Thursday, October 05, 2006
A thought: a potential difficulty?
F & W perhaps have different ways of seeing the same thing, especially in their respective conceptualisation of discipline as a modern expression of power. However, it is more than just a difference in the ‘level’ of their analysis perhaps? W saw the individual that existed disappear in the machine like organisation of discipline (eg in the factory or the army), whereas F sees that the ‘individual’ was artificially produced where s/he did not before exist (through knowledge, examination, analysis). This is quite a key tension, I think, and where they in some way diverge. I will have to see what implications this thought might have for the rest of my work. However they do agree that discipline has integrative effects too.
Self referential, but important
‘…the benefit of bringing the approaches of Weber and Foucault together is that we can develop a more rounded view that takes into account institutional settings whilst understanding the interrelations that circulate within institutions and across its boundaries…
…Political parties, it must be remembered, are specific sites of power’s operation that intersect and interact with other spheres, in the state, the economy and society more generally. By providing an arena for power’s operation, institutional practice can give shape to, or at least influence, the context of the relations which produce power. If institutions are crystallisations of a strategy of power relations, understanding the institutional context of power, and how relations within it operate with and against structures and rules, will surely reveal something of the nature of power itself.’ (from my second chapter, pp.23-24).
…Political parties, it must be remembered, are specific sites of power’s operation that intersect and interact with other spheres, in the state, the economy and society more generally. By providing an arena for power’s operation, institutional practice can give shape to, or at least influence, the context of the relations which produce power. If institutions are crystallisations of a strategy of power relations, understanding the institutional context of power, and how relations within it operate with and against structures and rules, will surely reveal something of the nature of power itself.’ (from my second chapter, pp.23-24).
Some contextual notes that won't mean anything to anybody except me (sorry)
Power contructing and constituting the individual in Foucault (though don’t get too mesmerised by this) – [point is relations of force that exist in the minutiae]
How things happen, rather than why – this is an historical perspective
Herkunft – what does Herkunft have to say about class and the development of parties out of organised communities?
Small small events and their effects (see my Ch. 2 p.8) – even things like drink, sleep, diet, misunderstandings etc can be important.
Enstehung – states of play, not final moments or culminations; continuations of violence via rules (these are not settlements – which, incidentally, is how I have up to now seen stable political regimes…)
History not a handmaiden to philosophy, and neither can it be made one to politics (see my Ch. 2, p.10).
Therefore I cannot examine the development of political parties in the context of the party as it looks now. It has to be as it is at each point, each crystallising moment.
NB - Some interesting parts in Panebianco’s preface to challenge.
Power is not held but it is produced & reproduced in relations – it operates through people and within institutions, although it does not actually reside in either. It produces strategic situations and individual subjectivities. It should not be understood in the terms of an institution, but once understood it can be used to analyse an institution (which is a strategy of power). [Q – what are the particular practices that emerge in political organisations…? That may also have spread & swarmed in some way? Or have spread from elsewhere… in fact probably from the places that F saw disciplinary power emerging from.]
Resistance is part of the process: pluralities, mobile and transitory
The tension between F & W is the level of analysis and this can be used creatively.
In particular F leads us away from the ‘negative’, prohibitive, juridical approach to power that is deep-rooted in the Western tradition and in Weber too. Power is in the latter’s work a restriction, a censor on human action. It is anti-productive.
How things happen, rather than why – this is an historical perspective
Herkunft – what does Herkunft have to say about class and the development of parties out of organised communities?
Small small events and their effects (see my Ch. 2 p.8) – even things like drink, sleep, diet, misunderstandings etc can be important.
Enstehung – states of play, not final moments or culminations; continuations of violence via rules (these are not settlements – which, incidentally, is how I have up to now seen stable political regimes…)
History not a handmaiden to philosophy, and neither can it be made one to politics (see my Ch. 2, p.10).
Therefore I cannot examine the development of political parties in the context of the party as it looks now. It has to be as it is at each point, each crystallising moment.
NB - Some interesting parts in Panebianco’s preface to challenge.
Power is not held but it is produced & reproduced in relations – it operates through people and within institutions, although it does not actually reside in either. It produces strategic situations and individual subjectivities. It should not be understood in the terms of an institution, but once understood it can be used to analyse an institution (which is a strategy of power). [Q – what are the particular practices that emerge in political organisations…? That may also have spread & swarmed in some way? Or have spread from elsewhere… in fact probably from the places that F saw disciplinary power emerging from.]
Resistance is part of the process: pluralities, mobile and transitory
The tension between F & W is the level of analysis and this can be used creatively.
In particular F leads us away from the ‘negative’, prohibitive, juridical approach to power that is deep-rooted in the Western tradition and in Weber too. Power is in the latter’s work a restriction, a censor on human action. It is anti-productive.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Mild Panic Sets In After A Procrastinating Summer
OK. I am getting worried now. Since I have started this blog, I seem to have done less and less actual work on the blimming thesis. A great deal of that is because I have spent much of the summer doing up my flat and working on a few songs (more of this another time) amongst other things. Now I have two weeks to get something presentable together to put before my supervisor. I have always needed the pressure of a deadline, but this is ridiculous!
