: Researching micro worlds of girls through visual auto-ethnographic practices. Gerry Bloustien and Sarah Baker. (2003). Social Analysis, 47(3), 64-79.
Bloustien: ten 15 years old girls for three years. video cameras.
Baker: pre-teen aged girls (8-11), mainly still cameras.
In these research project, the cameras offered the girls a "space to play" (p. 69). [They named auto-visual ethnography]
The authors wrote about the role of the cameras:
"For the girls, the cameras became ways of interpreting and redefining their worlds, ways which frequently expressed far more than the girls were capable of saying, for often it was what was not said that was important." (p. 69).
"Clearly, then, the use of the camera as a methodological tool, and more importantly, placed in the hands and under the control of the young participants, deepened and precipitated a number of previously unforeseen dimensions to the research project." (p. 69)
Authors discussed about camera power arguing that "the camera was so successfully and so efficaciously an entry point into the field across different social domains and locales" (p. 70).
1. It allowed the girls to become active participants as they can control over the final product.
2. It provides researchers with positive dimensions of the research: it fosters reciprocity as the participants are exciting about learning new skills. This aspect is considered "ethical" by the researchers because it balances power relationship involved between researchers and participants [Give and take]
Rethinking of power imbalance, the authors wrote:
3. "What was clear, though, was that the cameras did give the young people license to explore these places of play through the 'objectifying' lens, a license which, in turn, helped to blur the more traditional lines between researcher and researched, and offered new insights about the nature of research." (p. 72).
4. The authors argued that "the use of the camera was able to provide the means of giving the participants an authoritative voice" (p. 72). This implies that the use of the camera was not for reflect reality but for "making the process of mutual discovery and creativity of both the researcher and subjects more transparent" (p. 72). The authors rephrased, "the camera offered insights into the 'layering' of ethnography, the different ways understanding and knowledge are negotiated and realized as part of everyday transactions in the world" (p. 72) . [CREATION OF REALITY]
This layering aspect was the focus of their research projects; they also purposefully examined what is not taken. Thus what mattered to these authors is:
"The point, then, is not what is produced with the visual tool, but how the production relates to the position occupied by the producer in the particular field of that production" (p. 76).
Showing posts with label power. Show all posts
Showing posts with label power. Show all posts
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Feminist Theory
:From Margin to Center. hooks, b. (2000). (2nd Ed.). Cambridge, MA: South End Press.
In this book first published in 1984, hooks interrogates gender experiences interlocking with race and class. In the preface to the second edition, hooks remarks dialectic critique and exchange in feminist theory and practice in the past and states:
"There has been no other movement for social justice in our society that has been as self-critical as feminist movement. Feminist willingness to change direction when needed has been a major source of strength and vitality in feminist struggle. That internal critique is essential to any politics of transformation. Just as our lives are not fixed or static but always changing, our theory must remain fluid, open, responsive to new information" (p. xiii)
[It is a caution that self-reflexivity should not turn to self-indulgence or sentimentality. The notion of oppression/empowerment and the complexity of personal experience should be thoroughly examined in multiple dimensions.]
Black women: shaping feminist theory (1-17)
Critiquing middle-class white women oriented feminism in the United States, hooks refutes women's experience of oppression common to all and insists on the complexity interlocked with race and gender.
"While it is evident that many women suffer from sexist tyranny, there is little indication that this forge ' a common bond among all women.' There is much evidence substantiating the reality that race and class identity creates differences in quality of life, social status, and lifestyle that take precedence over the common experience women share--differences that are rarely transcended." (p. 4)
Defining oppression as the absence of choice, she continues to argue:
"Many women in this society do have choices...They may know they are discriminated against on the basis of sex, but they do not equate this with oppression. Under capitalism, patriarchy is structured so that sexism restricts women's behavior in some realms even as freedom from limitations is allowed in other spheres. The absence of extreme restrictions leads many women to ignore the areas in which they are exploited or discriminated against."(p. 5)
Countering informed-feminist based on scholarship, hooks brings to light the lived experience of the oppressed, poor black women, as a site for acquiring their awareness of patriarchal order as well as their resistance.
