On Sun, 17 May 1998, Larry Chappell wrote:
> Maybe the question is not markets vs. non-markets, but rather what
> sort of markets (or other power dispersions) allow best for the
> cultivation of resistances and subjugated knowledges.
I don't think it really makes sense to talk about an arrangement of "power
dispersions" which allows for "cultivation of resistances and subjugated
knowledges": that which is cultivated is not subjugated and can't be a
resistance, no? And the opposite of whatever is cultivated is
subjugated: "after all, is it not perhaps the case that these fragments
of genealogies are no sooner brought to light, that the particular
elements of the knowledge that one seeks to disinter are no sooner
accredited and put into circulation, than they run the risk of
recodification, recolonization?" (Foucault, "Two Lectures").
Of course, I've snipped the word "best" from Larry Chappel's post; I'm not
sure how much difference that makes (which isn't to say I don't think it
makes a difference; I'm really not sure). Any arrangement of power
relations involves resistances; any deployment of power/knowledge implies
subjugated knowledges counter to it. I'm not sure whether, on Foucault's
terms, it is possible to say that one arrangement allows for more
resistances or is friendlier (while not being on the whole friendly) to
subjugated knowledges than another.
On the other hand, in "Sexual Choice, Sexual Act", Foucault writes: "the
important question ... is ... whether the system of constraints in which
society functions leaves individuals the liberty to transform the system."
I don't quite know what to make of that; it seems to me that, on
Foucault's terms, the possibility of transforming the system always
exists--indeed, any system of power relations implies its own
possibilities for resistance and transformation.
Again, these are things I'm very unsure about; I'd be glad to hear what
others think.
----Matthew A. King------Department of Philosophy------McMaster University----
"The border is often narrow between a permanent temptation to commit
suicide and the birth of a certain form of political consciousness."
-----------------------------(Michel Foucault)--------------------------------