What is Genealogy
TL;DR: In this article, a theory of genealogy is proposed, explaining its rise in the nineteenth century, its epistemic commitments, its nature as critique, and its place in the work of Nietzsche and Foucault.
Abstract: This paper offers a theory of genealogy, explaining its rise in the nineteenth century, its epistemic commitments, its nature as critique, and its place in the work of Nietzsche and Foucault. The crux of the theory is recognition of genealogy as an expression of a radical historicism, rejecting both appeals to transcendental truths and principles of unity or progress in history, and embracing nominalism, contingency, and contestability. In this view, genealogies are committed to the truth of radical historicism and, perhaps more provisionally, the truth of their own empirical content. Similarly, genealogies operate as denaturalizing critiques of ideas and practices that hide the contingency of human life behind formal ahistorical or developmental perspectives.
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01 Jan 2009
TL;DR: In this article, a genealogy of the modern state is presented, where the focus is on how this particular word came to figure in successive debates about the nature of public power.
Abstract: IWHEN WE TRACE the genealogy of a concept, we uncover the different ways in which it may have been used in earlier times. We thereby equip ourselves with a means of reflecting critically on how it is currently understood. With these considerations in mind, I attempt in what follows to sketch a genealogy of the modern state. Before embarking on this project, however, I need to make two cautionary remarks about the limitations of its scope. I assume in the first place that the only method by which we can hope confidently to identify the views of specific writers about the concept of the state will be to examine the precise circumstances in which they invoke and discuss the term state. I consequently focus as much as possible on how this particular word came to figure in successive debates about the nature of public power. The other limitation I need to signal is that I confine myself exclusively to Anglophone traditions of thought. I do so in part because I need to bring my historical materials under some kind of control, but mainly because it seems to me that any study of the changing vocabularies in which moral or political concepts are formulated can only be fruitfully pursued by examining the histories of individual linguistic communities. To attempt a broader analysis would be to assume that such terms as lo stato, l’Etat and Der Staat express the same concept as the term state, and this would be to presuppose what would have to be shown. Hence the seemingly arbitrary restriction of my historical gaze.
177 citations
Cites background from "What is Genealogy"
...4 For further considerations along these lines see Geuss 1999, Bevir 2008, Krupp 2008....
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TL;DR: The idea of "national races" or taingyintha has animated brutal conflict in Myanmar over who or what is "Rohingya" as mentioned in this paper. But because the term is translated from Burmese inconsistently, and because its u...
Abstract: The idea of “national races” or taingyintha has animated brutal conflict in Myanmar over who or what is “Rohingya.” But because the term is translated from Burmese inconsistently, and because its u...
158 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 2010
58 citations
Dissertation•
15 Mar 2019
TL;DR: In this article, the authors acknowledge acknowledgements and acknowledgements of the authors of this article. But they do not mention the authors' work. And they propose a new approach.
Abstract: .................................................................................................................................. i Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................ ii
47 citations
Cites background from "What is Genealogy"
...A ‘suspicion of utter certainties’ at the same time as ‘trying to develop compelling narratives supported by evidence derived from empirical research’ (Bevir, 2008, pp. 271 – 272)....
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...77) – genealogists are instead concerned with critiquing concepts and social constructions through locating and examining moments of rupture in how they have previously been understood or practiced (Bevir, 2008)....
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...…deployment of ideal significations and indefinite teleologies’ (Foucault, 1978, p. 77) – genealogists are instead concerned with critiquing concepts and social constructions through locating and examining moments of rupture in how they have previously been understood or practiced (Bevir, 2008)....
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01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: The authors investigates the relationship between great powers and responsibility through an analysis of the direct equation of greatness with responsibility in the concepts of responsible power and responsible stakeholder in both the discourse of the practitioners of international politics, and in theoretical literature.