This morning, then, I have set aside to plan how I can get where I need to be in such a short time. Thankfully, I have lots of notes which I wrote last year and then discarded from earlier chapters which will actually be useful for this one, plus the reading I have done in the last couple of months. What I lack at the moment is the creative hook on which to hang all of this and which supports the direction I had started to see for this work. Here goes...
This morning, then, I have set aside to plan how I can get where I need to be in such a short time. Thankfully, I have lots of notes which I wrote last year and then discarded from earlier chapters which will actually be useful for this one, plus the reading I have done in the last couple of months. What I lack at the moment is the creative hook on which to hang all of this and which supports the direction I had started to see for this work. Here goes...
Thursday, August 24, 2006
The Future of Literature....
In the meantime, I feel I need to tell someone that I have been getting an enormous amount of junk e-mail recently. Since there is no-one here but me right now, however, I will rattle on about it here where no-one will ever see it. I never used to get much of this stuff at all because it seemed I had some good filters set-up. I was puzzled about this sudden new development, blaming my service provider etc. Very soon, however, whilst weighing up the respective benefits of five cent shares in some five cent company, a £200,000 loan and 'improved squirting' (I kid you not), I discovered the phenomena of inserting random text from novels, stories and other sources into the e-mail to confuse the filtering system. Far from being annoyed, I now look forward to seeing what bizarre and wonderful gems I have along with my investment recommendations, viagra sales-pitches and various other suggested medical solutions to normal human sexuality. It may also have worrying consequences for the future of literature and the publishing industry (hurray!).
Rosabel Greene was the first I noticed, who confided in me that she had 'a premonition that some day I'll throw the teapot at him.' At who, she didn't say.
Shoufty Wasalty has been following a Burroughsian line: 'Jazz Goodbyes Saddest Falling Beast Been Misled Vous Oublie Pour Maimes Encore Think Twice Sais'. Hasn't anyone told him/her that the cut-up method is sooo twentieth century. Mind you, perhaps William B was just way ahead of his time... (this is not an attempt to start a discussion).
Nina MacDonald was telling a worryingly scatalogical story: 'He turned as he sat, and pulled a stool from under the caravan for Yvette. Come, would you like to go in the caravan, where nobody hears? Yvette knew that the old woman was telling a cool, barefaced lie.' Strange that one of the protagonists seems to change gender half way through. Is this about a meeting between Mark Oaten in drag with an elderly Pre-op Transexual?
Susie Berreira has interesting theory about the human impact of monetary policy: 'On the contrary' she says (contrary to what, I am not sure) 'appearance, voice, and manner combined to give an impression of calmness and poise. This was chiefly due to foreign exchange difficulties.'
Loyd is a man after my own heart: 'My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.' he says. He should patent those eyes.
Needless to say, I have saved the best until last. This sheer poetry arrived from my good friend Madge as she promises me ‘an improved tool’. Great, I could do with a new electric screwdriver, I thought. It appears she was being metaphorical. ‘Just imagine’ she says ‘how wonderful your life would become… with such a huge gun down your pants you will be able to conquer any female fortress!’. Quite. And she should know. She adds - rather appositely I thought - in the now customary anti-spam confusing post-script, and with a weariness clearly born of experience: “They Brag Most That Can Do the Least”. And as if to remind customers to act responsibly with their new found hardware: “Although the Sun May Shine, Leave Not Thy Cloak at Home”. Extra large, please.
Rosabel Greene was the first I noticed, who confided in me that she had 'a premonition that some day I'll throw the teapot at him.' At who, she didn't say.
Shoufty Wasalty has been following a Burroughsian line: 'Jazz Goodbyes Saddest Falling Beast Been Misled Vous Oublie Pour Maimes Encore Think Twice Sais'. Hasn't anyone told him/her that the cut-up method is sooo twentieth century. Mind you, perhaps William B was just way ahead of his time... (this is not an attempt to start a discussion).
Nina MacDonald was telling a worryingly scatalogical story: 'He turned as he sat, and pulled a stool from under the caravan for Yvette. Come, would you like to go in the caravan, where nobody hears? Yvette knew that the old woman was telling a cool, barefaced lie.' Strange that one of the protagonists seems to change gender half way through. Is this about a meeting between Mark Oaten in drag with an elderly Pre-op Transexual?
Susie Berreira has interesting theory about the human impact of monetary policy: 'On the contrary' she says (contrary to what, I am not sure) 'appearance, voice, and manner combined to give an impression of calmness and poise. This was chiefly due to foreign exchange difficulties.'
Loyd is a man after my own heart: 'My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.' he says. He should patent those eyes.
Needless to say, I have saved the best until last. This sheer poetry arrived from my good friend Madge as she promises me ‘an improved tool’. Great, I could do with a new electric screwdriver, I thought. It appears she was being metaphorical. ‘Just imagine’ she says ‘how wonderful your life would become… with such a huge gun down your pants you will be able to conquer any female fortress!’. Quite. And she should know. She adds - rather appositely I thought - in the now customary anti-spam confusing post-script, and with a weariness clearly born of experience: “They Brag Most That Can Do the Least”. And as if to remind customers to act responsibly with their new found hardware: “Although the Sun May Shine, Leave Not Thy Cloak at Home”. Extra large, please.
