Foucault’s Soul-Searching

In an indirectly Heideggerian fashion, Michel Foucault observes that technological

projects are unconsciously creating more problems than solutions. This is because
even though technology is a major hallmark of disciplinary society, it is still marked
by relations of sovereign power which continually hinders the advancements of
society.

Take for example the issue on population explosion which is growing by “leaps and
bounds”. Surely, there is a real threat here that we cannot walk away from it but due
to “politics” and “power plays”, any population policies are merely “progressively
sounding” but lacks the power to effect real changes because these “necessary”
changes are slowed down by said “power plays” or the interference of sovereign
power over disciplinary power. The reforms, therefore, may sound good,
reasonable, rational, but it is really here that Foucault pegs the issue or problem.

He said that many came in the “name of reform” but ended up a failure. This is
manifested in our many pedagogical systems put in place in our society that are
stifled by the so-called sovereign-power laden disciplinary society. The systems are
placed precisely to inculcate skills to the people so that eventually they can help
build the society. The problem here according to Foucault is sustained not only by a
pseudo social science but also by a market-driven educational system that turns
students into skilled individuals without hearts. In a way the society is building an
army of monsters more than citizens.

This pedagogical program therefore results into a parody, a mockery, which

obstructs true consensus building from the ground up which would facilitate the
establishment of an authentic progressive society. What we have instead are
pompous, self-centered individuals that are more of a liability than asset.

This Foucauldian “soul-searching” challenges us to get out of our comfort zones and
dare to engage the so-called danger zones of the real as embodied by the icon of the
penitentiary. We have become a people with “too much cake in the mouth” and we
cannot anymore recognize the true face of humanity because we are blinded by
many pseudo-scientific knowledge. This knowledge produces an individual filled
with social prejudices and traditional fears that go through life in a “musical chair
dance” fashion and inhibits the authentic dance of inclusion exemplified in the
Trinitarian life of God.

These biases engendered by superficial, heartless pedagogical institutions in reality

are creating more “prisons” because what they bring are more exclusion,
partitioning, grid-like mechanisms that oppresses the humane instead of liberating
it. The self-righteousness are so common-place that it pervades both social and
religious realms alike. Religious people easily and unconsciously manifest a
pharisaic mentality when dealing with “dangerous people” like the ones in the
prisons, those danger zones defined by disciplinary but heartless society. The grid
stratifies more than unifies and so progress is still an elusive dream.