"[White feminists] do not understand, cannot even imagine, that black women, as well as other groups of women who live daily in oppressive situations, often acquire an awareness of patriarchal politics from their lived experience, just as they develop strategies of resistance (even though they may not resist on a sustained or organized basis)." (p. 11)
hooks validates black women's lived experience as a vantage point from which "to criticize the dominant racist, classist and sexist hegemony as well as to create a counter-hegemony", because "This lived experience may shape our consciousness in such a way that our world view differs fro those who have a degree of privilege (however relative within the existing system)" (p. 16)
Feminism: a movement to end sexist oppression (pp. 18-33)
hooks warns the co-optation of liberal feminist movement in that it eventually contributes to maintaining the status quo by limiting feminism to women's attainment of social status equal to men. Instead, defining feminism as a movement to end sexist oppression, hooks calls attention to its political struggle to eradicate domination and transform society.
hooks criticizes the slogan, "the personal is political", writing "[It] became a means of encouraging women to think that the experience of discrimination, exploitation, or oppression automatically corresponded with an understanding of the ideological and institutional apparatus shaping one's social status" (p. 26). hooks demands collectivity in addition to individual experience in order to develop a comprehensive understanding of women's political reality:
"Feminism defined in political terms that stress collective as well as individual experience challenges women to enter a new domain--to leave behind the apolitical stance sexism decrees is our lot and develop political consciousness." (p. 27)
[Here it seems that by collectivity hooks means massive feminist movement that encompasses colored or underprivileged women.]
The significance of feminist movement (34-42)
She argues that the feminist position devaluing the importance of family has been easily co-opted to serve the interests of the state by giving the impression that feminism breaks down families. In this regard, she sharply points out different perspectives on family between white women activists and many black women: while white women regard family as an oppressive institution, many black women think that it is the least oppressive one. She emphasizes that family ties are in fact the only sustained support system for exploited and oppressed people, thus she calls ridding family life of the abusive dimensions caused by sexist oppression while sustaining the value of family.
Stressing the development of political consciousness to end sexist oppression, hooks contests that feminism is more than for women:
"The fight against sexist oppression is of grave political significance--it is not for women only. Feminist movement is vital both in its power to liberate us from the terrible bonds of sexist oppression and in its potential to radicalize and renew other liberation struggles."
Sisterhood: political solidarity among women (43-67)
hooks repudiates the prevalent idea of common oppression among all women:
"The idea of common oppression was a false and corrupt platform disguising and mystifying the true nature of women's varied and complex social reality. Women are divided by sexist attitudes, racism, class privilege, and a host of other prejudices." (p.44)
The motivation of Sisterhood, thus, is different among women. hooks criticizes that shared victimization, which is the bonding basis for bourgeois women's liberation, reflects male supremacist thinking: sexist ideology teaches women that to be a woman is a victim. On the other hand, hooks sheds light on the power and resistance among less privileged, colored women for the basis of Sisterhood:
"Women who are exploited and oppressed daily cannot afford to relinquish the belief that they exercise some measure of control, however relative, over their lives. They cannot afford to see themselves solely as 'victims' because their survival depends on continued exercise of whatever personal powers they possess...They bond with other women on the basis of shared strengths and resources. This is the woman bonding feminist movement should encourage. It is this type of bonding that is the essence of Sisterhood." (p. 46)
hooks states that racism is fundamentally a feminist issue because of their interconnectedness with sexist oppression. Observing the discussion of racism in feminist movement in recent year, she writes:
"In more recent years, racism has become an accepted optic in feminist discussions not as a result of black women calling attention to it (this was done at the very onset of the movement), but as a result of white female input validating such discussions, a process which is indicative of how racism works." (p. 52).
In the effort for unlearning racism, hooks calls for political commitment beyond individual psychological acknowledgment of personal prejudice and recognition of difference, different cultural codes. On the other hand, hooks is more critical about classism embedded in feminist discourses and writes:
"Until women accept the need for redistribution of wealth and resources in the United States and work towards the achievement of that end, there will be no bonding among women that transcends class" (p. 60).
hooks demands more vivid confrontation among women to build solidarity among women in lieu of support:
"If women always seek to avoid confrontation, to always be 'safe', we may never experience any revolutionary change, any transformation, individually or collectively." (pp. 66-67)
Men: comrades in struggle (68-83)
hooks warns anti-male sentiments prevalent in bourgeois women liberation movement:
"Anti-male sentiment have alienated many poor and working-class women, particularly non-white women, from feminist movement. Their life experiences have shown them that they have more in common with men of their race and/or class group than with bourgeois white women." (p. 69-70)
On the other hand, she denotes that the solidarity between women of color and men and those women's recognition of common resistance have contributed to creating political bonding between men and women and attending to the transformative potential of feminism.
hooks refutes separatist ideology that women alone can make feminist revolution because they are the primary agents maintaining and supporting sexist oppression, thus calling for working together.
