We’ll put Michel Foucault (born 1926, Poitiers, France – died 1984, Paris, France) in conversation with Durkheim. You should start by reading James Faubion’s short biography of Foucault.

THE DISCIPLINARY SOCIETY

Foucault. 1975. Discipline and Punish. (pp. 3-31, 170-228)

Foucault analyzes the rise of the disciplinary society. He opens by detailing a rapid shift from the public execution (an exercise of sovereign power) to the penitentiary timetable (an exercise of disciplinary power). Where power was once exercised to amplify corporeal suffering, it is now used to suspend rights, impose obligations, and specify prohibitions. The executioner has been replaced by an army of technicians that includes psychologists, teachers, doctors, and other experts. Rather than terrorize and repress, disciplinary power aims to increase the docility and utility of bodies. Put simply, disciplinary power makes productive individuals. It does so by targeting the “soul,” that hard to see, but nevertheless real, patterning of thoughts, wills, and inclinations. Foucault argues that disciplinary power does this through three general mechanisms: hierarchical observation, normalizing judgement, and examination (the combination of hierarchical observation and normalizing judgement). This motivates his comparison of three cases: the plague (as an example of hierarchical observation), the leper (as an example of normalization, or at least exclusion), and the panopticon (as an example of examination). The latter is key. While we may not live in literal panopticons, Foucault argues that we live in a network of panopticon-like institutions that make up a disciplinary society. This leads to some important discussions of state, democracy, economy, and more.