Starting with Foucault: An Introduction to Genealogy, Second Edition

56 Making f ubjecabreakers. This perceprion was a readily visible aspect of a new management-orientedconception of human beings* This was a reconception thatenabled control of people thmugh reconfiguration of them as subiects,Rather than continuing to use violence and the threat of violence to forceconformit5 a way was seen to make individuals want to conform, evenneed to conform.The new conception of the subject has two separate aspects, The first isthat an individual is a subject in the sense of being szlbject to regulation byother individuals, institutittns, and the state.& The second aspect is that anindividual is a subject in the sense of mperiencilzg strbj?iectiviv, of beingaware, But being a subject in this second sense is not merely being aware orconscious. It illcludes having aims, desires, and-most important in thepresent context-a self-image or sense of who and what one is,5 ThroughoutFswadt's discussions of subjects and suhjectivitfi; particularly in his genealogicalworks, the notion of ""the subject" hinciudes both of these aspects,""Sbject" and ""subjecsivity" are used in ways that are deliberatelyambiguous between the subject as a member of a governed society and as aself-aware identityFoucault provides a welter of factual material in tracing the change fromharshly retributive to subject-defining punishment, This material is the substanceof the genealogical account of the develvpment of the prison and thereconception of its inmates, Unfortunately, the material tends to limit produetiveinterpretation of Discipline and Pu~ish. The reason is that its detailednature makes the book appear to be only a kind of contrary socishistoricalaccount of the development of the contemporary penal system,Foucault can be plausibly read as offering no more than an account thatchallenges the established one. He can be read as simply denying that thedevelopment of the penitentiary-based penal syslem was due to reform arisingfrom a. change in perception ol criminals as individuals awed a measureof humane consideration rather than as the disposable property of the sovereign.If read in this way, Foucatlk is taken as arguing that penalitychanged not because of a genuine humane regard for the criminals itprocesses, but because of vested interests operating covertly behind a maskof humaneness, This possible but limited interpretation distorts Foucault'snotion of power by attributing the changes in penality to concealed or conspiratorialagency This distortion is the beginning of the common hut erroneousview that Foucauldian power is covert domination. This easy butmistaken undmstanding of power is attraaive because it forestalls the needto master Foucault's difficult conception of power as impersonal. The misreadingof Difciplirte and Punish, then, precludes successful understandingof "Phe History 4Sexuality as well as degrades the genealogical analysis ofthe growth of the prison,The mass of material presented in Discipline and Pu~ish supports Fowcault"contention that the idea of a ""soul" was introduced into legal and