Les origines d’un projet critique et la question du néolibéralisme : Foucault, une philosophie aux frontières

Abstract

Does the 1979 lecture at the Collège de France reveal Michel Foucault as a “great opponent” of neoliberalism or as a philosopher attracted to this type of thought? This question illustrates the classification effort this author has always been the target of. This article proposes, however, to consider his work from a completely different point of view: rather than trying to insert it into fixed frames, it is on the borders –of different disciplines, currents or strategies– that such a thought takes place. By questioning, at first, a part of the current debate on the Foucauldian reading of neoliberalism, we will then focus on the different contexts in which the philosopher inserts his reflection on this theme. This will enable us to understand better the way his reflection was, at that time, built on the basis of a real critical project, and therefore to apprehend, in fine, the particularities of the theoretical horizon that frames Foucault’s analyses of neoliberalism.

Keywords

• Michel Foucault
• neoliberalism
• critical project
• biopolitics
• governmentality
• intellectual ethics