Government, rights and legitimacy: Foucault and liberal political normativity. (April 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Patton, Paul
• Other Names: Chin Clayton guest-editor.; Thomassen Lasse guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: European journal of political theory. Volume 15:Number 2(2016)
• Page Start: 223
• Page End: 239
• Publication Date: 2016-04
• Subjects: Foucault -- governmentality -- homo juridicus -- homo oeconomicus -- legitimacy -- neoliberalism -- public reason -- Rawls -- rights; Political science -- Periodicals; Political science -- Europe -- Periodicals; 320.05
• DOI: 10.1177/1474885115582077
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1474-8851

Abstract

One way to characterise the difference between analytic and Continental political philosophy concerns the different roles played by normative and descriptive analysis in each case. This article argues that, even though Michel Foucault's genealogy of liberal and neoliberal governmentality and John Rawls's political liberalism involve different articulations of normative and descriptive concerns, they are complementary rather than antithetical to one another. The argument is developed in three stages: first, by suggesting that Foucault offers a way to conceive of public reason as a historical phenomenon. Second, it is suggested that both Rawls and Foucault allow us to consider rights as historical and particular rather than a-historical and universal. Third, it is argued that Foucault's genealogy of modern liberal government illuminates some of the tensions and some of the alternatives within the liberal tradition in relation to the concept of political legitimacy.