Biopolitics and Sovereignty

This article investigates the meanings of life in political philosophy. There are two answers to the question concerning the legitimacy of life in political philosophy. The first, negative answer is connected to Arendt, the second is connected to Michel Foucault, who delineated the genesis of biopolitics in Western tradition and argued that, ever since the classical age, “deduction” based on the practice of sovereign power has become merely one element in a range of mechanisms working to generate, incite, reinforce, control, monitor, optimize, and organize the forces of life. Nowadays, the capacity to manipulate our bare biological life, rather than simply govern the aspects of forms of life, implies biopolitics which contests how and when we use these technologies and for what purposes. The author of this article emphasizes the significance of the common treatment of biopolitics and sovereignty. Political philosophy demonstrates that there is irreducible difference between these types of power, but it is necessary to analyze them simultaneously. There are several tendencies (for example, biosecurity) that prove the importance of sovereign power for the practice of biopolitics. Nevertheless, sovereignty without biopolitics is exposed to weaknesses and regression. The task for political philosophy is to articulate the dynamic relations between sovereignty and biopolitics today.

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