Foucault's neoliberal ideology

Foucault's analysis of neoliberalism in The Birth of Biopolitics has had a considerable influence on the way that it is currently regarded. Nevertheless, his analysis is beset by numerous metatheoretical and methodological problems, which cause him to badly frame the phenomenon empirically. One expression of these problems is Foucault's willingness to accept at face value the way that neoliberalism's leading theorists portray it. Yet, over the past 40 years, what neoliberal theorists have said about neoliberalism has sharply deviated from its actual practices, which suggests that neoliberalism is an ideology, but because Foucault rejects the concept of ideology, his framework cannot entertain this possibility. Those who critique neoliberalism on the basis of his analysis, even when in opposition to Foucault's own inclinations, generally start from his uncritical assumptions and therefore often undercut the very purposes for which they put him to use. One such example is Wendy Brown, whose own influential Undoing the Demos demonstrates this inclination.     

论福柯性道德观中的虚无主义

福柯打着“我控诉”的战斗口号,否定一切善恶与人道主义;宣传各种离经叛道的思想和令人生畏的观点;认为人世间没有一个必须遵守的道德罗盘。围绕“生死爱欲、抒情内核、生命顶点和肉体黑箱”,通过同性恋、施虐／受虐性行为,及至可怖的艾滋病的“极限体验”来认识扑朔迷离的性本性,发现未曾感受过的性快感;向陈旧腐朽的道德观、性爱观挑战;以将传统观念中各种“邪恶的”性行为变得可以接受;推动性意识、性观念摆脱传统观念的制约,通过性话语转向性科学。     

权力与革命:福柯的1968

法国1968年5月运动给予福柯行动的机会和思索的资源。他以这次运动为对象和参照,进一步完善了自己的权力理论和革命理论,回应了人们对“新哲学家”和“新政治”的呼唤。福柯以微观权力为对象,分析了现代社会的规训机制,试图以此探讨现代社会的反抗策略。对于革命,福柯始终怀有极大的热忱,但他在1968年5月运动中的行动表明,福柯在本质上是一个新的无政府主义者。     

Aesthetic Licence: Foucault's Modernism and Kant's Post-modernism

Recently criticism and theory have maintained that Kant's aesthetic theory is central to modernism, and have used Foucault's archaeology to interrogate that modernism. This paper suggests that archaeology ultimately cannot escape Kant's hold because it depends on Kantian theses. The first section will consider how a recent exponent of an 'archaeological' viewpoint characterizes Kant's theory and will set out the critical role Kant ascribes to art. The second section compares Kant and Foucault to argue that despite appearances their projects turn out to be substantially coterminal. My interest in comparing these critics is not only to be provocative but also to show that post-modernist thinking, at least in the guise of Foucault, needs and uses standards that Kant proposes.     

Foucault's Genealogy and Teaching Multiculturalism as a Subversive Activity

It is being argued, in this article, that multicultural education is subversive because it challenges the assumed inevitability and superiority of the dominant culture by presenting alterna-tives to it. For multicultural education to be subversive, however, culture has to be understood as an order of things mapped across truth and power axis à la Foucault. These order of things are sup-pressed by the dominant culture in order to maintain its hegemony. It is being further argued that with the help of Foucault's genealogy we can understand how multicultural education can liberate subjugated order of things.