Starting with Foucault: An Introduction to Genealogy, Second Edition

Making f ubjeca38, Foucault 1979:23.39, Foucault I979:194,40, Foucault 1979: 194,41, My aim here is expository rather tl~an critical, but anc objection needs ta benoted because it helps to c1arif.y- the foregoing discussion. Et may he argued that thecarceral system deals with ongoing realities rather than producing anything, andthat the only novelty is better recognition and description of chose realities. It maybe claimed that the shift from the juridical to the carceral system was a progessivemove to more effective treatment of what was already there, not a shift to greatercontrol enabled by the creation of new subjects and categories. This objection captureswhat is at issue bemee1-r totalizirzg and effective history, The objection turnson postulating certain givens or "essences" &at the penal system now deals withmore effectively in virtue of acclamulrrted experience and better rlzeories, The objectionarticulates the fundamental difference between genealogy and what it opposesand its real force has to do with the cogency of genealaglcal claims and why weshould deem them superior to what they oppose.42. Foucault 1979:18,43. Foucault 1979:29.44. Foucault 1979:217,45, Foucault 1979:25.46. The most common contemporary interpretation is that power serves patriarchalcontrol,47. This is also what makes DiscipEi~e and I2%n&h a philosophical rather than anhistorical or sc;.ciotogical work.48. Foucault 1983a:221,49. This is the most fundamental reason why it is so wrong to interpret Foucauldlanpower as covert domination,SQ. Dreyhs and Rabinsw 19&3:187,51. ""Agent" must be understood here to include individuals, groups, institutions,and the state,52. Foucault 1980a:95,53, Foucault 1980a:93.54, Fo~lcaulr 1983a:219-20.55, Foucault 1983a:21%20.36. Foucauit 1"380a:534, What Fuucautt means by "nonsubjective" is that powerhas no point of view, as dues power in the ~rdir~a~y sense when it is used by an individualor group.57, Foucault I 980a:95.58, If the interpretation is more sophisticated, it will include reference to Foucault'sown inteljectual history and I~ow he was to develop the idea of Capital-PPower through adoption of Nietzsche's '%ill to power" and reinterpretation ofMarxism. XI the interpretation is still more saphisdcaeed, Foucault's Capital-PPower-producing reinterpretation is taken to be not crf Marxian but of struccuratistunderlying determinants,59, Korty 1989:63.60. Mola 1994:21--24,61, Fo~lcaulr 1988b:43,