Frédéric Gros – författare

This lecture, given by Michel Foucault at the College de France, launches an inquiry into the notion of parresia and continues his rereading of ancient philosophy. Through the study of this notion of truth-telling, of speaking out freely, Foucault re-examines Greek citizenship, showing how the courage of the truth forms the forgotten ethical basis of Athenian democracy. The figure of the philosopher king, the condemnation of writing, and Socrates' rejection of political involvement are some of the many topics of ancient philosophy revisited here.

This book addresses the possibilities of analyzing the modern international through the thought of Michel Foucault. The broad range of authors brought together in this volume question four of the most self-evident characteristics of our contemporary world-''international'', ''neoliberal'', ''biopolitical'' and ''global''- and thus fill significant gaps in both international and Foucault studies. The chapters discuss what a Foucauldian perspective does or does not offer for understanding international phenomena while also questioning many appropriations of Foucault''s work. This transdisciplinary volume will serve as a reference for both scholars and students of international relations, international political sociology, international political economy, political theory/philosophy and critical theory more generally.

The Courage of the Truth is the last course that Michel Foucault delivered in a series of lectures from 1970 to 1984 at the College de France. Here, Foucault continues the theme of the previous year's lectures in exploring the notion of "truth-telling" in politics to establish a number of ethically irreducible conditions based on courage and conviction. His death, on June 25th, 1984, tempts us to detect the philosophical testament in these lectures, especially in view of the prominence they give to the themes of life and death.

“The working hypothesis is this:  it is true that sexuality as experience is obviously not independent of codes and systems of prohibitions, but it needs to be recalled straightaway that these codes are astonishingly stable, continuous, and slow to change.  It needs to be recalled also that the way in which they are observed or transgressed also seems to be very stable and very repetitive. On the other hand, the point of historical mobility, what no doubt change most often, what are most fragile, are modalities of experience.”

- Michel Foucault 

In 1981 Foucault delivered a course of lectures which marked a decisive reorientation in his thought and of the project of a History of Sexuality outlined in 1976.  It was in these lectures that arts of living became the focal point around which he developed a new way of thinking about subjectivity.  It was also the moment when Foucault problematized a conception of ethics understood as the patient elaboration of a relationship of self to self.  It was the study of the sexual experience of the Ancients that made these new conceptual developments possible.  Within this framework, Foucault examined medical writings, tracts on marriage, the philosophy of love, or the prognostic value of erotic dreams, for evidence of a structuration of the subject in his relationship to pleasures (aphrodisia) which is prior to the modern construction of a science of sexuality as well as to the Christian fearful obsession with the flesh.  What was actually at stake was establishing that the imposition of a scrupulous and interminable hermeneutics of desire was the invention of Christianity.  But to do this it was necessary to establish the irreducible specificity of ancient techniques of self.

Ce Cahier de l’Herne dynamique, transdisciplinaire et créatif recueille des entretiens : ceux d’amis,de proches, qui dressent un portrait plus intime, offrant un visage différent de l’auteur ; des textesinédits de Foucault, et même inconnus à ce jour, sur l’art, la folie, Nietzsche, etc. ; des témoignagesqui révèlent l’atmosphère intellectuelle de l’époque et la place controversée mais néanmoins centralequ’y occupa Foucault. Toute la variété de l’oeuvre de Michel Foucault est prise en considération dansl’éventail des contributions.Une iconographie inédite et abondante vient enrichir ce Cahier.