Ostrogorski
Just reading now. Always forget that this takes time. Ostrogorski is actually quite entertaining. If you like that sort of thing. It is a good history of the development of the Conservative and Liberal parties into modern organisations more like political parties as we understand them today. It was written in 1895 or thereabouts - before the rise of the Labour party and the schism and then collapse of the Liberals, so one therefore gets a different kind of perspective compared with later works on parties. Good stuff with some good detailed history that might be useful for charting contingencies and concrete events that were crucial in the development of disciplinary organisation. I have been marking pages with post-its vociferously. I will write something up on this very soon...
Monday, August 14, 2006
The next stage of research
Now that I have the broad outlines of my theory, I think I need to begin a review of the major literature on political parties, which will form the basis of a third chapter. This chapter will examine the development in thought on political parties over the years since Ostrogorski and Michels and suggest that a new development is needed which keeps the best of the 'Weberian' approach and develops his ideas in a later modern context using Foucault. I have gone over Michels' work two or three times by now and have more notes to work from. Definitely included on the list should be:
Ostrogorski (ugh dreading this one: huge book, small print, written by a Russian)
Michels
Duverger
Kirchheimer
McKenzie
Panebianco
Sartori
In addition, I will also consult some specific academic Labour Party histories for examples. Especially Shaw, Russell, Hayter.
Other sources will no doubt arise as I go along. The good news is that I have done quite a bit of work on the general party references already - about a year ago.
Serious work begins tomorrow afternoon, with an update possibly appearing here tomorrow or certainly within the next two or three days.
Ostrogorski (ugh dreading this one: huge book, small print, written by a Russian)
Michels
Duverger
Kirchheimer
McKenzie
von Beym
WarePanebianco
Sartori
In addition, I will also consult some specific academic Labour Party histories for examples. Especially Shaw, Russell, Hayter.
Other sources will no doubt arise as I go along. The good news is that I have done quite a bit of work on the general party references already - about a year ago.
Serious work begins tomorrow afternoon, with an update possibly appearing here tomorrow or certainly within the next two or three days.
Where Am I and Where Am I Going?
Not an ontological question, but a practical one. So, to reiterate, I am here:
1. Power becomes apparent in action, interaction and relations between people and networks.
2. Actions congeal into practice and thence into procedure and process.
3. This becomes the basis of (a) social organisation and what Foucault refers to as 'instutional crystallisations', providing a context for future action.
4. Modes of organisational power emerge out of actions beneath the surface of these crystallisations or congealments that reinforce, challenge and cut through existing states-of-play. This is the aspect of relations of power that is constantly shifting and circulating.
6. These modes of power develop through concrete, specific and contingent events rather than historical imperative or ontological necessity.
7. A specifically modern form of power, as related by both Foucault and Weber (albeit with slightly different points in mind) is 'disciplinary' power, which has had particular affects on the organisation of political parties and thus the practice of formal politics.
And I am going here, I think:
1. To define this specifically modern form of power.
2. To trace its emergence in the formal party political context, making use of examples.
3. To discuss how it has changed or how it is different from the definitions respectively set out by Weber and Foucault.
4. To assess its impact on the practice and the investigation of party politics and government.
Now all I need is the beginnings of a route there....
1. Power becomes apparent in action, interaction and relations between people and networks.
2. Actions congeal into practice and thence into procedure and process.
3. This becomes the basis of (a) social organisation and what Foucault refers to as 'instutional crystallisations', providing a context for future action.
4. Modes of organisational power emerge out of actions beneath the surface of these crystallisations or congealments that reinforce, challenge and cut through existing states-of-play. This is the aspect of relations of power that is constantly shifting and circulating.
5. Relations affecting the shape of organisational power may also be ones that run over the boundaries of particular institutional crystallisations. This is particularly important for political party relations with the state, the electorate, the media and so on.
6. These modes of power develop through concrete, specific and contingent events rather than historical imperative or ontological necessity.
7. A specifically modern form of power, as related by both Foucault and Weber (albeit with slightly different points in mind) is 'disciplinary' power, which has had particular affects on the organisation of political parties and thus the practice of formal politics.
And I am going here, I think:
1. To define this specifically modern form of power.
2. To trace its emergence in the formal party political context, making use of examples.
3. To discuss how it has changed or how it is different from the definitions respectively set out by Weber and Foucault.
4. To assess its impact on the practice and the investigation of party politics and government.
Now all I need is the beginnings of a route there....
Easing Myself Back In...
So, after a month of almost completely ignoring my thesis and giving my time over to tiling the bathroom and doing up the kitchen, it's time to continue. I must say it has been useful to have this site to revisit and remember where I was all that time ago. My next steps are:
1) To tighten up my theory a bit (though I should leave room for iteration);
2) To plan the next stage of research in the light of that - this is likely to be a closer investigation of the more directly political science and historical texts about parties and political organisation. After that, and assessing its implications for my theoretical work so far, I suspect that I will want to investigate more of the detail whether through memoirs, interviews, archive research etc. or perhaps some combination of all three.
Really, do I know what I am doing? I feel like I am making this up as I go along. Although, perhaps this is the point. A thesis like this (of any kind?) is a creative act. Certainly it is not entirely free. I am bound by rules and discipline myself. I am restrained by practice, supervision, method and assessment. But in not being 'free' (what does this word really mean anyway?), I have room to be creative. How can I say what I want to say within the boundaries that are set me? How can I use the structures built around me to push outside and beyond them, just a little? Structure is useful because it gives us something to work with or against, to reinforce or to pull down. In any case, there is little choice in the matter because a) we cannot escape from forms of order or structure or power [and would we in any sense want to? what would we be without it?]; b) I want to get a PhD; c) I am being unnecessarily pretentious and really ought to get on with some work rather than speculate like a sixth form philosophy student. Just easing myself back in...