Changing Perspective on Power (84-95)
hooks refutes one of the prevailing feminist idea that women are different from men, think and act differently, thus having a different value system. She argues that, because women accept the value system of the culture overall, they passively absorb sexism and willingly assume a pre-determined sex role. In other word, they don't conceptualize power differently. She writes:
"The suggest that women must obtain power before they can effecitively resist sexism is rooted in the false assumption that women have no power. Women, even the most oppressed among us, do exercise some power. These power cna be used to advance feminist struggle." (p. 92)
hooks quotes Elizabeth Janeway from her work, Powers of the Weak:
"By disbelieving, one will be led toward doubting prescribed codes of behavior, and as one begins to act in ways that can deviate from the norm in any degree, it becomes clear that in fact there is not just one right way to handle or understand events."
Thus hooks emphasize that "Failure to exercise the power of disbelief made it difficult for women to reject prevailing notions of power and envision new perspective" (p. 93). She writes:
"Sexism has never rendered women powerless. It has either suppressed the strength or exploited it. Recognition of that strength, that power, is a step women together can take towards liberation."
One example of power exercised by women is the power of consumption. By boycotting purchasing certain products, women may impact society, hooks argues.
In this book first published in 1984, hooks interrogates gender experiences interlocking with race and class. In the preface to the second edition, hooks remarks dialectic critique and exchange in feminist theory and practice in the past and states:
"There has been no other movement for social justice in our society that has been as self-critical as feminist movement. Feminist willingness to change direction when needed has been a major source of strength and vitality in feminist struggle. That internal critique is essential to any politics of transformation. Just as our lives are not fixed or static but always changing, our theory must remain fluid, open, responsive to new information" (p. xiii)
[It is a caution that self-reflexivity should not turn to self-indulgence or sentimentality. The notion of oppression/empowerment and the complexity of personal experience should be thoroughly examined in multiple dimensions.]
Black women: shaping feminist theory (1-17)
Critiquing middle-class white women oriented feminism in the United States, hooks refutes women's experience of oppression common to all and insists on the complexity interlocked with race and gender.
"While it is evident that many women suffer from sexist tyranny, there is little indication that this forge ' a common bond among all women.' There is much evidence substantiating the reality that race and class identity creates differences in quality of life, social status, and lifestyle that take precedence over the common experience women share--differences that are rarely transcended." (p. 4)
Defining oppression as the absence of choice, she continues to argue:
"Many women in this society do have choices...They may know they are discriminated against on the basis of sex, but they do not equate this with oppression. Under capitalism, patriarchy is structured so that sexism restricts women's behavior in some realms even as freedom from limitations is allowed in other spheres. The absence of extreme restrictions leads many women to ignore the areas in which they are exploited or discriminated against."(p. 5)
Countering informed-feminist based on scholarship, hooks brings to light the lived experience of the oppressed, poor black women, as a site for acquiring their awareness of patriarchal order as well as their resistance.
"[White feminists] do not understand, cannot even imagine, that black women, as well as other groups of women who live daily in oppressive situations, often acquire an awareness of patriarchal politics from their lived experience, just as they develop strategies of resistance (even though they may not resist on a sustained or organized basis)." (p. 11)
hooks validates black women's lived experience as a vantage point from which "to criticize the dominant racist, classist and sexist hegemony as well as to create a counter-hegemony", because "This lived experience may shape our consciousness in such a way that our world view differs fro those who have a degree of privilege (however relative within the existing system)" (p. 16)
Feminism: a movement to end sexist oppression (pp. 18-33)
hooks warns the co-optation of liberal feminist movement in that it eventually contributes to maintaining the status quo by limiting feminism to women's attainment of social status equal to men. Instead, defining feminism as a movement to end sexist oppression, hooks calls attention to its political struggle to eradicate domination and transform society.
hooks criticizes the slogan, "the personal is political", writing "[It] became a means of encouraging women to think that the experience of discrimination, exploitation, or oppression automatically corresponded with an understanding of the ideological and institutional apparatus shaping one's social status" (p. 26). hooks demands collectivity in addition to individual experience in order to develop a comprehensive understanding of women's political reality:
"Feminism defined in political terms that stress collective as well as individual experience challenges women to enter a new domain--to leave behind the apolitical stance sexism decrees is our lot and develop political consciousness." (p. 27)
[Here it seems that by collectivity hooks means massive feminist movement that encompasses colored or underprivileged women.]
The significance of feminist movement (34-42)
She argues that the feminist position devaluing the importance of family has been easily co-opted to serve the interests of the state by giving the impression that feminism breaks down families. In this regard, she sharply points out different perspectives on family between white women activists and many black women: while white women regard family as an oppressive institution, many black women think that it is the least oppressive one. She emphasizes that family ties are in fact the only sustained support system for exploited and oppressed people, thus she calls ridding family life of the abusive dimensions caused by sexist oppression while sustaining the value of family.
