviors, different from the initial program but which fulfill their objective” (Foucault 1996 q, 425-426). There is conscious activity manifested here, both on the part of the original “program,” constructed so as to reach defined “objectives,” and in the “strategy” wherein “one can construct” new uses and objectives for the practices that failed to reach their initial goals. For example, in Madness and Civilization Foucault describes quite explicitly conscious decisions to confine the poor and idle, including governmental acts in both France and England that set up institutions expressly for this purpose (Foucault 1988 b, 38-54). In addition, the “strategies” whereby the failure of confinement as an economic tactic was turned into its success as a means of moral correction (1988 b 54-64) consisted in part of conscious decisions by subjective agents, such as governmental and religious edicts. Foucault argues that such strategies are not, in their general structure, consciously directed by any one person or even group (Foucault 1996 q, 426). But this doesn’t mean there is no conscious, intentional activity manifested in the strategies at all. On the contrary, a strategy emerges from the efforts of different individuals and groups, acting in their own ways and for different interests. No person or persons are responsible for the strategy as a whole, but they do each manage to exhibit agency through their conscious decisions on a smaller scale. It is clear that to some degree, individuals are acting as “causes” of particular actions. What Foucault seems to mainly emphasize is that strategies and other relations of power may have a comprehensive, general structure in which one can find a certain intelligibility, a certain number of aims and objectives, but which has not been set up or directed by any particular individual or group. Foucault explains this point in a passage from The History of Sexuality Volume I that is complex enough to warrant quoting at length: [T]here is no power that is exercised without a series of aims and objectives. But this does not mean that it results from the choice or decision of an individual subject. . .; the rationality of power is characterized by tactics that are often quite explicit at the restricted level where they are inscribed . . ~ tactics which, becoming connected to one another, attracting and propagating one another, but finding their base of support and condition elsewhere, end by forming comprehensive systems; the logic is perfectly clear, the aims decipherable, and yet it is often the case that no one is there to have invented them . . .: an implicit characteristic of the great anonymous, almost unspoken strategies which coordinate the loquacious tactics whose “inventors” or decisionmakers are often without hypocrisy. (Foucault 1990 a, 95). Relations of power develop into “comprehensive systems” out of the connection of various, local “tactics”; but this connection into a larger system is not under the conscious control of any one person or group of persons. 24 More significantly for the present purpose, we can interpret the above passage as indicating that while the general system is not invented by any particular individuals, the local tactics out of which it develops might be. It is only the logic of the “comprehensive system” that Foucault speaks of here as being “anonymous.” The more specific and local tactics may indeed be developed by the decisions of particular individuals, who are “without hypocrisy” in that they can honestly say they are not consciously directing the more general strategies to which they have contributed. These particular “tactics” can themselves be considered relations of power, according to Foucault’s view of the exercise of power as “guiding the possible conduct and putting in order the possible outcome” of one’s own actions or those of others (Foucault 1983 b, 221). Thus it seems possible that for Foucault, we can consciously control some aspects of power. This interpretation poses a problem, however. If Foucault hopes to present a genealogy of the individual subject as he arguably attempts to do in Discipline and Punish, for example 25 then how can it be that he includes in such a genealogy the activities of subjects themselves? How can subjects be formed out of the actions and behaviors of already-formed subjects? Jeff Minson suggests a way out of such a dilemma by arguing that Foucault does not use genealogy to “investigate the construction of subjectivity as such, but rather that of ‘personal’ categories, the human person, the child, mother, father, sexual identities, etc. . . .” (Minson 1986, 135). In other words, Foucault traces the development of particular categories of persons, particular kinds of subjects rather than the development of subjectivity as such. This resonates with Foucault’s own claim that there is not one, single, unified category of subjectivity, but rather multiple forms, varying kinds of subjects. Gary Wickham agrees, arguing that the notion that “subjects” in general are produced by “power” in general ignores the specificity of how various power relations work to produce various types of subjects: 26 [S]ubjects are produced and/or reproduced or repeated in specific sites. There is no general process, whether it is called normalization or something else, in which subjects can be said to be produced in relation to a unified essence called power. (Wickham 1986, 156) Wickham cites Minson to argue that “what is often referred to as the construction of individual subjects is better seen as the construction of people,” of multiple categories of persons (Wickham 1986, 158). Using the claims of Minson and Wickham, we can say that in genealogies such as Discipline and Punish, Foucault may be tracing the development of particular kinds of subjects, of categories of persons, through particular practices of power. The “disciplined” and “normalized” individual is produced, for example, through disciplinary power, while the “subject of desire” is produced through mechanisms of confession. 27 Even these categories may be too general for Minson, who points to more specific roles within these categories, such as the mother, father, child, etc. My main point here is to show that Foucault need not be said to reject the notion of the “constituent subject” altogether, as Alcoff claims. I have argued that Foucault seems to call for such a blanket rejection only for the purpose of writing a genealogy of this subject, and that even then, he neither needs to nor does in fact live up to the general rejection of the subject that he advises. Foucault may be said to trace the historical development of specific kinds of subjects through specific relations of power in which are implicated other kinds of subjects, rather than providing a genealogy of the general category of “the subject” out of some general category of “power.” Further, in arguing that subjects are constructed by power rather than working as causal agents in relation to it, Foucault appears to be mainly concerned with showing the “anonymity” of “comprehensive systems” of power and strategies. It is possible that the more local tactics out of which larger strategies and relations of power are formed are under the conscious control of agents (this is, at any rate, how Foucault himself seems to describe them, and his arguments that power and strategies are not directed by subjects are aimed specifically at general systems rather than local tactics). To say that Foucault rejects the “constituent subject” altogether, then, seems too hasty an overgeneralization. In addition, I don’t agree with Alcoff that Foucault’s insistence on the social construction of subjectivity entirely rules out “the subject’s ability to reflect on the social discourse and challenge its determinations” (Alcoff 1988, 417). Foucault of course insists that we are always free to resist the relations of power under which we live “Where there is power, there is resistance . . .” (Foucault 1990 a, 95) and though it may seem as if the subject’s determination by social discourses and practices of power tend to deny this possibility regardless of his claims to the contrary, I don’t think this is necessarily the case. It is, however, difficult to unravel just how the Foucauldian subject, aesthetic or otherwise, is able to engage in resistance to the power relations that construct it. Alcoff is correct to point out that Foucault “does not locate the source of. .. resistance within the construction of subjectivity,” and that he “never says that subjugated discourses arise out of a conscious, reflective agency that chooses to resist” (Alcoff 1990, 74). In order to say how the Foucauldian aesthetic subject might be an agent of resistance, we may have to go beyond precisely what Foucault actually says and discuss what he might have been able to say within the context of his stated claims. Locating the capacity for subjective agency within Foucault’s views seems crucial for the claim that some version of the aesthetic subject is offered by Foucault as part of the “cure” for the regime of truth. I have argued that this cure involves a practice of freedom through efforts at resistance to relations of power we find “poisonous,” and that the aesthetic subject seems more likely to engage in such resistance than the now-dominant desiring subject. But if Foucault’s view allows us no subjective agency, it seems futile to speak of working towards a cure at all, of trying to consciously resist and transform the relations of power in which we live. Foucault’s view of the efficacy of resistance, his suggestion that we try to create ourselves aesthetically, and his prescriptions to intellectuals as to their political role all suggest that he thinks we can, indeed, exercise some kind of agency in the face of power relations. But how might this be possible, given his contention that we as subjects are created by power? To argue that Foucault’s view of subjectivity leaves no room for agency requires that one be able to show the Foucauldian subject entirely constrained in its choices of action by relations of power; and for this, it is not enough to point out that the subject is produced by relations of power, as Jana Sawicki argues: [T]o focus on the ways in which the subject is in fact constituted, and on the broader social and political forces that determine the parameters and possibilities of rational agency is not to deny agency. It does, however, point to its limits. (Sawicki 1991, 103) Foucault’s claims regarding the construction of subjectivity by relations of power certainly point to the limits of agency the subject is not an entirely “free” agent, but is rather constrained in many respects. This, by itself, does not mean it is entirely constrained, however. Sawicki contends that Foucault allows for a “critical subject” that is not devoid of agency: I understand Foucault’s project... as presupposing the existence of a critical subject, one capable of critical historical reflection, refusal and invention. This subject... is able to choose among the discourses and practices available to it. ... [T]his subject can suspend adherence to certain principles and assumptions, or to specific interpretations of them, in efforts to invent new ones. Foucault’s subject is neither autonomous nor enslaved, neither the originator of discourses and practices that constitute its experiences nor determined by them. (Sawicki 1991, 103-104) Such claims, however, might seem to indicate that the “critical subject” here attributed to Foucault is one that possesses an essential freedom within its “true” self beyond power, through which it accomplishes its “critical historical reflection, refusal and invention.” Sawicki indicates that this is not the case, when she claims that the Foucauldian subject is not “autonomous,” that it is not “the originator of discourses and practices that constitute its experiences.” We need to ask, though, how it is that this subject manages its refusals and inventions - connecting Sawicki’s “critical subject” to the “aesthetic” one discussed here, how, exactly, does the aesthetic subject engage in resistance and creativity if it is not the autonomous agent of Enlightenment, liberal ideals? How do we make sense of a subject that chooses and creates without appeal to the paradigm of the subject of desire and its free, “true” self? Sawicki outlines one possible way to respond to such questions by arguing that the subject is constructed through multiple, heterogeneous social practices and relations of power. This heterogeneity produces a “fragmented” subject whose divisions provide it with a range of alternative actions: [P]ersonal identity [is] constituted by the myriad of social relationships and practices in which the individual is engaged. Because these relationships are sometimes contradictory and often unstable, the identity that emerges is a fragmented and dynamic one. (Sawicki 1991, 41) Sawicki explains that one of the effects of the construction of subjectivity by social practices is that subjects can experience conflicts between aspects of their identities produced through different relations of power: “Thus, for example, in a racist and homophobic society, a black lesbian experiences the conflicting aspects of her identity in terms of conflicts over loyalties and interests relative to the black and lesbian communities” (1991, 41). Sawicki adds that the subject’s interests “are constantly open to change and contestation” because they are “a function of one’s place in the social field at a particular time” and this place is never entirely static (1991, 42). In other words, both our identities and our interests, though they are produced by power, are produced by multiple, heterogeneous, and dynamic relations of power; and as a result, these identities and interests are, as Sawicki puts it, “fragmented and dynamic.” We can experience