1) To tighten up my theory a bit (though I should leave room for iteration);
2) To plan the next stage of research in the light of that - this is likely to be a closer investigation of the more directly political science and historical texts about parties and political organisation. After that, and assessing its implications for my theoretical work so far, I suspect that I will want to investigate more of the detail whether through memoirs, interviews, archive research etc. or perhaps some combination of all three.
Really, do I know what I am doing? I feel like I am making this up as I go along. Although, perhaps this is the point. A thesis like this (of any kind?) is a creative act. Certainly it is not entirely free. I am bound by rules and discipline myself. I am restrained by practice, supervision, method and assessment. But in not being 'free' (what does this word really mean anyway?), I have room to be creative. How can I say what I want to say within the boundaries that are set me? How can I use the structures built around me to push outside and beyond them, just a little? Structure is useful because it gives us something to work with or against, to reinforce or to pull down. In any case, there is little choice in the matter because a) we cannot escape from forms of order or structure or power [and would we in any sense want to? what would we be without it?]; b) I want to get a PhD; c) I am being unnecessarily pretentious and really ought to get on with some work rather than speculate like a sixth form philosophy student. Just easing myself back in...
Will London ever be finished?
Been away a while, taking a break. While I write at my desk there are workmen outside cutting up slabs of paving stone with circular stone cutters, replacing the old mess of tarmac and concrete with a decent looking pavement. I have to ask the question, when will London ever be finished? I am truly grateful that they are smartening up what was once a very spooky East End street (although that is what attracted me to the place to start with!), but nonetheless this has been going on for months now and it's driving me crazy! Most mornings I wake up to drilling, digging, buzzing...
Anyway, enough. I'm not complaining. Really. Back to work...
Anyway, enough. I'm not complaining. Really. Back to work...
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Slight Return
On another subject, I have been thinking again today about power, as I am wont to do.
A major point of departure between the two theoretical mentors I have chosen is the fact that whilst Weber’s ideas of power are inextricably tied up with ideas of (political) ‘legitimacy’, Foucault specifically rejects such notions. However, the idea of ‘legitimacy’, if not the fact of it, offers us useful ways of thinking about power in a formal political context. Weber himself details how different ‘types’ of legitimate authority are appropriate in different times and places (charismatic, traditional, legal-rational) and serve as a means of reinforcing modes of power. Thus, if the dominant mode of power is the production of a series of force relations in tension with each other, the idea of ‘legitimacy’ might be seen as an additional instrument of power, a technique by which power extends its reach. Process, procedure is a potent expression of power in modernity and it is in these techniques that legitimacy in ‘civilised’ societies is claimed: from democracy, rule of law, due process etc etc to particular cultural rules of engagement. It is another channel through which individuals may become produced as subjects.
Not sure if that makes sense at the moment. May have to come back to it, but there’s a germ of an idea in there.
A major point of departure between the two theoretical mentors I have chosen is the fact that whilst Weber’s ideas of power are inextricably tied up with ideas of (political) ‘legitimacy’, Foucault specifically rejects such notions. However, the idea of ‘legitimacy’, if not the fact of it, offers us useful ways of thinking about power in a formal political context. Weber himself details how different ‘types’ of legitimate authority are appropriate in different times and places (charismatic, traditional, legal-rational) and serve as a means of reinforcing modes of power. Thus, if the dominant mode of power is the production of a series of force relations in tension with each other, the idea of ‘legitimacy’ might be seen as an additional instrument of power, a technique by which power extends its reach. Process, procedure is a potent expression of power in modernity and it is in these techniques that legitimacy in ‘civilised’ societies is claimed: from democracy, rule of law, due process etc etc to particular cultural rules of engagement. It is another channel through which individuals may become produced as subjects.
Not sure if that makes sense at the moment. May have to come back to it, but there’s a germ of an idea in there.
On Philosophical Objections
A number of people have said to me that the argument against the government's foolish ID cards scheme cannot be won on a philosophical basis. We ought to oppose them on the basis that they will not achieve the things claimed and that they will be, at best, an expensive folly. This is probably true, but my objection is philosophical. Regardless of what the latest proclaimed 'benefit' is (which changes more often than John Reid changes jobs), the ID card scheme - or more specifically the National Identity Register [NIR] (which is the real objectionable part of this scheme) - is designed so that the state can link all our information, track our movements, habits etc. and, more importantly, effectively sanction our right to an identity. On what level should this be objected to if not 'philosophically'? The state and various authorities already know plenty about us, but at least we notionally have some kind of choice at the present. The NIR appears only to be a small step to some, but to me it appears a giant leap towards an insidious 'soft' authoritarianism.
Henry Porter might be accused of ranting about this over-much (and often is) but his article in today's Guardian is a good summary of almost every objection to this evil folly, from the philosophical to the financial.
Philosophically, he says:
"In a free country I believe that every human being has the right to define him or herself independently and without reference to the government of the time. This, I believe, is particularly important in a multicultural society such as ours. The ID card and NIR require and will bring about a kind of psychological conformity, which is utterly at odds with a culture that has thrived on individualism, defiance and the freedom to go your own way."
