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University Osnabrück
MICHEL FOUCAULT
THE HISTORY OF SEXUALITY
RIGHT OF DEATH AND POWER OVER LIFE.
MARIANNE LEUBNER
PAULINA MÉNDEZ
JUNE, 2013
Outline
1. Introduction to Michel Foucault His Life
2. The History of Sexuality Context in which it was written
3. Right of death and power over life. (Analysis of power according Foucault)
Sovereign power
Foucault’s great transformation
Bio power (Anatomo politics of the human body and the bio-politics of the human body)
Bio power and Sexuality
Some examples
4. Discussion questions
1. Introduction to Michel Foucault
Born Paul-Michel Foucault in Poitiers, France on
October 15, 1926.
Foucault’s father was a surgeon who hoped
Michel would follow in his footsteps
Known for his critical studies of various social
institutions, including medicine, education,
psychiatry and his work on the history of
sexuality
Influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche, Immanuel
Kant and Georges Dumézil.
He died of an AIDS-related illness on June 16,
1984; the 1st high profile French personality to
be reported as an AIDS victim.
1926 - 1984
His life
2. The History of SexualityContext
1939-45 World War II
1961 Construction of the Berlin Wall
1964 Vietman War
1968 May 68. Protest in France
The History of Sexuality, originally slated to be a six-volume project, was
never fully published due to restrictions within its estate.
3. Right of death and power over life.
Great
transformation
Sovereign power(territory)
Power over death
XVI
Sword XVII
Power over life
Discipline power
(individuals)
InstitutionsXVIII
Power over life
Bio power(population)
NormBio politics
Symbolics of blood
Analytics of sexuality
Sovereign power. The right to take “life” or let live
Sovereign power involves obedience to the law of
the king or central authority figure. It was conditioned by the defense of the sovereign,
and his own survival. Its symbol, after all, was the sword.
Foucault’s Great Transformation
“One might say that the ancient right to take life or let live was
replaced by a power to foster life or disallow it to the point of
death… The setting up, in the course of the classical age, of this
great bipolar technology– anatomic and biological, individualizing
and specifying, directed toward the performances of the body…
characterized a power whose highest function was perhaps no longer
to kill, but to invest life through and through” (193-94).
shift in the right of death power that exerts a positive influence on life subjecting it to administer, regulate, optimize, control
Discipline power
Politicisation of the body
Direct power of the state to the individual
Anatomic politics of the human body
Bio-power
"an explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugations of bodies and the control of populations" (p. 140)
Bio-politics:
health policy
security
relationship between resources and inhabitants
circulation of wealth
Great
transformation
Sovereign power(territory)
Power over death
XVI
Sword XVII
Power over life
Discipline power
(individuals)
InstitutionsXVIII
Power over life
Bio power(population)
NormBio politics
Symbolics of blood
Analytics of sexuality
Example warshift towards the whole population:right to kill those who represented a kind of “biological danger” to others“Wars are no longer waged in the name of a sovereign who must be defended; they are waged in behalf of the existence of everyone; entire populations are mobilized for the purpose of wholesale slaughter in the name of life necessity: massacres have become vital.” p. 137
Example death penalty “How could power exercise its highest prerogatives by putting people to death, when its main role was to ensure, sustain and multiply life, to put this life in order?” p. 138
“Sex as a political issue”
Sex was a means of access both to the life of the body and the life of the species.
Instead of saying that sex is repressed by power, he points out that the combination of power, knowledge and pleasure constructs the social existence of sex.
He uses historical analysis to show how the power apparatuses penetrate into society and individual and how power will of knowledge encourage people to practice and speak out sex.
Foucault highlights 4 lines of attack that the politics of sex play upon: The sexualization of children
The hysterization of women
The solidity of the family institution
The safeguarding of society
Some examples in the world.
Do you agree with Foucault’s assessment that our society is based on bio-power?
Based on Foucault’s writing, what issues does our society currently face that may be seen as threats to the current nation state based on bio-power?
Do you think that the “liberation” which is promoted by the system is real or just another kind of repression?
References• http://www.michel-foucault.com/• Foucault, Michel. 1976 The History of Sexuality. Paris• Lazzarato, Maurizio. 2006. Del Biopoder a la Biopolítica. • Petra Gehring: "Was ist Biomacht? Vom zweifelhaften Mehrwert
des Lebens"; Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2006.• Volker Gerhardt: "Selbstbestimmung in der Biopolitik"; in:
Vorgänge 175 (2006).
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