Foucault and the Critique of the Liberal Theory of Sovereignty

Abstract

In this paper I attempt to analyze Foucault’s critique of Hobbes’ theory of sovereignty as articulated in his lectures at the College de France. In these lectures Foucault aims to show that the liberal theories of sovereignty are “economical,” in that they discuss the problem of the establishment of political power on the model of “free exchanges.” According to Foucault, this would presuppose the existence of a substance, or essence of power, which clearly contradicts the notion that the origin of the “strategic” and the “relational” interpretation of power must be sought in Hobbes. In order to deny Hobbes’ the paternity of the idea that “politics means continuing war by other means,” Foucault shows that it is compatible with neither Boulainvilliers’ interpretation of history as a “war of the races” nor Nietzsche’s belief in the agnostic nature of knowledge. As a matter of fact, Hobbes’ interest was to pacify history, which requires freezing over all relations based on force. Foucault’s evidence is that Hobbes reduces the notion of sovereignty by acquisition to the notion of sovereignty by contract. I try to show that the opposite interpretation is equally valid, namely that, given that the sovereign would still be left in the “state of nature,” contractual sovereignty can be regarded as the sovereign’s “acquisition” of his subjects. The exercise of sovereignty in its traditional sense would thus assume the shape of a constant struggle against human nature, which can be disciplined but never improved upon. Paradoxically, this interpretation is even more “Foucauldian” than Foucault’s, but the problems it uncovers are of Foucault’s own making.

Keywords

• Foucault
• Hobbes
• sovereignty
• power
• social contract theory
• acquisition