Spot on. What's more he is right about useful idiots like David Goodhart ('philosophically' in favour - see his recent Prospect article), who seem to become more and more authoritarian in their outlook every day. For the rest of Porter's Guardian article, click here.
Henry Porter might be accused of ranting about this over-much (and often is) but his article in today's Guardian is a good summary of almost every objection to this evil folly, from the philosophical to the financial.
Philosophically, he says:
"In a free country I believe that every human being has the right to define him or herself independently and without reference to the government of the time. This, I believe, is particularly important in a multicultural society such as ours. The ID card and NIR require and will bring about a kind of psychological conformity, which is utterly at odds with a culture that has thrived on individualism, defiance and the freedom to go your own way."
Spot on. What's more he is right about useful idiots like David Goodhart ('philosophically' in favour - see his recent Prospect article), who seem to become more and more authoritarian in their outlook every day. For the rest of Porter's Guardian article, click here.
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Some Theoretical Developments
For the last few days, I have been allowing my thoughts to settle a bit. The aim has been to allow my mind to untangle some of the ideas I have expressed on these pages, and to begin to shape them into a more systematic theory that can be put to good use in the study of political organisations. It’s not completely there, but I think I have something a bit more coherent.
So my theory, the basis of my methodology for the rest of my thesis, might be described as follows:
1. Power becomes apparent in action. Although it does not exclusively belong in individuals, it is expressed in the actions, interactions and relations between people and networks.
2. Institutions are ‘crystallisations’ of power’s effects. Series of action can congeal into practice and become regularised. Further, regularised practice can harden into procedure & process and forms the basis of social organisation. This development forms a context for future action, which may further congeal into new practices and processes. These ideas enable us to conceive of Foucauldian power as an anonymous and independent relations of force giving form to the rational organisation that Weber describes. Bureaucratic organisation, which becomes harder and harder to escape, and perhaps impossible to undo (with increasing layers of hardened practice), can be seen as coming into being through the development of practices and processes in this way.
3. Modes of organisation and forms of power have developed through concrete, specific and contingent events, rather than historical imperative or ontological necessity. My focus is on how the banal and the every-day, the chance event or the unforseen can be revealed as being of crucial importance in the development of modern forms of political organisation.
4. I do not make the assumption that the political organisation can itself explain power. We will learn more about both power and political institutions by averting our eyes from the formal structures of the latter and focus on the operation of the former, especially beneath the surface of the institutional crystallisations referred to. Even within these ossified structures micro-level relations, actions and interactions reinforce, challenge or cut-through rules and structures. It is my belief, for example, that organisations change practice and process formally only in response to developments that have already occurred ‘beneath the surface’. At times actual relations and practices may reinforce formalised rules and procedures, but at times they may also be fundamentally opposed to the latter. These are, however, aspects of organisational life that might be necessary to its functioning despite its formal appearance.
5. Also operative are the relations that run over the boundaries of the institution itself, reinforcing, altering or undermining existing practices, processes. They are part of the operation of power on the political representative and leader. For example, round-the-clock news media, the introduction of management and training techniques, interactive communications technology all bring about a greater degree of control of the detailed aspects of individual politicians behaviour: speech, dress, gesture, cultural ‘positioning’ etc. Such forms of discipline might be visible in the familiar repetition of performances in media interviews, or in codes and guidelines issued by parties to their members.
This is looking better I think. I am constantly concerned not to get led astray by tempting tangential arguments, especially ontological ones. Working with the material I am, this is hard to resist! More honing to do!
So my theory, the basis of my methodology for the rest of my thesis, might be described as follows:
1. Power becomes apparent in action. Although it does not exclusively belong in individuals, it is expressed in the actions, interactions and relations between people and networks.
2. Institutions are ‘crystallisations’ of power’s effects. Series of action can congeal into practice and become regularised. Further, regularised practice can harden into procedure & process and forms the basis of social organisation. This development forms a context for future action, which may further congeal into new practices and processes. These ideas enable us to conceive of Foucauldian power as an anonymous and independent relations of force giving form to the rational organisation that Weber describes. Bureaucratic organisation, which becomes harder and harder to escape, and perhaps impossible to undo (with increasing layers of hardened practice), can be seen as coming into being through the development of practices and processes in this way.
3. Modes of organisation and forms of power have developed through concrete, specific and contingent events, rather than historical imperative or ontological necessity. My focus is on how the banal and the every-day, the chance event or the unforseen can be revealed as being of crucial importance in the development of modern forms of political organisation.
4. I do not make the assumption that the political organisation can itself explain power. We will learn more about both power and political institutions by averting our eyes from the formal structures of the latter and focus on the operation of the former, especially beneath the surface of the institutional crystallisations referred to. Even within these ossified structures micro-level relations, actions and interactions reinforce, challenge or cut-through rules and structures. It is my belief, for example, that organisations change practice and process formally only in response to developments that have already occurred ‘beneath the surface’. At times actual relations and practices may reinforce formalised rules and procedures, but at times they may also be fundamentally opposed to the latter. These are, however, aspects of organisational life that might be necessary to its functioning despite its formal appearance.
