Society Must Be Defended: Lectures at the Collhge de France, 1975-76

By Michel Foucault

Book Overview

An examination of the relation between war and politics, by one of the twentieth century's most influential thinkers

From 1971 until 1984 at the Coll ge de France, Michel Foucault gave a series of lectures ranging freely and conversationally over the range of his research. In Society Must Be Defended, Foucault deals with the emergence in the early seventeenth century of a new understanding of war as the permanent basis of all institutions of power, a hidden presence within society that could be deciphered by an historical analysis. Tracing this development, Foucault outlines the genealogy of power and knowledge that had become his dominant concern.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312422660
• ISBN13: 9780312422660
• Release Date: December 2003
• Publisher: Picador USA
• Length: 310 Pages
• Weight: 0.71 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Grade A

The book was in excellent condition and was delivered no hassle and tout suite. C'est tres bon......

Society Must be Defended

Readers of Foucault must read this entire lecture series rather than rely upon the previous three published lectures to appreciate the full message he conveys.

Indispensable Addition to Foucault's Oeuvre

Foucault never wrote a monograph on power per se, the arguably most influential notion put forth by him. Yet this posthumous publication of his College de France lectures 1975-76 approximates one. Here one can find the most elaborate discussion of the distinction between power-as-law and power as a bunch of local techniques and force relations, and more important, the idiosyncratic conceptualization of political power based on the model of war. It is also in these lectures that Foucault gives a sustantial analysis of racism. Although these topics are already touched upon in The History of Sexuality vol. 1, unfortunately they have not been given extended space to develop thanks to Foucault's drastic modification of his writing plan. Two decades after his premature death, we are finally allowed to have a better understanding of Foucault's profound reflection upon these issues. The continual unveiling of Foucault's other lectures in print in years to come makes life worthy to live even in this depressive political atmosphere.