In the last class we were briefly introduced to Michel Foucault, a political philosopher, in his relation of freedom in a situation. I thought it might be interesting to view a political stance on the existential “situations” that Sartre poses.
First Sartre and Foucault ask different questions regarding one’s freedom. For Sartre, his ultimatum is exposed when he asks, “are we really un-free?” Sartre would respond that we are never without freedom, and your life is not determined. We are free in the sense that we have options, not that we have superhuman capabilities. Sartre’s humanistic approach to freedom contrasts with that of Michel Foucault, who seeks to prove that we are not free, and we are not really even a “subject” that can be considered free.
Foucault says that subjects are produced by means of the flow of power relations. This is particularly radical because he asserts that power is not an object that can be possessed, like physical strength. Rather, the connections through which power flows creates what we know as “subjects,” which are likely to use the power that shaped them in order to form more subjects. This is where I am still struggling with Foucault, because the individual cannot be considered without the notion of power. I feel this is at odds with nearly every philosopher we have studied in existentialism, because he seeks to deny the individual’s existence by saying we are essentialized by the power that produces us. It seems as if Foucault wants to focus on the external factors of human existence to define an individual’s situation, not the freedom of options like Sartre suggests.
Certainly, I can understand Foucault point in the example of the MTV show the Hills (which I haven’t personally seen, but this example oddly pops up in every Dr. Johnson class so far). The show has such an influence, or power, or the masses that it seeks to reproduce the same power relation within the individuals that watch. The show pushes a certain type of lifestyle, which apparently a lot of people accept or deem worthy. This is where the power has been reproduced: in the individual who try to imitate the aspects of the show.
It is difficult to compare Foucault to Sartre, because Michel simply denies any type of individual. There are no beings and objects; there are only things that are produces by power. The only response I can imagine is that Sartre would conclude that all of the networks of power and its reproduction are part of the facticity of a being’s life. Foucault does not want to grant the notion of the individual completely free of some influence, thereby essentializing the very existence of the “subject,” because it must be the result of the reproduction of power. So where is my ability to transcend? Is transcendence even a legitimate option in the network of power? Even if I am capable transcend, is it only because someone else reproduced a notion to transcend? It is hard for me to see where new ideas form in a network of power, if there are no subjects, then where would ideas not reproduced by power come from? I find all of Foucault’s notions very difficult to answer because of the ingrained notion of the individual separate of his surroundings and able to assert his own values which he show vehemently denies.