Foucault, Neoliberalism, and Beyond
Edited by Stephen W. Sawyer and Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins
London: Rowman & Littlefield International. Publication Date: Apr 2019
Few philosophers have garnered as much attention globally as Michel Foucault. But even within this wide reception, the consideration given to his relationship to neoliberalism has been noteworthy. However, the debate over this relationship has given rise to a great deal of polemics and confusion.
This volume brings together leading figures in the field to provide a reliable guide to one of the most controversial subjects in recent continental thought. It puts across the case for Foucault’s importance for post-colonial, race, queer and feminist studies, among other areas, and opens up his relationship to neoliberalism to offer a broader picture of tensions brewing within the left more generally.
Contents
Introduction: Stephen Sawyer and Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins
Chapter 1: Michael C. Behrent, Neoliberalism: The Highest Stage of Anti-Humanism?
Chapter 2: Serge Audier, Is Foucault a Good Guide for Understanding, Critiquing and Combatting Neoliberalism?
Chapter 3: Daniel Zamora, Finding a “Left Governmentality”: Foucault’s Last Decade
Chapter 4: Aner Barzilay, Rereading the Birth of Biopolitics in Light of Foucault’s Early Reading of Marx
Chapter 5: Dotan Leshem, Foucault, Genealogy, Critique
Chapter 6: Duncan Kelly, Michel Foucault on Phobie d’État and Neoliberalism
Chapter 7: Claudia Castiglioni, Foucault, Neoliberalism, and the Iranian Revolution
Chapter 8: Luca Paltrinieri, Neoliberal Selves: Human Capital Between Bourdieu and Foucault
Chapter 9: Judith Revel, Not Fostering Life, and Leaving to Die
Reviews
This volume dismantles any simple link between Foucault and neoliberalism, leaving us with parts for reassembly into politics of our own.
Quinn Slobodian, Associate Professor of History, Wellesley College
Foucault’s lectures on liberal and neoliberal governmentality at the end of the 1970s have provoked multiple controversies over the evolution of his thought and politics. This excellent collection of essays provides a wealth of historical detail and analysis that helps to situate these lectures in relation to their time and to the trajectory and sources of his thought. This book is indispensable for an informed appreciation of Foucault’s work during this period and its relation to a key moment in French and global history.
Paul Patton, Hongyi Chair Professor of Philosophy, Wuhan University
In recent political debate, the question of Michel Foucault’s notoriously ambiguous relationship to neoliberalism has become a cypher for all kinds of contemporary preoccupations on the left. But do we really know what Foucault was responding to? This volume performs the immensely valuable work of historicizing Foucault’s relationship to Marxism, neoliberalism and the so-called second left. Making no attempt to definitively resolve the question of Foucault’s political sympathies, the papers in this volume meticulously document the unique political challenges of the late 1970s and manage to be all the more illuminating about our contemporary predicament. This brilliant volume will transform the tenor of contemporary debate around Foucault, neoliberalism, and the revolutionary left.
Melinda Cooper, Associate Professor in the School of Social and Political Science, University of Sydney
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