Introduction: Exploring the Intersection of Power, Care, and Subjectivity
Two of the most influential philosophers of the 20th century, Heidegger and Foucault, offer us profound insights into power, self, and being. Foucault provides a genealogical account of power, showing how the self is turned into subjects, which acts as a blueprint allowing individuals to navigate the terrain of subjugation. Conversely, Heidegger delves into the nature of being, guiding us from inauthentic to authentic existence so we no longer view ourselves as mere objects. Both philosophers aim to give an account of freedom through the notion of “Care.” In Heidegger, Care is a property of Dasein that interacts with the world. In Foucault, Care is a form of extraordinary discipline that people impose on themselves to transcend their “everydayness.” First, I’ll map out the Foucauldian subject through the chapter in “Discipline and Punish” called “Docile Bodies”; then I’ll compare that to the notion of care in Heideggerian terms. After presenting these two accounts, a theoretical convergence can take place.
Foucault: The Care of the Docile
Foucault examines the normalizing processes by which power subjugates humans and the self into the subject in the chapter “Docile Bodies” in “Discipline and Punish.” He provides an extreme example of the Docile Body relatable to our daily lives: the soldier. To become a soldier, a person must undergo rigorous training to engrave the essence of soldiering into their body. Foucault writes, “A body is docile that may be subjected, used, transformed, and improved.” A docile body is like clay, constantly molded by power. The subjugators found they could control others by focusing on individuals, using subtle coercion to exert power over the active body. They moved from controlling linguistic functions to controlling moods and emotions, achieving efficiency of movement and internal control. Lastly, the coercion was constant and uninterrupted, ensuring control over both body and mind.
Foucault defines discipline as the meticulous control of the operations of the body, which assures the constant subjection of its forces and imposes upon them a relation of docility-utility. Discipline is used to dominate people. Foucault clarifies that this form of subjugation is different from slavery, which operates through the appropriation of the body. Discipline, instead, is based on utility and usefulness to the subjugator.
Foucault believes that “discipline is a political anatomy of detail,” a concept he further explores in “The Use of Pleasure” and “The Care of the Self.” Within the normalizing networks of power, there is a possibility for intentional creativity, bringing forth new ways of self-cultivation. These new modes of subjectivation lead to a self-violating process that opens new spaces for self-knowledge. Understanding the power structures of society allows one to theorize about them and bring about change in the relationship between the self and the society that governs it.
Heidegger: The Care of Dasein
According to Heidegger, Dasein is Care. Ontically speaking, Dasein protects, repairs, and considers things in the world in relation to the self and others. Given the decaying nature of all things, Care is an alertness to death. Care is not a project Dasein takes on but rather a fundamental aspect of its being. Dasein constantly moves towards greater possibilities of self-altering and self-becoming, always ahead of itself.
The Care nature of Dasein replaces the Cartesian subject as substance with qualities, as Dasein is a constant source of becoming through interaction with the world (the clearing or Lichtung). Reflecting on Dasein, and thinking of Dasein as Care, the thinking “Self” becomes another “Self.” This constant reflection differentiates from traditional Cartesian meditation, where the thinking subject is separated from the object and thus does not interact or change.
Care involves three dimensions: Thrownness, projection, and fallenness. Fallenness means Dasein falls away from its authentic potential to an inauthentic state, manifested in idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity, which blinds Dasein to its full potential. Heidegger describes this process:
“In utilizing public means of transport and in making use of information services such as the newspaper, every Other is like the next. This Being-with-one-another dissolves one’s own Dasein completely into a kind of Being of ‘the Others’, in such a way, indeed, that the Others, as distinguishable and explicit, vanish more and more. In this inconspicuousness and unascertainability, the real dictatorship of the ‘they’ is unfolded. We take pleasure and enjoy ourselves as they take pleasure; we read, see, and judge about literature and art as they see and judge; likewise, we shrink back from the ‘great mass’ as they shrink back; we find ‘shocking’ what they find shocking. The ‘they’, which is nothing definite, and which all are, though not as the sum, prescribes the kind of Being of everydayness.”
Convergence: The Subjectivating Power of the They
It is through the previous quote that I combine Foucault’s and Heidegger’s respective theories. Initially, Foucault’s rejection of subjectivity as a primary analytic category and Heidegger’s focus on Dasein as phenomenology might seem opposed. However, a careful reading reveals similarities in their conceptualizations of care and freedom. Both philosophers discuss normalization and the pursuit of freedom. Rather than separating their theories, we can see them as complementary. Heidegger explains the normalizing force of the “they,” and Foucault shows that this force can be a tool for self-actualization and freedom. Through the care of the self and self-cultivation, like the ancient Greek shoemaker, constant practice becomes a form of newfound creativity and freedom. For Heidegger, this leads to authenticity; for Foucault, authentic existence is viable within subjugation.
Both philosophers emphasize the need to constantly question one’s relationship with the world. For Foucault, this is askesis, and for Heidegger, philosophy is a transformative exercise. They warn against the dangers of centralized ideas of history, philosophy, and dogma. Philosophy, for them, means constantly navigating a vast ocean of conservatism, abandoning stasis, and essential identity…in the end, to become constantly queer.
References
- Foucault, M., & Rabinow, P. (1984). The Foucault Reader. New York: Pantheon Books.
- Heidegger, M., Macquarrie, J., & Robinson, E. (2008). Being and Time. New York: HarperPerennial/Modern Thought.
- McWhorter, L. (1999). Bodies and Pleasures. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press.