Hamid Yahyavi
Abstract
Purpose: The present paper aims to articulate Michel Foucault’s thought for analyzing the problematic of the state. “Foucault vision of modern state” is not paid attention by political theoreticians as much as micro-physics analysis. While on the contrary, it can open a new research ...
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Purpose: The present paper aims to articulate Michel Foucault’s thought for analyzing the problematic of the state. “Foucault vision of modern state” is not paid attention by political theoreticians as much as micro-physics analysis. While on the contrary, it can open a new research domain through which one can survey and investigate the various domains of the state. Design / Methodology / Approach: Investigating on Foucault’s those works which have not been known such as College de France Lectures on the basis of “textual methodology” and taking advantages of descriptive-analytical approach, the paper seeks to elucidate Foucauldian method of analyzing procedures, mechanisms and components of modern state, rereading his theoretical arguments as well. Findings: The present paper indicates that in the course of a theoretical shift, Foucault begin to take into consideration the problematic of government as a new dimension in the analysis of power whereby the relations of power is studied within the viewpoint of leadership. He addresses to “the genealogy of Modern State”, which the connection between political rationality and the government lies at the heart of it, in addition to “the genealogy of Modern Subject”. Abandoning the problematic of the state and exploring it on the basis of Governmentality, Foucauldian approach has raised a new way of investigating the nature and component of the state. By inventing the concept of Governmentality, Foucault represents the process of affection of mentality upon government’s practices, besides concentrating on governmental practices rather than institutions. By this start point, he reveals a transformation in the mentality of government in modern ages which nowadays has became spread in a large scale. As a whole, in Foucault’s view, the state is considered as a construct which, on the one hand, is related to the governmental rationalities (as the intellectual dimension) and, on the other hand, to the art of government (as the Practical dimension). There is no such thing as a state, but there is art of government. Governmental apparatus can be added to this analytical framework (as an Institutional dimension) Originality / Value: Offering a Three-dimensional analysis of the "state" (composed of rationality, practice, institution) on the basis of a critical view, this sort of analysis will be included a wide range of liberal and illiberal governances. This analytical frame work, which is based on an anti-essential vision of the state, is considerably deserved to explain the components of modern state and seems useful in dealing with the problematic of the state in Iran.