conflicts within our conception of our identity, our “self,” as well as within our interests. We are thus faced with a field of several possibilities from which to choose, and we can decide to take action on some interests and not others. According to this view, the aesthetic subject would be able to choose to resist or not, and to create itself as a work of art, because it is a divided subject with multiple, heterogeneous aspects. Of course, this means that the aesthetic subject’s choices would be made on the grounds not of the essential freedom of its “true” self, but of aspects of itself that are produced by relations of power. In other words, if the aesthetic subject chooses to resist a particular power relation, this choice will be grounded in an appeal to a belief, value, pleasure, knowledge, etc. that is itself constructed by power (perhaps by a different relation of power than that being resisted, perhaps not). Similarly, when the aesthetic subject chooses to create itself as a work of art, the choices it makes in this process will be based in aspects of itself that are not “up to” the subject, but are produced for it by power relations. Jon Simons explains that in his discussion of aesthetic self-creation, “Foucault does not return to a notion of an immutable or essential subject that is always endowed with the capacities to transform itself’: When there is resistance, it is because of the capacity of ‘already existing categories of persons’ . . whose subjectivity is also a function of the degree of domination, equality, or reciprocity they have with other subjects. If we do have liberty, that is because the power relations that constitute us and exist between us as subjects also empower us. 28 (Simons 1995, 78) In other words, if the aesthetic subject has the capacity to transform itself, this is due to the ways in which it is constituted by power relations and the relationships it has to other subjects also so constituted. These power relations do not simply constrain, they are also enabling and empowering one sense in which this is the case is that we can appeal to particular aspects of ourselves that have been constructed by power in order to resist some of the power relations that we find too constraining. As Pierre Macherey explains, the relations of power that construct me as a subject are also enabling in that they make possible my thought and actions. Macherey argues that to be a subject (for Foucault) is to be dependent upon the action of a norm that is a function of power; but such action is not simply prohibitive or oppressive. Rather, it inserts one into a “global system of evaluation,” a network that categorizes and evaluates subjects according to norms, but also provides the conditions under which the subject can think and act at all: [T]he thinking and acting subject. . . acts only to the extent that he is acted upon, . . . does not think except to the extent to which he is thought of, by norms and under norms in relation to which his thought and action can be measured that is to say, integrated into a global system of evaluation, where they figure as a degree or as an element. . . . [F]rom this point of view, being a subject is therefore literally to be ‘subjected’ not, however, in the sense of submission to an order which is exterior and supposes a relationship of pure domination, but to that of an insertion of individuals . . . into a homogeneous and continuous network, a normative apparatus, which reproduces them and transforms them into subjects. (Macherey 1992, 180) This passage asserts at least that for Foucault, being “subject” does not simply mean being placed in a “relationship of pure domination.” It indicates, rather, that one cannot be a “thinking and acting subject” without being placed in some kind of relationship to a norm, inserted into a “normative apparatus” or network through which one’s thoughts and actions can be measured and evaluated. In other words, without some kind of limitations through power, without some kind of category and value-lines being drawn, we could not think and act because we would exist in an open field of meaninglessness. The relations of power that produce and constrain us as subjects also give shape and meaning to our lives. In order to conceive of ourselves and to think about the world and act in it as individuals, perhaps we require the existence of at least certain limitations, certain dividing-lines that help us to categorize, evaluate, and make sense of ourselves and our surroundings. It may very well be, therefore, that I am very much constrained in my actions by the way I have been constructed by power, under Foucault’s view of subjectivity; but these constraints enable me to think and act, often against some of the various ways in which I have been constrained. On this interpretation the aesthetic subject can choose to resist particular relations of power and can choose to create itself aesthetically, not because it possesses a core of freedom in its “true” self beyond power, but because it is constructed multiply, with heterogeneous parts that can conflict and can be used against each other and against the various relations of power that produced them. For example, as a woman living in the United States in the late twentieth century, I may appeal to values and ideals that have been constructed for me by relations of power such as “the right of privacy” in order to preserve women’s reproductive freedom, thereby resisting certain relations of power in my surroundings. This is not a “free choice” in the radical sense that I, as an autonomous agent, have decided to do this entirely on my own. These ideals, and my adherence to them, have been constructed by the social practices and discourses that are part of my historical development to some degree at least, my adherence to them is not under my control. This does not mean, however, that I am powerless to resist the social forces that construct me. I can at least resist other ideals, values, beliefs on the basis of those I am constructed so as to hold; and further, I can even take a critical stance towards the latter on the basis of other discourses that are themselves products of power and therefore beyond my control. Keeping with the present example, in some contexts I can appeal to notions like “the right of privacy” for “women,” while in other contexts I can stand back from these and view them critically perhaps even choosing to resist discourses and practices that would invoke them. I may, for instance, criticize the category of “women” in my research and publications as a philosopher, arguing that its use can contribute to oppression by suppressing individual differences, while at the same time recognizing that in particular contexts such as the fight for reproductive freedom, invoking this category may be worth the risk. Throughout all of his/her choices and resistances, the aesthetic subject is guided according to the ways s/he has been constructed by relations of power. S/he does appeal to categories and concepts that are not only produced by power, but that the subject him/herself is constructed so as to hold. But the multiplicity and heterogeneity of the relations of power in which we live help to insure that we are not absolutely determined to act in any one particular direction. The aesthetic subject can challenge particular truths, knowledges, discourses, practices, etc. on the basis of others, because each may be produced by relations of power that are heterogeneous and can come into conflict. Further, the aesthetic subject can decide to challenge and transform particular aspects of him/herself on the basis of other aspects that are also products of power. The choice to do so many not be entirely free, in that the aesthetic subject is guided towards it by his/her construction through power; but there is still manifested in this scenario the possibility of both resistance to power and aesthetic creation of the self. We are still, however, left with the question of agency can what I have described as the subject’s ability to challenge and resist particular relations of power be enough to grant the subject agency? Jon Simons indicates that the constraints imposed on us through our production by relations of power make agency itself possible: The subject is indebted to the limits, however oppressive, imposed on him or her for the possibility of being anyone at all, having an identity and capacities to act. Paradoxically, such subjective capacities include those of resisting the power that has made us what we are. (Simons 1995, 4) In order to be “anyone at all,” in order to have “capacities to act” (including the capacity to resist “the power that has made us what we are”), Simons argues, we must have some limits imposed upon us. I think it is certainly the case that agency requires that the subject experience some limitations, if only to provide shape and meaning to the choices made. But to what degree are our choices constrained by the ways we are constructed by relations of power? Are we entirely determined in our choices, or are we simply guided towards them? Foucault does not provide us with an answer. 29 Indeed, this is not surprising, given that his views on the multiplicity of forms of subjectivity would tend to discourage much discussion of the status of “the subject” in general. Further, the question of agency and intentionality tends to imply the notion of an interior scene of pure freedom beyond power, giving the subject the power to make autonomous choices and have a will that belongs to its “own,” “true” self. This, of course, is a view of the subject that Foucault endeavors to criticize. Yet we need not therefore conclude that Foucault rejects agency altogether, nor that he suggests others do so. In order to see why, it is helpful to consider the issue of agency in the context of Foucault’s political role as an intellectual. I have argued that Foucault acts as an intellectual exile, distancing himself from current claims to truth and value without rejecting them entirely. I have also explained that he utilizes a particular rhetorical strategy in his genealogies whereby he brings his readers to question their habits of thought without rejecting them entirely, to become exiles from their usual ways of thinking. Our conception of subjectivity could be said to be one such habit of thought from which Foucault encourages us to exile ourselves. Recall that in Discipline and Punish Foucault provides a genealogy of how we become “disciplined” individuals. Recall also that he describes these through the lens of current beliefs and values one of which could be the belief in the “liberal” subject with its “autonomous” agency. As we read through the methods of discipline and normalization Foucault describes, we may be brought by his descriptions to criticize these methods by appeal to our individual “rights” to “autonomy” and “freedom.” Our habitual ways of thinking about the subject (including the idea that the subject is an autonomous agent with free intentions and choices) will then have been elicited in us through the text. The second movement of Foucault’s rhetorical strategy can then become operative: we may realize that the genealogy he provides traces the history of the very habits of thought thereby elicited, including our usual conceptions of the subject. The result may be our exile from the idea of the subject as an autonomous agent, a “primitive term” existing before and beyond power. This does not mean, however, that we end up rejecting this notion altogether. To take up a position of exile in relation to it is to distance oneself while yet retaining ties to it. We can maintain a critical distance to the notion of an autonomous subject with a free agency by recognizing that it has been created through practices of power and by noting how invoking this subject can work to further support the workings of certain types of power relations. Yet we can retain ties to this view of subjectivity by recognizing that appeal to it may be helpful in certain contexts. Recall that the use of habitual modes of thought may work to improve conditions in the current regime of truth, even as we work to change this regime. We might say that working with the model of subjectivity that involves an autonomous, free agency could produce important benefits here and now. It may be quite helpful, in particular contexts, to conceive and speak of subjects as autonomous agents. Alcoff herself agrees with this point: [l]t can be argued that, some of the time, thinking of ourselves as subjects can have, and has had, positive effects contributing to our ability effectively to resist structures of domination. Subjectivity can accord a sense of agency and authority over one’s actions, needs, interests, and desires. It can create an obstacle to the instrumental appropriation of one’s self for externally articulated ends. ... In short, even though it may be a discursive construction, the notion that one is a subject can engender a repositioning of one’s perspective from other to self. . . and a vigorous awareness of the possibility of critical reflection on demands that issue explicitly from an external source. (Alcoff 1990, 73) Thinking of ourselves as autonomous agents, even if this is the product of a construction by power relations, can provide us with the impetus to reflect on and resist our manipulation and appropriation by forces deemed to be external to us, according to Alcoff. As an intellectual exile, Foucault could be said to agree. If, as I have argued, he undertakes to encourage others to question their usual habits of thought, to distance themselves from these without rejecting them altogether, then this project is not at odds with Alcoff’s own view that “the notion of subjectivity can create a means of access for our manipulation, but it can also produce a way in which to articulate our