What you're calling 'agency' is a relation of power. This notion of
free-will is deeply problematic, as it suggests a) a voluntarism and b) the
possession of a capacity for action. Foucault is interested in power not as
a possession, but as a strategy, i.e. he is interested in the way power
functions in terms of facticity and not ability. Equally he speaks of power,
not will to power (Nietzsche).
His understanding of power must be thought ontologically, as an
investigation of the conditions of possibility. Instead of resistance being
understood as freedom, or emancipation from power, it is better thought of
as empowerment. It is for this reason that Foucault talks of relationships
of power, of tactics and strategies, of power as a game, with ordered rules
and exchanges. The existence of power depends on points of resistance, which
are therefore necessarily everywhere there is power. This is why there is no
single focus for resistance, just as there is not a single focus for power.
The freedom that is a necessary condition for relations of power is
therefore the very thing that allows the possibility of resistance. Freedom
is of a more fundamental level than resistance; it is what allows it, it is
its ontological condition. Freedom is the ontological condition for ethics
(Dits et ecrits IV, 712; Foucault Live 435). Because Foucault is talking of
power and not domination; because by power he means relations or strategies
of power; and because power requires the subjects to be free, the problem of
freewill is misconceived: if we understand what Foucault means by power then
there cannot not be the potential for resistance.
If you understand this, then the question of self-construction is not nearly
so problematic.
Stuart
free-will is deeply problematic, as it suggests a) a voluntarism and b) the
possession of a capacity for action. Foucault is interested in power not as
a possession, but as a strategy, i.e. he is interested in the way power
functions in terms of facticity and not ability. Equally he speaks of power,
not will to power (Nietzsche).
His understanding of power must be thought ontologically, as an
investigation of the conditions of possibility. Instead of resistance being
understood as freedom, or emancipation from power, it is better thought of
as empowerment. It is for this reason that Foucault talks of relationships
of power, of tactics and strategies, of power as a game, with ordered rules
and exchanges. The existence of power depends on points of resistance, which
are therefore necessarily everywhere there is power. This is why there is no
single focus for resistance, just as there is not a single focus for power.
The freedom that is a necessary condition for relations of power is
therefore the very thing that allows the possibility of resistance. Freedom
is of a more fundamental level than resistance; it is what allows it, it is
its ontological condition. Freedom is the ontological condition for ethics
(Dits et ecrits IV, 712; Foucault Live 435). Because Foucault is talking of
power and not domination; because by power he means relations or strategies
of power; and because power requires the subjects to be free, the problem of
freewill is misconceived: if we understand what Foucault means by power then
there cannot not be the potential for resistance.
If you understand this, then the question of self-construction is not nearly
so problematic.
Stuart