5. Also operative are the relations that run over the boundaries of the institution itself, reinforcing, altering or undermining existing practices, processes. They are part of the operation of power on the political representative and leader. For example, round-the-clock news media, the introduction of management and training techniques, interactive communications technology all bring about a greater degree of control of the detailed aspects of individual politicians behaviour: speech, dress, gesture, cultural ‘positioning’ etc. Such forms of discipline might be visible in the familiar repetition of performances in media interviews, or in codes and guidelines issued by parties to their members.
This is looking better I think. I am constantly concerned not to get led astray by tempting tangential arguments, especially ontological ones. Working with the material I am, this is hard to resist! More honing to do!
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Using Foucault
Foucault once said the following:
'I would like my books to be a kind of tool-box which others can rummage through to find a tool which they can use however they wish in their own area... I would like [my work] to be useful to an educator, a warden, a magistrate, a conscientious objector. I don't write for an audience, I write for users, not readers.'[1]
My supervisor also warned me not to get 'hypnotised' by him and I like the quote above because he himself seems to sanction that view. He exhorts us here to take what we will and use it well.
This is exactly how I intend to approach him. It is not for me, nor is it especially useful to me, to ‘go all the way’ with Foucault. I don’t want to get entangled in the broad anti-humanist and post-structuralist controversies of which some of his work was a part. Therefore I need to be very clear about what I am going to take from Foucault and how I am going to use it.
On perhaps a simplistic level Foucault is fleshing out the anatomy of power, the detail that Weber misses because of his focus on structures and institutions.
He develops a (kind of) phenomenology of everyday life – although, crucially, he is not especially interested in how it is directly experienced by the individual, but in how it bears upon the subject that is subjected.
On the other hand, Foucault appears to miss the continuing importance of institutions in the evolution of power.
[1] Michel Foucault, (1974) 'Prisons et asiles dans le mécanisme du pouvoir' in Dits et Ecrits, t. II. (Paris: Gallimard), 1994, pp. 523-4. Sourced here.
'I would like my books to be a kind of tool-box which others can rummage through to find a tool which they can use however they wish in their own area... I would like [my work] to be useful to an educator, a warden, a magistrate, a conscientious objector. I don't write for an audience, I write for users, not readers.'[1]
My supervisor also warned me not to get 'hypnotised' by him and I like the quote above because he himself seems to sanction that view. He exhorts us here to take what we will and use it well.
This is exactly how I intend to approach him. It is not for me, nor is it especially useful to me, to ‘go all the way’ with Foucault. I don’t want to get entangled in the broad anti-humanist and post-structuralist controversies of which some of his work was a part. Therefore I need to be very clear about what I am going to take from Foucault and how I am going to use it.
On perhaps a simplistic level Foucault is fleshing out the anatomy of power, the detail that Weber misses because of his focus on structures and institutions.
He develops a (kind of) phenomenology of everyday life – although, crucially, he is not especially interested in how it is directly experienced by the individual, but in how it bears upon the subject that is subjected.
On the other hand, Foucault appears to miss the continuing importance of institutions in the evolution of power.
[1] Michel Foucault, (1974) 'Prisons et asiles dans le mécanisme du pouvoir' in Dits et Ecrits, t. II. (Paris: Gallimard), 1994, pp. 523-4. Sourced here.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
Raw Power Continued
Power comes into evidence through actions, reactions and interactions. It exists in relations that might be described as ‘relations of force’.
Organisation is a particular structure of relations and of actions, reactions and interactions that grow in response to contingencies and concrete events.
By following Foucault’s dictum to ‘cut off the king’s head’, whilst at the time applying that approach to the study of formal political settings, we can investigate how power works at the micro-level in the interactions and relations that exist within the political party and its processes.
I wish to bring these ideas together with an understanding of power in a Weberian sense as something that, even if it begins with individuals, gathers an inevitable structural logic as ‘relations’ become organisation and process and as the organisation grows. Using this, we can develop an understanding of how an institution acts as a kind of regulator and distributor of power through its structures and how that intersects with the relations within it (and that run across it). It also enables us look at the impact of the intersections between different institutions. For example the political party intersects with the state bureaucracy, the media, powerful lobby groups etc. Relations are formed across these and are the basis for struggles of power.
They both recognised how rationality in organised relations is a particular development of modernity. Weber couched his ideas in structural legitimacy of domination, Foucault in force relations at the micro-level. The latter, however, neglects institutional effects.
I will combine them both by attempting to understand power in the concrete institutional setting of a political party. I will attempt to understand the workings of power within it, the development of organisation and process within it from the ‘ground up’: from the point of view of a micro-physics of power.
Weber and Foucault both recognised disciplinary power as a characteristically modern form, how it structures and manipulates the very gestures of the body. For Weber this disturbs and undermines the individual, goes against his ‘natural rhythm’[1]. For Foucault, however, this creates the individual and shapes his/her ‘soul’. Here, power is very closely and intimately related to knowledge. Knowledge, through documentation, observation and examination, provides a means through which power can be expressed and give substance to its operation – the application of knowledge through relations of force brings the results of power to light.
