Adorno, Foucault, and the history of the present
type: CreativeWork
description: What is the nature of our society? What kinds of power regimes shape our existence? What forms of emancipatory resistance might chart the way towards a better future that responds to the dangers, injustices, and pathologies marking the present? These are just some of the questions my dissertation aims to answer through the help of the conceptual resources that Theodor Adorno and Michel Foucault provide us with. Accordingly, whereas the few attempts that have been made been to compare their works remain inadequate, partial, or simply out-dated, my thesis offers a detailed and comprehensive appraisal of both the explanatory and reconstructive potential of Adorno’s and Foucault’s common project of developing a critico-theoretical account of modern Western society, with a view also to showing the often-neglected compatibility of their respective approaches. At issue, is not only the scholarly reconstruction of a possible dialogue beyond their differences, but also, and more importantly, the analysis of the continued relevance of their works for our understanding of the world we inhabit. To this end, Chapters 1 and 2 start with an examination of the historical conditions Adorno and Foucault see at the root of the dangers and pathologies ailing our age. More specifically, Chapter 1 starts with a review of Adorno’s conception of late modern society as a reified totality ruled by the logic of capitalist exchange. I then confront Adorno’s account of social domination with Foucault’s early analytics of power and illustrate the similarities between their pictures of the disciplinary mechanisms at the basis of the constitution of modern individuals. The chapter concludes by presenting their critique of the scientific discourses and ideological procedures that have supported these power mechanisms. After examining the connection they establish between the development of capitalism and modern biopower, Chapter 2 compares Foucault’s and Adorno’s portraits of the political culture …
abstract: What is the nature of our society? What kinds of power regimes shape our existence? What forms of emancipatory resistance might chart the way towards a better future that responds to the dangers, injustices, and pathologies marking the present? These are just some of the questions my dissertation aims to answer through the help of the conceptual resources that Theodor Adorno and Michel Foucault provide us with. Accordingly, whereas the few attempts that have been made been to compare their works remain inadequate, partial, or simply out-dated, my thesis offers a detailed and comprehensive appraisal of both the explanatory and reconstructive potential of Adorno’s and Foucault’s common project of developing a critico-theoretical account of modern Western society, with a view also to showing the often-neglected compatibility of their respective approaches. At issue, is not only the scholarly reconstruction of a possible dialogue beyond their differences, but also, and more importantly, the analysis of the continued relevance of their works for our understanding of the world we inhabit. To this end, Chapters 1 and 2 start with an examination of the historical conditions Adorno and Foucault see at the root of the dangers and pathologies ailing our age. More specifically, Chapter 1 starts with a review of Adorno’s conception of late modern society as a reified totality ruled by the logic of capitalist exchange. I then confront Adorno’s account of social domination with Foucault’s early analytics of power and illustrate the similarities between their pictures of the disciplinary mechanisms at the basis of the constitution of modern individuals. The chapter concludes by presenting their critique of the scientific discourses and ideological procedures that have supported these power mechanisms. After examining the connection they establish between the development of capitalism and modern biopower, Chapter 2 compares Foucault’s and Adorno’s portraits of the political culture …
author: Mascaretti, Giovanni M
language: en
keywords: B Philosophy (General), BJ Ethics, JC Political theory
date published: 2017
date modified: 2026-07-24T02:18:12Z
provider: University of Essex
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Essex