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).