What Foucault Calls `` Bio Power `` Essay - 1546 Words

What Foucault calls â€Å"Bio-power†, an institutional power of the life and death of the human species, a long-term result of the 17th century Cartesian mechanization of nature, could be considered dangerous. The question today is: is having power of manipulation, life, and death dangerous? Should someone have the power to be able to give, extend, or end a life? Is it overall helping or harming humanity? The subject of bio power, or the idea of someone having the power to control another, has been around since the stone age. The ability to â€Å"control† or manipulate someone has always been a possibility. In the stone age, the more strong, wise, and powerful caveman controlled the younger, weaker caveman. Today, our bosses, coaches, and professors have the ability to â€Å"control† us. It all seems to relate back to social anarchy, and who is on top of the â€Å"popularity ladder†. The word or expression â€Å"Bio power†, however was coined by Michel Foucault, a French scholar, historian, and social theorist in the late 1960’s. Foucault was interested in the regime of power he saw rising, which he termed â€Å"bio-power† or the power that governments and institutions exercised over man. Foucault took interest in the objectification of a human subject, and how knowledge became power, specifically the idea of how it could be used for the wro ng reasons. For example, how scientists and doctors have to the power of life and death in the palm of their hands. To fertilize, or sterilize a human being, toShow MoreRelatedState Of Exception As A Paradigm Of Government862 Words   |  4 Pagespolitical crises appear only to be understood on political and not juridical grounds. What is little recognized is that law possesses within itself an exception that traps humans and objects within the juridical order. 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ThroughoutRead MoreMichel Foucault: Power and Identity Essay1990 Words   |  8 PagesIntroduction Michel Foucault and Erving Goffman’s work was centralised around there two different concepts of how your identity is formed through the process of power and expert knowledge. This Essay will discuss the ideas of Michel Foucault who was a French Social Theorist. His theories addressed the relationship between power and knowledge and how both of these are used as a form of social control through society. The essay will look at Foucault’s work in The Body and Sexuality, Madness and CivilisationRead MoreA Reflection On Public Administration Essay5906 Words   |  24 PagesPosttraditional Public Administration Since the linguistic turn, sparked in the late 1960s by such theorists as Jacques Lacan and Michel Foucault, interesting normative and methodological challenges for the policy sciences have emerged. 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