Foucault allows us to conceive of power as an independent force, Weber allows us to see its structural logic at work within institutions, with the important proviso that institutions are, in essence, ‘solely the resultants and modes of organisation of the particular acts of individual persons’[2]. Bureaucratic institutions are repositries of knowledge (through documentation, record-keeping, efficient procedure), with a ‘memory’. Foucault, however, forces us down a level to see power operating at ground-level. In terms of understanding institutional contexts, we can therefore examine how actions become practice, how practice becomes rules which structure further action. We can also, with the benefit of Foucauldian analysis, see how the everyday, seemingly banal, accidental, minor interactions and relations work beneath rules and structures as such and reinforce political discipline.
There is much more to untangle here. More soon.
[1] See ‘The Meaning of Discipline’ in Gerth & Wright Mills, ed (1948) – From Max Weber (London: RKP), 253-264
[2] Max Weber (1978) – Economy and Society (University of California Press), p.13
Organisation is a particular structure of relations and of actions, reactions and interactions that grow in response to contingencies and concrete events.
By following Foucault’s dictum to ‘cut off the king’s head’, whilst at the time applying that approach to the study of formal political settings, we can investigate how power works at the micro-level in the interactions and relations that exist within the political party and its processes.
I wish to bring these ideas together with an understanding of power in a Weberian sense as something that, even if it begins with individuals, gathers an inevitable structural logic as ‘relations’ become organisation and process and as the organisation grows. Using this, we can develop an understanding of how an institution acts as a kind of regulator and distributor of power through its structures and how that intersects with the relations within it (and that run across it). It also enables us look at the impact of the intersections between different institutions. For example the political party intersects with the state bureaucracy, the media, powerful lobby groups etc. Relations are formed across these and are the basis for struggles of power.
They both recognised how rationality in organised relations is a particular development of modernity. Weber couched his ideas in structural legitimacy of domination, Foucault in force relations at the micro-level. The latter, however, neglects institutional effects.
I will combine them both by attempting to understand power in the concrete institutional setting of a political party. I will attempt to understand the workings of power within it, the development of organisation and process within it from the ‘ground up’: from the point of view of a micro-physics of power.
Weber and Foucault both recognised disciplinary power as a characteristically modern form, how it structures and manipulates the very gestures of the body. For Weber this disturbs and undermines the individual, goes against his ‘natural rhythm’[1]. For Foucault, however, this creates the individual and shapes his/her ‘soul’. Here, power is very closely and intimately related to knowledge. Knowledge, through documentation, observation and examination, provides a means through which power can be expressed and give substance to its operation – the application of knowledge through relations of force brings the results of power to light.
Foucault allows us to conceive of power as an independent force, Weber allows us to see its structural logic at work within institutions, with the important proviso that institutions are, in essence, ‘solely the resultants and modes of organisation of the particular acts of individual persons’[2]. Bureaucratic institutions are repositries of knowledge (through documentation, record-keeping, efficient procedure), with a ‘memory’. Foucault, however, forces us down a level to see power operating at ground-level. In terms of understanding institutional contexts, we can therefore examine how actions become practice, how practice becomes rules which structure further action. We can also, with the benefit of Foucauldian analysis, see how the everyday, seemingly banal, accidental, minor interactions and relations work beneath rules and structures as such and reinforce political discipline.
There is much more to untangle here. More soon.
[1] See ‘The Meaning of Discipline’ in Gerth & Wright Mills, ed (1948) – From Max Weber (London: RKP), 253-264
[2] Max Weber (1978) – Economy and Society (University of California Press), p.13
Raw Power
What is power? Why should we try to pin this idea down, why is it so important? Perhaps we cannot nail it down as such. But why we should we imagine it?
I am confused by the concept of power
Power doesn’t have substance, it is not a physical entity
Power is (a) word
This makes it very difficult to generalise about it. It might have many different meanings.
As a noun it might be the ability to do something or act in a particular way; or it might be a capacity or ability to direct or influence others or the course of events.
It might be attached to a person, an organisation, a political or social entity, a state, a supernatural being or force, (a) god. It might refer to physical strength or mechanical or electrical energy.
How can it be attached to all of these things and mean the same thing? Is it polysemic or simply contested?
It is used to describe, in nature, a force, a potential to affect and disturb
It is a capacity contained in nature
It has, through science and engineering been harnessed by human beings
It is also used to describe very human ideas: the power of speech, the power of thought. These are powers, but do they represent power? Perhaps they do, but not in the sense that I am trying to convey. These capacities as the ability to do something are best described as potentia (the power of things in nature). I am more interested in potestas, that is being in the power of another, which Lukes (2005) sees as sub-concept of the former. Potestas refers to the ability to direct or influence others.
The immediate implication of potestas is that power is possessed by one person over another. I am not, however, certain that power is possessed in this way.
Power is at work in an interplay, in an action and reaction: in a conversation, in the back and forth between two people words, gestures, a glance, a flick of the eyebrows, tone of voice.
Power is at work in the spaces I inhabit and in the networks of which I am a part. Through networks, spaces, relations I am shaped and my actions, reactions and interactions are contextualised and shaped. They are seen, compared, measured. They are honed and defined.
In this view, I cannot take power and keep it to myself. It works through my relations with people and things, through the accumulation of knowledge and in the way I orient myself to people and things. Power is not an encompassing force as such and it is not located within boundaries. It is ‘produced from one relation to the next’ as Foucault might put it.
It comes from practice, however, that may occur in a specific place at a specific time. It is likely to be an action upon an action, a response to a chance event that grows into an imperative, a congealing of that action into a practice. Practice becomes procedure and process which may spread beyond its boundaries as one network of relations and forces comes into contact with another.