Stressing the development of political consciousness to end sexist oppression, hooks contests that feminism is more than for women:
"The fight against sexist oppression is of grave political significance--it is not for women only. Feminist movement is vital both in its power to liberate us from the terrible bonds of sexist oppression and in its potential to radicalize and renew other liberation struggles."
Sisterhood: political solidarity among women (43-67)
hooks repudiates the prevalent idea of common oppression among all women:
"The idea of common oppression was a false and corrupt platform disguising and mystifying the true nature of women's varied and complex social reality. Women are divided by sexist attitudes, racism, class privilege, and a host of other prejudices." (p.44)
The motivation of Sisterhood, thus, is different among women. hooks criticizes that shared victimization, which is the bonding basis for bourgeois women's liberation, reflects male supremacist thinking: sexist ideology teaches women that to be a woman is a victim. On the other hand, hooks sheds light on the power and resistance among less privileged, colored women for the basis of Sisterhood:
"Women who are exploited and oppressed daily cannot afford to relinquish the belief that they exercise some measure of control, however relative, over their lives. They cannot afford to see themselves solely as 'victims' because their survival depends on continued exercise of whatever personal powers they possess...They bond with other women on the basis of shared strengths and resources. This is the woman bonding feminist movement should encourage. It is this type of bonding that is the essence of Sisterhood." (p. 46)
hooks states that racism is fundamentally a feminist issue because of their interconnectedness with sexist oppression. Observing the discussion of racism in feminist movement in recent year, she writes:
"In more recent years, racism has become an accepted optic in feminist discussions not as a result of black women calling attention to it (this was done at the very onset of the movement), but as a result of white female input validating such discussions, a process which is indicative of how racism works." (p. 52).
In the effort for unlearning racism, hooks calls for political commitment beyond individual psychological acknowledgment of personal prejudice and recognition of difference, different cultural codes. On the other hand, hooks is more critical about classism embedded in feminist discourses and writes:
"Until women accept the need for redistribution of wealth and resources in the United States and work towards the achievement of that end, there will be no bonding among women that transcends class" (p. 60).
hooks demands more vivid confrontation among women to build solidarity among women in lieu of support:
"If women always seek to avoid confrontation, to always be 'safe', we may never experience any revolutionary change, any transformation, individually or collectively." (pp. 66-67)
Men: comrades in struggle (68-83)
hooks warns anti-male sentiments prevalent in bourgeois women liberation movement:
"Anti-male sentiment have alienated many poor and working-class women, particularly non-white women, from feminist movement. Their life experiences have shown them that they have more in common with men of their race and/or class group than with bourgeois white women." (p. 69-70)
On the other hand, she denotes that the solidarity between women of color and men and those women's recognition of common resistance have contributed to creating political bonding between men and women and attending to the transformative potential of feminism.
hooks refutes separatist ideology that women alone can make feminist revolution because they are the primary agents maintaining and supporting sexist oppression, thus calling for working together.
Changing Perspective on Power (84-95)
hooks refutes one of the prevailing feminist idea that women are different from men, think and act differently, thus having a different value system. She argues that, because women accept the value system of the culture overall, they passively absorb sexism and willingly assume a pre-determined sex role. In other word, they don't conceptualize power differently. She writes:
"The suggest that women must obtain power before they can effecitively resist sexism is rooted in the false assumption that women have no power. Women, even the most oppressed among us, do exercise some power. These power cna be used to advance feminist struggle." (p. 92)
hooks quotes Elizabeth Janeway from her work, Powers of the Weak:
"By disbelieving, one will be led toward doubting prescribed codes of behavior, and as one begins to act in ways that can deviate from the norm in any degree, it becomes clear that in fact there is not just one right way to handle or understand events."
Thus hooks emphasize that "Failure to exercise the power of disbelief made it difficult for women to reject prevailing notions of power and envision new perspective" (p. 93). She writes:
"Sexism has never rendered women powerless. It has either suppressed the strength or exploited it. Recognition of that strength, that power, is a step women together can take towards liberation."