resistance to manipulation” (Alcoff 1990, 78). Kelly Oliver provides a view of subjectivity, agency, and political practice in Subjectivity Without Subjects that is in many ways similar to the movement of exile I claim Foucault undertakes and encourages others to follow. Oliver points out first of all that our construction by power does not, by itself, exclude our capacity for agency and resistance because these do not require a subject that exists entirely outside of power: For Foucault, resistance does not require a unified transcendent subject. Resistance does not have to originate from outside the system of dominance. In fact, it can not. Feminists have been making this argument for decades. “Women” are constituted by social practices, yet they can resist. So, there is an immanent resistance. (Oliver 1998, 114) I have already suggested one way in which an “immanent resistance” might be possible following Jana Sawicki, we might say that though we are constructed by power relations, the heterogeneity of these relations produces fragmented subjects that can resist some of the ways they have been constructed on the basis of others. I have also argued that Foucault need not be read as saying we need to reject the notion of an autonomous, free agency coming from what Oliver calls here “a unified, transcendent subject.” This means that even if resistance does not require such a subject, as Oliver points out, it can be effectively undertaken within the context of such a model. Oliver agrees. She suggests we take to heart Foucault’s insistence that “we need to develop local strategies for dealing with particular sites of oppression” (1998, 121); and this may mean in part that we can sometimes appeal to old models of subjectivity in contexts where these might be helpful, while rejecting these models in other contexts. Oliver provides an intriguing analogy with the relationship between theory and practice in scientific inquiry to develop this point. She points out that scientists sometimes formulate theories “that cannot be put into practice, given current technology,” and that “in these cases, practice has to catch up with theory” (Oliver 1998, 120). 30 Most significantly, it can often be the case that practice manages to catch up with such “speculative theories” by working within and transforming old theoretical frameworks: In many cases, the only way practice can inscribe a particular theoretical innovation is by experimenting within older theoretical frameworks. In other words, practice inscribed by now questionable or outdated theoretical frameworks can be used to usher in the new framework. (1998, 120-121) Oliver argues that, taking a cue from the scientific process, we may need to utilize practices that operate within “older theoretical frameworks” in order to make possible practice within new ones. The new theoretical views we formulate may not yet be able to be put into practice. Applying this point to the way we approach subjectivity, Oliver argues that we may want to deconstruct or otherwise criticize the notion of an autonomous, unified subject “in theory,” but we may have to continue practice that operates under the old framework wherein this subject is posited: We can imagine that although our innovative theory that deconstructs the subject may eventually be put into political practice, the “technology” does not yet exist to do that. We can also imagine that to put this new framework into action, we may have to continue our “experiments” within the old framework that posits some kind of semiunified subject. (Oliver 1998, 121) Oliver describes a movement similar to that of the exile. She indicates that we may need to continue to operate with old, habitual concepts and categories while yet distancing ourselves from them. We can do this by utilizing these old frameworks, which may be all we have available at the present time, precisely in order to change the theoretical framework within which they operate. We can use, for example, the notion of a unified, autonomous subject for the purpose of eventually transforming this view of subjectivity. We can make appeal to it while at the same time taking a step back from it by recognizing it as a strategic tool rather than a transcendentally “true” view of what subjectivity is “really like.” On Oliver’s view, we can continue to utilize practices that operate within the “older theoretical framework” of subjectivity as a way to eventually develop practices that adhere to a new theoretical framework. In addition, she points out, “older theoretical frameworks may still be the best strategies for dealing with some systems, whereas the new framework may be best for others”: For example, perhaps whereas a politicized poststructuralist framework may be good strategy for overcoming oppressive categories within academic theories and theory making, traditional frameworks may be better strategies for overcoming oppressive categories within the U.S. legal system. (Oliver 1998, 121) I have argued that Foucault seems to encourage others to exile themselves from their usual modes of thought, and that this means we need not give them up altogether. Rather, our habitual ways of thinking and acting under the current regime of truth may work to produce important changes within that regime. In this passage, Oliver makes a similar point in certain contexts, “traditional frameworks may be better strategies for overcoming oppressive categories.” We may need to appeal to the “rights” and “autonomy” of “women,” for example, in order to transform conditions for real women living here and now in a regime of truth that operates through such categories. Yet we can do so while maintaining a critical distance from such categories and concepts, and working to develop new “theoretical frameworks” in the meantime. By considering his role as an intellectual exile, we can argue that perhaps all Foucault hoped to do was to encourage us to question the notion of autonomous, subjective agency, to step back from it and reflect on it critically. He may have simply meant to point out that this notion has been historically and contingently developed, and that it is therefore “fragile” and malleable. This does not mean we must absolutely give it up altogether, for it can still have important uses here and now. It may be, as Oliver suggests, that we can work through this model of subjectivity towards something new. We can then say that Foucault does not resolve the question of agency in his work on subjectivity, in part because as an intellectual he works mainly to bring others to question their habitual beliefs, conceptions and categories (such as that of the subject’s capacity for agency). Rather than telling us what the subject is “really like,” whether it has a true agency or whether it is entirely determined by relations of power, Foucault may have played his role as an intellectual by simply encouraging us to exile ourselves from such questions and the answers we may be tempted to give. He then leaves the possibility open that we can continue to use our old conceptions of subjectivity when we deem it helpful, and work to change them if and when we think it necessary. Foucault seems to have provided a suggestion as to one way to rethink the subject, namely the creation of the self as a work of art. The aesthetic subject, however, may be a model of subjectivity where the question of “agency” doesn’t well apply, suggesting that perhaps this question is in some sense a misplaced one in regard to the subject that creates itself aesthetically. As Thomas Flynn points out, in the arts of existence practiced in ancient Greece (as Foucault describes them) “[the] self is an achievement, not an initial principle” (Flynn 1985, 538). In other words, the “self’ of the Greek aesthetic subject is not treated as an ontological entity that preexists and directs the individual’s self-fashioning. The notion of an essential self that stands behind one’s choices and actions, and can be “free” or not in its ordering of them, was a later development corresponding to the rise of the subject of desire. If it could be said that for the modem aesthetic subject the self is something “achieved” through a process of self-creation rather than an interior entity that can have its “own” “free” will or not, then perhaps the question of agency doesn’t apply to it in the way it would apply to the subject of desire (which is thought to have a “natural,” “true self’ that is originally free from power, a will that is free until power restrains and oppresses it). 31 I have suggested that Foucault’s discussion of the aesthetic creation of the self in his later work can be read as part of the “cure” of freedom for the “poison” of the regime of truth. Lois McNay agrees: “It is [the] principle of an autonomous aesthetics of the self that Foucault presents as an antidote to the normalizing tendencies of modern society” (McNay 1992, 86). I have endeavored to describe the ways in which the aesthetic subject can be said to be free, indeed more free than the desiring subject. I now consider how the freedom of creating oneself as a work of art can contribute to a “cure.” The self and the social It is important to keep in mind that the freedom of the aesthetic subject is not grounded in a lack of constraint in its process of self-creation; indeed, its aesthetic stylization is shaped and perhaps even strongly directed by the social discourses and practices in which it is enmeshed. The aesthetic subject does not achieve a state of freedom through the creation of itself as a work of art in the sense that it thereby frees itself from the relations of power that might previously have constituted it. Rather, it practices a “real freedom” in the sense described above: a resistance to power relations it finds problematic through “a constant attempt at selfdisengagement and self-invention” (Rajchman 1985, 38). In other words, the aesthetic subject is continually ready to disengage from itself, from its previous identity, if it finds that certain aspects of itself are bound up with relations of power it finds “poisonous.” This “self-disengagement,” in turn, facilitates a practice of freedom consisting in resistance to particular relations of power - if I am ready to take a step back from certain aspects of myself and view them with a critical eye because I realize they are products of power relations that are “dangerous,” I will probably tend to be critical also of these relations of power themselves and to try to resist the specific manifestations of them I find around me. If I realize that my “self’ is made up of truths, knowledges, beliefs, values, desires, pleasures, etc. that are constructs of power relations, I will be much more ready to disengage myself from these than if I think they are part of a “natural,” essential, “true” self. Distancing myself from a few of these, I can also then analyze and criticize the relations of power that produced them. If I find these poisonous, I can then choose to resist them. This kind of scenario seems less likely for the subject of desire. This subject seeks to discover its “true” self and release it from what it perceives to be mainly or exclusively repressive relations of power. It would not view this “true” self as a contingent result of power relations, and would therefore not try to disengage from it. It would likely resist only certain kinds of social practices and discourses, namely those that it finds repressive, that it thinks are working to constrain its “true” self. The subject of desire would not resist those power relations that produce and sustain this notion of an essential self, nor those that appear to “liberate” it. Its conception of self affects, therefore, its view of the power relations within which it is enmeshed, dampening the impetus for resistance to some of them. Even if certain relations of power become intensely constraining, the subject of desire may not feel the need to resist them, as it may think it is nevertheless “liberated.” The conception of self held by the aesthetic subject also affects its view of power relations, but in a way that makes it more likely to engage in resistance to any particular power relation at any time. The aesthetic subject remains constantly vigilant, always aware that “everything is dangerous.” 