Governmentality
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Governmentality was a concept developed by French philosopher Michel Foucault in the later years of his life, roughly between 1979 and his death in 1984, particularly in his lectures at the Collège de France during this time.
Definition of governmentality
Foucault sees government as a general technical form which encompasses everything from one's self-control to the control of populations. Correspondingly, he feels that the important thing in the political arena is to encourage the cultivation of the appropriate governmentality by politicians. For Foucault, this concept replaces his earlier concept of power-knowledge.
Governmentality refers to a historically specific economy of power. It refers to societies where power is de-centered and its members play an active role in their own selfgovernance. Because of its active role, individuals need to be regulated from 'inside'. Society is based on different institutional domains (family, school, prison,...), and each domain has its own logic. A particular form of governance applies to each domain, and a certain knowledge of subjects is produced. The knowledge produced allows to govern how individuals will behave in certain contexts from inside the subject, from the subject itself.
History of the term
The concept of governmentality segues from Foucault's ethical thoughts during this time. In the second and third volumes of The History of Sexuality, namely, The Use of Pleasure (1984) and The Care of the Self (1984), and in work on Technologies of the Self (1982), he began to distinguish between subjectivation and forms of subjectification by exploring how selves were fashioned and then lived in ways which were both heteronomously and autonomously determined. Also in a series of lectures and articles, including The Birth of Biopolitics (1979), Omnes et Singulatim: Towards a Criticism of Political Reason (1979), The Subject and Power (1982) and What is Enlightenment? (1984), he posed questions about the nature of contemporary social orders, the conceptualization of power, human freedom and the limits, possibilities and sources of human actions. His best known formulation of these issues is his lecture entitled Governmentality (1978).
References
- Foucault, Michel (1978) `Governmentality', trans. Rosi Braidotti and revised by Colin Gordon, in Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon and Peter Miller (eds) The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, pp. 87-104. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1991.
- Foucault, Michel (1982) `Technologies of the Self', in Luther H. Martin, Huck Gutman and Patrick H. Hutton (eds) Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault, pp. 16-49. Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1988.
- Foucault, Michel (1984) The History of Sexuality Vol. 2: The Use of Pleasure, trans. Robert Hurley. New York: Random House, 1985.
- Foucault, Michel (1984) The History of Sexuality Vol. 3: The Care of the Self, trans. Robert Hurley. New York: Vintage Books, 1988.de:Gouvernementalität