One example of power exercised by women is the power of consumption. By boycotting purchasing certain products, women may impact society, hooks argues.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Weber: a short introduction
Gianfranco Poggi. (2006). Cambridge, UK: Polity Press
Questions of Method (17-35)
One of the greatest contribution that Weber made to sociology and cultural science is his radical refusal to positivistic model that prevailed in natural science and its expansion to other fields. Thus researchers should rely on their intuition in interpreting social phenomena and persuasive communication about the given topics. The fundamental difference that divides him from the main stream seems to originate from his ontological POV: Weber sees that human beings act within the reality where they exist on the basis of the meanings [Poggi emphasized] they attribute to it. Human events are basically individual, consisting of actions and passions of individuals, and thus its scientific understanding should be based upon methodological individualism, the questions of which may include individuals' interpretation of their own circumstances and needs. His concept of ideal types plays a significant role in understanding the relation of sociology and history. While historians emphasize the uniqueness of certain facts, sociologists should provide them with ideal types, which are intrinsically at the state of fluidity, continuously corrected and replaced by others. [Ideal types does not mean optimal, rather frameworks that allows tools for interpretation of the reality, I think.] By constructing ideal types, sociology is characterized as handmaiden to history and history takes them as hypothses. Thus, Poggi puts an emphasis on Weber's perspective of contingency of social events--in that there are more than one ways of interpreting them--and necessity--in that there are not many though.
Webers' Conception of the Socio-Historical Process (36-58)
Poggi asserts that Weber would agree with Marx on the fundamental role of classes in the historical process, but he sees history as an arena where conflicts different from classes arise in the sphere of socio-cultural and political relations. One particularity in his perspectives lie in that he regards the individuals as the ultimate agents that cause conflicts and move the society. He refuses a society as an organic whole entity that sits on top of individuals. [I think this is his fundamental perspective that deduces his other ideas.]
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (59-74)
The most highly regarded Weber's essay, the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, explores the genesis of modern capitalism. Not disregarding economic components of capitalism, Weber emphasized the availability of institutional and intellectual resources, such as rationalized arrangement for political and economical activities with a weighted focus on early capitalist entrepreneurship taken by a large number of individuals, who collectively experimented new and disruptive ways of producing wealth through enterprises motivated by a very distinctive capitalist spirit. Weber finds the Calvinism, the dogma of which is predestination--God decreed for each human being its destiny in the afterlife--as the core genesis of the spirit of capitalism: accumulation of wealth was morally justified first, then the elimination of strong religious impediments became necessary. Thus, capitalism played a significant role in advancing secularization. After this developmental stage, the capitalist spirit ceased to function in the capitalist system.
Other Essays in the Sociology of Religion (75-88)
Weber's interest in religion about its general roles, Poggi defines, originates from his phylosophical anthropology--'human being as an interpretative animal, positioning itself in the world by attaching significance to selected aspects of reality'--and historically interpretaion is done chiefly through religion that imparts meaning to the cosmos.
Political Power and Legitimacy (89-104)
Weber regard organized violence as the grounding form of political power, in particular, with regard to the state (Politics as a Vocation). Political power creates legitimacy to make its order more durable, secure and effective. Weber presents three topologies about legitimacy, traditional (relying on past validity and goodness)/charismatic (obedience to the forces leader embodies)/legal-rational. Among three, legal-rational legitimacy is peculiar to modern polities and a central component of state. Unlike the others, it is grounded in the notion of commands accorded to authorized norms and obedience as dutiful observance of a whole system of norms. If the legitimacy is questioned, charismatically legitimated order "repeatedly justify itself and acquire new resources by means of new initiatives and achievements, particularly of a military and economic nature, in order to renew the followers' trust in the extraordinary qualities of the reader" (p.99). This aspect is not specifically addressed by Weber. Weber's interest in a phenomenon common to all political orders regardless of its particular form turned his attention to administrative staff structured in polity. While insecure contingency characterizes the staff in charismatically legitimate polities, the staff in legal-rational legitimacy is recruited and organized in a bureaucratic model and this model constitutes the nature of the modern state, Weber asserts.
The State and Bureaucracy (105-126)
To Weber, state is the continuously reproduced result of the convergence of innumerable lines of individual activity, not a superior entity, thus state's activities are intrinsically contingent, in other words, the set of ends they pursue is open-ended. The nature of state, which is portrayed as an ensemble of practices, facilities, rules and personnel, etc. as one entity, is defined by Weber as follows: 1) political entity, which comprises the core of the institutional identity of the state, is based on organized violence, 2) legal-rational legitimacy is determined by law, 3)individuals become citizens and they constitute a new kind of political community, a nation, 4) administration to implement the policies is bureaucratic by nature. Poggi evaluates Weber, although he acknowledged the inhumanity of the capitalism and accorded to socialists' justification, remained as a class member of bourgeoisie by adhering to the (western) modernity.