This is all highly abstract, as much Foucauldian influenced theory is wont to be. How can I begin to make this useful?
What Foucault seeks to do is to track the processes by which compliance is secured voluntarily. How power works in ‘hidden’ and subtle ways such that one becomes subject to it without having felt physically coerced.
These ideas need to be removed from abstraction in some way and applied. Weber can help us to do this because he couches his concerns about the growing anonymity of power, about its tendency in modern, rational society to become restrictive and all-pervasive, in the specific analysis of forms of organisation. It is clear to me that Foucault must have read and been influenced by Weber whilst developing some of his ideas about modern power. When one reads Weber on discipline (see ‘The Meaning if Discipline’ in the Gerth & Wright Mills edited book From Max Weber), it leaps out of the page. There is I believe, despite a number of almost schismatic differences between the two theorists, a creative tension that can point us towards some exciting new insights.
The question thus becomes, how to bring them together?
I am confused by the concept of power
Power doesn’t have substance, it is not a physical entity
Power is (a) word
This makes it very difficult to generalise about it. It might have many different meanings.
As a noun it might be the ability to do something or act in a particular way; or it might be a capacity or ability to direct or influence others or the course of events.
It might be attached to a person, an organisation, a political or social entity, a state, a supernatural being or force, (a) god. It might refer to physical strength or mechanical or electrical energy.
How can it be attached to all of these things and mean the same thing? Is it polysemic or simply contested?
It is used to describe, in nature, a force, a potential to affect and disturb
It is a capacity contained in nature
It has, through science and engineering been harnessed by human beings
It is also used to describe very human ideas: the power of speech, the power of thought. These are powers, but do they represent power? Perhaps they do, but not in the sense that I am trying to convey. These capacities as the ability to do something are best described as potentia (the power of things in nature). I am more interested in potestas, that is being in the power of another, which Lukes (2005) sees as sub-concept of the former. Potestas refers to the ability to direct or influence others.
The immediate implication of potestas is that power is possessed by one person over another. I am not, however, certain that power is possessed in this way.
Power is at work in an interplay, in an action and reaction: in a conversation, in the back and forth between two people words, gestures, a glance, a flick of the eyebrows, tone of voice.
Power is at work in the spaces I inhabit and in the networks of which I am a part. Through networks, spaces, relations I am shaped and my actions, reactions and interactions are contextualised and shaped. They are seen, compared, measured. They are honed and defined.
In this view, I cannot take power and keep it to myself. It works through my relations with people and things, through the accumulation of knowledge and in the way I orient myself to people and things. Power is not an encompassing force as such and it is not located within boundaries. It is ‘produced from one relation to the next’ as Foucault might put it.
It comes from practice, however, that may occur in a specific place at a specific time. It is likely to be an action upon an action, a response to a chance event that grows into an imperative, a congealing of that action into a practice. Practice becomes procedure and process which may spread beyond its boundaries as one network of relations and forces comes into contact with another.
This is all highly abstract, as much Foucauldian influenced theory is wont to be. How can I begin to make this useful?
What Foucault seeks to do is to track the processes by which compliance is secured voluntarily. How power works in ‘hidden’ and subtle ways such that one becomes subject to it without having felt physically coerced.
These ideas need to be removed from abstraction in some way and applied. Weber can help us to do this because he couches his concerns about the growing anonymity of power, about its tendency in modern, rational society to become restrictive and all-pervasive, in the specific analysis of forms of organisation. It is clear to me that Foucault must have read and been influenced by Weber whilst developing some of his ideas about modern power. When one reads Weber on discipline (see ‘The Meaning if Discipline’ in the Gerth & Wright Mills edited book From Max Weber), it leaps out of the page. There is I believe, despite a number of almost schismatic differences between the two theorists, a creative tension that can point us towards some exciting new insights.
The question thus becomes, how to bring them together?
Monday, July 03, 2006
Brain Dead Days
All day I have been trying to make myself sit and think. Sometimes it seems almost impossible to relax. I pick up the guitar, twiddle around on that, cook some dinner, scoot around the internet looking at nothing in particular, try to get this blog set up properly...
It all feels pretty random so far. I have written two chapters on Weber and Foucault and now I am trying to synthesise their work into some kind of workable methodology of power that I can use to study political parties. I am sure that it is possible but I am at that familiar point where I don't know quite where to draw all the strings together.
It is too late in the day now and I am brain-dead. This is an all too familiar feeling and a constant peril if you have to work for a living as well as undertake research at this level. There's always that little fear nagging away that inspiration will never quite come.
Of course, inspiration takes quite a lot of hard work, and I can scarcely be accused of that today. Time to turn the brain off and revisit things tomorrow.
It all feels pretty random so far. I have written two chapters on Weber and Foucault and now I am trying to synthesise their work into some kind of workable methodology of power that I can use to study political parties. I am sure that it is possible but I am at that familiar point where I don't know quite where to draw all the strings together.
It is too late in the day now and I am brain-dead. This is an all too familiar feeling and a constant peril if you have to work for a living as well as undertake research at this level. There's always that little fear nagging away that inspiration will never quite come.
Of course, inspiration takes quite a lot of hard work, and I can scarcely be accused of that today. Time to turn the brain off and revisit things tomorrow.
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