32 In being constantly wary, the aesthetic subject maintains a critical distance from some of the power relations within which it exists by appeal to beliefs, values, ideals, etc. that are produced by others. Though it is continually ready to practice “self disengagement,” this does not mean that it attempts to exit power relations altogether or to reject all aspects of itself that are produced by them. The aesthetic subject knows it can resist any relation of power, anytime, but it does not resist all relations of power at once. Similarly, it can question and reinvent any aspect of itself, anytime, but it does not question all of itself at once. In this sense, one could say, the aesthetic subject is a kind of an “exile” from itself it is able to maintain a critical distance from itself without attempting to exit itself altogether. It also, then, plays an exile role in regard to the relations of power in which it is entangled, since it resists some of these on the basis of invoking others. The aesthetic subject does not feel a need to reject all relations of power or aspects of itself that are products of such relations, because it recognizes that the limits placed on it thereby are both constraining and enabling: some of these limits enable it to resist others whose constraints it finds too strong. The aesthetic subject would tend, then, to practice the resistance of the exile that forms the “real freedom” Foucault suggests as a “cure.” Foucault provides an example of what the aesthetic subject as exile might look like, by referring to Charles Baudelaire’s description of modernity and the figure of the “dandy.” Recall that according to Foucault, Baudelaire characterizes modernity as a particular kind of attitude towards the present, with which one transforms the present by focusing on it in “what it is.” The modern individual finds elements of beauty or significance in the present and emphasizes them in order to imagine the present differently than it is. These elements of beauty that one finds are emphasized in their contingency, as ephemeral and fleeting; and yet one points to them in order to paint a new picture of the present. One “heroizes” the present while at the same time imagining it transformed (Foucault 1997 d, 114, 117). Baudelaire does not only focus on artists who possesses this kind of attitude toward the present and who express it in traditional media such as painting; he also applies this view to the artist who creates the self through a modern attitude, according to Focault: [M]odernity for Baudelaire is not simply a form of relationship to the present; it is also a mode of relationship that has to be established with oneself. ... To be modern is not to accept oneself as one is in the flux of the passing moments; it is to take oneself as object of a complex and difficult elaboration: what Baudelaire, in the vocabulary of his day, calls dandysme. (Foucault 1997 d, 117-118) The modern attitude can be taken up not simply in relation to the present and expressed in traditional artistic media; it can also be taken up in relation to one’s present self and expressed in its aesthetic creation and transformation. The process of doing so is similar to the one described above. The modern artist of the self does not simply watch the self as a spectator, noting its configuration in the flux of passing moments; rather, s/he grasps aspects of the present self in their beauty, value, and meaning, and through this emphasis imagines him/herself transformed. Dandyism, according to Baudelaire, consists in “the burning need to create for oneself a personal originality, bounded only by the limits of the proprieties” (Baudelaire 1964, 28). In creating this “personal originality,” one imagines oneself transformed, not by destroying the self, but by grasping and emphasizing certain elements of it in “what it is.” The dandy looks for the beautiful and the personally meaningful in the self and expresses this in “[making] of his body, his behavior, his feelings and passions, his very existence, a work of art” (Foucault 1997 d, 118). In so doing, this figure of modernity is not seeking some notion of a “true” self, but is rather locating the “poetry within [its] history” (Baudelaire 1964, 12): it expresses the beauty of elements of its present self that are contingent rather than “natural.” Foucault explains that rather than trying to discover the truth of the self, the modern artist of the self feels compelled to continually re-create it: Modern man, for Baudelaire, is not the man who goes off to discover himself, his secrets and his hidden truth; his is the man who tries to invent himself. This modernity does not “liberate man in his own being”; it compels him to face the task of producing himself. (Foucault 1997 d, 118) The modem individual experiences a compulsion, Foucault indicates here, to invent him/herself. Lois McNay describes it as an obligation : “Foucault sees this exploration of the self not as a liberation of a true or essential inner nature, but rather as an obligation, on the part of the individual, to face the endless task of reinventing him or herself’ (McNay 1992, 89). Neither Foucault nor McNay elaborate this compulsion or obligation in detail, but it is reminiscent of Baudelaire’s description of the dandy, who feels a “burning need” to create him/herself as a work of art. This is not the need to “liberate” the “true” self, the compulsion born out of practices of confession to release one’s hidden secrets from repression and let them be expressed. It seems rather a compulsion one imposes on oneself to aesthetically create the self once the notion of a “true” self is given up. The source and structure of this compulsion, however, is unclear. 33 What I wish to emphasize is how the modem individual described by Foucault through reference to Baudelaire resembles the aesthetic subject. Clearly, Foucault discusses both in terms of creating the self as a work of art; but we can also favorably compare modern aesthetic subjectivity with the modem attitude in terms of the latter’s “heroization” of the present. The aesthetic subject could also be said to transform itself, not by rejecting or destroying the self it has, but through “the practice of a liberty that simultaneously respects this reality and violates it” (Foucault 1997 d, 117). The aesthetic subject chooses to invent itself by changing some aspects of itself through appeal to others; and to that extent one might say it finds value and meaning in some parts of its present self and emphasizes these to imagine and express itself differently. It violates the reality of its present self, but through a practice that also respects this reality by focusing in on particular aspects of it. The aesthetic subject transforms itself by grasping itself in “what it is” in a slightly different way as well: it seeks to change itself by recognizing the contingency of its identity and therefore its malleability, rather than through a gesture of rejection. It violates the reality of its present self by recognizing it in its reality as contingent and working therefore to alter itself. This process can continue indefinitely, as each re-invention produces an identity that can be recognized in “what it is” as also malleable in this way. Foucault indicates that the modern attitude one can take towards oneself is intimately related to the modem attitude one can take towards the present (Foucault 1997 d, 117-118); and on the basis of this one might say that the aesthetic subject is likely to take a similar attitude towards the relations of power it finds in its present surroundings as it does to itself. If it feels “compelled” to create itself as a work of art, to imagine itself transformed by respecting its own reality, it may also feel a similar compulsion to do the same in regard to the present and the particular configuration of power relations therein. The aesthetic subject, like the modem painter, may find within the present elements of beauty and meaning through the expression of which it imagines the present differently. It is possible to think of the resistance to power as a practice of freedom in this way in resisting particular power relations on the basis of beliefs, values, etc. that are the products of other power relations, one is invoking and emphasizing particular aspects of the present in order to imagine it changed. But such a grounding for resistance is also recognized as contingent and therefore subject itself to alteration, to re-invention on the basis of other aspects of the (perhaps now altered) present. In other words, through resistance the present is “heroized,” but not in a way that appeals to ahistorical, absolute truth. Rather, one resists through appeal to parts of the present as present, as historically developed and as ephemeral, continually changing. 34 Through this brief discussion of Baudelaire’s “modern attitude” and the figure of the dandy, I have attempted to better illustrate how the aesthetic subject creates itself as a work of art, and how this might be connected to a practice of freedom through resistance to power. I have suggested that the aesthetic subject would be more likely to engage in practices of resistance than the desiring subject, and have indicated why this might be the case. Foucault does seem to think that creating oneself as a work of art can have important social and political effects, can produce beneficial changes beyond one’s isolated subjectivity. His connection of the arts of existence with ethics is telling in this regard, since it indicates a link between caring for oneself and caring for others. Foucault attempts to explain this link in more detail in an interview: The care of the self is ethical in itself; but it implies complex relationships with others insofar as this ethos of freedom is also a way of caring for others. . . . Ethos also implies a relationship with others, insofar as the care of the self enables one to occupy his rightful position in the city, the community or interpersonal relationships .... [l]n the case of the free man, I think the postulate of this whole [Greek] morality was that a person who took proper care of himself would, by the same token, be able to conduct himself properly in relation to others and for others. A city in which everyone took proper care of himself would be a city which functioned well and found in this the ethical principle of its permanence. (Foucault 1996 e, 437) In these passages, Foucault is mainly talking about the aesthetic creation of the self as it occurred in the ancient Greek ethics of sexual austerity, wherein the relationship of self-mastery one has with oneself was thought to contribute not only to one’s own freedom (as a release from slavery to the appetites), but also to the freedom of others. Specifically, Foucault indicates that for the Greeks, selfmastery was a kind of self-governance that influences one’s governing of others. Foucault argues that according to the Greeks, the abuse of power over others indicates a lack of self-mastery: In the abuse of power, one exceeds the legitimate exercise of one’s power and imposes one’s fantasies, appetites and desires on others. . . . But one can see in any case, this is what the Greek philosophers say -- that such a man is the slave of his appetites. And the good ruler is precisely the one who exercises power as it ought to be exercised, that is, simultaneously exercising his power over himself. (1996 e 438) Foucault emphasizes that the care of the self is “ethically prior” to the care of others, because “the relationship with oneself is ontologically prior” (1996e, 437). Thus the ethical relationship one develops with oneself crucially affects the ethical relationships one has with others. Foucault concludes, therefore, that for the Greeks, “it is the power over oneself that. . . regulates one’s power over others” (1996e, 438). To what degree this might be the case for the modern aesthetic subject? It might very well be possible to undertake an elaborate study of the aesthetic subject, investigating whether and how its aesthetic self-creation might contribute to its ethical relationships with others; but Foucault himself never provided a clear picture of this possibility, as Lois McNay points out. She argues that his conception of the aesthetic creation of the self seems to be presented as “a solitary process, rather than a socially integrated activity,” one result of which is that “it is unclear how such an ethics translates into a politics of difference that could initiate deep-seated social change” (McNay 1992, 177). McNay’s point is not that the link between the private and the public realms cannot be forged (indeed, she points to several feminist theorists who have done just that), but rather that Foucault has not gone far enough to explain how he himself is making the connection: “Foucault fails to explain how the individual’s actions may contribute to a radical reworking of the impoverished practices of the social/public” (1992, 180). Though I have argued that the aesthetic subject would be more likely to engage in resistance to power as a practice of freedom than the desiring subject, I agree with McNay when she says that Foucault has not made clear the emancipatory potential of the aesthetic creation of self. I believe it is evident that he presents the notion of an aesthetic subjectivity as a way to practice freedom, and McNay is correct to point out that “[i]t is clear from his interviews that Foucault saw an ethics of the self as having implications that extend further than the limited arena of individual aesthetic self-formation” (McNay 1992, 177). But more needs to be done to explain and justify this extension than Foucault himself accomplished. 35 I have tried to indicate here how one might at least begin to show “how the radical lessons drawn from a reinvention of the self can be used to break down more institutionalized cultural practices” (McNay 1992, 179). For Foucault the “arts of existence” seem a part of the “cure” for the “poisonous traces” of the regime of truth. Mainly, we can approach relations of power we find “poisonous” through practices of resistance, through continued vigilance, questioning, and struggle that together constitute our “real freedom.” I have argued that if we take up the kind of aesthetic subjectivity Foucault describes, we may be more likely to engage in the endless questioning and resistance our “real freedom” requires. The aesthetic subject is an exile from the self, working to transform the self it finds in its present without leaving this present self behind entirely. It engages in self-creation by focusing on itself in “what it is” it recognizes that its present self is the product of a contingent, historical development and is therefore malleable. Further, in creating itself aesthetically this subject does not go entirely beyond its present self and the constraints therein. Rather, it works with the materials it finds already within itself, appealing to some aspects of itself in order to transform others. The aesthetic subject, though a product of power like any other subject, recognizes that it is a product of multiple and heterogeneous power relations, and that its subjectivity is, as a consequence, fragmented and conflicted. It uses its own fragmentary nature to change come parts of itself on the basis of others. The aesthetic subject therefore creates itself as a work of art through a process of distancing, of taking a step back from itself and imagining itself differently, while yet maintaining important ties to the self from which it is thereby exiled. The question of whether this subject is an autonomous “agent” of its aesthetic creation is not fully answered by Foucault, because his intellectual role consists in bringing us to question our usual concepts (such as agency), to look at them from a critical distance. Perhaps the aesthetic subject holds to the belief in agency while also questioning it. As Linda Alcoff points out, the notion of subjective agency can work to encourage us to reflect on and resist relations of power that we find oppressive (Alcoff 1990, 73). The sense of authority and control this notion provides may help the aesthetic subject to continue its self-re-creations, even while it recognizes the need to question this model of subjectivity due to its potential to support potentially oppressive relations of disciplinary power. The aesthetic subject is an exile in several senses: from itself, from its own agency, and from the relations of power it resists. 