Questions of Method (17-35)
One of the greatest contribution that Weber made to sociology and cultural science is his radical refusal to positivistic model that prevailed in natural science and its expansion to other fields. Thus researchers should rely on their intuition in interpreting social phenomena and persuasive communication about the given topics. The fundamental difference that divides him from the main stream seems to originate from his ontological POV: Weber sees that human beings act within the reality where they exist on the basis of the meanings [Poggi emphasized] they attribute to it. Human events are basically individual, consisting of actions and passions of individuals, and thus its scientific understanding should be based upon methodological individualism, the questions of which may include individuals' interpretation of their own circumstances and needs. His concept of ideal types plays a significant role in understanding the relation of sociology and history. While historians emphasize the uniqueness of certain facts, sociologists should provide them with ideal types, which are intrinsically at the state of fluidity, continuously corrected and replaced by others. [Ideal types does not mean optimal, rather frameworks that allows tools for interpretation of the reality, I think.] By constructing ideal types, sociology is characterized as handmaiden to history and history takes them as hypothses. Thus, Poggi puts an emphasis on Weber's perspective of contingency of social events--in that there are more than one ways of interpreting them--and necessity--in that there are not many though.
Webers' Conception of the Socio-Historical Process (36-58)
Poggi asserts that Weber would agree with Marx on the fundamental role of classes in the historical process, but he sees history as an arena where conflicts different from classes arise in the sphere of socio-cultural and political relations. One particularity in his perspectives lie in that he regards the individuals as the ultimate agents that cause conflicts and move the society. He refuses a society as an organic whole entity that sits on top of individuals. [I think this is his fundamental perspective that deduces his other ideas.]
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (59-74)
The most highly regarded Weber's essay, the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, explores the genesis of modern capitalism. Not disregarding economic components of capitalism, Weber emphasized the availability of institutional and intellectual resources, such as rationalized arrangement for political and economical activities with a weighted focus on early capitalist entrepreneurship taken by a large number of individuals, who collectively experimented new and disruptive ways of producing wealth through enterprises motivated by a very distinctive capitalist spirit. Weber finds the Calvinism, the dogma of which is predestination--God decreed for each human being its destiny in the afterlife--as the core genesis of the spirit of capitalism: accumulation of wealth was morally justified first, then the elimination of strong religious impediments became necessary. Thus, capitalism played a significant role in advancing secularization. After this developmental stage, the capitalist spirit ceased to function in the capitalist system.
Other Essays in the Sociology of Religion (75-88)
Weber's interest in religion about its general roles, Poggi defines, originates from his phylosophical anthropology--'human being as an interpretative animal, positioning itself in the world by attaching significance to selected aspects of reality'--and historically interpretaion is done chiefly through religion that imparts meaning to the cosmos.
Political Power and Legitimacy (89-104)
Weber regard organized violence as the grounding form of political power, in particular, with regard to the state (Politics as a Vocation). Political power creates legitimacy to make its order more durable, secure and effective. Weber presents three topologies about legitimacy, traditional (relying on past validity and goodness)/charismatic (obedience to the forces leader embodies)/legal-rational. Among three, legal-rational legitimacy is peculiar to modern polities and a central component of state. Unlike the others, it is grounded in the notion of commands accorded to authorized norms and obedience as dutiful observance of a whole system of norms. If the legitimacy is questioned, charismatically legitimated order "repeatedly justify itself and acquire new resources by means of new initiatives and achievements, particularly of a military and economic nature, in order to renew the followers' trust in the extraordinary qualities of the reader" (p.99). This aspect is not specifically addressed by Weber. Weber's interest in a phenomenon common to all political orders regardless of its particular form turned his attention to administrative staff structured in polity. While insecure contingency characterizes the staff in charismatically legitimate polities, the staff in legal-rational legitimacy is recruited and organized in a bureaucratic model and this model constitutes the nature of the modern state, Weber asserts.
The State and Bureaucracy (105-126)
To Weber, state is the continuously reproduced result of the convergence of innumerable lines of individual activity, not a superior entity, thus state's activities are intrinsically contingent, in other words, the set of ends they pursue is open-ended. The nature of state, which is portrayed as an ensemble of practices, facilities, rules and personnel, etc. as one entity, is defined by Weber as follows: 1) political entity, which comprises the core of the institutional identity of the state, is based on organized violence, 2) legal-rational legitimacy is determined by law, 3)individuals become citizens and they constitute a new kind of political community, a nation, 4) administration to implement the policies is bureaucratic by nature. Poggi evaluates Weber, although he acknowledged the inhumanity of the capitalism and accorded to socialists' justification, remained as a class member of bourgeoisie by adhering to the (western) modernity.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Power/Knowledge:Selected Interviews & Other Writings (1972-77)
Michel Foucault. (1980). Colin Gordon (Ed). New York: Pantheon Books.
