Foucault viewed government as a code of conduct (Nadesan, 2008, p. 16).
Foucault defines governmentality as "the ensemble formed by the institutions, procedures, analyses and reflections, the calculations and tactics that allow the exercise of this very specific, albeit complex form of power, which has as its target population, as its principal form of knowledge political economy [the science of policing], and its essential technical means apparatuses of security" (qted. in Ericson and Haggerty, 1997, p. 94).
Nadesan (2008) understands governmentality "as a genealogy of liberal regimes of government" (p. 13) and states Foucault discussed mercantilism, laissez-faire governmentality, welfare-state, and neoliberalism. These produce three places of visibilty: the state, the market, and the population.
FOCUS OF Govenmentatliy
Nadesan (2008) reports that governmentalitiy moves outside institutions to look from the point of view of power and technology (p. 10).
SENSE OF SELF
There is no preconceived self outside of the social space: sexuality or mental illness don't exist outside of the spaces that frame/create/define them. This goes against liberalism which thinks of people as free agents that resist or agree to external forces (p.10). Everyday life is produced by an assemblage of social fields such as "the state, the market, and population" (p. 10); there is no a priori field of these things from the outside. All are part of this assemblage of flows.
ROLE OF STATE
Nadesan (2008) quotes Lemke's definition of governmnetality saying that it "conceives of the state as an instrument and effect of political strategies that define the external borders between the public and the private and the state and civil society" (Nadesan, 2008, p. 10).
Risk and Governmentality
According to Ericson Haggerty (1997), governmentality relates to risk technologies and practices which assist in self-governance of which biopower contributes.
Risk professionals help carry out governmentality because these individuals "make risk visible, rationalize them through processes of assessment and validation, and then offer them an interpretation in order to constitute and enforce standards" (p. 102). These individuals are looked to for guidance, especially due to the fact that risks only exist in the expert assertion that risks are real.
References:
Ericson, R. V., & Haggerty, K.D. (1997). The Risk Society. In R.V. Ericson & K.D. Haggerty (Eds.) Policing the risk society (pp. 81-130). U of Toronto: Toronto.
Nadesan, M.H. (2008). Governmentality, biopower, and everyday life. Florence, KY: Routledge.