>
> Hi.
>
> Excuse, please, the abruptness with which i begin this post.
>
> Power is *not* is bad thing, and I don't think that Foucault ever claimed
> that it was. Power does not stand opposed to resistance, or to freedom,
> as the enemy against which one struggles. One doesn't struggle in order
> to escape *power* - one exercises power in order to escape domination. To
> say that power is bad is to identify power with the institutions or
> apparatuses that oppress one. It is to posit these factors as the
> "origin" of power - this is *precisely* what Foucault argues against - in
> the section on method in History of Sexuality, in interviews, etc. etc.
>
> Thus, when Foucault claims that there is no escaping power, he is not
> saying that any given struggle is doomed to failure. This is because no
> struggle is waged against power - struggle is waged *with* power. One
> uses the power available in a specific moment, one exercises power in
> one's own interests. And there's nothing wrong with this. To be perfectly
> bloodthirsty about it (and perfectly Foucauldian), one doesn't struggle
> in order to eliminate power: one struggles in order to exercise power
> over one's opposition. To quote: "the proletariat doesn't wage war with
> the bourgeoisie because it's just to do so. The proletariat wages war
> because it wants to win." (Okay, so I'm paraphrasing.)
>
> Power is not bad - it is precisely the fact that I don't have any power
> that's the problem. One struggles to seize power. Power is neither good
> nor bad.
>
> Another problem I have with the discussions of power I've read (and this
> is connected to my comments above) is that power is presented as this
> terrible and inexorably spreading force, slowly but surely unfolding
> itself over the great stage of Modernity. In "The Confession of the
> Flesh", Foucault argues that the metaphor of the "point progressively
> irradiating its surroundings" is *wrong* from his perspective. This
> monumentalizing representation of power, I think, has something to do
> with the different valences the word in English and in French. In its
> French usage (this is Spivak's point - not mine), there is nothing
> monumental or frightening about the word "pouvoir" (translated as power).
> Power is actually quite mundane and, to all appearances, quite
> unremarkable. "Pouvoir" has more of a valence of "ability" or
> "can-do-ness" - not "irresistable force". And, I think, it is precisely
> the mundaneness of power's normal, everyday exercise that Foucault was
> trying to problematize. Power is not spectacular - power is boring. And
> it precisely the fact that it is so unremarkable that makes it so
> effective.
>
> I just realized that what I've just said might be taken to contradict
> what I said earlier. But allow me to clarify: I'm using the term power
> here in two different senses, which is to say, I'm actually not talking
> about the "same" thing at all. In the first instance: power as "a mobile
> and shifting field of force relations" - in which both oppression and
> resistance are contained. In the second instance: power as what is
> exercised and has complex effects of domination. Power as neither good
> nor bad and power as bad.
>
> Oh. One more thing. Could we please stop using the term "human
> condition"? It reeks of Eurocentrism. (And, hence, of racism.)
>
> revolution now
> malcolm (malcolmt@xxxxxx)
>
>
i'm intrigued that my use of the phrase 'human condition' can be
construed as racist. To speak of the human condition is to speak of the
conditions of human beings in whatever circumstances individuals are found (be they white, african american, hispanic, etc.). I simply cannot, and will not
accept that the use of the term 'human' must mean white, western males. Such
an insistence that it does is to place such a term in perpetual stagnation,
to suggest that it must have one meaning, and that such meaning cannot be
transformed.
> Hi.
>
> Excuse, please, the abruptness with which i begin this post.
>
> Power is *not* is bad thing, and I don't think that Foucault ever claimed
> that it was. Power does not stand opposed to resistance, or to freedom,
> as the enemy against which one struggles. One doesn't struggle in order
> to escape *power* - one exercises power in order to escape domination. To
> say that power is bad is to identify power with the institutions or
> apparatuses that oppress one. It is to posit these factors as the
> "origin" of power - this is *precisely* what Foucault argues against - in
> the section on method in History of Sexuality, in interviews, etc. etc.
>
> Thus, when Foucault claims that there is no escaping power, he is not
> saying that any given struggle is doomed to failure. This is because no
> struggle is waged against power - struggle is waged *with* power. One
> uses the power available in a specific moment, one exercises power in
> one's own interests. And there's nothing wrong with this. To be perfectly
> bloodthirsty about it (and perfectly Foucauldian), one doesn't struggle
> in order to eliminate power: one struggles in order to exercise power
> over one's opposition. To quote: "the proletariat doesn't wage war with
> the bourgeoisie because it's just to do so. The proletariat wages war
> because it wants to win." (Okay, so I'm paraphrasing.)
>
> Power is not bad - it is precisely the fact that I don't have any power
> that's the problem. One struggles to seize power. Power is neither good
> nor bad.
>
> Another problem I have with the discussions of power I've read (and this
> is connected to my comments above) is that power is presented as this
> terrible and inexorably spreading force, slowly but surely unfolding
> itself over the great stage of Modernity. In "The Confession of the
> Flesh", Foucault argues that the metaphor of the "point progressively
> irradiating its surroundings" is *wrong* from his perspective. This
> monumentalizing representation of power, I think, has something to do
> with the different valences the word in English and in French. In its
> French usage (this is Spivak's point - not mine), there is nothing
> monumental or frightening about the word "pouvoir" (translated as power).
> Power is actually quite mundane and, to all appearances, quite
> unremarkable. "Pouvoir" has more of a valence of "ability" or
> "can-do-ness" - not "irresistable force". And, I think, it is precisely
> the mundaneness of power's normal, everyday exercise that Foucault was
> trying to problematize. Power is not spectacular - power is boring. And
> it precisely the fact that it is so unremarkable that makes it so
> effective.
>
> I just realized that what I've just said might be taken to contradict
> what I said earlier. But allow me to clarify: I'm using the term power
> here in two different senses, which is to say, I'm actually not talking
> about the "same" thing at all. In the first instance: power as "a mobile
> and shifting field of force relations" - in which both oppression and
> resistance are contained. In the second instance: power as what is
> exercised and has complex effects of domination. Power as neither good
> nor bad and power as bad.
>
> Oh. One more thing. Could we please stop using the term "human
> condition"? It reeks of Eurocentrism. (And, hence, of racism.)
>
> revolution now
> malcolm (malcolmt@xxxxxx)
>
>
i'm intrigued that my use of the phrase 'human condition' can be
construed as racist. To speak of the human condition is to speak of the
conditions of human beings in whatever circumstances individuals are found (be they white, african american, hispanic, etc.). I simply cannot, and will not
accept that the use of the term 'human' must mean white, western males. Such
an insistence that it does is to place such a term in perpetual stagnation,
to suggest that it must have one meaning, and that such meaning cannot be
transformed.