Abstract: The dissertation investigates the relationship between great powers and responsibility through an analysis of the direct equation of greatness with responsibility in the concepts of ʻresponsible power’ and ʻresponsible stakeholder’ in both the discourse of the practitioners of international politics, and in theoretical literature. Preponderant power is thought to come with corresponding responsibilities set by the international social order, and it is meeting these responsibilities that secures the state the status of a great power, hence transforming the fact of great power into a right. The equivalence between greatness and responsibility, however, is paradoxical if the latter stands for accountability for the fulfilment of obligations. Such an understanding of responsibility is fully internal to a pre-given structure of order with its norms, social and functional roles, and criteria of legitimacy. The assertion of greatness, on the other hand, requires an actor to reveal itself outside any pre-given standard, and to have its own standards recognised as equal – hence the historical centrality of war to claiming great powerhood. Asserting one's greatness by fulfilling the required responsibilities therefore seems paradoxical. Still, the ʻresponsible power’ discourse also provided the rationale for the European Union's invitation to a rising China to jointly take on the responsibility of managing Africa's development despite the fact that China was not perceived to be a responsible power
33 citations
References
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01 Jan 1979
17,729 citations
Book•
18 Apr 2012
TL;DR: Foucault shows the development of the Western system of prisons, police organizations, administrative and legal hierarchies for social control and the growth of disciplinary society as a whole as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: In the Middle Ages there were gaols and dungeons, but punishment was for the most part a spectacle. The economic changes and growing popular dissent of the 18th century made necessary a more systematic control over the individual members of society, and this in effect meant a change from punishment, which chastised the body, to reform, which touched the soul. Foucault shows the development of the Western system of prisons, police organizations, administrative and legal hierarchies for social control - and the growth of disciplinary society as a whole. He also reveals that between school, factories, barracks and hospitals all share a common organization, in which it is possible to control the use of an individual's time and space hour by hour.
11,379 citations
01 Jan 1978
TL;DR: In this paper it is shown that Reel was wrong to follow the English tendency in describing the history of morality in terms of a linear development-in reducing its entire history and genesis to an exclusive concern for utility.
Abstract: 1 . Genealogy i s gray, meticulous, and patiently documentary . It operates on a field of entangled and confused parchments, on d ocuments that have been scratched over and recopied many times . O n this basis, it i s obvious that Paul Reel was wrong to follow the English tendency in describing the history of morality in terms of a linear development-in reducing its entire history and genesis to an exclusive concern for utility . He assumed that words had kept their meaning, that desires still pointed in a single direction, and that ideas retained their logic; and he ig nored the fact that the world of speech and desires has known invasions, struggles, plundering, disguises, ploys. From these elements, however, genealogy retrieves an indispensable re straint: it must record the singularity of events outside of any monotonous finality; it must seek them in the most unpromising places, in what we tend to feel is without history-in sentiments, love, conscience, instincts; it must be sensitive to their recur rence, not in order to trace the gradual curve of their evolution, but to isolate the different scenes where they engaged in dif ferent roles . Finally, genealogy must define even those in stances when they are absent, the moment when they remained unrealized (Plato, at Syracuse, did not become Mohammed) . Genealogy, consequently, requires patience and a knowl edge of details, and it depends on a vast accumulation of source
2,251 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1886
TL;DR: On the prejudices of philosophers the free spirit the religious nature maxims and interludes on the natural history of morals we scholars our virtues people and fatherlands what is noble? from high mountains - epode as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: On the prejudices of philosophers the free spirit the religious nature maxims and interludes on the natural history of morals we scholars our virtues people and fatherlands what is noble? from high mountains - epode.
963 citations
Book•
19 Dec 2019TL;DR: Hume has captured the nature of this intense debate in a classic work that has stood the test of time as mentioned in this paper, where the relentless inquirer and empiricist David Hume assembles a group to discuss the existence of God, his divine nature, his attributes, and the point of his creation.
Abstract: Humankind has pondered many mysteries, but few more enticing than the existence of a divine creator who is said to have set the universe in motion. Imitating the well-known style of Platonic dialogues, the relentless inquirer and empiricist David Hume assembles a group to discuss the existence of God, his divine nature, his attributes, and the point of his creation. How do we come to have knowledge of God? Who has the burden of proof with respect to these matters of intense religious significance, and what sort of proof might gain universal assent? Can one argue from the orderliness of the universe to the conclusion that it must have had a purposeful creator at its helm? Hume has captured the nature of this intense debate in a classic work that has stood the test of time.
881 citations