36 is a slightly altered version of the title of an interview with Foucault, “The Ethics of the Concern for Self as a Practice of Freedom” (Foucault 1996 e). 14 Even those “general guidelines” within which the moderate individual could tailor his behavior were not many, and not tied to “any social at least to any legal institutional system,“ according to Foucault: “For instance, the laws against sexual misbehavior were very few and not very compelling” (Foucault 1983 a, 231). 15 One could, of course, question Foucault’s claim here in regard to this “absence of morality” - are we, indeed, moving away from an ethics that focuses on obedience to a code of rules? I will not address this question here, as it is not crucial to the present point. Even if his diagnosis of our current ethical attitudes is not entirely accurate, he still turns to a study of Greek ethics in response to his perception of these; and it is this turn to considering the Greek model of ethics that I want to emphasize here. 16 See Foucault (1983 a 232-234) for a brief discussion of a few aspects of the ancient Greek ethics of sexual austerity that, Foucault indicates, could not and should not be recreated today. 17 The “must” in this statement is somewhat puzzling, coming from someone who insists that the intellectual ought not to tell others what they must do. I have argued that in his genealogical texts, Foucault can be read as acting the prophet, sometimes even to the point of offering prescriptions as to what must be done; but that he also encourages the questioning of such prophecies by distancing himself from them. Yet at times he does not exhibit such movements of exile, especially in interviews. There, as I have mentioned at the end of Chapter Three, Foucault often attempts to separate himself from intellectual prophecy altogether through a pure negation, claiming that he does not and will not play the prophet. Other times (though not as often), as in this quote, he takes on the role of the prophet uncritically, saying outright “what must be done.” I have argued (in Chapter Three) that Foucault may end up being a prophet in this way precisely because of the direct refusal of such a role that he sometimes exhibits. It is, rather, by playing the prophet as a ruse that he can best avoid being one; and such a strategy would therefore have been better than the negation of prophecy on which he at times insists. 1 8 1 am not going to address here the question of whether or not Foucault’s estimation of Sartre is correct on this point. What concerns me most are the claims Foucault is making for his own view and while this may seem linked in this quote to “what Sartre has said,” Foucault himself says something quite similar in regard to how “the self is not given to us.” Thus I think Foucault’s suggestion of an aesthetic creation of the self remains the same whether his criticism of Sartre is appropriate or not. 19 There is, of course, a problem here: if the form of the subject is developed through relations of power and “games of truth,” then it seems we must change the latter in order to change the former. The way I am putting it here, it sounds as if Foucault thinks we can change relations of power by adopting a new form of subjectivity. Of course, Foucault does argue that through resistance we can work to change relations of power; and I will argue that the aesthetic subject is one that may be more likely to engage in practices of resistance. To that extent, we might say that a change in the form of subjectivity might bring about a change in power relations. Still, it seems Foucault must say that in order to bring about a change in subjectivity, we must change the power relations that work to produce it. Are we caught in a kind of catch-22 here, where we must first transform power relations in order to transform power relations? There may be a way out of this dilemma, in that the relations of power that produce the desiring subject may leave open the possibility of an aesthetic subjectivity without encouraging it outright. We might then be able to take up this possibility and use it to then transform some of the relations of power within which we live. Foucault does argue that our view of ethics is already changing, that we are somewhat close to the Greeks in our current view of ethics; and perhaps the relations of power governing ethics may therefore now allow for the emergence of an aesthetic subjectivity. How, exactly, this might work is something that requires more elaboration than I can provide here. I take up this question again to some extent when I discuss the problem of agency in Foucault’s view of aesthetic subjectivity, in a later section of this chapter. 20 As discussed above, the relationship to self in the Greek “aesthetic subject” was characterized by (among other things) self-mastery and freedom in moderation, while the “subject of desire” practices a relationship to self characterized by (among other things) self-decipherment, selfrenunciation, and purity. 21 In what follows, I present my own view of a modern version of the aesthetic subject, a version that is inspired by Foucault’s remarks about how the Greek aesthetic subject might be updated. This is only one possible version of a modern aesthetic subject, however there are likely multiple ways that the notion of the aesthetic subject could be updated. I describe below a model of such a subject that works along the lines of the exile, as I have found this model to provide a number of benefits in the context of attempting resistance to power (see, e.g., the discussion of “resisting exiles” near the end of Chapter Two, above). Hereinafter, the “aesthetic subject” should be understood to refer to the modern aesthetic subject, unless stated otherwise. 23 Indeed, this subject doesn’t seem too far from the “subject of desire,” who expects to find its truth hidden within, a “natural,” “true self’ that is often repressed by power but otherwise seems untouched by it. If so, we have already seen a detailed picture of how this subject could be the product of certain practices of power such as the confession. 24 Foucault does not explain carefully how such a linking of multiple tactics can occur without being directed by some conscious agent. To investigate further how this might be possible would take us too far afield of the present subject (though Gary Wickham provides a discussion of this issue see Wickham (1986, 159-163)). I am mainly concerned here with showing that while for Foucault the more general structures of power relations may be “anonymous,” the local tactics from which they develop need not be. The latter do seem to be organized and directed by subjective agents with causal power. 25 1 have argued that in this text Foucault describes practices of disciplinary and normalizing power that work to create “individuals.” 26 Wickham argues that Foucault himself is guilty of obscuring the specificity of the production of subjects through power, by speaking in general terms of “subjects” being produced by “power.” Wickham considers Foucault’s use of such terms misleading (Wickham 1986, 156). 27 These two kinds of subjects seem related for Foucault, as the confession - which Foucault says has now permeated many Western societies - could be said to share many traits with disciplinary techniques such as the examination. Still, if we are to take Minson and Wickham seriously, perhaps we may have to consider that the disciplined individual could be a different category of person than the desiring subject. 28 Simons quotes a phrase from Gary Wickham in this passage (Wickham 1986, 159). 29 Some commentators have attempted to provide an answer for him, arguing that if we are constructed by power, this still does not mean we are entirely determined by it. Lois McNay argues that for Foucault, there is no “straightforward causal chain between large-scale determining structures and the actions of individuals,” and she appeals to a notion of “non-exhaustive mutual determination” between social structures and human agents to argue that “Foucault is able to attribute a certain degree of autonomy and independence to the way in which individuals act” (McNay 1992, 60, 61). Specifically, she suggests that “there is a mutual dependence of structure and agency”: “The activities of social agents are necessarily situated and constrained .... At the same time, however, social structures are constituted by human agency” (1992, 60). This idea of mutual determination between structures and agents is an intriguing one that, I think, is not fully spelled out in McNay’s text; and it could therefore benefit from further investigation. lan Hacking, in a very brief article entitled “Self-Improvement,” suggests that Foucault argues for the possibility of self-formation as a power we bring to bear on ourselves: “it is we who are doing it, not having it done to us” (Hacking 1986 b, 236). Not only can we be “disciplined” by power from the outside, we can also practice a “self-discipline” that, Hacking indicates, gives us a kind of agency: “[Foucault] says ‘we constitute ourselves as subjects . . .’ as agents, that is, not as victims” (1986 b 235). The way in which we might engage in such a self-constitution, and to what degree it provides us with subjective agency, however, needs more discussion and explanation than Hacking provides. provides an example to illustrate this point: “A particular chemical or nuclear reaction, for example, can be simulated on a computer even though, because of current physical limitations, it cannot be performed in the laboratory” (Oliver 1998, 120). 3 11 intend this as a suggestion for further thought, one that I find intriguing but too complex to take up in detail here. Reiner Schiirmann provides an argument that is somewhat similar. He notes that for Foucault, subjects are formed not only through relations of power imposed from outside the self, but also through the “interiorization” of those relations and self-imposition of them. He points out also that this “interiorized” subjection is also a “heteronomous” one. In other words, this self-subjection involves the interiorization of constraints that are produced by discourses and practices external to us: “To learn from the soft sciences who and what we are, and to recognize ourselves in their dicta, is to interiorize power in the form of knowledge” (Schiirmann 1985, 544). Schiirmann contrasts this heteronomous, interior subjection with the possibility of “outer, yet autonomous” self-formation that Foucault’s work also offers. By this he seems to mean a self-creation whereby subjects that are produced by and enclosed in particular relations of power (and that are therefore not modeled on “the decontextualized self of inwardness”) “constitute their subjectivities in the public sphere” (1985, 544, 545). A subject that is contextualized in this way, that is not a “worldless subject,” can create itself and thereby become autonomous “as it makes the possibilities its own which are held out in its narrow sphere of freedom . . .” (1985, 545). This means that we are not autonomous subjects because there is a part of us that is untouched by power relations, that is “worldless” and “decontextualized”; rather, autonomy is something we can achieve through the actions we take within the historical context in which we live and are defined: “A subject can make current figures of discourse and effects of power its own or combat them; it can or can not assume those subject functions” (1985, 543). Perhaps both the self and its autonomy are something “achieved.” This might indicate that agency, too, is something that does not precede our choices, but is achieved through them. Jon Simons makes this point briefly by invoking Nietzsche: “It is through artistic, creative activity that we experience ourselves as agents with power. Here . . . Foucault follows Nietzsche, for whom artistic activity exemplifies agency, thereby enabling us to experience autonomy and to enact our will to power” (Simons 1995, 77). In other words, perhaps we can become autonomous agents through the practice of self-creation. This is only a very rough sketch, however, and there remain a number of questions and problems to be worked out before an adequate justification could be provided for this suggestion. 