Prison Talk (pp. 37-54)
"With the prisons there would be no sense in limiting oneself to discourses about prisons; just as important are the discourses which arise within the prison, the decisions and regulations which are among its constitutive elements, its means of functioning, along with its strategies, its convert discourses and ruses, ruses which are not ultimately played by any particular person, but which are none the less lived, and assure the permanence and functioning of the institution. All of this has to be brought together and made visible by the historian." Foucault asserts that power exists in a capillary form as it operates on body, actions, attitude, and discourses in granularity of every day life. Foucault's suggested study of history is to use a magnifying instrument to make unseen visible. By looking into one particular incident, one may not only reveal the same domain but also add another layer to history. His particular contribution to the study of history is that he started to investigate the relation between power and knowledge. He argues, "the exercise of power perpetually creates knowledge and, conversely, knowledge constantly induces effects of power." His comments on university is of interest: "The university hierarchy is only the most visible, the most sclerotic and least dangerous form of this--relation of power and knowledge-- phenomenon...Diffused, entrenched and dangerous, they operate in other places than in the person of the old professor."
Truth and Power (pp.109-133)
This conversation records Foucault's perspective on truth and power and methodological approach to knowledge. By the productive aspect of power, he means power that 'traverses and produces things, induces pleasure, forms knowledge and produces discourse' through the whole social body. According to him, this is a new 'economy' of power--biopower in Hardt and Negri's term. He emphasizes study of power goes beyond the State and sovereignty because the State can only operate on already existing power relations, not regulating all the powers. Detaching power from sovereignty and law, he suggests redefining power as a form of warlike domination, peace as a form of war and the State a means of waging it. As reflected in Hardt and Negri's work, Foucault stresses permanent war in civil society, and questions the role of army and military in this society. [It is interesting to find overlaps with regard to constant war and characteristics of power between Hardt & Negri and Foucault.] Unlike in feudal societies, power is exercied through 'social production' that intends to obtain productive services from individuals in their concrete life, Foucault argues, and thus power has to permeate the bodies of individuals, acts, attitudes and behaviors, as seen in school discipline.
His perspective on intellectuals also meets Hardt and Negri's. Foucault emphasizes 'specific' intellectuals rather than 'universal' intellectuals. He asserts that 'specific' intellectuals, experts or savant, specialized in certain domain of knowledge, maintains concrete awareness of struggles, thus drawn even closer to the proletariat since they confront the same adversary as the proletariat in their own struggles. Their growing importance is exemplified by Foucault with physicists debating in political realm at the turn of the century. He finds the real importance of specific intellectuals in the extention of 'technico-scientific structures' in the economic and strateific domain. Foucault stresses that unlike universal intellectuals, who were the writers of genius and opposed the unjust sovereignity, specific intellectuals are a group of handful people who possess at their disposal power, which can either produce or destroy life. [Here again resonates the concept of biopower by Hardt and Negri.] Foucault continues, the pitfall of experts' struggles lies in lack of a 'global strategy' or 'outside support.' In other words, isolation or singularity lacking network is a problem. [Grounding in this idea, Hardt and Negri argues that a distributed communication network can be an instrument for orchestrating these struggles.]
Foucault says, "truth isn't outside of power." According to him, truth is produced by constraints and induces power through the regime of truth, or the general politics of truth, of each society. The regime of truth is explained by him as follows, "the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true; the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements, the means by which each is sanctioned; the techniques and procedures accorded values in the acquisition of truth; the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true."
He suggests that political problems for intellectuals should be placed in terms of power and truth rather than science and ideology. In this way, he argues that professionalization of intellectuals, which distinguishes intellectual labors from manual labors, can be 'envisaged' in a new way. Thus, according to him, emancipating truth from power does not hold the same importance as "detaching the power of truth from the forms of hegemony at social/economical/cultural levels."
The History of Sexuality (pp.183-193)
Foucault argues that one should go beyond focusing on a negative grid of power in terms of justice, technology and strategy and need to see a productive side of it--'bio-power' or 'somato-power'--which operates on the body itself bypassing the subject's consciousness. He also emphasizes on certain power, which is not a projection of sovereign's power. He calls this power the concrete and 'changing' soil that sovereign power is grounded. He criticizes the existentialism with the notion that it lays everything at individual responsibility, while those with a political/economic perspective limit their views to the market economy or capital exploitation. Thus, he brings about new schemas of politicisation for political anaylsis.
