Independent Study

Foucault described the transition from sovereignty to biopower in a short summary: we have moved from ‘let live and make die’ to ‘make live and let die.’ It seems that, at an accelerating rate, contemporary biopolitical (post-biopolitical?) power ‘lets live and lets die.’ I would like to examine what might be called a ‘anti-disciplinary’ form of power which seems different from sovereign and biopolitical power. In particular, I am interested in the following questions:

Is Foucault himself somewhat to blame for this transition? In other words, in what ways has a discourse critical of biopower encouraged this transition to anti-disciplinary society? For instance, we know that a discourse critical of sovereign power provided an opening for biopower’s emergence.

What are the effects of this new form of power on subjects — in what ways has the withdrawal of power’s interest in discipline and capacitation affected subjects, and in particular, the ways in which subjects think of themselves, their relation to the state, and others?

Is this assumption that power is no longer interested in discipline and capacitation even correct? Does the pandemic counter this narrative in any way? Do post-colonial discourses have anything to say to the contrary? How is this narrative complicated by biopower?

Does ‘resistance’ make sense if power is now letting live and letting die? Clearly anti-disciplinary society is problematic, but what does ‘resistance’ to an uninterested power mean?

potential texts

Postscript on the Societies of Control, Gilles Deleuze. Byung-Chul Han. Paul Virilio. Beyond the Periphery of the Skin, Silvia Federici. Foucault, Gilles Deleuze. Cruel Optimism, Lauren Berlant. What Should We Do with Our Brain?, Catherine Malabou. Bodies and Pleasures, Ladelle McWhorter. On the Postcolony, Achille Mbembe. Autopoiesis and Cognition, Maturana and Varela. Forget Foucault, Baudrillard.

potential films

Safe (1995). First Reformed (2018). The Adjuster (1991).

objects of interest

medically assisted dying

for profit online pill services

therapy discourse

self-care

deinstitutionalization

anti-psychiatry

harm-reduction

safe supply

ephemera