Periodic Reporting for period 1 - BSPC (Biopolitics, Sovereignty and Political Conflict)
Reporting period: 2022-09-01 to 2024-08-31
In the context of what Michel Foucault calls biopolitics, my research addresses the effects of a historical shift from the juridico-political idea of politics to the politics of life (e.g. health, fertility), from sovereignty to biopolitics. Specifically, I examine the questions concerning the foundations of biopolitics-sovereignty relation, resistance and political conflict. My general aim is to show that Jean-Luc Nancy’s idea of technology as an end unto itself provides the impetus for reconsidering the underpinnings of biopolitics.
The central question of the studies in biopolitics is the intertwinement of sovereign power with biopolitical power. Sovereign power is something negative – it extracts resources, coerces, prohibits, represses, commands, and puts to death; biopolitical power, in contrast, is something positive – it stimulates, enhances, regulates, normalizes, and optimizes the living conditions of individuals and populations. Much of recent research plays the creative, positive potentiality of life against the negative power of sovereignty. By way of contrast, my article draws upon Nancy’s idea of technology as an end unto itself to reconsider affirmatively the aporetic intertwinement of sovereign power and biopolitical power.
My second objective is to follow the efforts of contemporary political thinkers to think through the ideas of resistance to power mechanism. Philosophers from Foucault to Agamben usually formulate the idea of resistance to power mechanism on the plane of immanence, on the plane of power relations. Thus, they play potentiality against power, potentia against potestas, immanence against transcendence, constituent power against constituted power. To assess critically the biopolitical figures of resistance like Bartleby and multitude, I highlight and reformulate the importance of popular sovereignty.
The third objective is to offer a novel angle from which to consider the conditions of political conflict. This phase argues that antagonistic forces must be defined separately in relation to a third term, which actualizes a conflictual relation as such in the figures of transcendence like Machiavelli’s prince, Hegel’s monarch, Marx’s Lumpen. This third term stands for the symbolic non-transparency of conflictual opposition, e.g. between plebs and nobles, workers and capitalists. I further hypothesize that technics can be seen as having assumed the function of this third term.
The central question of the studies in biopolitics is the intertwinement of sovereign power with biopolitical power. Sovereign power is something negative – it extracts resources, coerces, prohibits, represses, commands, and puts to death; biopolitical power, in contrast, is something positive – it stimulates, enhances, regulates, normalizes, and optimizes the living conditions of individuals and populations. Much of recent research plays the creative, positive potentiality of life against the negative power of sovereignty. By way of contrast, my article draws upon Nancy’s idea of technology as an end unto itself to reconsider affirmatively the aporetic intertwinement of sovereign power and biopolitical power.
My second objective is to follow the efforts of contemporary political thinkers to think through the ideas of resistance to power mechanism. Philosophers from Foucault to Agamben usually formulate the idea of resistance to power mechanism on the plane of immanence, on the plane of power relations. Thus, they play potentiality against power, potentia against potestas, immanence against transcendence, constituent power against constituted power. To assess critically the biopolitical figures of resistance like Bartleby and multitude, I highlight and reformulate the importance of popular sovereignty.
The third objective is to offer a novel angle from which to consider the conditions of political conflict. This phase argues that antagonistic forces must be defined separately in relation to a third term, which actualizes a conflictual relation as such in the figures of transcendence like Machiavelli’s prince, Hegel’s monarch, Marx’s Lumpen. This third term stands for the symbolic non-transparency of conflictual opposition, e.g. between plebs and nobles, workers and capitalists. I further hypothesize that technics can be seen as having assumed the function of this third term.
The outgoing phase of my research was conducted at the Deakin University (Australia). The conducted research can be summarized in relation to the work packages.
Work Package 1: The Sovereignty-Biopolitics Knot: I examined Schmitt’s conception of state sovereignty and Foucault’s ethico-social notion notion of power in terms of dispositif. Through the comparison of Schmitt and Foucault's ideas, I outlined the aporetic intertwinement of sovereignty and biopolitics. Drawin upon Nancy’s ideas of technology and sovereignty, I articulate affirmatively the aporetic knot of sovereignty and biopolitics.
Work Package 2: Reviewing Resistance: I argue that the affirmative biopolitics consists of two gestures: the first, Foucauldian one, moves from the politico-metaphysical presupposition of a sovereign subject to the process of an infinite self-constitution and pluralization, and the second, Schmittian one, posits the finite subject of the nothing to interrupt the process of an endless self-constitution and pluralization.
The efforts to disseminate and communicate the action results to diverse audiences can be summarized thus:
3 Peer reviewed publications (2 under review, 1 accepted)
2 Popular publications
6 presentations in international conferences
1 Workshop presentation
Work Package 1: The Sovereignty-Biopolitics Knot: I examined Schmitt’s conception of state sovereignty and Foucault’s ethico-social notion notion of power in terms of dispositif. Through the comparison of Schmitt and Foucault's ideas, I outlined the aporetic intertwinement of sovereignty and biopolitics. Drawin upon Nancy’s ideas of technology and sovereignty, I articulate affirmatively the aporetic knot of sovereignty and biopolitics.
Work Package 2: Reviewing Resistance: I argue that the affirmative biopolitics consists of two gestures: the first, Foucauldian one, moves from the politico-metaphysical presupposition of a sovereign subject to the process of an infinite self-constitution and pluralization, and the second, Schmittian one, posits the finite subject of the nothing to interrupt the process of an endless self-constitution and pluralization.
The efforts to disseminate and communicate the action results to diverse audiences can be summarized thus:
3 Peer reviewed publications (2 under review, 1 accepted)
2 Popular publications
6 presentations in international conferences
1 Workshop presentation
The work done so far has advanced a critical perspective on the key issues and concepts of biopolitics. The results obtained go beyond the state of art in the following respects:
1. My research has shown that technology is the critical point of reference for understanding biopolitics, sovereignty, resistance, freedom and conflict.
2. By elaborating on the idea of technology as an end unto itself, I have contributed to the study on Jean-Luc Nancy's philosophy.
3. My affirmative articulation of sovereign power with biopolitical power takes issue with the biopolitical critiques of sovereignty after Foucault.
4. The positive account of sovereignty goes beyond the immanentist conceptions of resistance that seek to undo all forms of socio-political separation.
Additionally, I have published two popular articles in the Estonian cultural weekly “Sirp”: “Suveräänsus üleilmastumise loojakul” and “Vene-Ukraina soda ja suveräänsus.” The last article was published in the Finnish online journal Poliitikasta as “Russia-Ukraine War and Sovereignty.”
1. My research has shown that technology is the critical point of reference for understanding biopolitics, sovereignty, resistance, freedom and conflict.
2. By elaborating on the idea of technology as an end unto itself, I have contributed to the study on Jean-Luc Nancy's philosophy.
3. My affirmative articulation of sovereign power with biopolitical power takes issue with the biopolitical critiques of sovereignty after Foucault.
4. The positive account of sovereignty goes beyond the immanentist conceptions of resistance that seek to undo all forms of socio-political separation.
Additionally, I have published two popular articles in the Estonian cultural weekly “Sirp”: “Suveräänsus üleilmastumise loojakul” and “Vene-Ukraina soda ja suveräänsus.” The last article was published in the Finnish online journal Poliitikasta as “Russia-Ukraine War and Sovereignty.”