32 Taking this warning to heart, there may be a danger in constant vigilance itself might it not result in something like a continual paranoia? Instead of an aesthetic subject m , then, one might become a paranoid subject. This would be more likely if the aesthetic subject m that I have been describing here were not an exile, but worked to avoid being subjected to any kind of identity whatsoever. I have argued that the aesthetic subject m works against some of the ways it is constituted by power, but only through relying on other aspects of its identity that are also so constituted. It does not attempt to exit the self that has been created for it by power entirely, but rather works to change some parts on the basis of others. It therefore distances itself from itself without making a clean break. Such a subject would seem less likely to become overly paranoid than one that attempted to negate all the ways it has been constructed through power, seeing them as oppressive and evil. The aesthetic subject m , on the other hand, can allow him/herself to rely on certain stable aspects of its identity in order to change others, recognizing that while these are “dangerous,” they are not to be avoided altogether. Still, the aesthetic subject m needs to remember that those aspects of itself that it keeps stable in order to change others are themselves contingent, and they could at some point become “poisonous” enough to call for resistance. S/he must be sure not to lapse into thinking that these are “natural” parts of the self, lest s/he no longer be able to recognize the ways in which these parts can be oppressive and are subject to change and resistance. This amount of “vigilance” may perhaps itself be “dangerous,” as it requires a fair amount of self-awareness and self-analysis. However, one could argue that this kind of vigilance is no worse than that which is required for self-awareness in any number of other important regards: e.g., feminists should arguably be vigilant and self-critical in order to be sure that the ways we think about and peak about “women” do not reproduce the kinds of oppressions we are hoping to resist. Perhaps the vigilance of the aesthetic subject m does not require much more self-examination and analysis than does committed feminism. 33 While I do not claim to speak here for the “burning need” of the dandy to create him/herself as a work of art, according to Baudelaire, we might say that the aesthetic subject m described here experiences a compulsion to change certain parts of itself due to the “poison” s/he finds therein. In other words, we may feel compelled to create ourselves differently once we find that some of the ways in which we have been constituted by power are, we feel, too oppressive or constraining. 34 Using the example cited above, if I (as a woman in a twentieth century Western democracy) resist relations of power that would constrain my reproductive freedom by appeal to the notion of my “right of privacy,” I am locating an idea within the present that I find powerful and meaningful, and using it to try to change other aspects of the present. But I can do so by realizing that this “right of privacy” is itself historically developed and contingent, and by using it I am appealing to something in the present as present and not as timeless and absolute. I am arguing here that the aesthetic subject m is more likely to do this than the desiring subject, since I have described the former as a subject well aware of the contingency of the ways it has been created by power (including its belief in notions such as the “right to privacy”). 35 Of course, this issue of the care of the self was developed by Foucault late in his life, and had he lived longer he may have been able to say more about this link between the private and the public and why/how he thinks the aesthetic subject might contribute to political change. 36 Recall that the most effective resistance occurs, I have argued, when one does not attempt to exit entirely the power relations being resisted but rather searches within them for ways to respond that can work to produce change. One therefore distances oneself from particular power relations by working to change them, while remaining tied to them by bringing this change about from within. Conclusion Foucault’s political role as an intellectual is that of an exile. He works to encourage transformation of the current “regime of truth,” but does so from a distanced position within it. As a genealogist, Foucault works to change the present by imagining it differently while yet remaining within it. He takes on the “modern attitude” wherein “the high value of the present is indissociable from a desperate eagerness to imagine it, to imagine it otherwise than it is, and to transform it not by destroying it but by grasping it in what it is” (Foucault 1997 d, 117). In his genealogies Foucault focuses on particular truths, knowledges, discourses, practices, etc., that are significant here and now due to their current “fragility.” He begins with issues that, he claims, are already being questioned at the present time. He then makes them “more fragile” by telling a story of their past, revealing them to be historically and contingently developed. In performing such an “ontology of the present,” however, Foucault remains very much tied to present concerns, values, and even truths. He undertakes his historical, genealogical analyses from the perspective of the present, viewing them through the lens of the current regime of truth with its dominant truths, knowledges, values, etc. I have argued that this is a crucial aspect of a rhetorical strategy that may allow him to encourage others to question their usual ways of thinking without being directly told by Foucault the intellectual to do so. In his political role as an intellectual, Foucault works through and underneath the present, grasping it in “what it is” in order to imagine it differently. He thereby exiles himself from the present and its regime of truth, maintaining a critical distance from it for the purpose of transforming it, while yet remaining intimately linked with it. Foucault criticizes the Marxist intellectuals of his day due to their “universal” character. He argues that the “universal” intellectual position is a holdover from a “faded Marxism” (Foucault 1980 g, 126), and that Marxist intellectuals take up a “universal” role in regard to their views of truth, power, and subjectivity. They believe themselves to be the bearers of universal truths and values, often arguing for the “scientificity” of Marxism and thereby establishing a claim to dominance over other discourses. They act as prophets, Foucault argues, saying “this is what must be done” (where what must be done is what adheres to the Communist Party’s agenda), and acting as “the intermediary that transmits the intellectual, moral, and political imperatives of which the party can make direct use” (Foucault 1996 b, 262). In regard to power, according to Foucault the Marxists attempt to formulate a “metaphysics of power with a capital P,” attributing to it a universal, unitary structure in all its various manifestations (Foucault 1996 b, 258). This Power is epitomized in the structure of the state, where the state is thought to function as “the source or point of confluence of power” and its workings can therefore “be invoked to account for all the apparatuses in which power is organised” (Foucault 1980 c, 188). As a result, Marxist attempts at “revolution,” which are aimed only at state power, may leave untouched the multiple and heterogeneous power relations that do not depend on the state and its use of power. Finally, Foucault argues that the Marxist view of subjectivity attributes to it a unity and a “truth” that class struggle will eventually work to free from repression. Marxists ignore the ways in which subjectivity is produced by power, according to Foucault, insisting that “changing people’s consciousnesses” will change their social conditions when what needs to be done instead is to address “the political, economic, institutional regime of the production of truth” of which consciousness is a product (Foucault 1980 g, 133). Foucault does not, however, respond to the Marxist intellectuals by taking up a position of pure opposition against their intellectual role. Instead, in regard to the issues of truth, power and subjectivity Foucault exiles himself from the “universal” position he criticizes in Marxists. In so doing, Foucault plays the role of an intellectual exile as described by Edward Said. Said presents four characteristics of the intellectual exile. First, the exile lives in a median state of “inbetweenness,” not “at home” either in the place s/he has left nor in any new one. S/he is “beset with half-involvements and half-detachments,” the ties to what s/he has left behind keeping him/her from becoming fully involved in something new (Said 1994, 49). I have argued that Foucault exhibits movements of exile in regard to truth, power, and subjectivity. He works to question and unsettle some claims to universal truth on the basis of others that he holds stable, recognizing all the while that the latter can themselves be subject to question. In addition, in his genealogies Foucault questions particular truth and value claims by moving through them to tell a story of their past from the perspective of the present thereby managing to unsettle such notions from a position within them, and encouraging others to engage in a similar kind of “half-involvement” and “half-detachment” with the truths and values they had previously accepted uncritically. I have argued that rather than encouraging others to reject their habitual ways of thinking entirely, through his rhetorical strategy Foucault may be able to bring about a questioning of them from within a questioning of particular truth and value claims that may be undertaken even on the basis of those very claims themselves (since we may not have devised alternative ways of thinking yet, and may have to question old ways through a kind of immanent critique). In this way, Foucault’s audience may manage to distance themselves from previous modes of thought without exiting them altogether, remaining “half-involved” with them. In regard to power, Foucault takes on the character of the exile by arguing that while power relations are übiquitous and “dangerous,” they are not necessarily “bad”; and they therefore do not call for complete elimination. The key to our “real freedom” is not to try to exit all power relations entirely, but rather to practice resistance to them from within: Foucault suggests that the most effective resistance works by taking up possibilities for action that are opened up by power relations themselves, choosing those actions that can manage to transform the relations of power being resisted. Attempting to resist by opposing power relations from the “outside” is to take up action that still works from within and in support of the power relations themselves rather than promoting change in them. Effective resistance works by exhibiting a “half-involvement” with the relations of power being resisted, and a “half-detachment” rather than a complete one. Foucault also exiles himself from his own use of power as an intellectual, using the authority attached to this social position to encourage others to follow his movements of exile in his genealogies. As I have described his rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile,” Foucault utilizes his status as an “agent” of the current regime of truth, a “prophet” of universal truth, in order to get his audience (who may still be enmeshed in this regime) to take him seriously enough to question their previous habits of thought on the basis of his genealogical analyses of them. In order to elicit responses from his readers based on their usual modes of thought, Foucault writes as if he, too, is enmeshed in the current regime of truth and shares its truth and value claims. He writes his genealogical histories from the perspective of the present, bringing to mind in others particular ways of thinking that are currently dominant. Yet Foucault also distances himself from his assumed status as an intellectual “prophet,” revealing through his genealogical histories that he does not uncritically hold to those truths and values to which he appeals as a seeming “agent” of the regime of truth. By telling a story of their history, Foucault not only encourages his audience to question the modes of thought he worked to elicit; he also shows that he himself was acting as a “double agent” he both appeals to and questions dominant modes of thought. If his rhetorical strategy is successful, Foucault’s audience may end up with “half-involvements” and “half-detachments” not only in regard to their previous ways of thinking, but also to their relationship to Foucault as an intellectual “prophet.” They may begin to question the “call to prophetism” they had directed towards him (though they may not give it up altogether, since this questioning would have been brought about by following him as an intellectual authority). Foucault’s audience may manage an exile from him by looking to him as a “prophet” whose pronouncements must not be taken without question. Finally, Foucault exhibits movements of exile in regard to subjectivity. The “aesthetic subject” outlined in his discussion of the “arts of existence” is one that creates itself without exiting entirely the ways in which it has been produced by and limited by relations of power. I have argued that the aesthetic subject, updated from ancient Greece to function under the current regime of truth, works from within the ways it has been shaped by power by recognizing this identity and its limits as contingent and therefore mutable. This subject manages to transform itself by taking on models it finds already existing around it, noting that none of these is necessarily tied to it and each can be altered or rejected later. That the aesthetic subject is able to engage in this process of re-creating the self for Foucault indicates that subjectivity is not always entirely dominated and directed by the relations of power that produce it. Foucault insists that relations of power always leave room for resistance, and I have argued that the aesthetic subject may be able to resist some of the ways it has been produced by power from within those very limits. Following