I don't know if you will find this relevant, but I think I've been working
along some similar lines of inquiry. My interest is in how techniques of
power are used to shape policy making in the field of urban and regional
planning, in particular how environmental issues often get 'overlooked' in
decision making. I believe that developing Foucualdian critique of policy
processes can be a starting point for resistance, by exposing the
distortions and appropriations of knowledge that occur, and perhaps pointing
to new approaches to policy making (and therefore theory) which are more
sensitive to power-knowledge. If this is of any interest, a discussion of
this area can be found in:
Richardson, T (1996) Foucualdian discourse: power and truth in urban and
regional policy making, European Planning Studies, Vol 4 No 3 pp279-292
Tim Richardson
Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research
Sheffield Hallam University
City Campus
Sheffield S1 1WB
Tel: 0114 253 4296
Fax: 0114 233 3229
E mail: t.k.richardson@xxxxxxxxx
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From: dfudge
To: foucault
Subject: Foucault and the Environment?
Date: 12 September 1996 03:25
Just wondering if anyone out there in the rather silent Foucault land knew
of any discussion of a Foucauldian approach to the environment. How about,
maybe a discussion of Nietzsche's writing on nature? I'm trying to think
how power/knowledge might specifically operate in environmental discourse.
I can understand how present environmental discourse might serve as a
quasi-scientific body of knowledge, but I'm wondering what space of
resistance exists for an environmental crisis which seems to be seen as
largely a by-product of capitalism and the fetishism of consumption. In
other words, I need help understanding how Foucault's analysis of power in
discursive formations can be utilized to understand environmental
destruction AND to orient people towards some alternative.
feel no harm...