Hello everybody!
I got some sort of moral problems here.
In his last interview (printed in M.F. Politics, philosophy, culture.
1988), Foucault says: "That the search for a form of morality acceptable to
everybody in the sence that everyone should submit to it, strikes me as
catastrophic". (253-4)
The main question which strikes me here, is how can such an ethic be
applicable in modern societies without becoming elitistic? Foucault refers
to "the question of style in antiquity - stylization of the relation to
oneself, style of conduct, stylization of the relation to others". (244)
This 'Style of Existence' resembles the kind of ethics Nietzsche formulated
for the kind of being which should overcome modern man. To me, this is a
kind of ethics which is unaccessible for human beings already shaped by the
techniques of morality imposed on them through a culture in which they
'always-already' exists.
Foucault never mentioned some "übermensch" that should surpass us, and
this could imply that his kind of aesthetical ethics should be applicable
for us today. I'm aware of that Foucault never had the time to end his
ethical inquiries which he started in 'The use of pleasure' and 'The care
of the self'', but it seems to me that he schetches up an ethics which
emphasizes a conduct where the individual takes control over, and
experiments with, his own subjectivization. But I still wonder how this
'self-constitution of the subject' can overcome the moral 'life-world' we
already live in? I just can't accept a solution where Foucault's ethics is
reduced to som 'pseudo-psychological self-development program' for people
or groups who can't cope with society's normalized kind of conduct!
ML
I got some sort of moral problems here.
In his last interview (printed in M.F. Politics, philosophy, culture.
1988), Foucault says: "That the search for a form of morality acceptable to
everybody in the sence that everyone should submit to it, strikes me as
catastrophic". (253-4)
The main question which strikes me here, is how can such an ethic be
applicable in modern societies without becoming elitistic? Foucault refers
to "the question of style in antiquity - stylization of the relation to
oneself, style of conduct, stylization of the relation to others". (244)
This 'Style of Existence' resembles the kind of ethics Nietzsche formulated
for the kind of being which should overcome modern man. To me, this is a
kind of ethics which is unaccessible for human beings already shaped by the
techniques of morality imposed on them through a culture in which they
'always-already' exists.
Foucault never mentioned some "übermensch" that should surpass us, and
this could imply that his kind of aesthetical ethics should be applicable
for us today. I'm aware of that Foucault never had the time to end his
ethical inquiries which he started in 'The use of pleasure' and 'The care
of the self'', but it seems to me that he schetches up an ethics which
emphasizes a conduct where the individual takes control over, and
experiments with, his own subjectivization. But I still wonder how this
'self-constitution of the subject' can overcome the moral 'life-world' we
already live in? I just can't accept a solution where Foucault's ethics is
reduced to som 'pseudo-psychological self-development program' for people
or groups who can't cope with society's normalized kind of conduct!
ML