Jana Sawicki’s suggestion, if we recall that relations of power are multiple, particular, and heterogeneous, we can think of the subject produced by them as also multiple and heterogeneous, as a “fragmented” subject. We can then say that the aesthetic subject, recognizing that the ways it has been produced and limited by relations of power are each contingent, can choose to alter some on the basis of others. In other words, the aesthetic subject does not decide to re-create itself in a vacuum, as it were, choosing to do so on the basis of nothing; rather, it works to transform itself for reasons that appeal to other aspects of itself already in place and produced by power. In this way, the aesthetic subject exhibits “halfinvolvements” and “half-detachments” with itself and with the ways it has been produced and limited by particular, heterogeneous relations of power. The second characteristic of intellectual exile as described by Said is closely tied to the first: the life and work of the intellectual exile are characterized by “restlessness, movement, constantly being unsettled, and unsettling others” (Said 1994, 53). Foucault emphasizes how he writes so as to transform himself and others, and claims that this is “the intellectual’s reason for being” (Foucault 1996c,461). He shows no qualms about changing directions in his research, arguing that his texts are “philosophical fragments” that take place “between unfinished abutments and lines of dots” (Foucault 1996 i, 275). Being constantly ready to change because one is not sure where one is headed is a characteristic trait of the Foucauldian intellectual: I dream of the intellectual destroyer of evidence and universalities, the one who . . . incessantly displaces himself, doesn’t know exactly where he is heading nor what he’ll think tomorrow because he is too attentive to the present.... (Foucault 1996 d, 225) Foucault, and the Foucauldian intellectual, exhibit the restlessness of the exile because they are focused on the present and working to change the present; they are concerned more with how their work can encourage change than with its value as truth or its ability to be unified into a coherent whole. If they have to change tactics in order to bring about a “transformative experience” in others, they are more than willing to do so. Foucault is constantly unsettled because he undertakes his genealogical work in response to what is already showing signs of fragility in the present, and this is continually changing. In addition, he adapts his genealogies so as to elicit particular responses from readers in the current regime of truth, responses that he also attempts to bring them to question. This means that his texts are useful during a limited time; and if the conditions of his audience change, if their ways of thinking change, he will have to change the way he writes his texts as well. Jon Simons notes that “Foucault’s writings do not express the enduring truth,” that “(h]e wants them to serve ‘as an instrument, a tactic’ and to be like ‘Molotov cocktails’, but also ‘like fireworks, to be carbonized after use’” (Simons 1995, 93). 1 The Foucauldian intellectual then moves on to find new tactics for unsettling him/herself and others. According to Said the intellectual exile also has a “double perspective,” enabling him/her to view things from the perspective of “what has been left behind” by the exile as well as from where s/he is “here and now” (Said 1994, 60). For the Foucauldian intellectual, this means having the ability to see both from the perspective of the current regime of truth from which s/he has exiled him/herself, and from that of the distanced position within it that s/he has taken up. For Foucault as well as Said, the intellectual exile “tend[s] to see things not simply as they are, but as they have come to be that way” (Said 1994, 60). The Foucauldian intellectual as genealogist distances him/herself from the current regime of truth in part by telling a story of part of its history, by reaching through it towards its past. One of the consequences of this “double perspective” is that the Foucauldian intellectual exhibits aspects of both perspectives, speaking through a position in the present in order to speak also from the point of view of someone who is distanced enough from it to present a story of how it came to be. This can lead to confusion for commentators, who may expect the intellectual to hold to a single, unified view, either “for” or “against” that from which the intellectual is exiled. We can see this in the views of some of the critics I have considered here. Charles Taylor argues that Foucault attempts (unsuccessfully) to reject notions of truth and liberation altogether; Michael Walzer argues that Foucault exhibits an anarchism by trying to escape all relations of power; and Linda Alcoff contends that Foucault works to eliminate the notion of the subject as an autonomous agent. In each of these cases, I have argued, commentators focus too much on the distance Foucault maintains from such notions and ignore the ways in which he is still tied to them. Foucault questions, and encourages others to question, claims to universal truth, efforts at achieving freedom through liberation, relations of “disciplinary” and “normalizing” power, and the notion of a free, autonomous, subjective agency. But at the same time he continues to use and to point to the potential benefits of such notions. 2 Nancy Fraser follows Foucault’s movements on both sides in regard to liberal, Enlightenment norms: she argues that Foucault utilizes the “liberal framework” that he also rejects “as simply an instrument of domination,” and that he is therefore “caught in an outright contradiction” (Fraser 1989 a, 30). But I have shown that we can consider Foucault’s “double perspective” as a strategic movement of exile rather than evidence of confusion and contradiction. It is indeed possible to manage to remain within a discourse, a society, a regime of truth while also distancing oneself from it by questioning it without an attempt at exit. Finally, Said characterizes the condition of intellectual exile as one of freedom. The intellectual exile, as a marginal figure, has the chance to engage in “a process of discovery in which you do things according to your own pattern, as various interests seize your attention, and as the particular goal you set yourself dictates” (Said 1994, 62). Such a “condition of marginality,” Said notes, “frees you from having always to proceed with caution, afraid to overturn the applecart, anxious about upsetting other members of the same corporation” (1994, 63). This freedom is the upside of the intellectual exile’s “restlessness,” his/her inability to be “at home” anywhere. Though Said recognizes that of course “[n]o one is ever free of attachments and sentiments” (1994, 63), the intellectual who takes on the character of the exile can be relatively less attached than many other members of the current society and its regime of truth. According to Said s/he can have “the audacity of daring,” of “moving on,” of “not standing still” because s/he has left behind many of her ties to the current system of truth and power and its “centralizing authorities” (1994, 64, 63). Having foregone the conventional trappings of success and prestige, the intellectual exile may be in a good position to criticize the current regime of truth without risking too much in the process. His/her career may afford a good deal of “academic freedom” to say and do as his/her conscience dictates. We have seen how Foucault’s own work exhibits this daring in his criticisms of the “disciplinary” society, the movements of “sexual liberation,” the mechanisms of “confession,” etc. Though Foucault does not emphasize the freedom of his own position and the “audacity of daring” it allows, he does focus on how the intellectual can work to encourage the practice of freedom on the part of others through their own exile. Our “real freedom” consists in a continual resistance to power relations we find “poisonous,” and such resistance best takes place from a position of exile within those power relations themselves. Having loosened some of our ties to these relations of power, as resisting exiles we can exercise freedom by trying to bend them in new directions, transforming them with our actions. We can dare to “upset the applecart” if we deem it necessary. Such exile, the distance that allows for this audacity, is made possible in part by the realization that the relations of power within which we live are contingent and alterable; and therefore, if we find these relations intolerable we recognize that something can be done. This exile of those who would resist can be facilitated by the intellectual “prophet in exile” through the kind of rhetorical strategy Foucault employs in his genealogies. Foucault is right to point out, however, that the decision whether or not to resist, what to resist, and how must be made by those involved in the particular power relations to be resisted. While exile and marginality can provide a great degree of freedom, it can also be quite dangerous one can risk losing one’s job, friends and family, even one’s life. The choice as to whether or not the freedom of exile is worth the price must be made on one’s own. Foucault therefore emphasizes how he leaves others free to decide what, if anything, to do as a result of his efforts to “make things more fragile” and thereby reveal the possibility that they may be resisted. Yet I have argued that leaving others free to decide what must be done is best undertaken itself through a process of exile. Rather than refusing altogether to provide alternatives or solutions (as Foucault sometimes does), the intellectual would do better to offer solutions while distancing him/herself from them, encouraging others to question them. Otherwise, s/he can end up simply playing the prophet on the negative side of the universal solutions s/he hopes to avoid by opposing prophecy altogether, the intellectual simply ends up repeating it on the other side. S/he may end up indicating by his/her silence that there is, universally and absolutely, nothing to be done; or, like Foucault, s/he may work hard to tell others what they ought to think and do in regard to the intellectual’s own work, e.g., that they must quit looking to him/her for solutions, that what they think are solutions in the intellectuals work are not indeed so, etc. I have endeavored to provide a detailed account of Foucault’s political intellectual, considering both what Foucault says directly about the political role of intellectuals, as well as what he himself does in his genealogical work. I have located therein a movement of exile that is important for several reasons. First, paying close attention to the exile character of Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual can help resolve some of the problems critics have raised against Foucault’s work, including his views on truth, power, and subjectivity. I have argued that Foucault exhibited great concern with his own political role as an intellectual, considering carefully how his texts may affect others, and hoping to induce a “transformative experience” through his genealogical writing. Accordingly, in analyzing and criticizing his views we must take into account how his role as an intellectual affects what he says and how he says it he may have written or spoken in the ways he did as part of a certain rhetorical strategy, designed to elicit a particular kind of response from his audience. Thinking about this possibility may allow us to realize that if at times Foucault speaks like a “universal” intellectual, an “agent” of the current regime of truth, this may be part of an overall strategy through which he is attempting to distance himself from this role without exiting it altogether. In addition, we can consider that when he seems to be moving to the “outside” of the current system of truth and power, negating or opposing it entirely, perhaps we are focusing on his attempts at distancing and not recognizing how in the process he remains connected to that from which he is stepping-away. Or, perhaps in his moments of strict opposition, Foucault may be experiencing the impossible dream of the exile to break off completely the ties that continue to bind one to what has been left behind. Edward Said expresses this longing when he laments that for the exile, a “surgically clean separation” from “your place of origin” can seem better than remaining connected to it, “because then at least you could have the consolation of knowing that what you have left behind is, in a sense, unthinkable and completely irrecoverable” (Said 1994, 48). But for Foucault it is not, in part because his role as an intellectual involves inducing others to think and act for themselves about how the present regime of truth should be changed; and this means that he must play the role of the intellectual prophet for the purpose of first getting others to listen to him and then backing off, encouraging them to question his prophecy and to begin to develop their own alternatives to relations of power they find problematic. Yet at the same time, Foucault may become impatient for change, hoping for a “surgically clean separation” from the current regime of truth, wishing for permanent residence in a new place. I have argued that for the intellectual who hopes to encourage lasting change in the present system of truth and power, the negation of attempting to reach an impossible “outside” is not ultimately the best strategy, given its tendency to uphold the present system by mirroring it in the opposite direction. Recognizing the exile character of Foucault and the Foucauldian intellectual is also important because it provides a fruitful model for the intellectual who is concerned with his/her position in the regime of truth and the political