Prison Talk (pp. 37-54)
"With the prisons there would be no sense in limiting oneself to discourses about prisons; just as important are the discourses which arise within the prison, the decisions and regulations which are among its constitutive elements, its means of functioning, along with its strategies, its convert discourses and ruses, ruses which are not ultimately played by any particular person, but which are none the less lived, and assure the permanence and functioning of the institution. All of this has to be brought together and made visible by the historian." Foucault asserts that power exists in a capillary form as it operates on body, actions, attitude, and discourses in granularity of every day life. Foucault's suggested study of history is to use a magnifying instrument to make unseen visible. By looking into one particular incident, one may not only reveal the same domain but also add another layer to history. His particular contribution to the study of history is that he started to investigate the relation between power and knowledge. He argues, "the exercise of power perpetually creates knowledge and, conversely, knowledge constantly induces effects of power." His comments on university is of interest: "The university hierarchy is only the most visible, the most sclerotic and least dangerous form of this--relation of power and knowledge-- phenomenon...Diffused, entrenched and dangerous, they operate in other places than in the person of the old professor."
Truth and Power (pp.109-133)
This conversation records Foucault's perspective on truth and power and methodological approach to knowledge. By the productive aspect of power, he means power that 'traverses and produces things, induces pleasure, forms knowledge and produces discourse' through the whole social body. According to him, this is a new 'economy' of power--biopower in Hardt and Negri's term. He emphasizes study of power goes beyond the State and sovereignty because the State can only operate on already existing power relations, not regulating all the powers. Detaching power from sovereignty and law, he suggests redefining power as a form of warlike domination, peace as a form of war and the State a means of waging it. As reflected in Hardt and Negri's work, Foucault stresses permanent war in civil society, and questions the role of army and military in this society. [It is interesting to find overlaps with regard to constant war and characteristics of power between Hardt & Negri and Foucault.] Unlike in feudal societies, power is exercied through 'social production' that intends to obtain productive services from individuals in their concrete life, Foucault argues, and thus power has to permeate the bodies of individuals, acts, attitudes and behaviors, as seen in school discipline.
His perspective on intellectuals also meets Hardt and Negri's. Foucault emphasizes 'specific' intellectuals rather than 'universal' intellectuals. He asserts that 'specific' intellectuals, experts or savant, specialized in certain domain of knowledge, maintains concrete awareness of struggles, thus drawn even closer to the proletariat since they confront the same adversary as the proletariat in their own struggles. Their growing importance is exemplified by Foucault with physicists debating in political realm at the turn of the century. He finds the real importance of specific intellectuals in the extention of 'technico-scientific structures' in the economic and strateific domain. Foucault stresses that unlike universal intellectuals, who were the writers of genius and opposed the unjust sovereignity, specific intellectuals are a group of handful people who possess at their disposal power, which can either produce or destroy life. [Here again resonates the concept of biopower by Hardt and Negri.] Foucault continues, the pitfall of experts' struggles lies in lack of a 'global strategy' or 'outside support.' In other words, isolation or singularity lacking network is a problem. [Grounding in this idea, Hardt and Negri argues that a distributed communication network can be an instrument for orchestrating these struggles.]
Foucault says, "truth isn't outside of power." According to him, truth is produced by constraints and induces power through the regime of truth, or the general politics of truth, of each society. The regime of truth is explained by him as follows, "the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true; the mechanisms and instances which enable one to distinguish true and false statements, the means by which each is sanctioned; the techniques and procedures accorded values in the acquisition of truth; the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true."
He suggests that political problems for intellectuals should be placed in terms of power and truth rather than science and ideology. In this way, he argues that professionalization of intellectuals, which distinguishes intellectual labors from manual labors, can be 'envisaged' in a new way. Thus, according to him, emancipating truth from power does not hold the same importance as "detaching the power of truth from the forms of hegemony at social/economical/cultural levels."
The History of Sexuality (pp.183-193)
Foucault argues that one should go beyond focusing on a negative grid of power in terms of justice, technology and strategy and need to see a productive side of it--'bio-power' or 'somato-power'--which operates on the body itself bypassing the subject's consciousness. He also emphasizes on certain power, which is not a projection of sovereign's power. He calls this power the concrete and 'changing' soil that sovereign power is grounded. He criticizes the existentialism with the notion that it lays everything at individual responsibility, while those with a political/economic perspective limit their views to the market economy or capital exploitation. Thus, he brings about new schemas of politicisation for political anaylsis.
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