effects his/her work can have as a result. The rhetorical strategy of “writing in exile” as a genealogist may be able to allow intellectuals to reduce the “call to prophetism” and encourage others to resist in their own ways relations of power they find oppressive. It may allow the intellectual to lead others into their own exile exile from relations of power they would like to resist, so that they can manage an effective resistance from a distanced position within these relations; and exile from the intellectual him/herself as a “universal” prophet to which they must turn for answers. Still, I do not mean to argue that Foucauldian genealogy is the only way for intellectuals to act as “prophets in exile.” Foucault’s rhetorical strategy is an intriguing one, and could be taken up by those intellectuals who hope to “make things more fragile” by revealing their historical contingency and, consequently, their mutability. There may, however, be other ways that intellectuals can operate from a distanced position within the current regime of truth, can exile themselves from it in order to help bring about a change from within. I wish here to emphasize the general notion of the intellectual as exile from the present, to show how it may offer more beneficial political effects than attempts at exit, at managing a “surgically clean” break. It is important to keep in mind, however, that this is an intellectual role that is specifically suited to the current regime of truth - given the intellectual’s position as its “agent” and “prophet,” acting as such while also stepping back from this role and encouraging others to question it is a strategy that may work well here and now, but may be useless or counterproductive under other circumstances. This notion of the intellectual as exile is not without its problems, however. The intellectual who attempts to take up such a role is faced with a number of difficulties stemming from the fact that its success depends greatly on the response of his/her audience. I have noted that for Foucault’s strategy of “writing in exile” to work as described here, it seems necessary that his audience take him seriously (at first) as a prophet who has a grasp of universal truths and who therefore ought to be followed; only then will they be likely to follow him through his movements of exile and be thereby induced to question their previous ways of thinking and his own role as a prophet. But one’s audience will not always respond in the ways necessary for one’s political role to work as one hopes. Some of Foucault’s readers may receive him as a prophet, but a “false” one they may treat him as someone who speaks what he thinks are universal truths, but who has gotten it “wrong.” Such readers will not be likely to engage in self-exile on the basis of reading Foucault’s genealogical texts, since they will not take his claims seriously enough to experience a need to question their habitual modes of thought on the basis of these claims. Other members of Foucault’s audience may not treat him as a prophet at all, believing that (on account of his distancing movements) he means to reject universal truths altogether and to encourage others to do the same. Such readers may not end up exiling themselves from their usual ways of thinking; rather, they may try to reject them entirely in a gesture of nihilism. This, I have argued, is neither the most fruitful way to try to transform the current system of truth and power, nor is it necessarily the goal of Foucault’s own intellectual efforts. These and other undesirable reactions on the part of the intellectual exile’s audience are certainly possible, even likely; and misreadings and mischaracterizations of his/her work are bound to result. How ought the intellectual to deal with such responses on the part of his/her audience? Foucault expresses concern about the ways his work has been misinterpreted, and while he insists that “there are all manner of possible readings” of a text, and that he doesn’t see “any major inconvenience if a book, being read, is read in different ways,” he does still seem to try at times to give the law to his readers as to how his books ought to be read (Foucault 1996 a, 453). He insists, among other things, that he only raises problems, that he does not and will not provide solutions to them, and that he does not act as a prophet by telling others what they must think or do. I have argued that such statements may be an attempt to counter interpretations of Foucault’s work that paint him as a prophet simpliciter, as someone who keeps faith with universal truth. I have also pointed out that such statements are not only inaccurate (since, as a number of critics have argued, Foucault does at times appear to offer solutions), they are potentially counterproductive. As a “prophet in exile,” Foucault does and certainly can legitimately offer solutions and tell others what to think and do, as long as he also distances himself from such prescriptions and thereby encourages others to question them. By insisting on such negations of prophecy, Foucault ends up placing himself on its opposing side, making negative pronouncements with as much universal force as if he were speaking positive, universal truths. He can appear thereby a prophet of the negative, a universal nay-sayer whose efforts will not ultimately be effective in producing lasting change in the regime of truth. Foucault may have tried to exert too much control over the responses of his audience, telling them what they must think and do by insisting that he is not doing so and they must not think of him as if he were. Another difficulty the intellectual may face in taking up the role of an exile is that s/he may be part of a relatively small group of intellectuals who are doing so. This can pose problems, for even if I, as an intellectual, work hard to accomplish movements of exile in my work in order to encourage others to question their old ways of thinking, there may be many other intellectuals to which my audience can turn in order to find the prophet they seek when I begin to distance myself from this role. In other words, just because one or several intellectuals act as “prophets in exile” and thereby hope to reduce the “call to prophetism,” there are likely to be many other intellectuals who gladly respond to the call without making the effort to encourage others to question it. This may be another situation where it could be tempting to lay down the law to one’s audience as to how they are to respond, not only to one’s own work, but also to that of other intellectuals. This poses problems similar to those just mentioned in regard to Foucault’s negative prophecies. The best solution seems to be for the intellectual to recognize that his/her political role will not always produce the desired results, that by its very nature it is a precarious venture that, in focusing on promoting the freedom of others, will have to leave them the freedom to respond in their own ways. Intellectuals are in a good position to help encourage others to exile themselves from particular relations of power in the current regime of truth, because they are often already exiles themselves. Intellectual work is certainly tied to present systems of truth and power, as Foucault has shown, since it is often understood as aiming towards and sometimes achieving the status of universal truth. Yet given the definition of “intellectuals” I set out at the beginning of this investigation, they are to an important degree also removed from the current regime of truth. Recall that in using the term “intellectuals” I am restricting this category in part to “those whose occupations involve the elaboration and dissemination of ideas” (Wright 1978, 192): those who work to develop and change current conceptions and ways of thinking rather than simply transmitting accepted ones. Intellectuals are those who work in the “realm of ideas” because they are not content to put existing ideas into practice but aspire instead to change and develop them. In that sense intellectuals are already distanced from the present system of truth and power, have already taken a step away from it to view it with a critical eye and work towards changing at least certain aspects of it. I have argued that the most effective way to encourage transformation in the current regime of truth is to maintain the restless position of exile, to manage the instability of living “in-between” between being a loyal supporter of the current regime, and being a force of purely negative opposition. Intellectuals can maintain this unstable position by taking a critical step back from particular aspects of the present regime of truth while still remaining tied to it. Such ties can be maintained in various ways, including continuing to operate with this regime’s dominant structures of truth and power such as universities and other research institutions, certain media outlets, etc. Perhaps most intriguingly, however, the intellectual can remain connected to the present regime of truth by acting as its “agent,” by playing the role of the prophet, but also distancing him/herself from this role and thereby unsettling it. In some sense, Russell Jacoby may be wrong to say that “[f]ew American intellectuals live in exile.” If intellectuals are those individuals who work to elaborate and disseminate ideas, then to a certain degree they are already exiled from certain ways of thinking: rather than simply transmitting accepted ideas, they have taken a step back from these in order to view them critically and with an eye towards change. Yet many American intellectuals still remain connected to much of the dominant regime of truth, in several ways. They may be tied to institutions charged with producing truth, such as universities; they may be viewed by “the public” as “agents” of this regime, held to possess universal truths; they may have to transmit received truths and discourses through their teaching under pressure from administrators, etc. They could also, however, choose to operate as exiles through their research, writing, and lectures by finding ways to act as “prophets in exile” - as intellectuals who take on the role of universal “agents” of the regime of truth for the purpose of encouraging others to question this regime and the intellectual’s position within it as a prophet. In so doing, they might be able to appease, to some degree at least, Jacoby’s worries that intellectuals are straying too far from “the public,” holing themselves up in their “insular societies” far away from the practical realm of public social and political concerns. By acting as “prophets in exile,” American (and other) intellectuals would place careful focus on how their work is received by audiences, and what kinds of political effects it can have in the process. They would be concerned to encourage others to question and rework old habits of thought and even their conceptions of self, for the purpose of creating these anew in their own ways. Exile need not be, as Edward Said puts it, “one of the saddest fates” (Said 1994, 47). Rather, the ties that bind the intellectual to his/her present can also bind him/her to “the public” and their political concerns, and the distance the intellectual manages from these can inspire political resistance and change. In this way, the intellectual’s exile can be an important source of freedom. 1 Simons quotes Foucault here (Foucault 1985, 14). that Foucault does not reject all claims to universal truth nor all relations of power in a gesture of nihilism and/or anarchism, that he seems to acknowledge the possible benefits of efforts at liberation as long as their dangers are also noted, and that we need not think of him as rejecting entirely the notion of subjective agency - especially since it seems useful in regard to encouraging others to create themselves as works of art. I return to this last point briefly below. Works Cited: Foucault Foucault, Michel. [For Foucault citations, the dates of original publication are in brackets following citation dates. Usually these dates refer to publication in French. Dates in italics within the brackets, where applicable, specify when an interview or lecture was originally conducted (if different from original publication date, and if known).] 1972 a [1969]. 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Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 194-228. 1980 c [1977]. “The History of Sexuality.” Interview by Lucette Finas. Trans. Leo Marshall. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 183-193. 1980 d [1976]. “The Politics of Health in the Eighteenth Century.” Trans. Colin Gordon. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 166-182. 1980 e [1977]. “Power and Strategies.” Interview by the Editorial Collective of Les revoltes logiques. Trans. Colin Gordon. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 134-145. 1980 f [1975]. “Prison Talk.” Interview by J.-J. Brochier. Trans. Colin Gordon. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 37-54. 1980 g [1977, 1976]. “Truth and Power.” Interview by Alessandro Fontana and Pasquale Pasquino. Trans. Colin Gordon. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 109-133. 1980 h [1977 (published in Italian translation, not published in French), 1976]. “Two Lectures.” Trans. Kate Soper. In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Patheon Books, pp. 78-108). 1982 [1981, 1980]. “Sexuality and Solitude.” In Humanities in Review, ed. David Rieff. New York: Cambridge University Press, 3-21. This is the text of a lecture given in 1980 at the New York Institute for the Humanities and first published in The London Review of Books (May 21-June 3, 1981), 3, 5-6. 1983 a [1983]. “On the Genealogy of Ethics: An Overview of Work in Progress.” Interview by Hubert Dreyfus and Paul Rabinow. 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